The terrorist attacks carried out on Sept. 11, 2001, were originally envisioned as an even more spectacular assault involving 10 jetliners on the east and west coasts, but the plan was scaled back and was nearly derailed on several occasions by setbacks and squabbling among senior al Qaeda officials, according to a new report released this morning.

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In addition to the targets that were hit on Sept. 11, Mohammed initially proposed crashing hijacked planes into the CIA and FBI headquarters, unidentified nuclear power plants and the tallest buildings in California and Washington state,” the report says.

“The centerpiece of his original proposal was the tenth plane, which he would have piloted himself,” it says. Instead of crashing it in a suicide attack, Mohammed would have killed every adult male passenger on the plane, contacted the media from the air and landed the aircraft at a U.S. airport. Then he would have made a speech denouncing U.S. policies in the Middle East before releasing all the women and children, the report says.

When bin Laden finally approved the operation, he personally scrapped the idea of using one of the hijacked planes to make a public statement, the report says.

Via: washingtonpost.com: Al Qaeda Originally Envisioned Plot With 10 Jets

It’s scary to think that the horrendous events of 9/11 were originally intended to be much much worse.