Former US president Bill Clinton says he thoroughly researched evidence of aliens while in office, and “wouldn’t be surprised” if we were visited one day by extraterrestrials.

Speaking to late night TV host Jimmy Kimmel, Mr Clinton said that the anniversary of the Roswell incident in Area 51 prompted him to investigate the controversial topic.

“First, I had people go look at the records on Area 51 to make sure there was no alien down there,” Clinton said. “But there are no aliens there. So then I, when the Roswell thing came up, I knew we’d get gazillions of letters. So I had all the Roswell papers reviewed, everything.”

While the former president found no evidence of interplanetary hitchhikers at Area 51, he says that doesn’t rule out life on other planets.

“We know from our fancy telescopes that just in the last two years more than 20 planets have been identified outside our solar system that seem to be far enough away from their sun and dense enough that they might be able to support some form of life,” he said. “So it makes it increasing less likely that we’re alone.”

Mr Clinton just hopes that, if aliens do visit, they aren’t on a mission to destroy the Earth.

“I just hope that it’s not like ‘Independence Day’, the movie, that it’s a conflict,” he said.

But far from signalling our doom, the elder statesman – whose wife Hilary is also considering a tilt at the White House – mused that a close encounter of the third kind could bring about world peace.

“[It] may be the only way to unite us in this incredibly divided world of ours,” Clinton said. “If they’re out there, we better think of how all the differences among people on Earth would seem small if we felt threatened by a space invader. That’s the whole theory of ‘Independence Day’. Everybody gets together and makes nice.”