The late US vice-president Dick Cheney, who died at age 84, was considered one of the most significant occupants of that position in US history. While countless vice-presidents were limited to marginal or ceremonial functions, Cheney held substantial influence during the administration of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was often described as the "actual president".
Bush objected to that description and claimed the dynamic was more complex. He noted that Cheney was courteous, consistently calling him in official appearances as Mr President, while he called him as Dick. Bush questioned even descriptions of their relationship as a team because it implied that they were on equal footing. Regardless of such protestations, Cheney found the relaxed president pliable on a broad range of administrative determinations.
The Aftermath of 9/11
At the head of a contingent of neo-conservatives that included Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been participating in a session at a educational institution in Florida. As Bush traveled to a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, commanding the downing of any unresponsive planes heading toward the US Capitol.
Cheney stated the assaults transformed him, causing him to be determined on retribution. Along with other conservative figures, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a invasion of Afghanistan in an attempt to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the armed intervention of Iraq, even though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Debated Policies
He expressed no regrets about the military campaign, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis perished, and not about the enhanced interrogation of individuals apprehended after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was founded on misleading intelligence repeated by Cheney, was the proper course of action. "It represented the right thing to do back then. I believed it back then and I believe it now."
Yet even at the time, there were dissenting voices at a top tier about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the administration's own delegates to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the position. "I observed, at a minimum," he wrote later "obvious failure, inaction, and unaccountability: at worst, deception, ineptitude, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not solely responsible for the Iraq invasion. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for such action. He had written a document setting out circumstances in which national priorities might be compromised (encompassing "obtaining crucial commodities, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "America should be postured to act independently when joint efforts cannot be arranged," specifically mentioning defense operations against Iraq.
Bush also had arrived in the Oval Office generally inclined on implementing what his father had famously refused to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Following he had been sacked by the White House, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his intention of lowering America's engagement in the Middle East dispute and mooted military action against Iraq.
Bush carried a personal grudge against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a plot to murder his father, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore disliked that one of the largest hotels in Baghdad had a ground design with a portrait of his predecessor's visage that all visitors had to walk over.
Investigation Approaches
However it was Cheney who was part of the most vehement advocating striking Iraq, consistently quoting information documents that were either insubstantial or totally deceptive. He backed what the Bush government indirectly described as "enhanced interrogation", the use of interrogation method and torture.
Answering a Senate report in 2014 that found that no valuable data had resulted from the interrogation methods, Cheney rejected the conclusions as "full of crap". He stated to Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to implement measures and establish procedures to apprehend the perpetrators who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it was not repeated. That's exactly what they did and they earn a lot of praise."
External Perception
Cheney enjoyed monikers imposed on him by detractors such as the dark character and The Prince of Darkness, and by the notion that he was a dark force manipulating Bush. In the author's 2013 publication about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Do I represent the sinister strategist in the corner that remains unseen come out of his domain? It's a effective way to operate, actually."
Corporate Connections
Controversy over his business interests accompanied him through his period as VP. While he had limited background in commerce but good contacts in military, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's largest petroleum companies, in 1995 as chair and CEO.
In 2000 he became Bush's election partner for the presidency. Controversially, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was granted US agreements worth billions.
It made him rich. His yearly earnings during his time at the corporation grew from his previous salary when he was defence secretary to over four million. When he resigned in 2000 he had a compensation package valued at more than $20m|twenty
