The late US VP Dick Cheney, who died at age 84, was regarded as one of the most powerful occupants of the vice-presidency in American history. While numerous vice-presidents had to settle for peripheral or ceremonial functions, Cheney wielded substantial sway during the term of George W Bush, so much so that he was frequently referred to as the "actual president".
Bush resented this portrayal and said the connection was more complex. He pointed out that Cheney was deferential, consistently calling him in public as the President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush challenged even descriptions of their partnership as a partnership because it implied that they were peers. In spite of such protestations, Cheney found the laidback president accommodating on a wide array of governmental choices.
A Aftermath of 9/11
At the head of a group of conservative hawks that included defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in response to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been participating in a session at a school in Florida. As Bush headed for a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, commanding the downing of any unidentified airplanes heading toward the Capitol building.
Cheney said the attacks transformed him, making him become focused on revenge. In conjunction with other neo-cons, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a occupation of Afghanistan in an endeavor to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the invasion of Iraq, although there was little proof of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Debated Decisions
He showed no remorse about the armed intervention, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, or about the harsh treatment of individuals captured after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was founded on inaccurate information circulated by Cheney, was the correct decision. "It represented the right thing to do at that time. I believed it then and I maintain that stance presently."
Yet even at the time, there were opposing views at a top tier about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the administration's own representatives to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the role. "I saw, as a baseline," he wrote later "true dereliction, carelessness, and irresponsibility: potentially, deception, incompetence, and corruption."
Wider Perspective
Cheney was not entirely responsible for the Iraq campaign. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had advocated for such action. He had drafted a memorandum setting out situations in which American interests might be endangered (featuring "availability of essential resources, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "America should be prepared to act independently when collective action cannot be orchestrated," explicitly mentioning military moves against Iraq.
Bush also had arrived in the Oval Office vaguely intent on carrying out what his parent had notably declined to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Subsequent to he had been fired by the administration, the finance chief 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 suggested military action against Iraq.
Bush carried a personal grudge against Saddam, convinced he had been behind a plot to assassinate his parent, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He also resented that one of the largest hotels in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a portrait of his parent's countenance that all visitors had to step on.
Investigation Approaches
But it was Cheney who was among the most outspoken supporting attacking Iraq, repeatedly quoting agency briefings that were both insubstantial or entirely misleading. He endorsed what the Bush administration indirectly described as "advanced techniques", the use of simulated drowning and torture.
Responding to a Senate analysis in 2014 that determined that no actionable intelligence had resulted from the interrogation methods, Cheney rejected the report as "full of crap". He told Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to establish protocols and establish procedures to apprehend the bastards who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it never happened again. That is precisely what they did and they earn a lot of recognition."
Public Persona
Cheney reveled in nicknames assigned to him by detractors such as the Star Wars villain and the dark figure, and by the concept that he was a shadow power manipulating Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication 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 background that operates invisibly come out of his domain? That is a nice way to operate, actually."
Commercial Ties
Dispute over his corporate affiliations followed him during his tenure as vice-president. While he had little experience in corporate affairs but established relationships in military, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial petroleum conglomerates, in 1995 as chairman and top executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's election partner for the White House. Debatably, during the military campaign, Halliburton was awarded US deals totaling multiple billions.
It significantly boosted his finances. His yearly compensation during his period at the corporation increased from his quarter-million dollars when he was Pentagon chief to $4.4m. When he left in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at over $20m|twenty
