Conspirators Targeted Aircraft Traveling From London To North
America In 2006
In the summer of 2006, as many as 18 conspirators planned to
simultaneously blow up almost 10 airplanes by bringing hydrogen
peroxide-injected soda-bottles-turned-bombs onto flights bound from
London to the U.S. and Canada. In a program premiering August 21st,
National Geographic Channel (NGC) — with unprecedented access
to undercover agents and top officials from the CIA, Homeland
Security and British Counter-Terror Command — goes inside the
story behind the largest and most sophisticated terrorism plot
since September 11, 2001, which changed airline security measures
around the world.
"The Liquid Bomb Plot" details how a threat that began as a
British counterterrorist investigation evolved into a global
emergency. In the U.S., President Bush's administration, the CIA
and the Department of Homeland Security worked feverishly to
protect America from an attack on the scale of 9/11.
Interviews include, from the U.S., General Michael Hayden,
former director, CIA; Michael Chertoff, former secretary,
Department of Homeland Security; Robert Grenier, former Islamabad
station chief, CIA; Kip Hawley, former director, Transportation
Security Administration; and Charlie Allen, chief intelligence
officer, Department of Homeland Security. Top U.K. interviews
include Lord John Reid, former home secretary and former defense
secretary, Britain; Andy Hayman, former assistant commissioner for
specialist operations, Metropolitan Police; and Peter Clarke, OBE,
former national co-coordinator of terrorist investigations,
Metropolitan Police.
In
the program, U.S. officials recount how they essentially forced the
hand of the British to arrest the suspected terrorists ahead of
schedule by making a secret trip to Pakistan. General Michael
Hayden was working closely with the British government on Operation
Overt, the largest surveillance operation in U.K history, with more
than 200 agents involved in surveillance alone, not to mention the
senior officials on both sides of the pond monitoring the
situation.
General Hayden discusses on camera how he visited Pakistan and
met with the head of the Pakistan Intelligence Agency without
alerting the British, who had requested more time to gather
evidence. During Hayden's trip, Rashid Rauf, the key Al Qaeda
operative in the plot, was arrested by the Pakistani authorities,
thus compelling the British to move into the "arrest phase" ahead
of plan before those involved found out they might be
compromised.
"The British had always suspected the Americans were behind
Rauf's arrest, but this is the first and only time a senior U.S.
figure has discussed the arrest publicly," explains Executive
Producer Louise Norman, who worked for more than a year to gain
access to the details behind the terror plot from both the U.S. and
British governments. "'The Liquid Bomb Plot' is by far the most
comprehensive, detailed report on how this incredible terror plot
was foiled. I thought I knew the full story, but what happened
behind the scenes has never been fully reported until now."
The resulting arrests led to 11 terrorism-related convictions
and a mountain of evidence, including 26,000 exhibits from 102
property searches, 80 seized computers and related devices, and
15,000 CDs, 500 disks and 14,000 gigs of data. The arrests also
made news around the world and changed air travel in the most
substantial way since 9/11—including passengers not being
allowed to go through airport security with more than 3.4 ounces of
liquid.