Bill Clinton Strikes Back

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Bill Clinton: I got closer to killing bin Laden


NEW YORK (CNN) -- In a contentious taped interview that aired on "Fox News Sunday," former president Bill Clinton vigorously defended his efforts as president to capture and kill al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

"I got closer to killing him than anybody has gotten since. And if I were still president, we'd have more than 20,000 troops there trying to kill him," Clinton said, referring to Afghanistan.

"We do have a government that thinks Afghanistan is one-seventh as important as Iraq," he added, referring to the approximately 140,000 U.S. troops in Iraq. (Watch Clinton go on defensive -- 1:18)

In the interview, which was taped on Friday, Clinton also lashed out at Fox's Chris Wallace, accusing him of promising to discuss Clinton's initiative on climate change, then straying from the issue by asking why the former president didn't do more to "put bin Laden and al Qaeda out of business."

"So you did Fox's bidding on this show. You did your nice little conservative hit job on me," he said to Wallace, occasionally tapping on Wallace's notes for emphasis. "I want to know how many people in the Bush administration you asked this question of? (Watch Clinton blast the "neo-cons" -- 1:51)

"And you've got that little smirk on your face and you think you're so clever. But I had responsibility for trying to protect this country. I tried and I failed to get bin Laden. I regret it," Clinton said.

Wallace said that the question was drawn from viewer e-mails.

Clinton asserted he had done more to try to kill bin Laden than "all the right-wingers who are attacking me now." In fact, Clinton said, conservatives routinely criticized him for "obsessing" over bin Laden while he was in office.

"They ridiculed me for trying. They had eight months to try. They did not try. I tried. So I tried and failed," he said.

The September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks occurred about eight months after Bush took office.

The former president said he authorized the CIA to kill bin Laden and overthrow the Taliban in Afghanistan after the bombing of the USS Cole in 2000, but the action was never carried out. Clinton said that was because the United States could not establish a military base in Uzbekistan and because U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies refused to certify that bin Laden was behind the bombing.

"The entire military was against sending special forces into Afghanistan and refueling by helicopter. And no one thought we could do it otherwise, because we could not get the CIA and the FBI to certify that al Qaeda was responsible while I was president."

Clinton also defended withdrawing U.S. forces from Somalia in 1993, after 18 servicemen were killed in Mogadishu when their Black Hawk helicopter was shot down.

Bin Laden told CNN in a 1997 interview that his followers were involved in that attack, which occurred eight months after the first attack on the World Trade Center.

"There is not a living soul in the world who thought Osama bin Laden had anything to do with Black Hawk down or was paying any attention to it," Clinton said.

In recent weeks, Clinton has responded to criticism of his administration's anti-terrorism efforts, sparked in part by the airing of an ABC docudrama miniseries called "The Path to 9/11."

The show, broadcast during the weekend before the fifth anniversary of the attacks, dramatized events leading up to the attacks in New York and Washington on September 11.

Former members of the Clinton administration protested in particular a scene that shows then-National Security Adviser Samuel Berger ducking a chance to have bin Laden killed or captured in a 1998 raid by CIA agents and Afghan guerrillas.

The scene contradicts the findings of the 9/11 Commission, upon which ABC had said the film was based.


http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/09/24/clinton.binladen/index.html


this is great, people have been lately given him a lot of shit for Bin Laden to push the blame from Bush to him.
 
The accusations that the Clinton admin did less to thwart "terrorism" than the Bush admin is insane - especially since we have basically given up looking for him after we cut and ran from Afganistan.

I know where bin laden is - in the White House.
 
I think Clinton is well justified in his anger of being ambushed by Chris Wallace and being generally portrayed as getting his pecker wanked while Osama roamed free. No one can possibly know the pressure and details of being the president and having to make the decision to attack a target across the globe on a moment's notice. It's enormous, especially when having to consider collateral damage and world opinion versus the value of the target. Just ask any Israeli prime minister whether or not they should have taken out Arafat with a well placed rocket, it's a complicated
issue.

However, he made some outright lies that Mathews should have called him on. His claim that no one even knew of Al-Qaeda in 1995 was an outright lie. They knew of al-queda training camps in Sudan, and knew of possible monitary funding of the UN bombing by al-qaeda in 1993. Browbeating mathews to read richard clark's book will only comfirm this misstaement.

