The former US vice-president Dick Cheney, who passed away at the age of 84, was regarded as among the most powerful occupants of the vice-presidency in US history. Whereas numerous second-in-commands were confined to marginal or symbolic roles, Cheney held huge influence during the administration of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was commonly called as the "actual president".
Bush objected to such a characterisation and said the dynamic was more complex. He observed that Cheney was courteous, consistently addressing him in official appearances as Mr President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush questioned even portrayals of their relationship as a partnership because it implied that they were equals. Regardless of these denials, Cheney considered the easygoing president pliable on a whole raft of administrative determinations.
A Aftermath of 9/11
In charge of a faction of neo-cons that included defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been taking part in a session at a elementary school in Florida. As Bush traveled to a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took command, ordering the downing of any unidentified aircraft approaching the US Capitol.
Cheney claimed the attacks altered his perspective, causing him to be focused on retaliation. Along with other neo-conservatives, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an endeavor to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the military action of Iraq, though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Disputed Decisions
He voiced no apologies about the armed intervention, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis perished, or about the enhanced interrogation of detainees apprehended after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was based on inaccurate information repeated by Cheney, was the proper course of action. "It was the proper decision to do at that time. I believed it at the time and I maintain that stance now."
However even then, there were opposing views at a top tier about the poor management of Iraq. One of the White House's own delegates to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the position. "I saw, as a baseline," he later wrote "true dereliction, inaction, and irresponsibility: in the worst case, falsehoods, ineptitude, and corruption."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not entirely accountable for the Iraq campaign. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for such action. He had drafted a document detailing scenarios in which national priorities might be threatened (including "access to essential resources, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "the US should be postured to act independently when collective action prove impossible," explicitly mentioning armed actions against Iraq.
Bush also had entered the presidency vaguely intent on executing what his father had notably declined to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Subsequent to he had been fired by the White House, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his plan of reducing America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and mooted defense operations against Iraq.
Bush bore a private grievance against Saddam, convinced he had been responsible for a plot to assassinate his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore disliked that one of the biggest establishments in Baghdad had a floor mural with a image of his parent's face that all visitors had to tread upon.
Investigation Approaches
However it was Cheney who was one of the most vociferous supporting attacking Iraq, frequently referencing information documents that were either thin or entirely inaccurate. He endorsed what the Bush government politely called as "advanced techniques", the use of waterboarding and torture.
Addressing a Senate analysis in 2014 that concluded that no actionable intelligence had been obtained through the torture, Cheney rejected the report as "full of crap". He informed Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to establish protocols and create initiatives to catch the perpetrators who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they merit a lot of praise."
Public Persona
Cheney took pleasure in labels assigned to him by opponents such as the Star Wars villain and the dark figure, and by the idea that he was a shadow power manipulating Bush. In the author's 2013 publication about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Am I the evil genius in the background that operates invisibly leave his hole? It's a effective way to function, in fact."
Business Interests
Dispute over his commercial relationships pursued him throughout his time as vice-president. Although he had minimal expertise in corporate affairs but strong connections in security, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's biggest oil and gas conglomerates, in 1995 as chair and top executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's running mate for the executive branch. Debatably, during the military campaign, Halliburton was awarded US contracts worth substantial sums.
It made him rich. His yearly earnings during his period at the company rose from his previous salary when he was Pentagon chief to millions. When he left in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at more than $20m|twenty
