LONDON: The United States has withdrawn all B-1 bombers deployed at RAF Fairford in southwest England, with reports citing an unspecified new threat, while the UK government said the base remains safe.
The move follows a security incident on September 27, when police were called to the airbase after a local farmer reported suspicious activity involving several men and vans.
The incident triggered a counter-terrorism investigation and led to the evacuation of 85 nearby homes. Investigators found no explosives in the vehicles, although counter-terrorism police said “a quantity of petrol was recovered.”
A Pentagon official confirmed that all US bombers deployed to RAF Fairford had “re-deployed to their home stations in the United States”, adding that operational security had prevented officials from confirming the movement in real time.
An unidentified US official told CNN the bombers were moved following “an unspecified new threat”, describing it as a “real world incident”.
The New York Times reported, citing two US officials, that commanders had received new warnings about an Iran-backed plot targeting the base. One official said the latest information was linked to threat warnings that had emerged three weeks earlier but became urgent within the previous 24 hours.
Asked whether RAF Fairford was safe, the UK prime minister’s official spokesman said: “Yes.”
“We have tried and tested approaches to defend our bases around the country and throughout the world,” he told reporters.