Another glaring admission was that he "contracted" and gave an order for forces to kill Bin Laden, yet also claimed that Intelligence wouldn't "sign off" on his responsibility for the Cole attack. So, then, I guess he "illegally" gave an order for an assasination without proof. Now, mr. clinton and others know that Intelligence never "signs off" on such cases never giving a 100% answer on anything. They provide intelligence to the best of their ability and the president makes a judgement. But it's a clever way of passing the buck for his failure and it sounds good on TV.
 
[quote name='bmulligan']Another glaring admission was that he "contracted" and gave an order for forces to kill Bin Laden, yet also claimed that Intelligence wouldn't "sign off" on his responsibility for the Cole attack. So, then, I guess he "illegally" gave an order for an assasination without proof. Now, mr. clinton and others know that Intelligence never "signs off" on such cases never giving a 100% answer on anything. They provide intelligence to the best of their ability and the president makes a judgement.[/QUOTE]

Clinton was talking about overthrowing the Taliban not merely offing Osama.

Also when Clinton said no one really knew about Al Qaeda right after Somalia that was what 92-93? Not 1995.

The first WTC attack was February 26, 1993, the battle of Mogadishu after which Clinton decided to hand over to the UN was October 3 and 4, 1993.

Al Qaeda was an offshoot of the Mujahadeen, it would probably be more accurate to say that people knew but no one really gave a shit.
 
Precisely, I think his comments of "Nobody knew al quaeda existed" were woefully misintepreted, although I don't think he should have put it so bluntly. I think he is also absolutely right in his anger towards the question "Why didn't you do more...", Chris Wallace showed a real lack of respect with that question.
 
[quote name='CappyCobra'] Nice to see a Democrat with balls back on the screen.[/QUOTE]

Now if someone will follow his lead, they might win an election.
 
[quote name='Metal Boss']I think he is also absolutely right in his anger towards the question "Why didn't you do more...", Chris Wallace showed a real lack of respect with that question.[/QUOTE]

Truth be told, hindsight being 20/20, there are a lot of people who were whispering that question enough to convince many people (e.g., schuerm) that Clinton was responsible for 9/11. I'd say it's about damn time that someone asked him this question, and he reacted to it quite well. Not Elizabeth Smart giving Nancy Grace whatfor well, but well nonetheless.

As for the "nobody knew about al qaeda" comment, I'm not certain what he meant. I'd hate to think it took two years plus following the first attempt on the WTC to discover an organization around it. What's more, it's not as if Osama bin Laden was off the US Intelligence radar at that point either. I'd like to think he simply misspoke, but it certainly wasn't true in any event.
 
I'm pretty sure he meant in 1993 no one had any idea al quaeda was in Somalia, much less an actual functioning group. There is also a dispute if they were there at all seeing, as Clinton said, the warlord who we fought against there wasn't a religious radical which one would think would be a pre-requsite of being a jihadist.
 
[quote name='CappyCobra']Some parts were hard to hear over that ass Clinton was tearing up. :lol: Nice to see a Democrat with balls back on the screen.[/quote]
Yeah, especially one not named Hillary Clinton.
 
[quote name='mykevermin']Truth be told, hindsight being 20/20, there are a lot of people who were whispering that question enough to convince many people (e.g., schuerm) that Clinton was responsible for 9/11. I'd say it's about damn time that someone asked him this question, and he reacted to it quite well. Not Elizabeth Smart giving Nancy Grace whatfor well, but well nonetheless.

As for the "nobody knew about al qaeda" comment, I'm not certain what he meant. I'd hate to think it took two years plus following the first attempt on the WTC to discover an organization around it. What's more, it's not as if Osama bin Laden was off the US Intelligence radar at that point either. I'd like to think he simply misspoke, but it certainly wasn't true in any event.[/quote]

I have never said President Clinton was responsible for 9/11, just like President Bush wasn't either. Terrorists were responsible for 9/11.
 
Somehow it seemed like he's been waiting for this opportunity for a long time and took his pent up anger out on Wallace becuase he's one of those "right wing conspiracy" minions out to get him.

