The late US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who passed away at the age of 84, was regarded as arguably the most powerful occupants of the vice-presidency in American history. Although many VPs had to settle for peripheral or figurehead positions, Cheney wielded enormous power during the presidency of George W Bush, to the point that he was frequently described as the "actual president".
Bush resented such a characterisation and said the connection was more nuanced. He observed that Cheney was courteous, invariably addressing him in public as Mr President, while he called him as Dick. Bush challenged even portrayals of their association as a partnership because it implied that they were peers. In spite of these objections, Cheney considered the easygoing president accommodating on a broad range of administrative determinations.
A Post-9/11 Era
At the head of a contingent of neo-conservatives that included Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been participating in a session at a school in Florida. Whereas Bush made his way to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, commanding the shooting down of any unidentified planes heading toward the government building.
Cheney claimed the assaults transformed him, leading him to become focused on revenge. Along with other neo-conservatives, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a takeover of Afghanistan in an effort to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the invasion of Iraq, although there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Disputed Actions
He expressed no regrets about the invasion, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis died, or about the enhanced interrogation of individuals captured after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was founded on faulty information circulated by Cheney, was the proper path to take. "It proved to be the proper decision to do at that time. I believed it back then and I maintain that stance today."
But even at the time, there were contrary opinions at a senior level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the administration's own special envoys to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the position. "I observed, at the very least," he subsequently stated "clear negligence, inaction, and recklessness: in the worst case, falsehoods, unfitness, and dishonesty."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not completely accountable for the Iraq military action. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for such action. He had composed a memo setting out circumstances in which US concerns might be compromised (encompassing "access to crucial commodities, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "the United States should be postured to take unilateral action when collective action cannot be orchestrated," specifically citing defense operations against Iraq.
Bush too had assumed the presidency generally inclined on carrying out what his predecessor had specifically avoided to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Subsequent to he had been sacked by the administration, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his objective of diminishing America's engagement in the regional tensions and mooted armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush bore a individual resentment against Saddam, convinced he had been behind a conspiracy to assassinate his father, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally disliked that one of the most prominent accommodations in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a portrait of his father's face that each person had to walk over.
Questioning Techniques
However it was Cheney who was part of the most vehement advocating striking Iraq, repeatedly citing agency briefings that were either weak or completely misleading. He endorsed what the Bush administration euphemistically referred to as "enhanced interrogation", the use of simulated drowning and torture.
Answering a Senate report in 2014 that determined that no useful information had resulted from the interrogation methods, Cheney rejected the findings as "riddled with crap". He told Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to establish protocols and put in place initiatives to catch the perpetrators who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it would not recur. That is precisely what they did and they earn a lot of credit."
Public Image
Cheney took pleasure in labels assigned to him by opponents such as the Star Wars villain and the sinister presence, and by the idea that he was a sinister influence directing Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 book about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Is it me who is the sinister strategist in the shadows that operates invisibly come out of his hole? This represents a effective way to function, truthfully."
Commercial Ties
Dispute over his business interests followed him throughout his time as vice-president. While he had minimal expertise in commerce but good contacts in security, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's biggest energy companies, in 1995 as chair and chief executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's VP candidate for the presidency. Debatably, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was granted US contracts valued at substantial sums.
It greatly increased his wealth. His annual income during his period at the firm increased from his quarter-million dollars during his time as military head to millions. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at more than $20m|twenty
