Richard Perle: On the defensive: America's Prince of Darkness

Richard Perle is a man with many enemies. Some he has designated himself, the list being topped by Saddam Hussein, whom he has elevated almost single-handed to world-threatening despot. The majority, however, he has made in the course of more than 30 years as the most convinced and uncompromising of America's hawks.

So there was undisguised glee among US liberals and old-style cosmopolitan conservatives this week when Perle suddenly resigned his one official post: chairman of the Pentagon's shadowy Defense Policy Board (DPB). It had taken him several days and much protesting of innocence to conclude that his position was untenable.

The charge was one of straightforward conflict of interest. The New York Times – hardly a soulmate of Perle's – had reported that Perle stood to reap a fat fee as a consultant to the bankrupt telecommunications company, Global Crossing. The aim of the consultancy, the article said, was to effect a sale of the company that would place it under Chinese ownership – something about which the US government had grave misgivings on national security grounds. The article followed an exposé in the New Yorker magazine in which the investigative journalist, Seymour Hersh, had accused Perle of inappropriately mixing business and public office in dealings with Saudi Arabia. Perle had threatened to sue.

Perle did not deny the Global Crossing contract, but insisted it had nothing whatever to do with his position as a Pentagon adviser, and everything to do with his past experience of national security issues. He denied that he had used his publicly funded post for private gain. In a radio interview, he called the author of the original story, Hersh, "a terrorist" – the greatest insult in today's America after being called a crony of Saddam Hussein.

But, as he stated in his letter of resignation, he had seen similar controversies before, and had concluded, "as I cannot quickly or easily quell criticism of me based on errors of fact," he had little alternative but to resign.

Given Perle's closeness to many in the Pentagon, the official statement from the Defense Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, hardly exuded warmth. "Richard Perle has a deep understanding of our national security process and an abiding interest in preserving America's strength and freedom. He has been an excellent chairman and has led the DPB during an important time in our history."

Any hopes that his foes might have had that Perle was departing public life, however, were premature. He had resigned only the chairmanship; he remains on the board. Remarkably, he is also keeping his consultancy, although he says that he will donate any fee to the families of servicemen killed and injured in Iraq. The net result is that he has deftly managed to keep a foot in both camps. The chairmanship and the cash might be lost, but as someone who made large sums from defence consultancy after serving as Ronald Reagan's Assistant Defense Secretary, Perle is not short of cash.

Nor, it must be said, have financial considerations ever been seen as the prime motivating force for Richard Perle. He is first of all an ideologue, with all the self-confidence and missionary zeal that word implies. After advising George W Bush's campaign on defence matters during the 2000 presidential campaign, he declined a paid post in the administration, choosing to accept the unpaid chairmanship of the DPB instead. What he sought was not so much overt power (and the responsibility that went with it) as influence, and a platform from which to expound his views.

The DPB, created in 1985, is a strangely untransparent body of about 30 people, which has an advisory, but no executive, role. It is not technically part of the Administration – its members are not government employees – but it enjoys access to classified documents and, under Perle, has acquired increasing clout. As chairman, Perle was not paid, but he was required to comply with the ethics code that governs US government employment: that includes not using the position for personal financial gain. This is the propriety that he is accused of violating in his latest business dealings.

Perle used the ambiguity of his status, half inside, but officially outside the Administration, to impressive effect. There is scarcely a talk-show or newspaper comment page in the English-speaking world where he has not appeared. Highly articulate, passionate about the rightness of his sharply black-and-white views, and deceptively avuncular in manner, he made himself widely available. Thus did he become the voice of the Bush administration on foreign and defence policy around the world. And where more moderate members of the Administration – from the State Department, for example – seemed to shy away from public exposure – Perle has been a frequent guest, including on the BBC.

His view of a world as divided between a righteous America and evil dictatorships, with a timid Europe in the middle, is one reason why the Bush administration's stock is so low in much of Europe. For all his comfortable pudginess and easy manner, he makes the world, and George Bush's intentions towards it, seem scary to those accustomed to seeing political geography in a more nuanced perspective.

Now 62, he grew up under the shadow of the Cold War, which to a large extent still governs the categories he thinks in. As a student, he was a disciple of the mathematician and hardline cold-warrior Albert Wohlstetter, a philosophical patron he shares with Paul Wolfowitz, the Deputy Defense Secretary, as hardline a thinker as Perle.

