President Bush fired back at ex-president Clinton on Thursday, saying his weak response to repeated terrorist attacks on U.S. interests during the 1990s encouraged al Qaida to launch the 9/11 attacks.
"The terrorists saw our response to the hostage crisis in Iran, the bombings in the Marine barracks in Lebanon, the first World Trade Center attack, the killing of American soldiers in Somalia, the destruction of two U.S. embassies in Africa and the attack on the USS Cole," Bush noted, after getting an update on the war on terror at the Pentagon.
"The terrorists concluded that we lacked the courage and character to defend ourselves and so they attacked us," the president added, in quotes picked up by United Press International.
Four of the six terrorist attacks cited by Bush took place on Clinton's watch, with the first two coming during the presidencies of Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan.
Bush's decision to invoke Clinton's poor record on terrorism comes just five days after the ex-president slammed him for attacking Iraq without just cause. |