CIA warned of terror attack in 1995

The CIA warned as early as 1995 that Islamic extremists were likely to attack US aviation, Washington landmarks or Wall Street and by 1997 had identified Osama bin Laden as an emerging threat on US soil, a senior intelligence official said.

The official took the rare step of disclosing information in the closely held National Intelligence Estimate for those two years to counter criticisms in a staff report released on Wednesday by the independent commission examining pre-September 11 intelligence failures.