I must say I sympathize with his frustration. He did launch a cruise missile attack on Osama at the purported chemical weapons factory, he took the exact same beating by republicans as Bush is now taking from the Dems. So, saying he did nothing, or didn't do enough would be a tremendous insult. Yes, I'd agree, a very disrespectful to frame the question as fact that Clinton didn't do enough to get Osama.

Clinton's own words, though, enlightened us to the fact that Sudan offered Osama to us and Clinton passed and that he, "pleaded with the Saudi's" to take him." I'm sure everyone has heard the audio on that one by now.
 
[quote name='niceguyshawne']Now if someone will follow his lead, they might win an election.[/quote]
Agreed - but, it's been statistically shown that they won the last two. The statistical chance (given exit polls, various history metrics, etc) of GWB actually "legally" winning the elections has shown to have been nil.

Also if you have any type of scientific background you may have read that those towers couldn't have been demolished in that way by two planes. Whomever was closer to bin laden is a moot point - 9/11 was an inside job anyhow.
 
[quote name='schuerm26']Give it a break. All your nonsense conspiracies have been debunked.[/quote]

So have those in a certain ABC mini-series.
 
[quote name='bmulligan']Clinton's own words, though, enlightened us to the fact that Sudan offered Osama to us and Clinton passed and that he, "pleaded with the Saudi's" to take him.[/QUOTE]

I must have missed that part.
 
[quote name='nathansu']Agreed - but, it's been statistically shown that they won the last two. The statistical chance (given exit polls, various history metrics, etc) of GWB actually "legally" winning the elections has shown to have been nil.

Also if you have any type of scientific background you may have read that those towers couldn't have been demolished in that way by two planes. Whomever was closer to bin laden is a moot point - 9/11 was an inside job anyhow.[/QUOTE]

You, sir, are a conspiracy theorist nutjob. Please try to learn some critical thinking skills in school one of these days.
 
http://www.nypost.com/seven/09252006/news/nationalnews/rice_boils_over_at_bubba_nationalnews_.htm

RICE BOILS OVER AT BUBBA


RIPS 'FLATLY FALSE' CLAIM ON BUSH'S BID
TO GET BIN LADEN



By IAN BISHOP Post Correspondent

Email Archives Print © Reprint Feeds Newsletters
September 25, 2006 -- Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice yesterday accused Bill Clinton of making "flatly false" claims that the Bush administration didn't lift a finger to stop terrorism before the 9/11 attacks.

Rice hammered Clinton, who leveled his charges in a contentious weekend interview with Chris Wallace of Fox News Channel, for his claims that the Bush administration "did not try" to kill Osama bin Laden in the eight months they controlled the White House before the Sept. 11 attacks.
"The notion somehow for eight months the Bush administration sat there and didn't do that is just flatly false - and I think the 9/11 commission understood that," Rice said during a wide-ranging meeting with Post editors and reporters.
"What we did in the eight months was at least as aggressive as what the Clinton administration did in the preceding years," Rice added.
The secretary of state also sharply disputed Clinton's claim that he "left a comprehensive anti-terror strategy" for the incoming Bush team during the presidential transition in 2001.
"We were not left a comprehensive strategy to fight al Qaeda," Rice responded during the hourlong session.
Her strong rebuttal was the Bush administration's first response to Clinton's headline-grabbing interview on Fox on Sunday in which he launched into an over-the-top defense of his handling of terrorism - wagging his finger in the air, leaning forward in his chair and getting red-faced, and even attacking Wallace for improper questioning.
The "Fox News Sunday" show had its best ratings since the capture of Saddam Hussein in December 2003, according to Nielsen Media Research. Two versions of the interview were the two most-watched clips on YouTube yesterday, totaling more than 800,000 views.
After Clinton got angry during the questioning, Wallace said Clinton aide Jay Carson tried to get his producer to stop the interview. Carson said he was concerned that time was running out and that little of the philanthropy efforts of the former president had been addressed.
At The Post, Rice also touched on hot spots around the globe:
  • On Iran: "There isn't a particularly good, direct way to neutralize the Iranian threat."
  • On Iraq: "You're never going to have a just Sunni-Shia reconciliation if you don't have a political system in which the interests of all can be represented - and that's what Iraq represents."
  • On Pakistan: "The future of Pakistan, as [President Pervez] Musharraf and his people fully understand, is to de-radicalize elements of the population."
  • On the Middle East conflict: "It would help to have a moderate force in the Palestinian territories and to have the beginnings of rapprochement with Israel and the rest of its neighbors."
  • On the Far East: "I would like to see an improvement in Japanese-China relations."
In her pointed rebuttal of Clinton's inflammatory claims about the war on terror, Rice maintained the Bush White House did the best it could to defend against an attack - and expanded on the tools and intelligence it inherited.

