The former US vice-president Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was regarded as among the most significant occupants of the vice-presidency in American history. Whereas many VPs had to settle for peripheral or symbolic roles, Cheney exercised substantial power during the administration of George W Bush, to the point that he was frequently called as the "true president".
Bush resented that description and claimed the dynamic was more complicated. He pointed out that Cheney was deferential, consistently calling him in public as the President, while he called him as Dick. Bush disputed even portrayals of their association as a collaboration because it indicated that they were peers. Regardless of these denials, Cheney found the easygoing president accommodating on a wide array of governmental choices.
A Post-9/11 Era
Leading of a group of neo-conservatives that encompassed Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been participating in a meeting at a educational institution in Florida. As Bush traveled to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, ordering the downing of any unidentified airplanes approaching the Capitol building.
Cheney said the assaults changed him, causing him to be focused on revenge. Together with other conservative figures, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an attempt to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the armed intervention of Iraq, even though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Disputed Actions
He expressed no regrets about the military campaign, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis perished, or about the waterboarding of suspects captured after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was based on faulty intelligence repeated by Cheney, was the proper path to take. "It proved to be the proper decision to do back then. I had faith back then and I hold that view presently."
But even at the time, there were opposing views at a high level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the government's own representatives to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the role. "I witnessed, at a minimum," he subsequently stated "true dereliction, carelessness, and recklessness: in the worst case, deception, unfitness, and graft."
Wider Perspective
Cheney was not solely responsible for the Iraq invasion. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for similar measures. He had written a document setting out scenarios in which national priorities might be threatened (featuring "access to essential resources, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the United States should be positioned to take unilateral action when cooperative measures cannot be orchestrated," particularly citing defense operations against Iraq.
Bush also had entered the Oval Office generally inclined on implementing what his predecessor had specifically avoided to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. After he had been dismissed by the president, 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 diminishing America's involvement in the regional tensions and mooted defense operations against Iraq.
Bush carried a personal grudge against Saddam, thinking he had been responsible for a scheme to kill his father, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He also resented that one of the largest establishments in Baghdad had a ground design with a likeness of his parent's face that all visitors had to tread upon.
Investigation Approaches
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most vociferous behind invading Iraq, repeatedly quoting information documents that were either insubstantial or entirely deceptive. He supported what the Bush administration indirectly described as "advanced techniques", the employment of interrogation method and harsh treatment.
Responding to a Senate analysis in 2014 that found that no valuable data had resulted from the interrogation methods, Cheney dismissed the conclusions as "full of crap". He stated to Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to take steps and establish procedures to capture the perpetrators who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it was not repeated. That's exactly what they did and they deserve a lot of praise."
Public Persona
Cheney took pleasure in nicknames assigned to him by detractors such as the Star Wars villain and the dark figure, and by the concept that he was a dark force manipulating Bush. In the journalist's 2013 book about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Do I represent the malevolent mastermind in the corner that nobody ever sees emerge from his hole? That is a advantageous way to function, truthfully."
Corporate Connections
Controversy over his commercial relationships pursued him during his tenure as vice-president. Although he had minimal expertise in corporate affairs but good contacts in defence, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's biggest petroleum corporations, in 1995 as chairman and chief executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's election partner for the presidency. Contentiously, during the military campaign, Halliburton was awarded US contracts valued at substantial sums.
It made him rich. His yearly earnings during his tenure at the firm grew from his $258,394 during his time as Pentagon chief to over four million. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at more than $20m|twenty
