The former US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was considered among the most significant incumbents of the vice-presidency in the nation's history. Whereas numerous VPs were limited to marginal or figurehead functions, Cheney wielded enormous power during the presidency of George W Bush, to the point that he was frequently described as the "true president".
Bush disliked such a characterisation and stated the dynamic was more nuanced. He pointed out that Cheney was deferential, invariably addressing him in public settings as President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush challenged even descriptions of their relationship as a collaboration because it suggested that they were equals. Regardless of these denials, Cheney considered the relaxed president malleable on a wide array of policy decisions.
The Period Following the Attacks
At the head of a faction of neo-cons that featured military head Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in response to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been taking part in a gathering at a school in Florida. While Bush made his way to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took command, commanding the downing of any non-communicating airplanes approaching the government building.
Cheney claimed the strikes altered his perspective, causing him to be determined on retribution. Together with other conservative figures, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a invasion of Afghanistan in an endeavor to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the military action of Iraq, although there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Debated Decisions
He expressed no regrets about the invasion, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis perished, nor about the enhanced interrogation of suspects rounded up after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was founded on faulty intelligence circulated by Cheney, was the right decision. "It represented the right thing to do then. I believed it at the time and I believe it presently."
But during that period, there were contrary opinions at a senior level about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the administration's own delegates to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the position. "I saw, at a minimum," he subsequently stated "obvious failure, negligence, and irresponsibility: in the worst case, falsehoods, unfitness, and corruption."
Broader Context
Cheney was not solely to blame for the Iraq military action. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for similar measures. He had drafted a document detailing scenarios in which national priorities might be endangered (featuring "obtaining essential resources, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "America should be positioned to operate alone when cooperative measures prove impossible," explicitly citing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush additionally had entered the Oval Office vaguely intent on executing what his parent had specifically avoided to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Following he had been sacked by the administration, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his plan of diminishing America's participation in the Middle East dispute and suggested military action against Iraq.
Bush held a individual resentment against Saddam, believing he had been responsible for a scheme to murder his parent, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore disliked that one of the largest hotels in Baghdad had a floor mural with a likeness of his predecessor's visage that all visitors had to walk over.
Interrogation Methods
Yet it was Cheney who was among the most outspoken behind attacking Iraq, repeatedly quoting intelligence reports that were either insubstantial or completely inaccurate. He endorsed what the Bush administration indirectly described as "enhanced interrogation", the use of simulated drowning and harsh treatment.
Answering a Senate analysis in 2014 that determined that no valuable data had resulted from the torture, Cheney dismissed the report as "full of crap". He stated to Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to establish protocols and establish procedures to catch the perpetrators who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it never happened again. That was specifically what they did and they deserve a lot of credit."
Public Image
Cheney reveled in monikers assigned to him by critics such as the dark character and the dark figure, and by the concept that he was a shadow power directing Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 volume about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Do I represent the evil genius in the background that nobody ever sees come out of his lair? It's a advantageous way to function, in fact."
Business Interests
Controversy over his corporate affiliations accompanied him through his period as second-in-command. Even though he had little experience in business but good contacts in defence, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial energy conglomerates, in 1995 as chair and chief executive.
In 2000 he became Bush's election partner for the White House. Controversially, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was awarded US deals valued at multiple billions.
It significantly boosted his finances. His annual income during his time at the corporation rose from his quarter-million dollars during his time as military head to over four million. When he left in 2000 he had a package valued at over $20m|twenty
