The late US vice-president Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was considered arguably the most influential occupants of that office in the nation's history. While countless second-in-commands were limited to peripheral or figurehead functions, Cheney wielded enormous influence during the administration of George W Bush, so much so that he was commonly described as the "real president".
Bush resented this portrayal and stated the relationship was more complex. He observed that Cheney was respectful, consistently addressing him in public settings as President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush challenged even portrayals of their relationship as a collaboration because it implied that they were equals. Regardless of these objections, Cheney considered the laidback president malleable on a broad range of administrative determinations.
The Post-9/11 Era
At the head of a faction of neo-cons that included 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 terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been attending a meeting at a educational institution in Florida. As Bush traveled to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, directing the shooting down of any unidentified airplanes approaching the US Capitol.
Cheney said the strikes changed him, leading him to become determined on retribution. In conjunction with other conservative figures, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a invasion of Afghanistan in an effort to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the invasion of Iraq, although there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Disputed Policies
He showed no remorse about the armed intervention, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis died, and not about the enhanced interrogation of individuals apprehended after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was predicated on faulty reports echoed by Cheney, was the correct decision. "It was the correct action to do at that time. I had faith then and I believe it presently."
Yet even at the time, there were contrary opinions at a senior level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the government's own delegates to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the post. "I observed, as a baseline," he wrote later "clear negligence, inaction, and irresponsibility: potentially, lying, incompetence, and dishonesty."
Broader Context
Cheney was not solely accountable for the Iraq military action. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had advocated for similar measures. He had written a document detailing circumstances in which US concerns might be compromised (encompassing "availability of essential resources, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the United States should be positioned to take unilateral action when cooperative measures cannot be orchestrated," explicitly referencing defense operations against Iraq.
Bush additionally had assumed the White House vaguely intent on implementing what his predecessor had notably declined to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Following he had been fired by the administration, the finance chief Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his intention of diminishing America's engagement in the regional tensions and mooted military action against Iraq.
Bush bore a personal grudge against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a conspiracy to assassinate his father, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore resented that one of the biggest hotels in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a portrait of his predecessor's visage that all visitors had to step on.
Interrogation Methods
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken supporting attacking Iraq, frequently citing information documents that were either insubstantial or totally misleading. He backed what the Bush administration indirectly described as "advanced techniques", the use of simulated drowning and physical pressure.
Addressing a Senate analysis in 2014 that found that no valuable data had resulted from the harsh techniques, Cheney rejected the conclusions as "loaded with crap". He told Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to take steps and create procedures to catch the bastards who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they earn a lot of praise."
Public Image
Cheney took pleasure in nicknames imposed on him by detractors such as the Star Wars villain and the sinister presence, and by the notion that he was a shadow power manipulating Bush. In the journalist's 2013 book about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Is it me who is the malevolent mastermind in the shadows that nobody ever sees leave his domain? This represents a nice way to work, actually."
Corporate Connections
Controversy over his business interests accompanied him throughout his time as second-in-command. Although 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 petroleum corporations, in 1995 as chairman and top executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's election partner for the executive branch. Contentiously, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was awarded US contracts totaling multiple billions.
It made him rich. His yearly earnings during his period at the corporation increased from his $258,394 while military head to over four million. When he resigned in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at in excess of $20m|twenty
