The late US VP Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was considered arguably the most powerful holders of the vice-presidency in US history. Although many vice-presidents had to settle for peripheral or figurehead positions, Cheney exercised substantial power during the administration of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was commonly referred to as the "true president".
Bush disliked such a characterisation and claimed the relationship was more complicated. He noted that Cheney was respectful, always calling him in public settings as the President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush questioned even descriptions of their partnership as a collaboration because it suggested that they were equals. Regardless of such protestations, Cheney viewed the easygoing president accommodating on a whole raft of administrative determinations.
A Period Following the Attacks
Leading of a group of neo-cons that featured military head Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been taking part in a session at a elementary school in Florida. As Bush traveled to a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, ordering the downing of any unidentified airplanes nearing the US Capitol.
Cheney stated the assaults transformed him, leading him to become determined on retribution. Together with other conservative figures, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a invasion of Afghanistan in an endeavor to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the armed intervention of Iraq, though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Disputed Decisions
He showed no remorse about the military campaign, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, and not about the harsh treatment of suspects rounded up after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was based on faulty reports echoed by Cheney, was the correct course of action. "It was the proper decision to do at that time. I was convinced then and I believe it presently."
However during that period, there were contrary opinions at a senior level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the government's own delegates to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the role. "I witnessed, at a minimum," he later wrote "true dereliction, negligence, and irresponsibility: potentially, lying, unfitness, and corruption."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not entirely accountable for the Iraq military action. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for similar measures. He had drafted a memo outlining situations in which American interests might be endangered (including "obtaining crucial commodities, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the US should be prepared to act independently when joint efforts cannot be orchestrated," specifically mentioning defense operations against Iraq.
Bush too had entered the Oval Office vaguely intent on implementing what his parent had specifically avoided to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Subsequent to he had been fired by the administration, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his intention of lowering America's engagement in the regional tensions and mooted armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush held a private grievance against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a plot to kill his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore disliked that one of the largest accommodations in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a likeness of his predecessor's visage that all visitors had to tread upon.
Questioning Techniques
However it was Cheney who was among the most vehement advocating striking Iraq, repeatedly citing agency briefings that were both insubstantial or entirely deceptive. He supported what the Bush government politely called as "enhanced interrogation", the use of simulated drowning and torture.
Addressing a Senate report in 2014 that determined that no actionable intelligence had resulted from the harsh techniques, Cheney dismissed the findings as "loaded with crap". He informed Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to implement measures and establish programmes to apprehend the perpetrators who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it would not recur. That is precisely what they did and they earn a lot of recognition."
Public Persona
Cheney reveled in labels imposed on him by detractors such as Darth Vader and the dark figure, and by the concept that he was a sinister influence manipulating Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Am I the sinister strategist in the background that remains unseen emerge from his lair? This represents a effective way to function, actually."
Commercial Ties
Controversy over his corporate affiliations pursued him throughout his time as second-in-command. Although he had little experience in commerce but good contacts in military, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial petroleum corporations, in 1995 as chair and chief executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's VP candidate for the White House. Debatably, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was given US deals worth billions.
It made him rich. His yearly compensation during his period at the firm grew from his $258,394 while defence secretary to millions. When he left in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at in excess of $20m|twenty
