The former US VP Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was considered one of the most influential occupants of the vice-presidency in the nation's history. While many second-in-commands were confined to peripheral or ceremonial positions, Cheney held enormous influence during the administration of George W Bush, to the point that he was often described as the "true president".
Bush objected to such a characterisation and said the connection was more complex. He noted that Cheney was respectful, always referring to him in public as Mr President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush challenged even characterisations of their relationship as a partnership because it implied that they were peers. Regardless of these objections, Cheney found the laidback president accommodating on a broad range of administrative determinations.
The Post-9/11 Era
Leading of a faction of conservative hawks that featured Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been participating in a session at a school in Florida. Whereas Bush traveled to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, ordering the destruction of any unidentified planes approaching the US Capitol.
Cheney stated the assaults transformed him, leading him to become determined on retaliation. Together with other neo-conservatives, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a invasion of Afghanistan in an attempt to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the invasion of Iraq, even though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Controversial Policies
He expressed no regrets about the invasion, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis died, nor about the harsh treatment of detainees captured after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was based on inaccurate information echoed by Cheney, was the correct course of action. "It proved to be the right thing to do back then. I believed it at the time and I maintain that stance today."
However even then, there were opposing views at a senior level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the government's own representatives to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the position. "I saw, as a baseline," he wrote later "true dereliction, negligence, and irresponsibility: in the worst case, lying, unfitness, and graft."
Wider Perspective
Cheney was not entirely to blame for the Iraq military action. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for such action. He had drafted a memo outlining situations in which American interests might be endangered (encompassing "obtaining crucial commodities, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the US should be positioned to act independently when joint efforts cannot be orchestrated," explicitly mentioning defense operations against Iraq.
Bush too had assumed the Oval Office somewhat determined on implementing what his parent had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Following he had been sacked by the administration, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his intention of reducing America's engagement in the Middle East dispute and proposed defense operations against Iraq.
Bush carried a individual resentment against Saddam, thinking he had been involved in a plot to murder his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore objected to that one of the most prominent hotels in Baghdad had a floor mural with a image of his parent's face that all visitors had to walk over.
Investigation Approaches
Yet it was Cheney who was among the most vehement behind invading Iraq, repeatedly referencing information documents that were both insubstantial or completely inaccurate. He endorsed what the Bush White House politely called as "intensive questioning", the application of interrogation method and torture.
Answering a Senate document in 2014 that found that no valuable data had come from the harsh techniques, Cheney rejected the report as "loaded with crap". He informed Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to take steps and create programmes to capture the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it never happened again. That is precisely what they did and they deserve a lot of recognition."
Public Image
Cheney took pleasure in nicknames imposed on him by critics such as Darth Vader and The Prince of Darkness, and by the notion that he was a dark force directing Bush. In the author's 2013 book about the duo, 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 remains unseen leave his lair? This represents a effective way to operate, truthfully."
Commercial Ties
Debate over his business interests followed him through his period as second-in-command. Although he had minimal expertise in corporate affairs but established relationships in security, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial oil and gas companies, in 1995 as chair and chief executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's VP candidate for the presidency. Contentiously, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was given US agreements worth multiple billions.
It made him rich. His yearly compensation during his period at the corporation rose from his quarter-million dollars during his time as military head to $4.4m. When he departed in 2000 he had a compensation package totaling in excess of $20m|twenty
