The deceased US VP Dick Cheney, who passed away at the age of 84, was regarded as arguably the most significant incumbents of that office in American history. Although many vice-presidents had to settle for marginal or figurehead functions, Cheney wielded enormous influence during the presidency of George W Bush, to the point that he was commonly described as the "actual president".
Bush objected to that description and claimed the connection was more complicated. He pointed out that Cheney was courteous, consistently calling him in public as Mr President, while he called him as Dick. Bush disputed even descriptions of their partnership as a team because it implied that they were peers. Despite these denials, Cheney considered the easygoing president pliable on a broad range of policy decisions.
A Post-9/11 Era
At the head of a contingent of neo-conservatives that included military head Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been participating in a meeting at a school in Florida. While Bush headed for a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, commanding the shooting down of any non-communicating planes nearing the government building.
Cheney stated the assaults altered his perspective, making him become determined on revenge. Together with other conservative figures, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a occupation of Afghanistan in an attempt to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the invasion of Iraq, though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Debated Policies
He expressed no regrets about the invasion, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, or about the waterboarding of suspects apprehended after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was predicated on inaccurate intelligence circulated by Cheney, was the proper course of action. "It proved to be the correct action to do at that time. I believed it back then and I maintain that stance now."
But even then, there were opposing views at a senior level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the White House's own special envoys to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the post. "I observed, at the very least," he later wrote "clear negligence, carelessness, and unaccountability: at worst, deception, incompetence, and graft."
Broader Context
Cheney was not completely to blame for the Iraq invasion. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for similar measures. He had drafted a document outlining scenarios in which American interests might be compromised (encompassing "access to crucial commodities, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the US should be prepared to act independently when joint efforts cannot be arranged," specifically referencing military moves against Iraq.
Bush also had assumed the Oval Office generally inclined on executing what his parent had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Subsequent to he had been sacked by the president, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his plan of lowering America's engagement in the regional tensions and suggested defense operations against Iraq.
Bush bore a private grievance against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a plot to murder his parent, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He also disliked that one of the largest hotels in Baghdad had a floor mural with a portrait of his parent's visage that each person had to tread upon.
Questioning Techniques
But it was Cheney who was one of the most vociferous behind attacking Iraq, repeatedly referencing information documents that were both insubstantial or entirely inaccurate. He backed what the Bush administration indirectly described as "enhanced interrogation", the employment of interrogation method and harsh treatment.
Responding to a Senate report in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had been obtained through the harsh techniques, Cheney rejected the conclusions as "full of crap". He informed Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to take steps and put in place programmes to catch the bastards who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it never happened again. That is precisely what they did and they merit a lot of praise."
Public Image
Cheney enjoyed nicknames given to him by critics such as the dark character and the sinister presence, and by the notion that he was a sinister influence directing Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Do I represent the sinister strategist in the background that operates invisibly come out of his domain? This represents a effective way to function, truthfully."
Commercial Ties
Dispute over his business interests accompanied him during his tenure as second-in-command. Although he had minimal expertise in business but good contacts in security, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's biggest petroleum companies, in 1995 as leader and top executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's running mate for the White House. Debatably, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was given US contracts totaling billions.
It greatly increased his wealth. His yearly earnings during his tenure at the company rose from his quarter-million dollars while Pentagon chief to $4.4m. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement totaling more than $20m|twenty