"I would just suggest that you go back and read the 9/11 commission report on the efforts of the Bush administration in the eight months - things like working to get an armed Predator [drone] that actually turned out to be extraordinarily important," Rice added.
She also said Clinton's claims that Richard Clarke - the White House anti-terror guru hyped by Clinton as the country's "best guy" - had been demoted by Bush were bogus.
"Richard Clarke was the counterterrorism czar when 9/11 happened. And he left when he did not become deputy director of homeland security, some several months later," she said.
Rice noted that the world changed after 9/11.
"I would make the divide Sept. 11, 2001, when the attack on this country mobilized us to fight the war on terror in a very different way," Rice said.
Rice cited the final 9/11 commission report to substantiate her claims, while Clinton relied on Clarke's book as the basis for many of his rehashing the events leading up to the Sept. 11 attacks.
"I think this is not a very fruitful discussion. We've been through it. The 9/11 commission has turned over every rock and we know exactly what they said," she added.
Transitioning to the global war on terror, an animated Rice questioned, "When are we going to stop blaming ourselves for the rise of terrorism?"
Asked about recently leaked internal U.S. intelligence estimates that claimed the Iraq war was fueling terrorist recruiting, Rice said: "Now that we're fighting back, of course they are fighting back, too."
"I find it just extraordinary that the argument is, all right, so they're using the fact they're being challenged in the Middle East and challenged in Iraq to recruit, therefore you've made the war on terrorism worse.
"It's as if we were in a good place on Sept. 11. Clearly, we weren't," she added.
"These are people who want to fight against us, and they're going to find a reason. And yes, they will recruit, but it doesn't mean you stop pursuing strategies that are ultimately going to stop them," Rice said.
She insisted U.S. forces must finish the job in Iraq and the wider Middle East to wipe out the "root cause" of violent extremism - not just the terror thugs who carry out the attacks.
"It's a longer-term strategy, and it may even have some short-term down side, but if you don't look at the longer term, you're just leaving the problem to somebody else," she said.
She also said Middle East countries like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan have a "major educational reform" effort under way to root out propaganda literature and extremist brainwashing.
In Latin America, home to outrageous Venezuelan bomb thrower Hugo Chavez, Rice said the U.S. approach is to "spend as little time possible in talking about Chavez and more time talking about our positive agenda in Latin America," including several trade agreements. With Post Wire Services
 
[quote name='nathansu']Also if you have any type of scientific background you may have read that those towers couldn't have been demolished in that way by two planes. Whomever was closer to bin laden is a moot point - 9/11 was an inside job anyhow.[/QUOTE]

Say, you seem like an intelligent guy, have you ever considered the opportunities offered in the high class world of bridge ownership?
 
Y'know, all this nonsense would be a helluva lot easier to parse out if the 9/11 Commission was able to publish the discussions they had with Clinton and Bush/Cheney.
 
[quote name='mykevermin']Y'know, all this nonsense would be a helluva lot easier to parse out if the 9/11 Commission was able to publish the discussions they had with Clinton and Bush/Cheney.[/QUOTE]


that would make too much sense
 
I'm just wondering where all the outrage is that Clinton admitted trying to kill Osama Bin Laden without giving him "due process".
 
Good marketing for the mainstream Democratic Party, I guess.

(They knew what they were doing and what they were getting themselves in.)
 
http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/2001_memo_to_Rice_contradicts_statements_0926.html

2001 memo to Rice contradicts statements about Clinton, Pakistan

Larry Womack
Published: Tuesday September 26, 2006

Print This Email This
[New to RAW STORY? Be sure to check out our front page for all the latest breaking news.]

