The late US vice-president Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was seen as arguably the most influential occupants of the vice-presidency in American history. Whereas numerous second-in-commands were confined to peripheral or figurehead roles, Cheney held huge power during the presidency of George W Bush, to the point that he was commonly called as the "real president".
Bush resented that description and claimed the relationship was more complicated. He observed that Cheney was courteous, consistently addressing him in public as the President, while he called him as Dick. Bush disputed even portrayals of their association as a team because it indicated that they were equals. Regardless of these denials, Cheney viewed the laidback president malleable on a whole raft of administrative determinations.
The Post-9/11 Era
At the head of a faction of conservative hawks that featured defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been participating in a session at a elementary school in Florida. While Bush made his way to a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, directing the destruction of any unidentified airplanes approaching the government building.
Cheney said the strikes altered his perspective, causing him to be focused on retaliation. In conjunction with other conservative figures, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an attempt to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the armed intervention of Iraq, though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Disputed Actions
He showed no remorse about the armed intervention, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, or about the enhanced interrogation of individuals rounded up after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was based on faulty reports echoed by Cheney, was the proper course of action. "It was the right thing to do back then. I believed it then and I maintain that stance presently."
Yet even at the time, there were dissenting voices at a senior level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the administration's own delegates to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the post. "I saw, as a baseline," he wrote later "true dereliction, carelessness, and recklessness: potentially, falsehoods, incompetence, and dishonesty."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not entirely to blame for the Iraq military action. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had advocated for similar measures. He had written a memorandum detailing situations in which US concerns might be endangered (featuring "obtaining crucial commodities, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the US should be prepared to act independently when cooperative measures cannot be orchestrated," explicitly mentioning defense operations against Iraq.
Bush also had assumed the White House generally inclined on carrying out what his parent had specifically avoided to do in 1991; remove Saddam. After he had been dismissed by the White House, the finance chief Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his plan of reducing America's involvement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and suggested defense operations against Iraq.
Bush carried a personal grudge against Saddam, convinced he had been behind a scheme to murder his parent, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore disliked that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a ground design with a image of his predecessor's countenance that all visitors had to step on.
Investigation Approaches
However it was Cheney who was part of the most vehement supporting striking Iraq, repeatedly quoting agency briefings that were whether insubstantial or completely inaccurate. He backed what the Bush White House politely called as "advanced techniques", the use of waterboarding and harsh treatment.
Responding to a Senate analysis in 2014 that determined that no actionable intelligence had come from the harsh techniques, Cheney dismissed the findings as "riddled with crap". He told Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to take steps and establish initiatives to capture the bastards who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it never happened again. That's exactly what they did and they earn a lot of recognition."
Public Image
Cheney took pleasure in labels assigned to him by critics such as the dark character and the dark figure, and by the concept that he was a shadow power controlling 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: "Do I represent the malevolent mastermind in the corner that nobody ever sees emerge from his lair? It's a effective way to operate, in fact."
Commercial Ties
Controversy over his commercial relationships followed him through his period as vice-president. Although he had little experience in business but good contacts in defence, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's biggest petroleum conglomerates, in 1995 as leader and top executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's running mate for the presidency. Controversially, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was given US agreements worth multiple billions.
It greatly increased his wealth. His annual income during his tenure at the corporation increased from his $258,394 during his time as military head to over four million. When he resigned in 2000 he had a package totaling over $20m|twenty
