Dick Cheney, the “Dark Lord” of U.S. Policy

Responsible for military intervention, waterboarding and Guantanamo: Dick Cheney is regarded as an unscrupulous power politician. His memoirs confirm that image.

The U.S. president stood up to Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and demonstrated to the world his commitment to military intervention. He launched a four-day attack on Iraq using bombers and cruise missiles. “If Saddam defies the world, and we fail to respond, we will face a far greater threat in the future,” he said.

It was Dec. 16, 1998, and the president was Bill Clinton. In his memoirs entitled “In My Time,” which went on sale last Monday, Dick Cheney, who served as vice president under Clinton’s successor, now reminds us of this decisive action taken by a Democratic commander in chief.

Cheney Purposely Stayed in the Background

Cheney’s reference to Clinton isn’t the only sign that the controversial vice president views himself as having been in tune with the policies of past administrations. His nearly 600-page tome makes it apparent that Barack Obama, who was elected as a stark alternative to Bush, increasingly came to embrace the security policies of his predecessor.

Cheney, now 70, is considered the “Dark Lord” of U.S. policy. The astute political scientist purposely stayed in the background in order to avoid upstaging his intellectually inferior boss, President Bush. But this loyalty is generally interpreted as cynical string-pulling. By the end of his term, Cheney found himself portrayed as an unscrupulous power politician responsible for military interventions, waterboarding and Guantanamo.

That portrayal need not be altered significantly after one has read “In My Time.” Cheney confirms his hard-line stance. In 2007, he advocated the bombing of Syrian nuclear facilities in order to halt further weapons development and assistance from Iran and North Korea. But his position on that was “unfortunately” ignored. The “enhanced interrogation techniques,” including the simulated drowning process called waterboarding, are today considered torture. Cheney considers them to have been safe, legal and effective. He maintains they prevented further attacks after 9/11 and were instrumental in saving American lives.

That’s decidedly rejected by the Obama camp, but their moral stance is on shaky ground because the new president has since adopted so many of Bush’s controversial policies. He did away with waterboarding, but Obama has tripled the number of troops in Afghanistan, and under his command the CIA has expanded the use of unmanned drone aerial attacks on terrorist havens in Pakistan.

He has long since abandoned his bold promise to close Guantanamo within a year. He has launched his own attacks off Libya’s coast, and he had al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden assassinated by U.S. commandos.

Shocking Pictures of Waterboarding

Because of these developments, Cheney serenely defends his own policies. He brings up the fact that John McCain, the Republican candidate for president in 2008, was against the practice of waterboarding. Cheney says that McCain’s stance is worthy of respect because McCain was tortured as a prisoner of war. But Cheney also later covers his own back by revealing that other prisoners had assured him that such procedures didn’t really constitute torture.

As far as the decision to invade Iraq is concerned, Cheney defends it by saying U.S. intelligence had repeatedly confirmed that Saddam Hussein was developing nuclear and biological weaponry. He also cites an alleged Iraqi plan to assassinate President George H.W. Bush as proof of how dangerous the dictator was. In addition, he claims Saddam Hussein had granted high-ranking al-Qaida officials sanctuary in Iraq and added that subsequent to 9/11, there was no nation with a more likely nexus between terrorism and weapons of mass destruction than Iraq.

Disagreement on Putin

The former secretaries of Defense and State, Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice respectively, also don’t come off so well in Cheney’s book. They’re depicted as naïve. But even George W. Bush, generally the object of much of Cheney’s praise, has to absorb occasional criticism, such as when he rejected Cheney’s recommendation to attack Syrian nuclear facilities, thereby sending an unmistakable signal to nations like Iran and North Korea. The attacks in Syria were eventually carried out by the Israelis.

Bush and Cheney also disagreed in their assessments of Russian President Vladimir Putin after their initial meeting. Bush announced he had “looked the man in the eye” and “was able to get a sense of his soul.” Cheney, on the other hand, said he had looked Putin in the eye and saw an experienced KGB agent.