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Barack Obama lashed out at systemic intelligence failures over an attempted attack on a US jet amid reports Wednesday that Washington was planning reprisal strikes against targets in Yemen.

The US president was told Tuesday there had been warnings of possible Christmas holiday attacks, and information that the Nigerian would-be bomber was a threat, but the data was not properly distributed.

"A systemic failure has occurred and I consider that totally unacceptable," Obama said, breaking his Hawaii vacation for a second straight day as recriminations mounted over the botched December 25 attack.

"There was a mix of human and systemic failures that contributed to this potential catastrophic breach of security.

"We need to learn from this episode and act quickly to fix the flaws in our system because our security is at stake and lives are at stake."

CNN reported that the United States and Yemen were reviewing targets for reprisal strikes after a local Al-Qaeda affiliate claimed responsibility for the attempt to detonate chemicals stored in the would-be bomber's underpants.

The man accused of trying to blow up the Northwest airliner over Detroit, 23-year-old Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, was in Yemen until earlier this month.

"US special operations forces and intelligence agencies, and their Yemeni counterparts, are working to identify potential Al-Qaeda targets in Yemen," the report cited one US source as saying.

CNN cited two senior US officials who "stressed the effort is aimed at being ready with options for the White House if President Obama orders a retaliatory strike."

Yemen's foreign minister also called for Western help against the "hundreds" of Al-Qaeda militants in the country, warning of possible further attacks. Chronology: Movements of plane suspect

"We need more training, we have to expand our counter-terrorism units and this means providing them with the necessary training, military equipment, ways of transportation," Foreign Minister Abu Bakr al-Kurbi told the BBC.

"Of course there are a number of Al-Qaeda operatives in Yemen and some of their leaders... Maybe hundreds of them, 200, 300.

"They may actually plan for attacks like the one we have just had in Detroit."

Citing intelligence flaws, Obama complained that Abdulmutallab's father had warned US diplomats in Abuja that his son was an extremist threat -- yet he was still able to board the jet with explosives.

A Nigerian intelligence source said on Wednesday that CIA and FBI agents have questioned Abdulmutallab's father, asking him about his own background and that of his son.

"I can confirm that Umar Mutallab was summoned to the desk office of the US embassy in Abuja where he was interrogated by men from the CIA and FBI on Monday," the source told AFP.

It was not the first time that intelligence failures had opened the door to a terror attack: the September 11 attacks in 2001, which killed nearly 3,000 people, were blamed on similar errors.

Obama has ordered two reviews into the Christmas Day attack -- one into the no-fly list system and another into how Abdulmutallab managed to get past security at Amsterdam's Schiphol airport. He wants first results by Thursday.

A senior US official said the president learned on Tuesday that the US government did have information on Abdulmutallab before Christmas, which might have helped prevent his attempt to down the plane.

It was now clear the government had information before the attack "in some instances about the individual in question and plans, some of it was about Al-Qaeda and its plans," said the official.

"Some of it was about potential attacks during the holiday period."

The New York Times cited two officials saying the government had intelligence that leaders of an Al-Qaeda in Yemen were talking about a "Nigerian" involved in a future terror attack. Related article:Bomb bid reframes profiling debate

Abdulmutallab has reportedly confessed to being trained for his mission by an Al-Qaeda bomb maker in Yemen, which many top US officials see as a haven for extremists.

Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, an affiliate of Osama bin Laden's terror network led by Yemeni and Saudi radicals, has said it was behind the plot.(AFP)