The late US vice-president Dick Cheney, who died at age 84, was considered among the most influential incumbents of that office in American history. While numerous VPs were limited to minor or figurehead positions, Cheney held enormous power during the administration of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was frequently described as the "real president".
Bush objected to that description and said the connection was more complicated. He pointed out that Cheney was respectful, invariably addressing him in official appearances as Mr President, while he called him as Dick. Bush questioned even characterisations of their association as a partnership because it suggested that they were peers. Regardless of such protestations, Cheney viewed the relaxed president accommodating on a broad range of governmental choices.
A Period Following the Attacks
In charge of a group of neo-cons that included defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been attending a gathering at a elementary school in Florida. Whereas Bush headed for a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, directing the destruction of any unidentified planes nearing the government building.
Cheney said the assaults transformed him, causing him to be determined on retribution. In conjunction with other neo-conservatives, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a invasion of Afghanistan in an effort to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the invasion of Iraq, even though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Debated Decisions
He expressed no regrets about the invasion, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, nor about the harsh treatment of detainees rounded up after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was based on misleading reports circulated by Cheney, was the right decision. "It proved to be the correct action to do then. I believed it back then and I believe it today."
However even then, there were opposing views at a senior level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the government's own delegates to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the post. "I witnessed, as a baseline," he wrote later "clear negligence, inaction, and recklessness: in the worst case, lying, unfitness, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not solely responsible for the Iraq military action. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for similar measures. He had written a document setting out situations in which US concerns might be compromised (encompassing "obtaining vital raw materials, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "the US should be prepared to operate alone when joint efforts cannot be orchestrated," particularly referencing defense operations against Iraq.
Bush too had assumed the White House generally inclined on implementing what his father had notably declined to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Subsequent to he had been sacked by the president, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his plan of reducing America's engagement in the Middle East dispute and proposed armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush bore a personal grudge against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a scheme to kill his parent, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He also objected to that one of the most prominent hotels in Baghdad had a ground design with a image of his predecessor's face that each person had to step on.
Questioning Techniques
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken behind invading Iraq, frequently quoting information documents that were whether thin or totally misleading. He endorsed what the Bush government politely called as "advanced techniques", the employment of waterboarding and physical pressure.
Addressing a Senate analysis in 2014 that concluded that no actionable intelligence had been obtained through the interrogation methods, Cheney disregarded the report as "full of crap". He told Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to implement measures and create initiatives to capture the bastards who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it was not repeated. That's exactly what they did and they deserve a lot of credit."
External Perception
Cheney reveled in labels imposed on him by opponents such as the Star Wars villain and The Prince of Darkness, and by the notion that he was a dark force manipulating Bush. In the journalist's 2013 book about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Am I the malevolent mastermind in the background that nobody ever sees come out of his lair? That is a nice way to operate, truthfully."
Business Interests
Debate over his corporate affiliations pursued him during his tenure as VP. Although he had minimal expertise in commerce but good contacts in security, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's biggest oil and gas companies, in 1995 as chairman and CEO.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's VP candidate for the White House. Controversially, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was given US agreements valued at multiple billions.
It made him rich. His yearly earnings during his time at the firm grew from his previous salary while military head to over four million. When he resigned in 2000 he had a package valued at over $20m|twenty
