The deceased US vice-president Dick Cheney, who passed away at the age of 84, was seen as one of the most influential holders of the vice-presidency in American history. While numerous second-in-commands had to settle for marginal or ceremonial positions, Cheney held enormous power during the presidency of George W Bush, so much so that he was commonly described as the "true president".
Bush resented such a characterisation and said the relationship was more complicated. He pointed out that Cheney was deferential, invariably addressing him in public as the President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush challenged even characterisations of their partnership as a team because it indicated that they were peers. In spite of these objections, Cheney found the laidback president malleable on a whole raft of governmental choices.
The Post-9/11 Era
At the head of a faction of conservative hawks that encompassed military head Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been taking part in a gathering at a educational institution in Florida. As Bush headed for a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, commanding the destruction of any unresponsive airplanes approaching the Capitol building.
Cheney stated the attacks transformed him, causing him to be determined on retribution. In conjunction with other neo-cons, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a invasion of Afghanistan in an attempt to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the military action of Iraq, although there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Disputed Actions
He expressed no regrets about the military campaign, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis perished, or about the waterboarding of individuals apprehended after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was founded on misleading information repeated by Cheney, was the proper decision. "It represented the correct action to do then. I had faith then and I maintain that stance presently."
But during that period, there were opposing views at a high level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the government's own representatives to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the post. "I saw, at a minimum," he later wrote "obvious failure, carelessness, and irresponsibility: in the worst case, lying, ineptitude, and graft."
Wider Perspective
Cheney was not completely responsible for the Iraq campaign. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for similar measures. He had drafted a document outlining scenarios in which US concerns might be endangered (including "obtaining crucial commodities, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the US should be positioned to act independently when cooperative measures cannot be arranged," particularly mentioning defense operations against Iraq.
Bush additionally had assumed the presidency vaguely intent on carrying out what his father had famously refused to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Following he had been fired by the administration, the finance chief Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his plan of lowering America's involvement in the regional tensions and mooted armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush bore a individual resentment against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a plot to murder his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally objected to that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a ground design with a image of his predecessor's visage that everyone had to step on.
Investigation Approaches
But it was Cheney who was one of the most vehement behind striking Iraq, consistently referencing intelligence reports that were whether thin or completely deceptive. He backed what the Bush administration indirectly described as "advanced techniques", the application of interrogation method and torture.
Addressing a Senate report in 2014 that found that no useful information had come from the torture, Cheney dismissed the findings as "full of crap". He told Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to implement measures and establish programmes to catch the bastards who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they earn a lot of recognition."
External Perception
Cheney enjoyed monikers assigned to 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 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 shadows that nobody ever sees leave his lair? It's a effective way to work, actually."
Business Interests
Controversy over his commercial relationships followed him throughout his time as second-in-command. Even though he had little experience in corporate affairs but good contacts in security, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's largest energy conglomerates, in 1995 as chair and chief executive.
In 2000 he became Bush's election partner for the executive branch. Controversially, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was given US deals totaling multiple billions.
It significantly boosted his finances. His annual income during his tenure at the corporation grew from his $258,394 during his time as defence secretary to $4.4m. When he left in 2000 he had a compensation package totaling in excess of $20m|twenty