A memo received by United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice shortly after becoming National Security Advisor in 2001 directly contradicts statements she made to reporters yesterday, RAW STORY has learned.

"We were not left a comprehensive strategy to fight al Qaeda," Rice told a reporter for the New York Post on Monday. "Big pieces were missing," Rice added, "like an approach to Pakistan that might work, because without Pakistan you weren't going to get Afghanistan."

Rice made the comments in response to claims made Sunday by former President Bill Clinton, who argued that his administration had done more than the current one to address the al Qaeda problem before the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. She stopped short of calling the former president a liar.

However, RAW STORY has found that just five days after President George W. Bush was sworn into office, a memo from counter-terrorism expert Richard A. Clarke to Rice included the 2000 document, "Strategy for Eliminating the Threat from the Jihadist Networks of al-Qida: Status and Prospects." This document devotes over 2 of its 13 pages of material to specifically addressing strategies for securing Pakistan's cooperation in airstrikes against al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Click to expand...

C'mon Condi, if you're gonna lie, make sure the documents you're lying about haven't already been released. The link has the pdf's. While I'll admit the 13 page plan might not be totally complete, they coulda dotted a few i's and crossed a few t's then taken credit for the whole thing.
 
[quote name='mykevermin']I'm just wondering who in the world has suggested he deserve "due process," Mr. Straw Man.[/QUOTE]

See the other thread that was discussing giving terrorists protection under the constitution. Though it reassuring to me at least we can agree that Osama at least shouldn't get such protection. At least I'm consistent in my beliefs, that's all.
 
I'll go this far on Bin Laden, I'm more then a little surprised that there hasn't been some sort of trial in absentia of him. At the very least it'd be a huge PR bonus on part of either administration.
 
[quote name='dopa345']See the other thread that was discussing giving terrorists protection under the constitution. Though it reassuring to me at least we can agree that Osama at least shouldn't get such protection. At least I'm consistent in my beliefs, that's all.[/QUOTE]

Sure, because all other terrorists = Osama. No need to parse out the complexities of the world as long as you're consistent.

Pro-lifers who are against safe-sex education and unwanted pregnancy reducing policies and approaches think of themselves as consistent too. Let's give them three years and maybe build them a trophy! Yay for oversimplification!

You'll have to forgive me for not caring if you think that because Osama deserves what he gets, given that he is the admitted mastermind behind 9/11, all other alleged terrorists deserve similar treatment. Your "consistency" is pitiful, as it gives you carte blanche to make judgement calls for how other people are treated with no regard to how they came into our captivity.
 
[quote name='schuerm26']Give it a break. All your nonsense conspiracies have been debunked.[/quote]

Debunked by whom? Fox news columnists that have no scientific background to make such a judgement, or foresight to look at the facts?

Point blank, with jet propellant alone, the foundation of the building would not have been that hot (as indicated in various pictures of melted metal taken on 9/11). It's simple - metal cannot become so hot from propellant + associated explosions - the only thing that could have done it was something else that exploded.

Oh but the American Government would never do such a thing. ORLY? JFK had members whom planned such a thing (from the DOD and Joint Cheifs of Staff) fired.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods

And you think the idiots running this country wouldn't do exactly same? If so, please tell me how this "war on terror" isn't beneficial to the Bush administration.

Think for a minute, please.
 
[quote name='elprincipe']You, sir, are a conspiracy theorist nutjob. Please try to learn some critical thinking skills in school one of these days.[/quote]
Yes - please see operation northwood in my post above. Doubt anyone would hesitate to do the same now?

The common presumption of the American public en masse that our government is not capible of willfully harming us is absolutely crazy. I'd suggest you learn critical thinking skills and look at the facts. They are right in front of your eyes, all you have to do is stop ignoring them.
 
[quote name='mykevermin']Sure, because all other terrorists = Osama. No need to parse out the complexities of the world as long as you're consistent.

Pro-lifers who are against safe-sex education and unwanted pregnancy reducing policies and approaches think of themselves as consistent too. Let's give them three years and maybe build them a trophy! Yay for oversimplification!

