The deceased US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who has died at the age of 84, was seen as arguably the most influential occupants of that office in American history. Whereas many VPs were confined to marginal or symbolic positions, Cheney held substantial power during the administration of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was commonly called as the "actual president".
Bush resented this portrayal and claimed the relationship was more complex. He noted that Cheney was respectful, invariably calling him in official appearances as President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush challenged even portrayals of their association as a collaboration because it indicated that they were peers. In spite of such protestations, Cheney considered the relaxed president malleable on a whole raft of governmental choices.
A Period Following the Attacks
At the head of a group of neo-cons that encompassed military head Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been taking part in a gathering at a elementary school in Florida. As Bush headed for a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took command, ordering the downing of any unresponsive aircraft heading toward the government building.
Cheney stated the attacks altered his perspective, causing him to be intent on retribution. Together with other neo-conservatives, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a invasion of Afghanistan in an attempt to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the armed intervention of Iraq, even though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Controversial Actions
He showed no remorse about the armed intervention, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis perished, nor about the waterboarding of detainees captured after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was predicated on misleading information echoed by Cheney, was the correct decision. "It was the right thing to do back then. I believed it then and I hold that view presently."
But during that period, there were dissenting voices at a high level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the White House's own special envoys to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the role. "I observed, at a minimum," he wrote later "true dereliction, inaction, and unaccountability: at worst, lying, ineptitude, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not completely accountable for the Iraq military action. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had advocated for such action. He had written a memo detailing circumstances in which American interests might be endangered (encompassing "availability of vital raw materials, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the US should be prepared to act independently when cooperative measures cannot be arranged," explicitly referencing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush too had arrived in the Oval Office generally inclined on implementing what his father had notably declined to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Subsequent to he had been sacked by the president, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his intention of diminishing America's engagement in the Middle East dispute and proposed armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush held a private grievance against Saddam, thinking he had been involved in a plot to assassinate his parent, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore objected to that one of the largest establishments in Baghdad had a floor mural with a likeness of his parent's face that all visitors had to step on.
Interrogation Methods
However it was Cheney who was part of the most vociferous advocating attacking Iraq, frequently referencing agency briefings that were whether weak or entirely misleading. He endorsed what the Bush White House politely called as "advanced techniques", the employment of waterboarding and physical pressure.
Addressing a Senate document in 2014 that found that no valuable data had come from the harsh techniques, Cheney dismissed the report as "riddled with crap". He informed Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to take steps and create procedures to capture the bastards who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they merit a lot of credit."
Public Persona
Cheney reveled in nicknames imposed on him by critics such as Darth Vader and The Prince of Darkness, and by the concept that he was a dark force manipulating Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Is it me who is the malevolent mastermind in the background that remains unseen emerge from his lair? This represents a nice way to operate, actually."
Business Interests
Controversy over his commercial relationships accompanied him through his period as second-in-command. Even though he had little experience in business but strong connections in military, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's largest energy corporations, in 1995 as chairman and chief executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's election partner for the presidency. Debatably, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was granted US agreements worth substantial sums.
It greatly increased his wealth. His yearly earnings during his tenure at the company rose from his $258,394 during his time as defence secretary to $4.4m. When he left in 2000 he had a package totaling in excess of $20m|twenty
