The late US vice-president Dick Cheney, who passed away at the age of 84, was seen as among the most powerful occupants of the vice-presidency in the nation's history. Whereas numerous second-in-commands were limited to marginal or ceremonial positions, Cheney wielded huge influence during the administration of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was commonly called as the "true president".
Bush disliked such a characterisation and said the relationship was more complicated. He noted that Cheney was deferential, always calling him in official appearances as the President, while he called him as Dick. Bush challenged even portrayals of their partnership as a collaboration because it indicated that they were peers. In spite of these denials, Cheney found the relaxed president accommodating on a broad range of administrative determinations.
The Period Following the Attacks
At the head of a group of conservative hawks that featured defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been participating in a gathering at a school in Florida. While Bush traveled to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took command, directing the downing of any unresponsive planes nearing the Capitol building.
Cheney said the attacks changed him, causing him to be focused on retribution. Along with other conservative figures, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a takeover of Afghanistan in an endeavor to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the invasion of Iraq, although there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Controversial Policies
He voiced no apologies about the invasion, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, or about the enhanced interrogation of suspects rounded up after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was predicated on misleading information circulated by Cheney, was the proper decision. "It proved to be the correct action to do back then. I was convinced at the time and I hold that view now."
But even then, there were opposing views at a senior level about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the White House's own delegates to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the role. "I witnessed, at the very least," he later wrote "clear negligence, carelessness, and unaccountability: at worst, lying, unfitness, and dishonesty."
Broader Context
Cheney was not completely to blame for the Iraq campaign. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for similar measures. He had composed a memo outlining circumstances in which American interests might be compromised (including "obtaining crucial commodities, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the US should be prepared to take unilateral action when collective action cannot be arranged," explicitly referencing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush also had assumed the Oval Office somewhat determined on carrying out what his predecessor had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Subsequent to he had been sacked by the president, the finance chief Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his objective of diminishing America's participation in the regional tensions and suggested military action against Iraq.
Bush held a personal grudge against Saddam, thinking he had been behind a conspiracy to murder his parent, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He also disliked that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a image of his father's visage that everyone had to walk over.
Interrogation Methods
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken advocating attacking Iraq, frequently citing information documents that were either weak or totally misleading. He endorsed what the Bush White House indirectly described as "intensive questioning", the use of waterboarding and physical pressure.
Responding to a Senate report in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had come from the harsh techniques, Cheney rejected the conclusions as "full of crap". He stated to Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to establish protocols and put in place programmes to catch the individuals who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it would not recur. That's exactly what they did and they merit a lot of credit."
External Perception
Cheney enjoyed labels imposed on him by critics such as the Star Wars villain and the dark figure, and by the notion that he was a dark force controlling Bush. In the author's 2013 volume about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Do I represent the evil genius in the shadows that remains unseen emerge from his domain? That is a effective way to function, in fact."
Business Interests
Dispute over his commercial relationships pursued him through his period as VP. While he had little experience in business but good contacts in defence, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's biggest petroleum corporations, in 1995 as leader and CEO.
In 2000 he became Bush's running mate for the presidency. Debatably, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was given US contracts worth multiple billions.
It greatly increased his wealth. His yearly earnings during his period at the firm rose from his quarter-million dollars while Pentagon chief to $4.4m. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement totaling in excess of $20m|twenty
