Cheney: Waterboarding 'successful'

WASHINGTON, Dec. 15 (UPI) -- Vice President Dick Cheney denied the United States uses torture but said interrogation practices used on terror suspects have been "remarkably successful."

In an interview with ABC News, Cheney said waterboarding was appropriate in the interrogation of Khalid Sheik Mohammed, accused of masterminding the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

"On the question of so-called torture, we don't do torture," Cheney said. "We never have. It's not something that this administration subscribes to."

He said he supported the interrogation techniques used on Mohammed.

"There was a period of time there, three or four years ago, when about half of everything we knew about al-Qaida came from that one source," he added. "So, it's been a remarkably successful effort. I think the results speak for themselves."

In an interview Monday with right-wing radio personality Rush Limbaugh, Cheney said he doesn't think the incoming Obama administration will give up the power he helped accrue to the executive branch.

"We did not exceed our constitutional authority, as some have suggested, but we -- the president believes, I believe very deeply, in a strong executive, and I think that's essential in this day and age," Cheney said. "And I think the Obama administration is not likely to cede that authority back to the Congress. I think they'll find that given a challenge they face, they'll need all the authority they can muster."

Cheney said he is most proud of the administration's work to prevent further terrorist attacks on U.S. soil after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, and thinks the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where terror suspects are detained "has been very well run" and will be hard to close.

On the economy, Cheney said he thinks the steps taken so far to help the financial markets are "taking us in the right direction."

"But obviously there's still -- still a lot of work to be done out there, and we're still faced with the aftermath of a lot of this for the next several months," he said. "It's a problem the Obama administration is going to have to deal with."