The former US VP Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was seen as one of the most powerful holders of the vice-presidency in US history. Although many second-in-commands had to settle for peripheral or symbolic functions, Cheney exercised enormous power during the administration of George W Bush, so much so that he was commonly described as the "true president".
Bush resented this portrayal and claimed the connection was more nuanced. He observed that Cheney was deferential, consistently addressing him in public as Mr President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush questioned even characterisations of their partnership as a team because it indicated that they were equals. Despite these objections, Cheney found the laidback president malleable on a broad range of governmental choices.
The Post-9/11 Era
Leading of a group of neo-conservatives that encompassed military head 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. During of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been participating in a gathering at a elementary school in Florida. While Bush traveled to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, directing the destruction of any unresponsive airplanes nearing the US Capitol.
Cheney claimed the attacks changed him, leading him to become focused on retribution. Along with other conservative figures, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a occupation of Afghanistan in an effort to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the armed intervention of Iraq, though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Disputed Decisions
He showed no remorse about the military campaign, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis perished, and not about the harsh treatment of detainees captured after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was predicated on faulty information repeated by Cheney, was the proper decision. "It was the right thing to do then. I was convinced at the time and I believe it presently."
But during that period, there were contrary opinions at a high level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the administration's own delegates to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the role. "I witnessed, at a minimum," he later wrote "obvious failure, negligence, and unaccountability: in the worst case, deception, unfitness, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not completely responsible for the Iraq military action. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for comparable steps. He had composed a memorandum outlining situations in which US concerns might be threatened (encompassing "availability of vital raw materials, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "America should be postured to operate alone when collective action prove impossible," explicitly citing military moves against Iraq.
Bush additionally had assumed the White House generally inclined on implementing what his father had specifically avoided to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. After he had been dismissed by the president, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his intention of diminishing America's involvement in the Middle East dispute and proposed military action against Iraq.
Bush bore a personal grudge against Saddam, believing he had been involved in a plot to assassinate his father, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally objected to that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a image of his parent's countenance that all visitors had to walk over.
Questioning Techniques
But it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken advocating invading Iraq, frequently quoting intelligence reports that were both insubstantial or completely deceptive. He backed what the Bush administration euphemistically referred to as "advanced techniques", the use of simulated drowning and torture.
Answering a Senate report in 2014 that determined that no valuable data had come from the harsh techniques, Cheney dismissed the report as "riddled with crap". He informed Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to establish protocols and put in place initiatives to apprehend the perpetrators who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it was not repeated. That's exactly what they did and they earn a lot of recognition."
Public Image
Cheney took pleasure in labels given to him by opponents such as Darth Vader and The Prince of Darkness, and by the concept that he was a dark force manipulating Bush. In the journalist's 2013 volume about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Is it me who is the evil genius in the shadows that operates invisibly leave his domain? This represents a nice way to operate, actually."
Commercial Ties
Dispute over his business interests pursued him during his tenure as VP. Although he had little experience in business but good contacts in security, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's largest energy corporations, in 1995 as chair and chief executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's election partner for the executive branch. Debatably, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was given US contracts valued at substantial sums.
It greatly increased his wealth. His annual income during his period at the company rose from his previous salary when he was Pentagon chief to over four million. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement worth in excess of $20m|twenty
