In anticipation of his run to become the Democratic Party presidential candidate, former Vice President Joe Biden re-wrote his earlier account of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden. Biden now says that he encouraged President Barack Obama to move forward with the plot to assassinate Osama bin Laden.
NBC News reports – Speaking at the Walter Mondale: Living Legacy forum in Washington, Biden said he in fact privately counseled Obama to go ahead, acknowledging “it would have been a mistake” to encourage him either way during a national security meeting where Obama was consulting with top aides on the decision.
“We walked out of the room and walked upstairs,” Biden said. “I told him my opinion: I thought he should go, but to follow his own instincts.”
That contrasts with how Biden described his consultation with Obama during a meeting with House Democrats in 2012 when he said he told the president, “‘Mr. President, my suggestion is, don’t go. We have to do two more things to see if he’s there.'”
White House press secretary Josh Earnest declined to weigh in on Biden’s account of the events, saying during Tuesday’s White House press briefing only that “I am going to leave the dissection and the oral history of those days to those who were actually there.”
Declassified documents now reveal a secret plan by Osama bin Laden to create a crisis in the United States by taking out then-President Barack Obama and leaving a “totally unprepared” Joe Biden to become president, was found inside bin Laden’s compound.
Fox News- The secretive documents, first reported in 2012 by The Washington Post, outlined a plan to take out Obama and top U.S. military commander David Petraeus as they traveled by plane.
Bin Laden specifically wanted fellow terrorist Ilyas Kashmiri to shoot down Obama.
“Please ask brother Ilyas to send me the steps he has taken into that work,” bin Laden wrote to the top lieutenant, Atiyah Abd al-Rahman. Kashmiri wouldn’t get too far along in the plot, however; he was killed in 2011 in a U.S. drone strike shortly after bin Laden himself was shot to death by Navy SEALs.
Just The News reports – “Obama is the head of infidelity and killing him automatically will make Biden take over the presidency … Biden is totally unprepared for that post, which will lead the U.S. into a crisis,” wrote bin Laden to one of his advisers.
He also referred to Gen. Petraeus as “the man of the hour,” saying that killing him would “alter the war’s path” in Afghanistan.
The documents highlight the al-Qaeda leader’s continued focus on attacking Americans. To one of his deputies, he wrote that it was important to remain concentrated on “every effort that could be spent on attacks in America.” Bin Laden instructed regional leaders to “ask brothers in all regions if they have a brother … who can operate in the U.S.”
Biden’s own narrative on his position surrounding the strike that killed bin Laden has been shaky over the years. At times saying he told then-President Obama not to order the strike, but changing his mind every so often to claim he supported the movement.
