Osama Bin Laden Eyed 10-Year Anniversary of 9/11 For Terrorist Attack

A "rush examination" of the evidence gathered from Osama Bin Laden's secret compound in Pakistan reveals that the Al Qaeda leader was still involved in thinking up future terrorist attacks, despite now-outdated guesses from analysts that he may have become more of a figurehead in recent years. In fact, Bin Laden "continued to plot and plan, to come up with ideas about targets and to communicate those ideas to other senior Qaeda leaders," including handwritten ideas to attack American railroads, "possibly on Christmas, New Year's Day, the day of the State of the Union address or the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks," the New York Times reports. Bin Laden certainly had time to plan -- his wife found on the compound told investigators that he'd been living in the compound for five years; in that time, she claims to have never the room where they were discovered.

"As of February 2010, al-Qa'ida was allegedly contemplating conducting an operation against trains at an unspecified location in the United States on the 10th anniversary of September 11, 2001," according to an FBI bulletin obtained by ABC News last night. "As one option, al-Qa'ida was looking into trying to tip a train by tampering with the rails so that the train would fall off the track at either a valley or a bridge."

Though no specific plot appears to have been planned -- it was merely "aspirational" -- the translation and analyzation of the materials is ongoing. Meanwhile, according to the Times, extra security remains at airports and the Department of Homeland Security on high-alert in the event of attempted retaliation attacks in response to Bin Laden's death.

[jcoscarelli@villagevoice.com / @joecoscarelli]