Bin Laden considered targeting India and other countries in 1998: CIA documents

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Supporters of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden shout anti-American slogans, after the news of his death, during a rally in Quetta on May 2, 2011. | Photo Credit: Reuters

India features among the list of countries that former al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden had at one point considered targeting, as per the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). The revelation is part of the CIA’s release on Friday (September 11, 2026) of more than 100 pages of material across 69 intelligence briefs to former U.S. Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, to mark the 25 th anniversary of the World Trade Center attacks by al-Qaeda on September 11, 2001 in New York City.

The 28 August 1998 memo says Bin Laden and other terrorist leaders survived the U.S. strike (in Afghanistan). It adds that the al-Qaeda leader intended to conduct attacks in Egypt and the Arabian Peninsula — especially Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, India, Pakistan, Uganda and possibly Nigeria.

The documents demonstrate that the CIA had warned the Presidents, multiple times, of a possible attack from bin Laden during the September 1998 – September 2001 period for which documents have been released. That attacks were being planned is not a new revelation; rather, the CIA documents confirm the major conclusion of the 2004 ‘9/11 Commission’ report. That report had concluded al-Qaeda was planning attacks on the U.S. Those warnings were not heeded for a combination of reasons, including a lack of capabilities, imagination as well as management and policy priorities.

A September 1998 brief released on Friday (September 12) says that Bin Laden’s preferred target was U.S. soil and included a potential plan to “fly and explosive packed-plane into a U.S. city”.

The same September 1998 brief says “the Kashmir militant group Harakat ul-Mujahedin (HUM) is coordinating with Bin Laden to attack US, British and French interests” , with the location redacted.

An August 2001 memo is titled ‘Bin Ladin [sic] Determined to Strike in US’.

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