The late US VP Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was regarded as one of the most significant holders of that office in American history. While numerous vice-presidents had to settle for marginal or figurehead positions, Cheney held enormous power during the term of George W Bush, so much so that he was commonly called as the "real president".
Bush objected to this portrayal and said the connection was more complex. He noted that Cheney was respectful, always addressing him in public settings as Mr President, while he called him as Dick. Bush disputed even characterisations of their association as a team because it implied that they were on equal footing. In spite of such protestations, Cheney considered the easygoing president pliable on a whole raft of governmental choices.
A Period Following the Attacks
Leading of a group of neo-conservatives that encompassed military head Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been taking part in a meeting at a school in Florida. As Bush traveled to a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, ordering the shooting down of any unidentified aircraft heading toward the government building.
Cheney claimed the assaults transformed him, making him become focused on retribution. Along with other conservative figures, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a invasion of Afghanistan in an attempt to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the military action of Iraq, although there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Disputed Decisions
He showed no remorse about the armed intervention, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, and not about the waterboarding of individuals rounded up after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was based on inaccurate information echoed by Cheney, was the right path to take. "It represented the correct action to do back then. I was convinced at the time and I believe it today."
However even at the time, there were contrary opinions at a top tier about the poor management of Iraq. One of the government's own special envoys to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the role. "I saw, at a minimum," he later wrote "obvious failure, negligence, and recklessness: in the worst case, falsehoods, incompetence, and dishonesty."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not entirely to blame for the Iraq invasion. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for such action. He had drafted a memorandum outlining scenarios in which national priorities might be compromised (featuring "obtaining crucial commodities, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the United States should be prepared to act independently when joint efforts cannot be orchestrated," explicitly citing defense operations against Iraq.
Bush too had arrived in the presidency somewhat determined on carrying out what his predecessor had specifically avoided to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Following he had been fired 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 announced his plan of lowering America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and suggested defense operations against Iraq.
Bush carried a personal grudge against Saddam, thinking he had been behind a scheme to kill his father, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He also objected to that one of the largest hotels in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a portrait of his father's face that each person had to step on.
Investigation Approaches
Yet it was Cheney who was part of the most outspoken supporting attacking Iraq, consistently referencing information documents that were whether weak or completely inaccurate. He backed what the Bush government euphemistically referred to as "advanced techniques", the use of waterboarding and harsh treatment.
Addressing a Senate report in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had come from the harsh techniques, Cheney dismissed the report as "loaded with crap". He informed Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to implement measures and establish programmes to catch the perpetrators who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they deserve a lot of credit."
External Perception
Cheney enjoyed labels imposed on him by critics such as Darth Vader and the sinister presence, and by the concept that he was a dark force controlling Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Am I the sinister strategist in the shadows that operates invisibly come out of his domain? That is a advantageous way to operate, in fact."
Commercial Ties
Controversy over his corporate affiliations accompanied him through his period as vice-president. Although he had limited background in business but strong connections in security, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's largest oil and gas companies, in 1995 as chair and chief executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's running mate for the presidency. Contentiously, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was granted US agreements totaling substantial sums.
It made him rich. His annual income during his tenure at the corporation grew from his quarter-million dollars during his time as defence secretary to millions. When he resigned in 2000 he had a severance arrangement worth in excess of $20m|twenty
