Can we blame 9-11 on Bill Clinton?

Question

Clinton began his Presidency with the first WTC bombings in '93. He was "commander and chief" during the numerous terrorist acts from Al Qaeda and didn't do much. He watched as Al Qaeda grew from a small organization into an international organization. Can we blame him and his inaction for 9-11?

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/knew/etc/cron.html

The point of the question is, should we elect a future leader that will make the same mistakes. Can we learn from the past?

"There shall be peace in our time"
-Chamberlain

Yes I read the 9-11 report. It seems most of you arn't addressing the fact that he was president for 8 years and during that time he had many chances to destroy Al Qaeda and didn't.

Also shooting a few missles is a political STUNT not action!!!!

Answer 1

In a word, yes. Radical Islamic Terrorists have a proven track record of being encouraged when their targets do not retaliate. Due to his lack of action, it encouraged them to strengthen their resolve and come back en force.

Answer 2

You do realize that the facts are against you on every one of your points. Clinton inherited an economy that was in a shambles thanks to Reagan and Bush. If you aren't old enough to remember, the failing economy was the major reason Clinton defeated Bush. Clinton then helped not only turn the economy around, but presided over the longest economic expansion in our history, with an unprecedented period of both low unemployment and low inflation. There is no way at all anyone can say that Bush's deficit is Clinton's fault. Bush's deficit is due to the spending policies of the administration and the Republican congress that was in power for the first six years GWB was in office. As to 9/11, the record shows that Clinton did quite a bit to combat terrorism. Certainly more than Bush before 9/11, as he did not consider it a priority. So, the reason Bush is blamed for these things rather than Clinton is because they are clearly not Clinton's fault, as anyone can see. However, I do not blame Bush for 9/11. I doubt it could have been avoided even if he had cared, thanks to the juvenile provincialism that prevailed in our intelligence agencies.

Answer 3

No. I love the part suggesting that Clinton was responsible for the 1993 bombing. It was a month after he took office. Republicans like to play the "no attacks on American soil in 5 years" game. If you point out that there were no attacks after the 1993 bombing under Clinton, a period of nearly 8 years, they change the rules to throw in embassy bombings in Africa and the Cole. Well we've had attacks on our embassy in Greece, our embassy in Syria. The attacks on our troops are by definition terrorist attacks.
Am I saying that Clinton didn't make mistakes or miss opportunities? No. I wish the right would stop pretending that Bush hasn't made any mistakes or missed any opportunities.

Answer 4

Have you bothered to read the 9-11 report? They said that the Clinton Administration made many mistakes in regards to 9-11 but they also put the bulk of the blame on the Bush Administration and on Condi Rice.

To me it seems everybody screwed up, But to continue this partisan blame game is to forget that the ultimate responsibility for 9-11 is on Osman Bin Linden and El Quida

Answer 5

Read the 9-11 Commission Report. I am no fan of Clinton but reading about actions taken, planned and such, he was doing all he could do politically and diplomatically. The critics of it are blinded by events that happened later. If Clinton had a clean shot at him in 1998 or so, Osama would have been killed then. some of Clinton's people wanted him to stand trial, but I think slick Willie would have had him killed.

Answer 6

It is Bush's fualt. This is what Bush did:

Backed off Clinton administration's anti-terrorism efforts.
Shelved the Hart-Rudman report.

Appointed new anti-terrorism task force under Dick Cheney. Group did not even meet before 9/11.

Called for cuts in anti-terrorism efforts by the Department of Defense.

Gave no priority to anti-terrorism efforts by Justice Department.

Ignored warnings from Sandy Berger, Louis Freeh, George Tennant, Paul Bremer, and Richard Clarke about the urgency of terrorist threats.

Halted Predator drone tracking of Osama bin Laden.

Did nothing in wake of August 6 C.I.A. report to president saying Al Qaeda attack by hijack of an airliner almost certain.

Bush - knowing about the terrorists' plans to attack in America, warned that terrorists were in flight schools in the US - took a four week vacation.

Bush WAS the commander in Chief at the time of 9-11!!

Answer 7

why does everyone want to blame somebody other than the ones who did it? sometimes an enemy comes up with a surprise plan that works. afterall only half the planes they planned on taking actual hit a target. we live (or we used to) in a free society, that means that kind of thing may happen. I'll trade living free with the remote chance of being killed in a terrorist attack then trying to blame the current of past presidents. Let's move on; fear is the weapon of the terrorist

Answer 8

Clinton began his Presidency with the first WTC bombings in '93 -- in fact the bombing happened only TWO MONTHS into his presidency -- So was the 93 bombing Bush 1's fault?

Answer 9

I honestly don'r think you caould blame that event on someone, or atleast not on one specific person. These are people that are extremest. People that in all actuality don't care about anyone, not even themselves. Bill Clinton did have his faults just like every other president. I do believe that he did leaave a lot of things undone for the next president to end up having it fall on his lap for him to deal with.

I think that something possibly could have been done to possibly avoid this tragedy to have happend.

Answer 10

no. what's the point of blaming someone? i could say Bush ignored a memo called "Bin Laden determined to strike U.S." but what's the point? we should leave counter terrorism operations to the experts. i'm sure we could find out what the FBI and CIA was doing about al qaeda under Clinton and Bush, but why blame 1 man for 9-11, unless it is bin Laden. the 9-11 commission reported that the blame lies with our inability to imagine an attack like that one.

Answer 11

There's plenty of blame to go around but blame isn't going to get us anywhere. We can go all the way back to when Jimmy Earl Carter jerked all the support out from under the Shah of Iran and insisted that the Ayatollah be allowed to come back from France because he though Iran would be so much better under the rule of a religious man than under the guy who was keeping the peace.

The thing is, what are we going to do about it now?