President Clinton's top foreign policy advisers yesterday staunchly defended the attacks he ordered last week on suspected terrorist facilities in Afghanistan and Sudan and two said the timing of the strikes had nothing to do with the president's personal troubles.

"We think that what we managed to do was to have some significant impact on the terrorist planning activities in what is a major terrorist camp," (Madeleine K.) Albright said, referring to the remote area in Afghanistan that allegedly has been a paramilitary training base for followers of Islamic militant Osama bin Laden.

Defense Secretary William S. Cohen, on NBC's "Meet the Press," said that U.S. officials do not know if bin Laden, a Saudi millionaire and a suspected terrorist leader, was in the targeted area of Afghanistan during the cruise missile strikes.