The deceased US vice-president Dick Cheney, who passed away at the age of 84, was seen as among the most powerful occupants of that office in the nation's history. While countless second-in-commands were limited to minor or symbolic roles, Cheney exercised substantial sway during the administration of George W Bush, so much so that he was commonly referred to as the "true president".
Bush resented such a characterisation and said the dynamic was more complex. He pointed out that Cheney was deferential, invariably calling him in official appearances as Mr President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush challenged even characterisations of their association as a collaboration because it implied that they were on equal footing. In spite of such protestations, Cheney found the laidback president accommodating on a whole raft of policy decisions.
A Aftermath of 9/11
At the head of a group of neo-cons that featured military head Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been participating in a meeting at a educational institution in Florida. Whereas Bush headed for a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took command, commanding the shooting down of any non-communicating planes approaching the Capitol building.
Cheney claimed the assaults altered his perspective, causing him to be intent on retaliation. In conjunction with other neo-conservatives, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an effort to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the invasion of Iraq, though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Debated Policies
He showed no remorse about the military campaign, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis perished, and not about the waterboarding of detainees apprehended after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was predicated on inaccurate intelligence repeated by Cheney, was the proper path to take. "It represented the right thing to do then. I believed it back then and I hold that view presently."
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 representatives to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the position. "I observed, at a minimum," he later wrote "obvious failure, negligence, and unaccountability: in the worst case, lying, ineptitude, and corruption."
Broader Context
Cheney was not completely to blame for the Iraq campaign. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for similar measures. He had composed a document detailing situations in which US concerns might be threatened (including "obtaining crucial commodities, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the United States should be positioned to act independently when cooperative measures cannot be arranged," explicitly referencing military moves against Iraq.
Bush additionally had entered the Oval Office generally inclined on carrying out what his parent had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Subsequent to he had been fired by the administration, the finance chief Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his plan of diminishing America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and mooted military action against Iraq.
Bush carried a personal grudge against Saddam, thinking he had been involved in a conspiracy to assassinate his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He also disliked that one of the largest hotels in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a portrait of his father's countenance that all visitors had to tread upon.
Investigation Approaches
However it was Cheney who was one of the most vehement advocating invading Iraq, consistently citing intelligence reports that were both thin or completely inaccurate. He supported what the Bush government indirectly described as "intensive questioning", the use of interrogation method and torture.
Answering a Senate document in 2014 that concluded that no valuable data had resulted from the torture, Cheney disregarded the report as "riddled with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to establish protocols and establish programmes to apprehend 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 praise."
Public Persona
Cheney took pleasure in nicknames assigned to him by detractors such as Darth Vader and The Prince of Darkness, and by the notion that he was a shadow power directing Bush. In the journalist's 2013 volume about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Is it me who is the evil genius in the background that nobody ever sees come out of his lair? That is a effective way to function, actually."
Business Interests
Dispute over his commercial relationships followed him through his period as second-in-command. While he had limited background in business but strong connections in security, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial energy corporations, in 1995 as chair and top executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's VP candidate for the executive branch. Debatably, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was granted US deals worth multiple billions.
It made him rich. His annual income during his tenure at the corporation increased from his $258,394 during his time as military head to millions. When he resigned in 2000 he had a package valued at in excess of $20m|twenty
