The former US vice-president Dick Cheney, who died at age 84, was seen as among the most influential incumbents of that office in US history. Although numerous second-in-commands were confined to marginal or ceremonial functions, Cheney held enormous sway during the administration of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was commonly called as the "real president".
Bush disliked this portrayal and stated the relationship was more complicated. He noted that Cheney was respectful, consistently calling him in public settings as Mr President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush questioned even characterisations of their relationship as a team because it implied that they were on equal footing. In spite of such protestations, Cheney found the laidback president accommodating on a whole raft of governmental choices.
The Aftermath of 9/11
At the head of a contingent of conservative hawks that encompassed Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been attending a gathering at a educational institution in Florida. As Bush made his way to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took command, directing the destruction of any unidentified airplanes heading toward the Capitol building.
Cheney claimed the strikes changed him, making him become focused on retaliation. In conjunction with other neo-cons, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a invasion of Afghanistan in an endeavor to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the invasion of Iraq, although there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Controversial Actions
He voiced no apologies about the armed intervention, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis perished, and not about the enhanced interrogation of suspects rounded up after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was predicated on faulty intelligence repeated by Cheney, was the correct course of action. "It was the right thing to do at that time. I had faith then and I hold that view today."
Yet during that period, there were dissenting voices at a top tier about the poor management of Iraq. One of the White House's own special envoys to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the post. "I observed, at a minimum," he wrote later "clear negligence, negligence, and irresponsibility: potentially, falsehoods, ineptitude, and corruption."
Broader Context
Cheney was not completely to blame for the Iraq campaign. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for comparable steps. He had written a memo detailing scenarios in which national priorities might be endangered (featuring "obtaining vital raw materials, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the United States should be postured to act independently when cooperative measures cannot be arranged," specifically citing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush too had entered the presidency vaguely intent on carrying out what his predecessor had notably declined to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Subsequent to he had been sacked by the White House, the finance chief Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his intention of lowering America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and proposed military action against Iraq.
Bush bore a individual resentment against Saddam, convinced he had been responsible for a plot to murder his parent, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore objected to that one of the most prominent accommodations in Baghdad had a floor mural with a likeness of his father's visage that all visitors had to step on.
Investigation Approaches
However it was Cheney who was part of the most vociferous supporting invading Iraq, consistently quoting intelligence reports that were both insubstantial or entirely misleading. He supported what the Bush government euphemistically referred to as "advanced techniques", the application of waterboarding and harsh treatment.
Answering a Senate analysis in 2014 that found that no valuable data had come from the interrogation methods, Cheney dismissed the conclusions as "loaded with crap". He informed Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and create initiatives to capture the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they deserve a lot of praise."
External Perception
Cheney took pleasure in monikers assigned to him by detractors such as Darth Vader and the dark figure, and by the idea that he was a shadow power controlling Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Is it me who is the evil genius in the shadows that operates invisibly emerge from his lair? It's a nice way to function, in fact."
Business Interests
Debate over his commercial relationships pursued him through his period as VP. While he had minimal expertise in commerce but good contacts in defence, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's largest oil and gas conglomerates, in 1995 as leader and top executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's election partner for the White House. Controversially, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was granted US contracts valued at multiple billions.
It made him rich. His yearly earnings during his tenure at the corporation increased from his quarter-million dollars when he was defence secretary to $4.4m. When he resigned in 2000 he had a package valued at more than $20m|twenty
