The deceased US vice-president Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was considered among the most influential occupants of that position in American history. Whereas numerous second-in-commands had to settle for marginal or ceremonial positions, Cheney held huge power during the presidency of George W Bush, to the point that he was commonly referred to as the "real president".
Bush resented this portrayal and said the connection was more nuanced. He noted that Cheney was deferential, always calling him in public as President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush disputed even portrayals of their relationship as a collaboration because it indicated that they were equals. Despite these denials, Cheney found the relaxed president accommodating on a whole raft of policy decisions.
The Post-9/11 Era
At the head of a faction of neo-cons that encompassed military head Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary 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. At the time of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been participating in a meeting at a school in Florida. While Bush traveled to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took command, ordering the shooting down of any non-communicating airplanes heading toward the US Capitol.
Cheney stated the assaults altered his perspective, making him become focused on retribution. Together with other conservative figures, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an effort to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the invasion of Iraq, even though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Debated Decisions
He voiced no apologies about the invasion, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, nor about the harsh treatment of individuals apprehended after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was founded on inaccurate information repeated by Cheney, was the right course of action. "It represented the correct action to do at that time. I was convinced at the time and I hold that view today."
Yet even at the time, there were dissenting voices at a top tier about the poor management of Iraq. One of the government's own representatives to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the role. "I witnessed, at a minimum," he later wrote "clear negligence, carelessness, and unaccountability: potentially, falsehoods, unfitness, and graft."
Broader Context
Cheney was not solely to blame for the Iraq military action. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for comparable steps. He had written a memorandum setting out scenarios in which US concerns might be threatened (including "access to vital raw materials, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the United States should be postured to take unilateral action when joint efforts cannot be orchestrated," particularly mentioning military moves against Iraq.
Bush also had entered the Oval Office generally inclined on executing what his predecessor had specifically avoided to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Subsequent to he had been fired by the president, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his objective of reducing America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and proposed armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush bore a personal grudge against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a scheme to murder his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally resented that one of the biggest hotels in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a image of his predecessor's countenance that each person had to tread upon.
Investigation Approaches
However it was Cheney who was part of the most vehement advocating attacking Iraq, repeatedly referencing information documents that were either insubstantial or entirely deceptive. He supported what the Bush White House euphemistically referred to as "advanced techniques", the employment of interrogation method and harsh treatment.
Responding to a Senate analysis in 2014 that concluded that no actionable intelligence had been obtained through the harsh techniques, Cheney rejected the findings as "loaded with crap". He told Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to take steps and establish procedures to apprehend the bastards who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they deserve a lot of praise."
Public Image
Cheney reveled in labels imposed on him by detractors such as the Star Wars villain and The Prince of Darkness, and by the concept that he was a dark force directing Bush. In the author's 2013 volume about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Do I represent the sinister strategist in the shadows that remains unseen leave his domain? It's a nice way to work, truthfully."
Business Interests
Controversy over his corporate affiliations pursued him through his period as VP. Even though he had little experience in business but established relationships in security, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial energy conglomerates, in 1995 as leader and chief executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's election partner for the presidency. Controversially, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was given US contracts worth substantial sums.
It made him rich. His yearly compensation during his tenure at the corporation rose from his quarter-million dollars during his time as defence secretary to over four million. When he departed in 2000 he had a package valued at over $20m|twenty
