The deceased US vice-president Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was seen as arguably the most significant incumbents of that office in the nation's history. Although countless VPs were confined to marginal or symbolic roles, Cheney held enormous power during the presidency of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was commonly described as the "actual president".
Bush objected to such a characterisation and claimed the relationship was more complex. He pointed out that Cheney was respectful, invariably addressing him in official appearances as President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush challenged even characterisations of their partnership as a team because it implied that they were on equal footing. Despite these objections, Cheney considered the laidback president malleable on a wide array of policy decisions.
The Period Following the Attacks
In charge of a contingent of neo-cons that encompassed military head Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been attending a meeting at a educational institution in Florida. While Bush traveled to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took command, directing the shooting down of any non-communicating planes heading toward the Capitol building.
Cheney stated the attacks changed him, causing him to be determined on retribution. Along with other neo-conservatives, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a invasion of Afghanistan in an endeavor to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the armed intervention of Iraq, even though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Controversial Policies
He expressed no regrets about the invasion, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, and not about the harsh treatment of detainees captured after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was based on misleading information echoed by Cheney, was the proper decision. "It was the proper decision to do then. I believed it then and I believe it today."
However even at the time, there were opposing views 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 role. "I saw, as a baseline," he later wrote "obvious failure, negligence, and unaccountability: in the worst case, lying, ineptitude, and corruption."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not solely to blame for the Iraq campaign. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for such action. He had composed a document setting out circumstances in which American interests might be endangered (encompassing "access to essential resources, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the US should be positioned to act independently when collective action cannot be arranged," specifically mentioning armed actions against Iraq.
Bush additionally had arrived in the White House somewhat determined on executing what his parent had famously refused to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Following he had been dismissed by the administration, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his objective of lowering America's involvement in the Middle East dispute and suggested armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush bore a private grievance against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a conspiracy to murder his parent, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally disliked that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a floor mural with a likeness of his predecessor's face that each person had to tread upon.
Interrogation Methods
However it was Cheney who was one of the most vehement advocating invading Iraq, consistently referencing agency briefings that were both thin or totally misleading. He supported what the Bush White House euphemistically referred to as "enhanced interrogation", the use of simulated drowning and torture.
Addressing a Senate document in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had come from the interrogation methods, Cheney disregarded the conclusions as "full of crap". He stated to Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and create procedures to capture the perpetrators who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it would not recur. That is precisely what they did and they merit a lot of recognition."
External Perception
Cheney enjoyed monikers assigned to him by detractors such as the Star Wars villain and The Prince of Darkness, and by the idea that he was a shadow power directing Bush. In the author's 2013 publication about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Do I represent the malevolent mastermind in the background that nobody ever sees leave his lair? This represents a advantageous way to work, actually."
Commercial Ties
Controversy over his corporate affiliations accompanied him through his period as VP. While he had little experience in corporate affairs but established relationships in security, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's biggest energy corporations, in 1995 as chair and CEO.
In 2000 he became Bush's VP candidate for the White House. Contentiously, during the military campaign, Halliburton was awarded US agreements worth billions.
It significantly boosted his finances. His annual income during his tenure at the firm grew from his $258,394 when he was Pentagon chief to $4.4m. When he resigned in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at in excess of $20m|twenty
