On Friday I previewed the interview that Dick Cheney gave to Fox News Sunday based upon a McClatchy News report. I argued that the interview reveals the extent to which he is personally concerned about where a Justice Department investigation of torture will lead. I pointed out (a) that Cheney went so far as to say he's "OK" with CIA interrogators who violated the rules (as elastic as they were) by engaging in mock executions etc., and (b) that Cheney claimed rather bizarrely that he knew nothing about who specifically was being waterboarded under his watch. My point was that these extreme statements show that Cheney is worried any investigation will head in his direction.
Here is the transcript of the Cheney interview on Fox News Sunday. Cheney's full comments are even more over the top than one might have expected.
Early on he insists that Attorney General Holder's decision to open a (very limited) review of potential CIA wrongdoing is "clearly a political move". "I mean, there's no other rationale for why they're doing this," Cheney adds. Obviously Cheney wants to avoid at all costs having to debate the issue on the grounds of whether laws were broken.
When Chris Wallace raises the question of whether the DoJ will also investigate the lawyers who wrote the torture memos, Cheney expresses great indignation at the possibility and then quickly changes the subject.
Cheney also dodges the question of whether he knew about the scandalous details of abuse that were described in the CIA Inspector General's report. That is where Cheney admits to knowing about the existence of waterboarding in general, though not about who it was used against. But Cheney avoids addressing whether he was aware of any of the other types of abuse. He follows that with a blunt endorsement of those who engaged in abuse even beyond what the torture memos had authorized:
WALLACE: Let me ask you -- you say you're proud of what we did. The inspector general's report which was just released from 2004 details some specific interrogations -- mock executions, one of the detainees threatened with a handgun and with an electric drill, waterboarding Khalid Sheikh Mohammed 183 times.
First of all, did you know that was going on?
CHENEY: I knew about the waterboarding. Not specifically in any one particular case, but as a general policy that we had approved.
The fact of the matter is, the Justice Department reviewed all of those allegations several years ago. They looked at this question of whether or not somebody had an electric drill in an interrogation session. It was never used on the individual, or that they had brought in a weapon, never used on the individual. The judgment was made then that there wasn't anything there that was improper or illegal with respect to conduct in question...
(CROSSTALK)
WALLACE: Do you think what they did, now that you've heard about it, do you think what they did was wrong?
CHENEY: Chris, my sort of overwhelming view is that the enhanced interrogation techniques were absolutely essential in saving thousands of American lives and preventing further attacks against the United States, and giving us the intelligence we needed to go find Al Qaeda, to find their camps, to find out how they were being financed. Those interrogations were involved in the arrest of nearly all the Al Qaeda members that we were able to bring to justice. I think they were directly responsible for the fact that for eight years, we had no further mass casualty attacks against the United States.
It was good policy. It was properly carried out. It worked very, very well.
WALLACE: So even these cases where they went beyond the specific legal authorization, you're OK with it?
CHENEY: I am.
More tellingly still, Cheney refuses to be pinned down on whether he'd agree to speak to a DoJ prosecutor. He states, bizarrely, that his views are already sufficiently well known because he's been publicly outspoken. That suggests that a prosecutor may have to treat interviews such as this one as if they were held under oath.
Oh, and just in case you were wondering, Cheney also assures Chris Wallace that Democrats are soft on national security and national defense.
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