After receiving a graduate degree in politics from Princeton, Perle worked for the conservative Senator, Scoop Jackson – whose reputation was hawk of all hawks. He remained in Jackson's office for 11 years. Always a fierce advocate of Israel's interests, he departed, some say, under a cloud, because of what were seen as excessively close ties with the Israeli embassy in Washington.

Throughout the Cold War, Perle applied his clear-cut ideas to US rivalry with the Soviet Union and his sharp mind to the complexities of arms control. It was for this expertise and the sound conservatism of his beliefs that President Reagan appointed him Assistant Defense Secretary. He held the post for six years, six years of some of the most ideological rhetoric – "evil empire" – and highest defence spending in US history. He has never held any more senior post in any administration, however. Partly, it is believed, because he would not easily gain Congressional confirmation.

Perle's unstinting support for Israel has been a political liability for him in some circles, where his unapologetic espousal of Zionism has led to accusations that he has jeopardised US national interests. One instance cited is his fierce lobbying against any Clinton-brokered Middle East agreement that might entail Israel sacrificing territory or sharing Jerusalem. As well as his neo-conservative academic and Pentagon associations, Perle is currently on the board of the Jerusalem Post. It was this paper that last week printed a report, not yet proven, that US troops had discovered a chemical weapons factory in Iraq.

The zeal with which Perle advances the interests of Israel's conservatives, however, has long been more than matched by his excoriation of Iraq under Saddam Hussein. "Regime-change", as it has become known, has been a central objective of Perle's for at least a decade. He is one of a small group – again, including Wolfowitz – that regards Saddam as the fount of all evil in the Gulf region and bitterly condemns the decision of the first President George Bush not to pursue the Gulf War all the way to Baghdad.

Perle represents a constellation of views – some substantiated, many not – that lie at the heart of the second President Bush's choice to go to war on Iraq. As expressed in his many articles and interviews, he firmly believes that Saddam Hussein routinely sponsors terrorism and has close ties with and helped fund al-Qa'ida – blamed for the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001. He equally believes that Iraq possesses all manner of weapons of mass destruction and would use them without hesitation. The evidence for the first is negligible; the second at least inconclusive.

Perle, however, is not someone especially troubled by self-doubt. One of the reasons why he has been in such constant demand on television talkshows and elsewhere in the media is his facility with words and the categorical manner in which he expresses his views. He is master of the soundbite and never at a loss for an answer. In his years at the Pentagon, Perle often came across as a sinister figure, a Svengali. His dark hair and colouring, along with his quizzical frown and undisputed influence made him the "Prince of Darkness". The name has stuck, even though his hair is now grey and his manner more mellow.

As his career has progressed, it is at least arguable that his ideological certainty has clouded the intellectual rigour that drew him to embrace the hawks and the field of arms control in the first place. A master of the short polemic, he has never set out his philosophy in extended form; he has edited, but never authored, whole books – except one Cold-War novel. He is also one of several in the Bush circle who have not hesitated to argue for war as a solution, although they have no military experience themselves.

Until recently there was evidence that Perle's lust for war on Iraq was one of several views that vied for the President's ear. Mr Bush did not seem to trust him completely. The breakdown of the UN talks on 17 March was Perle's vindication. Two days later, the US was at war.

It is tempting to see it as a personal tragedy for Richard Perle that a misjudgement has forced him into self-demotion just as Mr Bush is embarking on the project that he did so much to advance. If the military campaign encounters further setbacks, however, he may have made his exit from the public front line just in time.

Life story

Born

Richard Norman Perle, 16 September 1941, New York City.

Family

Son of Jack and Martha Perle; married Leslie Joan Barr 31 July 1977; one child, Jonathan.

Education

BA from the University of from Southern California; MA in political science from Princeton University.

Business career

Adviser to International Advisors Incorporated 1989-1994; director of the Autonomy Corporation; managing partner of Trireme Partners LP; adviser to Global Crossing Ltd; director of The Jerusalem Post; CEO of Hollinger.

Political career

Staffer for Senator Henry 'Scoop' Jackson in the 1970s, when he wrote speeches for as many as 16 senators; Assistant Secretary of Defence for International Security Policy, 1981-1987; chairman of Defence Policy Board since July 2001.

Publications

Reshaping Western Security (1991);

paid $300,000 by Random House to write Hard Line (1992), about his time in the Reagan administration.

Nickname

The Prince of Darkness

He says

"The Saudis are a major source of the problem we face with terrorism."

They say

"It's Richard Perle's world. We're just fighting in it" – Maureen Dowd.

"I have known Richard Perle for many years and know him to be a man of integrity and honor" – Donald Rumsfeld.