Pre-Emptive Strikes

By Amanda Bower

Intelligence authorities around the world have managed to foil a number of terrorist plots in recent years. Some major successes:

Jordan

THE PLOT Bomb U.S. and Israeli millennium revelers in Jordan

HOW IT WAS FOILED A tip to Jordanian intelligence led to raids and confessions

WHO WAS INVOLVED Of 28 charged, 22 were convicted, including alleged bin Laden associate Raed Hijazi. Hijazi, who denies the charges, is being retried after he was sentenced to death in absentia

New York City

THE PLOT Assorted assassinations and bombs aimed at targets in New York City, including the U.N., tunnels and the George Washington Bridge

HOW IT WAS FOILED An informant's secret recordings led to FBI surveillance of a Queens garage, where bomb ingredients were mixed

WHO WAS INVOLVED Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman and nine others were convicted in 1995

Port Angeles, Wash.

THE PLOT Bomb Los Angeles International Airport on New Year's Eve 2000

HOW IT WAS FOILED U.S. customs agents found timing devices and bomb ingredients in the trunk of a car entering at the Canadian border

WHO WAS INVOLVED Algerian Ahmed Ressam wants a reduced sentence after testifying against his co-conspirators

Manila

THE PLOT Blow up 12 U.S. commercial airliners over the Pacific in early 1995

HOW IT WAS FOILED Officials investigating an explosion in a Manila apartment uncovered

WHO WAS INVOLVED Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, who also masterminded the 1993 World Trade Center attack, was convicted along with two others. He is serving 240 years in federal prison

Europe

THE PLOT Bomb the American embassy in Paris and (in possibly linked conspiracies) other targets in Europe

HOW IT WAS FOILED A confession (since partly retracted) from suspected al-Qaeda insider Djamel Beghal

WHO WAS INVOLVED After Sept. 11, dozens were taken into custody in Spain, Italy, France, Germany, Belgium and Britain

--By Amanda Bower