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US Troops in Gulf on Highest Alert After Terrorist Threats
US troops in the Gulf region have been put on the highest state of alert and ships from the 5th Fleet in Bahrain ordered to leave for sea after receiving threats of attack from terrorists allegedly linked to Osama bin Laden.
According to CNN's latest report, Pentagon officials said that US intelligence had obtained information from two separate sources that an attack was planned on US troops, and had been monitoring the activities of known bin Laden special agents.
"There were two separate indications from two different sources saying the same thing" and "that's what set off the alarm bells," one official was quoted as saying.
The officials said that there was a time schedule for the attack, but they declined to make it public.
The threats came after the US government announced on Thursday indictments against 14 suspects in the bombing of the Khobar Tower housing complex in Saudi Arabia in June, 1996, which killed 19 US servicemen and wounded hundreds of others.
In October last year, the destroyer USS Cole anchored in the Yemeni port of Aden was bombed by a group of suicidal terrorists, leaving some casualties to the US troops.
According to a report from The Washington Post, bin Laden, an exiled Saudi millionaire who has allegedly masterminded a series of anti-America terrorist activities, appears in a video reciting poems in which he says: "and in Aden, they charged and destroyed a destroyer that fearsome people fear, one that evokes horror when it docks and when it sails."
After receiving threats of new attack, the Pentagon ordered all forces in the Persian Gulf on the "Threat Condition Delta," the highest state of alert, late Thursday night. Under a Delta alert, all vehicles entering bases are stopped and many are searched, nonbusiness visits are banned, packages and supplies are closely checked, patrols are increased and troops are placed on high vigilance.
Under the alert, ships of the US 5th Fleet, including the USS Constellation aircraft carrier group, have been sent to sea as a precautionary measure.
Meanwhile, the US State Department said on Thursday it was warning American citizens abroad of an "increased risk" from possible terrorist attacks.
News of the threats already caused panic on Wall Street, sending stocks down sharply on Thursday.
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