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US intelligence had extensive warnings about bin Laden and al-Qaeda before 9/11

Get you up to speed: What did US intelligence know before the 9/11 attacks?

What remains unclear — The extent to which redacted information in the released documents affects the understanding of the intelligence surrounding the attacks.

US intelligence had extensive warnings about bin Laden and al-Qaeda before 9/11

EXPLAINERNews|September 11What did US intelligence know before the 9/11 attacks?

The CIA have declassified documents showing US presidents were warned about Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda before 9/11.

Published On 12 Sep 202612 Sep 2026

Twenty-five years after the September 11 attacks, the CIA has released a series of presidential briefing documents showing what United States leaders had been told about Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda in the years before the plane hijackings that killed nearly 3,000 people.

CIA Director John Ratcliffe called the release of the documents “an act of exceptional transparency”. This is the agency’s largest-ever release of presidential daily briefs, the classified intelligence summaries written for the president and his most senior officials.

The files cover the period from February 1998 to September 12, 2001 – the day after the deadly attacks on New York City and Washington, DC – and reveal how the CIA tracked bin Laden’s movements, his financing and his networks inside the US and abroad.

In one, a briefer warns that the group behind that year’s East Africa embassy bombings “may fly an explosive-packed airplane into a US city”.

Another notes that some in bin Laden’s network had received hijack training. Others describe his hunt for materials to build a radioactive “dirty bomb”.

The documents add little new information about how the attacks were planned, but they do offer a paper trail of accumulating warnings.

Here’s a breakdown of what is in them:

What has the CIA just released?

Seventy-one presidential daily briefs spanning the period from February 1998 to September 2001. These are the highly classified intelligence summaries prepared for the president and the government’s most senior officials.

The documents run to 101 pages, with the earliest, titled Terrorists seeking WMD capability, dated February 13, 1998.

The last, Situation Report: Bin Laden’s Tracks, is dated September 12, 2001, the day after the attacks.

In between are briefs on the Taliban’s refusal to give bin Laden up, his hunt for chemical, biological and radiological weapons, his financing, and repeated warnings that he intended to strike inside the US.

Many pages are redacted to protect sources.

What did US intelligence know about al-Qaeda before 9/11?

A great deal, and from quite early on.

The briefs show that analysts were tracking bin Laden’s movements, the support system around him, his network inside the US and abroad, and how his operations were financed.

Some of the warnings laid out in the presidential briefs were strikingly specific. In September 1998, three years before the attacks, a briefer wrote that bin Laden’s “preferred option is to strike the US on its own soil in Washington”.

Analysts also noted his interest in unconventional weapons: Chemical, biological, and radiological.

By June 1999, the briefs included reports that bin Laden’s operatives had experimented with explosives to “increase their energy output”, part of a pursuit of so-called “dirty bombs”.

The obstacles were understood, too.

An April 1998 brief found there was no evidence the Taliban intended to hand bin Laden over, describing him as their “guest” and noting that “gratitude for his assistance during the Soviet occupation” of Afghanistan between December 1979 and February 1989 left them “reluctant to alienate him by monitoring or controlling his activities”.

How many warnings of an attack was the president given?

The warnings weren’t just occasional; they kept coming.

In 1998,1999 and 2000, there were several reports, including one titled Terrorism: Bin Laden Extremists Planning Attacks.

Then in 2001, when George W Bush took over as president from Bill Clinton, the frequency increased, and by the summer the language was increasingly alarming, with one briefing simply titled: Bin Laden Determined To Strike in US.

Did officials know planes could be used in an attack?

Yes, as early as 1998.

A brief dated September 10 that year, titled Bin Ladin’s Location and Intentions, recorded his stated preference for striking Washington, then added that the group behind that summer’s East Africa US embassy bombings “may fly an explosive-packed airplane into a US city”. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) had quickly determined that those attacks had been carried out by al-Qaeda.

The same memo cautioned that intelligence gave “no conclusive information” on his intentions for future attacks.

That December, another brief described conspirators who “had evaded security checks during a recent trial run at an unidentified New York airport”, and noted that “some members of the Bin Laden network have received hijack training.”

That brief, dated December 4, 1998, was titled Bin Laden Preparing To Hijack US Aircraft and Other Attacks.

Does this prove the US government knew 9/11 was coming?

No. It may raise serious questions about why it did not appear to be more prepared, but it does not show any evidence of a lack of will by the government to prevent an attack.

The newly released material reinforces the explanation that intelligence agencies had many pieces of the puzzle but had failed to assemble them into a clear picture in time.

There is no evidence at all to support conspiracy theories about government involvement or that government officials had prior knowledge of the attacks, which have grown in popularity in the US.

Are all of these documents new?

No, some of the briefs have been made public before.