You'll have to forgive me for not caring if you think that because Osama deserves what he gets, given that he is the admitted mastermind behind 9/11, all other alleged terrorists deserve similar treatment. Your "consistency" is pitiful, as it gives you carte blanche to make judgement calls for how other people are treated with no regard to how they came into our captivity.[/QUOTE]

You'll then forgive me if I find your view that there are terrorists that are "less evil" pitiful as well. I think anyone that takes the innocent life of a fellow American regardless of their role as equally accountable.
 
[quote name='nathansu']Debunked by whom? Fox news columnists that have no scientific background to make such a judgement, or foresight to look at the facts?

Point blank, with jet propellant alone, the foundation of the building would not have been that hot (as indicated in various pictures of melted metal taken on 9/11). It's simple - metal cannot become so hot from propellant + associated explosions - the only thing that could have done it was something else that exploded.

Oh but the American Government would never do such a thing. ORLY? JFK had members whom planned such a thing (from the DOD and Joint Cheifs of Staff) fired.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods

And you think the idiots running this country wouldn't do exactly same? If so, please tell me how this "war on terror" isn't beneficial to the Bush administration.

Think for a minute, please.[/quote]

I agree that there has been no hard evidence presented to debunk the theory that there were explosives in the towers. I still think it is a possibility, given the way in which both collapsed. Whether or not our government had something to do with it is another question. And you can't forget building 7, which fell after only being hit by debris.
 
[quote name='nathansu']Agreed - but, it's been statistically shown that they won the last two. The statistical chance (given exit polls, various history metrics, etc) of GWB actually "legally" winning the elections has shown to have been nil.

Also if you have any type of scientific background you may have read that those towers couldn't have been demolished in that way by two planes. Whomever was closer to bin laden is a moot point - 9/11 was an inside job anyhow.[/QUOTE]


You live in a house that was built before 1978?
 
[quote name='nathansu']Debunked by whom? Fox news columnists that have no scientific background to make such a judgement, or foresight to look at the facts?[/QUOTE]

Oh I know...Popular Mechanics is now a conservative magazine.
 
[quote name='dopa345']You'll then forgive me if I find your view that there are terrorists that are "less evil" pitiful as well. I think anyone that takes the innocent life of a fellow American regardless of their role as equally accountable.[/QUOTE]

That "guilty before innocent" perspective isn't very American, now is it?
 
[quote name='mykevermin']That "guilty before innocent" perspective isn't very American, now is it?[/QUOTE]

TEH YES IT IES~~~~~!!!! DESE COLURS DONT RUNZ!!!1!#!Q31

Seriously, some people are stupid.
 
[quote name='mykevermin']That "guilty before innocent" perspective isn't very American, now is it?[/QUOTE]

Counterpoint: how are we to try suicide bombers?

(For arguement's sake)
 
[quote name='CocheseUGA']Counterpoint: how are we to try suicide bombers?

(For arguement's sake)[/QUOTE]

Are you talking about posthumously trying suicide bombers, or those who have been captured prior to execution (those 24 people in the UK a few months back, for instance)?
 
Posthumously, of course. I'm not necessarily advocating suspension of constitutional rights, but what's the line where we can decide what's ok when it comes to preventing innocent people losing their lives?
 
Well, if you want to try them posthumously, they'd have already committed the attack and killed innocents, and likely themselves. Any trial would be purely symbolic.

As for those who have not brought out an attack yet (like the Britains), give them a fair trial. If you want to make this kind of criminal action punishable by death, that's fine and within the jurisdiction of the criminal justice system. What would you recommend we do with captured would-be suicide bombers if not try them?
 
[quote name='mykevermin']Well, if you want to try them posthumously, they'd have already committed the attack and killed innocents, and likely themselves. Any trial would be purely symbolic.

As for those who have not brought out an attack yet (like the Britains), give them a fair trial. If you want to make this kind of criminal action punishable by death, that's fine and within the jurisdiction of the criminal justice system. What would you recommend we do with captured would-be suicide bombers if not try them?[/QUOTE]

I never said, or remotely implied anything about them. Try them, of course. But the first time we find one innocent, then they attempt it again, they are all up shit creek. At that point we'd have to have a complete overhaul of our criminal justice system and a re-examination about what our liberties are.
 
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