The deceased US VP Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was seen as arguably the most powerful occupants of that office in US history. Although numerous second-in-commands had to settle for marginal or symbolic positions, Cheney wielded huge sway during the administration of George W Bush, to the point that he was commonly called as the "true president".
Bush objected to such a characterisation and said the relationship was more nuanced. He pointed out that Cheney was respectful, always calling him in public settings as Mr President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush challenged even portrayals of their partnership as a partnership because it indicated that they were peers. Despite these objections, Cheney found the relaxed president malleable on a whole raft of policy decisions.
A Post-9/11 Era
In charge of a group of neo-cons that included defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been participating in a session at a school in Florida. Whereas Bush made his way to a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, commanding the shooting down of any unidentified airplanes approaching the US Capitol.
Cheney stated the attacks altered his perspective, making him become determined on retaliation. Together with other neo-cons, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a invasion of Afghanistan in an attempt to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the invasion of Iraq, though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Disputed Policies
He voiced no apologies about the invasion, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis died, and not about the enhanced interrogation of detainees captured after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was predicated on faulty information echoed by Cheney, was the proper decision. "It represented the correct action to do then. I believed it at the time and I maintain that stance today."
However during that period, there were contrary opinions at a top tier about the poor management of Iraq. One of the White House's own representatives to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the post. "I saw, at the very least," he later wrote "clear negligence, inaction, and irresponsibility: in the worst case, lying, incompetence, and graft."
Wider Perspective
Cheney was not entirely accountable for the Iraq campaign. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for such action. He had written a document detailing scenarios in which national priorities might be threatened (featuring "availability of crucial commodities, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "the United States should be prepared to take unilateral action when collective action prove impossible," particularly mentioning armed actions against Iraq.
Bush additionally had entered the Oval Office generally inclined on implementing what his father had specifically avoided to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Following he had been sacked by the president, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his objective of lowering America's involvement in the Middle East dispute and suggested defense operations against Iraq.
Bush bore a private grievance against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a conspiracy to murder his father, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore disliked that one of the most prominent hotels in Baghdad had a ground design with a image of his predecessor's face that everyone had to step on.
Interrogation Methods
Yet it was Cheney who was among the most vociferous behind attacking Iraq, frequently quoting intelligence reports that were either thin or completely misleading. He backed 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 found that no valuable data had come from the interrogation methods, Cheney rejected the report as "full of crap". He told Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and create initiatives to catch the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it never happened again. That is precisely what they did and they deserve a lot of praise."
External Perception
Cheney enjoyed nicknames given to him by detractors such as Darth Vader and the sinister presence, and by the notion that he was a sinister influence controlling Bush. In the journalist's 2013 book about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Do I represent the malevolent mastermind in the corner that remains unseen emerge from his domain? This represents a advantageous way to operate, truthfully."
Corporate Connections
Dispute over his business interests followed him through his period as second-in-command. Although he had minimal expertise in commerce but strong connections in defence, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's biggest petroleum corporations, in 1995 as chairman and CEO.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's VP candidate for the presidency. Debatably, during the military campaign, Halliburton was granted US deals totaling multiple billions.
It made him rich. His yearly earnings during his period at the firm rose from his $258,394 when he was military head to $4.4m. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement totaling in excess of $20m|twenty