The two best-known items were already out. The August 6, 2001 brief, Bin Ladin Determined To Strike in US, was declassified in 2004 at the 9/11 Commission’s request.

The broader findings are also known, including that US intelligence had tracked bin Laden’s intentions for years, that aircraft featured in the reporting, and that none of it identified the time, place, method or targets of the eventual plot. The 9/11 Commission set all of this out more than two decades ago.

The release adds the underlying documents, in the briefers’ own words, rather than a commission summary.

Ryanair CEO disputes passenger’s claim of being sucked out of aircraft window

Get you up to speed: Ryanair CEO calls claim passenger was saved by wife from being sucked out of window ‘delusional’ | News World

What remains unclear — The ongoing investigations by the NTSB and Greek authorities have not yet determined the exact cause of the engine fan blade failure.

Ryanair CEO disputes passenger’s claim of being sucked out of aircraft window

Ryanair has said it will fight claims that Ljubisa Karović was sucked out of an aircraft window after it was smashed by an engine fan blade (Picture: NTSB)

Ryanair has vowed to fight a passenger who claimed to have been sucked out of an aircraft window after it was smashed by an engine fan blade.

The Irish low cost airline continues to dispute Ljubisa Karović’s account that part of his face was pulled out of the window after the plane experienced a rapid depressurisation.

CEO Michael O’Leary said reports that Mr Karović was saved by his wife holding on to him were ‘delusional’ and insisted that no part of the passenger’s body was pulled out of the Boeing 737.

Asked about the case, he said: ‘He was certainly sucked towards the window, but he didn’t get out the window. He wasn’t partially out the window.’

He admitted that Mr Karović had been sucked towards the window ‘in very dramatic circumstances’ and had suffered injuries but maintained that his seat belt would have prevented him from leaving the aircraft.

He continued: ‘His wife who claims she saved him by hanging onto his feet is certainly somewhat delusional given that she was sitting in a seat three rows behind him.’

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Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary said Mr Karović would not be getting ‘millions and millions’ in compensation and that the airline disputes accounts that any part of his body left the aircraft (Picture: Clodagh Kilcoyne/PA)

In his own recollection of events, Mr Karović told the Guardian that he had blacked out after the window beside him blew out.

A fellow passenger attempted to block the window with a bag which was sucked out and then a larger suitcase which succeeded in plugging the hole.

His wife Svetlana Grković recalled seeing him being half inside and outside the plane while it was flying at around 18,000 ft.

Mr Karović suffered from a serious hand injury and spent days in hospital unable to speak following his ordeal.

Mr O’Leary, long known for his outspoken tone, said the airline would fight Mr Karović’s claims in court.

The Ryanair boss added Mr Karović had a ‘very excitable lawyer down in Greece who’s talking about class action suits and millions and millions and millions.’

‘He [Mr Karović] won’t be getting millions and millions and we don’t believe there’s any basis for any class action suits either, but ambulance chasing lawyers like the sound of their own voices’, he said.

The incident onboard Flight 1879, operated by Malta Air, is the subject of an ongoing investigation by US agency NTSB, which investigates matters relating to American-made aircraft.

Greek investigators are also probing the incident flight, which originated in Thessaloniki.

Videos of the flight, bound for Memmingen in Germany, showed other passengers donning oxygen masks after they dropped from overhead panels following the depressurisation.

Others recounted hearing a loud noise resembling a tyre bursting as the window blew out.

Inquiries are expected to focus on why the engine fan blades fractured at its base as well as the role of a possible bird strike after remains were found in the damaged engine.

Events onboard Malta Air Flight 1879 are currently being investigated by the NTSB (Picture: ADMS)

During a press conference on Thursday, Mr O’Leary also renewed his calls for Nats chief Martin Rolfe to resign following the air traffic control outage this week.

The Ryanair chief accused Mr Rolfe of ‘telling lies to save his own skin’ after the Nats director insisted the Tuesday incident was like nothing his organisation has experienced in ‘more than 50 years in operation’.

He said: ‘This guy should be fired. He gets paid a basic salary of £500,000 and a bonus of nearly £900,000 a year to deliver the worst ATC service in Europe.’

Mr O’Leary also generated controversy this week by referring to his rivals as ‘high-fare rapists’, in a comment that was seen by some as trivialising abuse towards women.

‘You might find some people will choose not to fly with Ryanair – but you know they’ll be overrun with the people abandoning Aer Lingus, Lufthansa, BA, and others desperate to get to Ryanair’s low fares because they can’t afford to fly with the high-fare rapists around Europe’, he said.

His words were criticised by transport secretary Heidi Alexander amongst others, who suggested women wouldn’t be rushing to book Ryanair following the CEO’s remarks.

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