[Anderson Cooper, Cnn Anchor:] There was a second terror attack in Kenya Thursday. That took place right before the hotel bombing. A pair of shoulder fired missiles narrowly missed an Israeli jetliner bound for Tel Aviv. CNN'S Kathleen Koch shows us that how that attack set off a chain of events at airports here in the United States.
[Kathleen Koch, Cnn Correspondent:] The Thursday attempted missile attack against that Israeli jet in Kenya is just the sort of thing that U.S. officials had feared my tried here some day. So spokesman Robert Johnson tells CN that the transportation security administration immediately notified all of its federal security directors at airports around the country about the incident. And it reminded them to review with their security teams the response plans that they had put into place to deal with such threats. It was back in May that the TSA and the FBI first warned U.S. airlines that such a missile attack could take place. That was after an apparent al Qaeda attempt to shoot down a U.S military plane in Saudi Arabia with a shoulder fired missile. And just a few weeks ago, the TSA and other government agencies met with airline officials here in Washington security issues and this topic came up. But the TSA is not sharing with CNN what response plans airports may have in place or what additional protective measures, if any, are in the works. Back to you.
[Cooper:] All right, so here is the deal. The administration is warning Americans more of these types of attacks could happen. Federal airport security admits it is a concern they've had for a while. And even though security inside the airports is evolving and improving, some say it has nothing to do with this kind of threat. So the end of the day, you just got to wonder how safe are we? CNN law enforcement analyst Mike Brooks is here with me tonight to talk a little bit about that. In the United States, I mean, is this kind of thing a real possibility?
[Mike Brooks, Cnn Law Enforcement Analyst:] Well, it's something we've been talking about for years. You know, they may put out a warning in May about this and the use of shoulder fired weapons against aircraft, but we've been talking about this in May. Especially coming from Washington, D.C. when I was in law enforcement there, we see the presidential helicopter taking off and landing all hours of the day and night on the ellipse. We see Air Force One taking off. Reagan National Airport, right at the end of the runway, there's a public park there I used to play rugby in all the time. And it was come right over our heads. And everyone always talked about the, you know, the possibility of something like that happening. In fact, after September 11 when they shut all the airports down, when they opened reopened Reagan Airport, they put some additional security patrols by police officer, by U.S. Park Police on the end of the right in that little park there. So you know, it's something we've been talking about. Whether it can become a reality here, I never say never, Anderson. You know, but it's probably a little more difficult to get shoulder fire weapons here in the United States than it would be in Africa or in Europe or anywhere.
[Cooper:] Well, I mean, that's what's scary about this is that in order to really stop this, it's really a law enforcement issue of preventing the kind of attack, because once the attack has happened, I mean, a commercial jet liner has no defense measures against this kind of thing. And installing those kind of defense measures, we're talking millions of dollars. And it's just not cost effective.
[Brooks:] Right, they're talking about $2 million I think yesterday, the figure was $2 million per plane.
[Cooper:] Right.
[Brooks:] But you know, we hear about incidents. There are incidents that happen across the United States all the time, but not that often about people taking shots with rifles and planes, you know, while they're taking off and landing. I mean, you know, the...
[Cooper:] The bottom line is at this point, these kind of shoulder fire weapons are not readily found in the United States. It's really overseas that the problem exists now.
[Brooks:] Yes, I'd say so right now. And but we still again we still have U.S. commercial airliners flying overseas, flying to South America in some of the hot spots. The FBI says their statistics, I'm not sure what kind of timeframe, they didn't give a timeframe, but 29 incidents of air of commercial aircraft being shot at with shoulder fired weapons and about 550 deaths. But they all those occurred in areas where there was some kind of conflict or war going on, not you know, during peacetime or any you know, here in the United States at all.
[Cooper:] When you look though at the number of countries that have manufactured these kind of weapons, I mean, going back with the 1960s, it's pretty alarming. And then when you realize, I mean, how porous a lot of these borders are, and then every you know, right before we went on there, you handed me this report about a number of surface to air missiles stolen from Bosnia.
[Brooks:] Right.
[Cooper:] You know, there have been reports of weapons stolen during the Gulf War from the United States. So these weapons are out there, kind of floating around?
[Brooks:] There are hundreds, if not thousands of these floating around. In fact, back in early "90s, the United States" CIA was trying to put trying to get a handle on how many of our own weapons were overseas, the stingers. You know, the more sophisticated weapons, more sophisticated in what we saw in Mombasa with the SA-7s, you know, with the SAM-7s. But you know, and there, what they were trying to do is every time they would show one of them being used by mujahadeen or anywhere in the country, and anywhere in the world, they would try to get the number off it to try to track these down, to see how many of them were out there. But as you said, with the especially in Africa. You look at Africa and the way the borders are there. In Kenda and Uganda, you can come and go as we discussed, you know, some of the smaller airports there, you can come and go at will to any you know, any other country in Africa. So you know, I think they tightening up on the borders in Africa is a real you know, is one way to try to prevent that. But do they have the manpower? Do they have the money to do that? Probably not.
[Cooper:] Want to broaden out the discussion just a little bit. Ben Wedeman just reporting that they're looking at gas canisters that were perhaps used in this suicide bombing.
[Brooks:] Right.
[Cooper:] At the Hotel Mombasa. You were here and your ears sort of perked up when you heard gas cans.
[Brooks:] Yes, in 1998 at the U.S. embassy bombing, we're also finding some kind of gas canister that were used either with the explosives in or with it was believed maybe some oxygen used as a booster, you know, as an oxidizer for the explosive to make to kind of pack a little more oomph into the explosion.
[Cooper:] You know, you hear Mossad is on the ground. You hear the Israelis are kind of really the ones driving this investigation. I know you've spoken favorably of the Kenyan intelligence service or the police service, the CID there I think it's called. Do you think they really have a handle on this investigation?
[Brooks:] Right now, they're probably acting more in an assisting role. They know, you know, it's kind of rounded I think they were talking the other day about rounding up the usual suspects, if you will, when they first got the 12. You know, going they know where some of the different communities are. That's one way they can help, but they really don't have the money and the resources to have an effective intelligence, you know, capability that the United States and that Israel does. Yes, they are great. You know, I mean, it's just like here in the United States we have task forces of local police assisting the federal law enforcement. But over there, you know, they're so spread out over a large country, mostly rural, you know, jungle I mean, it's very difficult to have...
[Cooper:] Right.
[Brooks:] ...the resources.
[Cooper:] All right, Mike Brooks, as always, thanks very much.
[Brooks:] Thanks, Anderson. TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com