Counter-terror police find only petrol in RAF Fairford vans as five bailed suspects 'remain under investigation'
From the Newshound archive · first published 28 September 2026 · last updated 29 September 2026.
Marco Rubio, US Secretary of State, as President Donald Trump publicly broke with the British government over its decision to grant bail to five suspects arrested near RAF Fairford.Stopped vans at RAF Fairford, where a farmer's 999 call led to the arrest of five British nationals suspected of plotting against US forces there.Suspects arrested at RAF Fairford, the Gloucestershire airbase where US forces are stationed for operations against Iran, as police probe possible hostile-state proxy involvement in the suspected bomb plot.Iran's Revolutionary Guard. Donald Trump said the suspected bomb plot targeting the US-run base "might be" linked to Iran, adding: "I know the answer — I'd rather not say it.
Counter-terror chief Laurence Taylor told a Scotland Yard briefing that searches of the three vans intercepted near the US-operated RAF Fairford base in Gloucestershire revealed nothing beyond a quantity of petrol — no explosive devices of any kind were recovered. London properties associated with the five British nationals, aged 23 to 25, who live in Westminster and Camden, have been searched and those searches are now complete. Taylor defended the decision to bail all five suspects within 36 hours as "grounded in experience and careful consideration of policing powers."
The vans bore markings belonging to a legitimate fuel transit company, which denied any link to the vehicles — fuelling local speculation that the men may have been fuel thieves rather than plotters.
Trump said he was "surprised" the five men had been released on bail and that he would not have done so — a public rebuke of British policing decisions.
Taylor expects cordon scenes around the airfield to be fully lifted by Wednesday, allowing evacuated villagers to return to normal.
