Bush Aides Seek To Contain Furor Sept. 11 Not Envisioned, Rice Says

By Dan Eggen and Dana Priest-Washington Post Staff Writers

Friday, May 17, 2002; Page A01

The White House yesterday offered a detailed timeline showing that President Bush was first told on Aug. 6 that Osama bin Laden's associates might be planning airline hijackings -- speculation that was repeated several times in briefings the president received leading up to Sept. 11.

As the administration sought to contain an uproar over Bush's handling of information he received before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice told reporters that the intelligence briefing given to Bush at his Crawford, Tex., ranch included two references to aircraft hijackings.

It mentioned the possibility that bin Laden and his operatives might be planning to hijack an aircraft "in the traditional sense" and might seek, for example, to exchange passengers for the release of imprisoned Muslim cleric Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, who had been convicted of plotting to blow up New York City landmarks.

But Rice said Bush was not told, and U.S. intelligence analysts never envisioned, that terrorists would use jetliners in the type of suicide attacks carried out in New York and Washington on Sept. 11. Rice and other administration officials said that the threat was not specific enough to warrant a public warning, but that the Federal Aviation Administration urged the airlines to be cautious.

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