Clinton, Quayle Missile Jabs Miss the Mark

Call it the case of the dueling missile gaffes.

Campaigning in Connecticut on Tuesday, Democratic presidential nominee Bill Clinton misstated the role of the Patriot air defense system in the Persian Gulf War, saying that the weapons “go through doors or down chimneys.”

Vice President Dan Quayle, at a campaign stop later in the day in the San Bernardino County community of Upland, sought to poke fun at Clinton over his comment. But Quayle proceeded to make his own mistake.

Clinton’s verbal miscue occurred as he spoke to manufacturing workers in Portland, Conn. At one point, he said, “We do all this research and people come up with great ideas, and then they turn them into things like the Patriot missiles, which will down through doors or down chimneys. . . . We all saw that on television.”

The Arkansas governor apparently was referring to camera footage released by the Pentagon that showed laser-guided bombs entering ventilation shafts in Baghdad and reports that some bombs struck aircraft hangar doorways.

However, Patriot missiles were used to shoot down other missiles. They were fired at Iraqi Scud ballistic missiles.

Quayle wasted little time calling attention to Clinton’s error. At his rally in Upland, he said Clinton “was trying to show he was an expert when it came to national security matters. The problem is, Bill Clinton didn’t know the difference between the Patriot missile and the Cruise missile.”

Drawing a laugh from his crowd of about 2,000, Quayle added: “Governor, you have confused the Patriot with the Cruise missile. Bill Clinton knows less about national security than I do about spelling.”

In fact, Cruise missiles don’t go down chimneys either. In the Gulf War, laser-guided bombs dropped by F-117 Stealth bombers accomplished that task.