Clinton: I Tried to Warn Bush About Bin Laden

Ex-President Bill Clinton claimed yesterday that he tried to warn President Bush before 9/11 that Osama bin Laden posed the greatest danger to the United States - but that Bush wouldn't listen.

Speaking at a luncheon sponsored by the History Channel, Clinton said that during a January 2001 transition exit interview, "I told [Bush] that in my opinion, the biggest security problem was Osama bin Laden."

President Bush, however, refused to heed the warning, Clinton claimed. He said that Bush's failure to appreciate the gravity of his advice on bin Laden was "one of the two or three of the biggest disappointments that I had."

The ex-president's quotes were first reported by Reuters.

In January, Mrs. Clinton also claimed that President Bush ignored her husband's bin Laden warnings, saying that the Republican leader had "different" priorities.

"I know that during the transition between the Clinton and Bush administrations that the outgoing administration told the incoming one that they would spend more time on terrorism and bin Laden than anything else," she told radio host Mike Siegel. "And that wasn't their priority. Their priorities were different."

The former first couple attempted to blame Bush for ignoring warnings about the top terrorist even though Mr. Clinton has admitted that he turned down an offer to take bin Laden into custody before 9/11.

Addressing a New York business group in February 2002, the ex-president offered his only account to date on the ill-fated decision:

"We'd been hearing that the Sudanese wanted America to start meeting with them again. They released him. At the time, 1996, he had committed no crime against America so I did not bring him here because we had no basis on which to hold him."

Clinton told the group that he declined Sudan's offer to extradite bin Laden "[even] though we knew he wanted to commit crimes against America."

Asked in January about her husband's devastating confession, Mrs. Clinton told NewsMax.com, "That's not my understanding of the facts. As I understand the facts there was never a full and thorough offer."

Sen. Clinton did not explain why her husband's account of such an important decision was at odds with her own.

To listen to Bill and Hillary contradict each other on how they let Osama bin Laden off the hook, Click Here.

Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:
Sen. Hillary Clinton

Editor's note:
"CATASTROPHE" Reveals Bill Clinton’s Role in 9/11 - Click Here to find out more