By Bill Gertz
THE WASHINGTON TIMES May 31, 2002
The U.S. government has alerted airlines and law
enforcement agencies that new intelligence indicates
that
Islamic terrorists have smuggled shoulder-fired
anti-aircraft
missiles into the United States.
Classified intelligence reports
circulated among top Bush
administration policymakers during
the past two weeks identified the
missiles as Russian-made SA-7
surface-to-air missiles or
U.S.-made Stinger anti-aircraft
missiles obtained covertly in
Afghanistan, said intelligence
officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
Authorities are looking for three types of
"manpads," or
man-portable, air-defense systems, including SA-7s and
Stingers, the officials said.
The SA-7s have a range of more than 3 miles and
can hit
aircraft flying at 13,500 feet. Stinger missiles can
hit aircraft
flying at 10,000 feet and 5 miles away.
The FBI sent out an intelligence alert two
weeks ago
warning about the missiles. The officials said the
warning is
based on intelligence and not a specific threat that
the missiles
are in the United States.
"We don't have information that al Qaeda is
planning to
use these against commercial aircraft in the United
States," an
FBI official said. "However, we are passing the
information
along for people to remain alert to the potential use."
The official said an FBI intelligence alert was
sent to
law-enforcement authorities about two weeks ago and that
airlines were notified on May 22.
As a result of the "recent apparent targeting
of U.S.-led
military forces in Saudi Arabia, law-enforcement
agencies in
the United States should remain alert to potential
use of
manpads against U.S. aircraft," the FBI said.
Other intelligence officials spoke of concerns
that the
missiles had been smuggled into the United States.
Senior Pentagon officials also were briefed
recently on the
threat posed by shoulder-fired anti-aircraft
missiles smuggled
into the United States.
Officials said the intelligence reports
followed the
discovery earlier this month of an empty SA-7
launcher near
a desert base used by U.S. air forces in Saudi
Arabia. The
launcher was found by Saudi security police near Prince
Sultan Air Base, near Riyadh, the Saudi capital.
The Saudis could not determine whether the
launcher had
fired a missile, and they destroyed it before U.S.
military or
intelligence officials could examine it.
One official said that intelligence report was
given
credence by Abu Zubaydah, the al Qaeda organization's
operations chief, who was captured in Pakistan in
March and
who has been providing information about the
terrorist group.
A U.S. official also said the portable
missiles, which can
be carried in small crates, "are fairly light and
not difficult to
obtain on the gray market."
"It's conceivable that terrorists could get
them," the official
said. "It is one of a number of possible threats
that we need
to be mindful and concerned about."
Officials said another worry was an interview in an
Arabic-language newspaper with a senior al Qaeda
terrorist.
Abd-al-Azim al-Muhajir, a senior commander, told a
reporter for London's Al-Sharq al Awsat in Pakistan last
week that the terrorist group is planning a major attack
against the United States.
Al-Muhajir said U.S. military operations in
Afghanistan
have "changed the nature of the action in the field,
media
appearances and training centers." However, he
insisted, al
Qaeda is not "finished."
Asked about new attacks against the United States,
al-Muhajir said: "We pray to God, the glorified and
exalted,
to help us in the coming stage, that is the
'guerrilla warfare,'
and in dealing with the aircraft. Thanks be to God
that we
have taken big strides in this."
Gen. Peter Pace, vice chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of
Staff, told reporters at the Pentagon that U.S.
military forces
are on alert for attacks by portable missiles.
"We take very seriously the fact that our
opponents do
have surface-to-air missiles, shoulder-fired
surface-to-air-missiles," Gen. Pace said. "And we take
precautions on the ground and in the air any time we
have our
aircraft arriving or departing."
He said there were no reports of U.S. aircraft
taking
surface-to-air missile fire in Saudi Arabia after
the discovery
of the SA-7 launcher.
"That does not mean it was not fired; it simply
means we
do not know if that particular weapon was fired at that
location or simply dropped off there," he said.