The former US vice-president Dick Cheney, who died at age 84, was seen as one of the most influential occupants of the vice-presidency in the nation's history. Whereas many VPs had to settle for marginal or symbolic roles, Cheney held enormous power during the term of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was often called as the "actual president".
Bush resented this portrayal and claimed the relationship was more complicated. He pointed out that Cheney was courteous, invariably referring to him in official appearances as the President, while he called him as Dick. Bush challenged even descriptions of their association as a partnership because it implied that they were peers. Despite such protestations, Cheney found the easygoing president pliable on a wide array of policy decisions.
The Period Following the Attacks
Leading of a contingent of conservative hawks that included Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been attending a session at a school in Florida. As Bush made his way to a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, directing the destruction of any unresponsive airplanes heading toward the Capitol building.
Cheney said the assaults transformed him, leading him to become intent on retaliation. Together with other neo-conservatives, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a takeover of Afghanistan in an attempt to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the military action of Iraq, even though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Debated Actions
He expressed no regrets about the military campaign, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis perished, and not about the enhanced interrogation of detainees apprehended after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was founded on inaccurate intelligence repeated by Cheney, was the right course of action. "It proved to be the correct action to do back then. I believed it at the time and I maintain that stance presently."
But even at the time, there were contrary opinions at a top tier about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the government's own special envoys to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the position. "I witnessed, at a minimum," he later wrote "clear negligence, inaction, and irresponsibility: potentially, deception, incompetence, and dishonesty."
Wider Perspective
Cheney was not entirely accountable for the Iraq invasion. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for such action. He had drafted a memorandum detailing situations in which US concerns might be endangered (including "availability of vital raw materials, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "the United States should be positioned to act independently when collective action cannot be orchestrated," specifically mentioning defense operations against Iraq.
Bush too had entered the presidency generally inclined on implementing what his predecessor had specifically avoided to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Subsequent to he had been sacked by the president, the finance chief Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his plan of lowering America's participation in the Middle East dispute and suggested armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush held a individual resentment against Saddam, thinking he had been responsible for a conspiracy to assassinate his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally resented that one of the biggest hotels in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a likeness of his parent's visage that all visitors had to tread upon.
Investigation Approaches
But it was Cheney who was among the most vociferous behind invading Iraq, frequently citing information documents that were both thin or entirely misleading. He endorsed what the Bush government indirectly described as "enhanced interrogation", the application of simulated drowning and harsh treatment.
Responding to a Senate document in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had resulted from the harsh techniques, Cheney dismissed the findings as "full of crap". He informed Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and put in place programmes to apprehend the bastards who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it would not recur. That's exactly what they did and they deserve a lot of credit."
Public Persona
Cheney enjoyed labels given to him by detractors such as the Star Wars villain and the dark figure, and by the notion that he was a shadow power manipulating Bush. In the author's 2013 book about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Do I represent the evil genius in the background that remains unseen emerge from his domain? This represents a advantageous way to function, in fact."
Commercial Ties
Dispute over his business interests accompanied him throughout his time as VP. Even though he had minimal expertise in business but established relationships in defence, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's largest oil and gas companies, in 1995 as chair and CEO.
In 2000 he became Bush's election partner for the executive branch. Contentiously, during the military campaign, Halliburton was granted US deals worth multiple billions.
It made him rich. His yearly earnings during his tenure at the company grew from his quarter-million dollars when he was defence secretary to $4.4m. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement totaling in excess of $20m|twenty
