The police in Germany have arrested three Islamic militants suspected of planning large-scale terrorist attacks against several sites frequented by Americans, including discos, bars, airports and military installations.

The suspects —two German citizens and a Turkish resident of Germany—were in advanced stages of plotting bombing attacks that could have been deadlier than the terrorist strikes that killed dozens in London and Madrid, police and security officials said on Wednesday. They said the possible targets included the busy Ramstein air base and the Frankfurt international airport.

"They were planning massive attacks," the German federal prosecutor, Monika Harms, said at a news conference, outlining a vast six-month investigation. She said that the suspects had amassed huge amounts of hydrogen peroxide, the main chemical used to manufacture the explosives used in the suicide bombings in London in July 2005.

Harms said the two German suspects were converts to Islam who had trained in terrorist camps in Pakistan. They had 1,500 pounds of hydrogen peroxide to make explosives, which they had hidden and were preparing to move when they were arrested on Tuesday afternoon. Officials said they also had military-grade detonators. German and American officials said that such indicators made them suspect connections to al-Qaeda.

"This would have enabled them to make bombs with more explosive power than the ones used in the London and Madrid bombings," Jörg Ziercke, head of the German Federal Crime Office, said, calling the links to al-Qaeda "close". German officials were visibly relieved by the arrests, which they said were the fruits of a six-month investigation involving 300 people from the police and prosecutor's office. On Wednesday, police officers raided 41 houses and apartments across Germany, seizing computers and other evidence.

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