The Great Rift: Dick Cheney, Colin Powell, and the Broken Friendship That Defined an Era

by James Mann

Overview

The Great Rift is a sweeping history of the intertwined careers of Dick Cheney and Colin Powell, whose rivalry and conflicting views of U.S. national security color our political debate to this day.

Dick Cheney and Colin Powell emerged on the national scene more than thirty years ago, and it is easy to forget that they were once allies. The two men collaborated closely in the successful American wars in Panama and Iraq during the presidency of George H. W. Bush—but from this pinnacle, conflicts of ideology and sensibility drove them apart. Returning to government service under George W. Bush in 2001, they (and their respective allies within the administration) fell into ever-deepening antagonism over the role America should play in a world marked by terrorism and other nontraditional threats.

In a wide-ranging, deeply researched, and dramatic narrative, James Mann explores each man’s biography and philosophical predispositions to show how and why this deep and permanent rupture occurred. Through dozens of original interviews and surprising revelations from presidential archives, he brings to life the very human story of how this influential friendship turned so sour and how the enmity of these two powerful men colored the way America acts in the world.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781627797559
Publisher:	Holt, Henry & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	01/14/2020
Pages:	432
Product dimensions:	6.40(w) x 9.20(h) x 1.50(d)

About the Author

James Mann is the author of several books on American politics and national security issues, including Rise of the Vulcans: The History of Bush’s War Cabinet and The Obamians: The Struggle Inside the White House to Redefine American Power. A longtime correspondent for the Los Angeles Times, he is currently a fellow in residence at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies. He lives in Washington, D.C.

Table of Contents

Preface

Part One
INDISPENSABLE
1 Useful Young Men
2 The Quiet Conservative
3 Climbing the Ladder
4 “Your Buddy, Colin”

Part Two
FORTY-ONE
5 Appointments
6 The First Invasion
7 A Much Bigger War
8 Deciding Not to Go to Baghdad
9 The Soviet Collapse
10 Cheney’s Blueprint
11 Departures

Part Three
INTERREGNUM
12 On the Outside
13 The Returns

Part Four
FORTY-THREE
14 From the Very Start
15 September 11 and Its Aftermath
16 The Two Tribes
17 The Nondecision
18 The Road to Baghdad
19 Chaos

Part Five
DISPENSABLE
20 Isolation

Epilogue
Notes
Acknowledgments
Index

Editorial Reviews

Illuminating [and] insightful . . . A significant work of American history.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

"Pick up this engaging book for its insights into Cheney and Powell, but take away the two visions for American leadership they embodied." —The New York Times Book Review

“In his excellent recounting of the rise and fall of the friendship of two major figures in the two Bush presidencies, James Mann tells, in a vivid and compelling way, the story of the American response to twenty years of earthshaking global events: the end of the Cold War, the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and especially the two wars against Saddam Hussein.” —Michael Mandelbaum, author of The Rise and Fall of Peace on Earth

“The Great Rift cements James Mann’s reputation as an essential historian of U.S. foreign policy in modern times. This riveting character study shows how two of the Bush family’s foremost advisers went from allies to adversaries—and what their split tells us about the Republican party in the age of Trump. Mann has done that rare thing: he has captured history in motion.” —David Greenberg, author of Republic of Spin and Nixon’s Shadow

“In James Mann’s powerful new book, The Great Rift, Iraq bookends the fraught and consequential relationship between Colin Powell and Dick Cheney. Deftly using their cooperation and competition as his lens, Mann provides a trenchant, engrossing, and ultimately sad chronicle of the rise and fall of American global leadership after the Cold War.” —Timothy Naftali, author of George H. W. Bush and founding director of the federal Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum

“More than an account of an intimate Washington partnership that degenerated into mutual loathing, this is a study of the limits of unswerving conviction on the one hand, and anti-conceptual pragmatism on the other. As such, it is a warning for the future no less than an account of the past.” —Eliot A. Cohen, former counselor of the Department of State and author of The Big Stick and Supreme Command

“James Mann’s gripping account of the rise and fall of Dick Cheney and Colin Powell is almost Shakespearean in its pitch-perfect portrayal of two close friends turned bitter foes, whose ambition and internecine warfare played a key role in America’s disastrous involvement in the war in Iraq, with grievous effects that continue to this day.” —Lynne Olson, bestselling author of Madame Fourcade’s Secret War and Citizens of London

“In this brisk, penetrating narrative, James Mann offers a thoroughly original way of understanding critical events at the highest levels of government over the last three decades. The Great Rift is outstanding.” —Jonathan Alter, author of The Defining Moment: FDR’s Hundred Days and the Triumph of Hope and The Center Holds: Obama and His Enemies

From the Publisher

★ 2019-12-23
A useful review of the hard-right shift of U.S. foreign policy since the end of the Cold War, delivered via a comparative study of two of the seminal players.

As Mann (George W. Bush, 2015, etc.) shows in this illuminating dual biography and history lesson, early on in their careers, Colin Powell and Dick Cheney both hitched their stars to top government insiders who helped propel them to the highest levels of power. Powell, the amiable, popular soldier, was an aide to both Frank Carlucci and Casper Weinberger at the Defense Department and National Security Council—before becoming national security adviser in 1987. Cheney, "the quiet conservative," became Donald Rumsfeld's aide during Gerald Ford's brief administration before assuming the role of White House chief of staff. Both men, notes the author, achieved stellar appointments during George H.W. Bush's administration and led a "good war" that expelled Iraq from Kuwait while agreeing, prudently, not to extend the war into Baghdad. Yet it was in George W. Bush's administration that the two—Cheney as VP, Powell as secretary of state—began to diverge in thinking and action. Cheney's "blueprint" was essentially to keep the U.S. as the world's dominant military superpower after the collapse of the Soviet Union and actively "block" any hostile rival. Powell maintained a centrist position and urged caution and restraint, especially regarding another war with Iraq. Cheney pushed for aggressive "antiterrorist measures," including the controversial and ultimately self-defeating "black sites" and "enhanced interrogation" measures, while Powell emphasized working with U.S. allies. Both men would develop their own "tribes" of followers. Yet, tragically, it was Powell who became the poster child for the invasion of Iraq, duped by U.S. intelligence into making a false casus belli of Iraq's possession of weapons of mass destruction. The friendship was over, and the split caused deep rifts in the country at large. Still, as Mann demonstrates thoroughly in his insightful dissection of their relationship, Powell was as complicit and eager a participant in the nation's disastrous ventures as Cheney.

A significant work of American history.

Kirkus Reviews