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LONDON -- British intelligence officials knew that the Nigerian man suspected of trying to bomb a Detroit-bound airliner had ties to U.K. extremists but did not consider him enough of a high risk to alert American authorities, a senior British official said Sunday. Officials realized about a year after Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab came to London to study in 2005 that he was in contact with Islamic extremists whose communications were being monitored, a senior government official told The Associated Press on Sunday.

(CNN) -- Almost as soon as the botched Christmas airplane bombing hit the airwaves, the politics of national security reared its head. Many Republicans quickly attacked President Obama for being responsible for the fact that Umar Farouk AbdulMutallab was able to walk onto an airplane with dangerous explosives despite the fact that the government had received warnings about him. They argued that the failure proved the White House was weak on terrorism. We must make certain that the government sets up some kind of independent review to better understand what went wrong. Nothing should be excluded from consideration, from the...

National security sources tell ABC News that the al Qaeda terrorist who tried to kill Saudi prince and counterintelligence chief Prince Mohammed bin Nayef in August used the same technique -- an underwear bomb -- and the same PETN explosive that Umar Farouq Abdulmutallab tried to use in his attempted Christmas Day attack. Within a week of that failed August attack on Prince Mohammed, President Obama dispatched his top counterterrorism and homeland security adviser John Brennan to Saudi Arabia to meet with Prince Mohammed to discuss the attempt, a senior administration official told ABC News. That September visit "started the...

Homeland security chief Janet Napolitano made history during her stay in San Francisco last week when she did what the Bush administration never could: She took responsibility for a mistake. With the Transamerica Pyramid in the background, Napolitano admitted that it was a total breakdown of both our intelligence and transpiration security operation that allowed suspected terrorist Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab to board a Northwest Airlines flight to the United States, putting 300 lives in jeopardy. It was a flagship first for the Obama administration, having someone that high up come out so quickly to say we messed up. Napolitano's actions...

Washington - President Obama this morning directly linked the Christmas Day airline-bombing attempt to a Yemen-based branch of Al Qaeda, and he offered a full-throated defense of his administration's anti-terrorism efforts against Republican criticism. Obama also promised to hold accountable U.S. security officials -- including homeland security, law enforcement and intelligence officers -- in the wake of an ongoing review into breakdowns in terrorism screening that enabled Abdulmutallab to board the plane despite intelligence that suggested he could pose a threat.

(CNN) -- President Obama pledged Saturday that the United States will hold accountable all of the individuals involved in the failed Christmas Day terrorist attack aboard a U.S.-bound jetliner. "All those involved in the attempted act of terrorism on Christmas must know you, too, will be held to account," Obama said in his weekly address. Obama also recently spoke with Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano to receive an update on a federal review of "detection capabilities and ... enhanced security measures" put in place since the attempted bombing. A new Transportation Security Administration directive requires airlines to physically pat down...

HONOLULU -- President Barack Obama drew a direct link Saturday between an al Qaeda group and a foiled attempt to blow up a U.S.-bound airliner on Christmas Day. In his Saturday morning radio address, Mr. Obama went further than he has in previous statements on the attack to connect the extremist group with the Dec. 25 attack. He pledged to work with officials in other nations to combat terrorism, including Yemen, where officials believe Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian accused of trying to destroy Northwest Flight 253, was schooled in terrorist techniques. "We know that he traveled to Yemen, a...

On Christmas Day, a gentleman from Nigeria succeeded (effortlessly) in boarding a flight to Detroit with a bomb in his underwear. Pretty funny, huh? But the Pantybomber wasn’t the big joke. The real laugh was the United States government. The global hyperpower spent the next week making itself a laughingstock to the entire planet. First, the bureaucrats at the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) swung into action with a whole new range of restrictions. Against radical Yemen-trained Muslims wearing weaponized briefs? Of course not. That would be too obvious. So instead they imposed a slew of constraints against you. At Heathrow...