Bin Laden targeted trains and small cities

DEEP in hiding, Osama bin Laden kept pressing followers to find ways to hit the US, officials said, citing his private journal and other documents recovered in last week’s raid.

Strike smaller cities, bin Laden suggested. Target trains as well as planes. Kill as many Americans as possible in a single attack.

Though he was out of the public eye and al-Qaida seemed to be weakening, bin Laden never yielded control, US officials said. His personal, handwritten journal and his massive collection of computer files reveal his hand at work in every recent major al-Qaida threat, including plots in Europe last year that had travellers and embassies on high alert, two officials said.