The deceased US vice-president Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was seen as among the most significant holders of that position in US history. Although countless second-in-commands were confined to minor or figurehead positions, Cheney held substantial influence during the presidency of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was often called as the "real president".
Bush objected to this portrayal and said the dynamic was more complicated. He pointed out that Cheney was courteous, consistently calling him in public settings as Mr President, while he called him as Dick. Bush challenged even characterisations of their partnership as a team because it implied that they were on equal footing. Regardless of these objections, Cheney found the laidback president malleable on a wide array of policy decisions.
A Post-9/11 Era
At the head of a faction of conservative hawks that included military head Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command 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 elementary school in Florida. While Bush traveled to a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, directing the destruction of any unidentified aircraft approaching the government building.
Cheney stated the strikes changed him, causing him to be intent on revenge. In conjunction with other neo-cons, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a invasion of Afghanistan in an effort to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the armed intervention of Iraq, even though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Disputed Policies
He voiced no apologies about the military campaign, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis died, or about the waterboarding of individuals captured after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was founded on faulty reports repeated by Cheney, was the proper path to take. "It proved to be the correct action to do then. I believed it back then and I believe it now."
Yet during that period, there were contrary opinions at a top tier about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the administration's own representatives to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the role. "I witnessed, as a baseline," he later wrote "true dereliction, negligence, and unaccountability: in the worst case, lying, unfitness, and corruption."
Broader Context
Cheney was not completely to blame for the Iraq military action. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for comparable steps. He had written a document outlining circumstances in which US concerns might be threatened (encompassing "obtaining vital raw materials, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the United States should be positioned to act independently when cooperative measures cannot be orchestrated," particularly referencing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush also had arrived in the Oval Office vaguely intent on carrying out what his predecessor had famously refused to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Following he had been dismissed by the White House, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his objective of diminishing America's involvement in the regional tensions and mooted defense operations against Iraq.
Bush held a personal grudge against Saddam, believing he had been behind a conspiracy to murder his parent, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore objected to that one of the biggest hotels in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a portrait of his parent's countenance that each person had to walk over.
Investigation Approaches
Yet it was Cheney who was among the most vociferous supporting invading Iraq, consistently quoting intelligence reports that were either thin or totally inaccurate. He supported what the Bush administration politely called as "advanced techniques", the employment of interrogation method and physical pressure.
Addressing a Senate document in 2014 that determined that no useful information had been obtained through the torture, Cheney dismissed the findings as "loaded with crap". He informed Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to implement measures and put in place programmes to apprehend the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it never happened again. That was specifically what they did and they merit a lot of recognition."
External Perception
Cheney enjoyed monikers imposed on him by critics such as the Star Wars villain and the sinister presence, and by the notion that he was a dark force controlling Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 volume about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Is it me who is the malevolent mastermind in the background that remains unseen come out of his domain? This represents a effective way to work, in fact."
Corporate Connections
Controversy over his business interests followed him during his tenure as vice-president. Although he had limited background in business but strong connections in military, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's biggest energy companies, in 1995 as leader and top executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's running mate for the presidency. Controversially, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was given US contracts valued at substantial sums.
It made him rich. His annual income during his time at the company rose from his previous salary while Pentagon chief to $4.4m. When he left in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at in excess of $20m|twenty
