The late US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was considered one of the most powerful holders of that office in US history. While countless vice-presidents were limited to peripheral or figurehead functions, Cheney held substantial influence during the administration of George W Bush, so much so that he was commonly referred to as the "real president".
Bush disliked such a characterisation and claimed the connection was more complicated. He pointed out that Cheney was respectful, invariably referring to him in public settings as President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush disputed even characterisations of their partnership as a partnership because it implied that they were peers. In spite of these denials, Cheney considered the relaxed president pliable on a broad range of policy decisions.
A Aftermath of 9/11
In charge of a faction of conservative hawks that included military head Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been taking part in a gathering at a educational institution in Florida. Whereas Bush headed for a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, directing the downing of any unidentified airplanes approaching the government building.
Cheney stated the assaults transformed him, leading him to become intent on revenge. Along with other neo-cons, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a invasion of Afghanistan in an attempt to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the armed intervention of Iraq, even though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Disputed Policies
He voiced no apologies about the military campaign, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis died, and not about the waterboarding of detainees rounded up after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was founded on misleading reports circulated by Cheney, was the proper decision. "It proved to be the right thing to do then. I was convinced at the time and I hold that view today."
Yet during that period, there were dissenting voices at a top tier about the poor management of Iraq. One of the White House's own delegates to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the role. "I saw, at the very least," he subsequently stated "clear negligence, carelessness, and recklessness: potentially, lying, ineptitude, and dishonesty."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not solely accountable for the Iraq campaign. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for such action. He had composed a document detailing scenarios in which national priorities might be threatened (featuring "obtaining crucial commodities, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "the United States should be prepared to operate alone when cooperative measures prove impossible," explicitly referencing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush too had assumed the Oval Office vaguely intent on implementing what his parent had famously refused to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Following he had been dismissed by the president, the finance chief Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his plan of reducing America's engagement in the regional tensions and proposed armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush bore a individual resentment against Saddam, thinking he had been involved in a scheme to murder his father, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He also objected to that one of the most prominent accommodations in Baghdad had a ground design with a image of his father's visage that each person had to step on.
Investigation Approaches
But it was Cheney who was part of the most outspoken supporting striking Iraq, frequently quoting agency briefings that were either thin or totally misleading. He backed what the Bush government euphemistically referred to as "advanced techniques", the employment of waterboarding and physical pressure.
Addressing a Senate report in 2014 that determined that no actionable intelligence had come from the harsh techniques, Cheney rejected the report as "full of crap". He told Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to establish protocols and put in place initiatives to catch the bastards who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they deserve a lot of credit."
External Perception
Cheney took pleasure in labels 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 controlling Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Am I the malevolent mastermind in the background that operates invisibly leave his hole? That is a advantageous way to function, actually."
Commercial Ties
Dispute over his business interests followed him during his tenure as vice-president. Even though he had little experience in commerce but good contacts in defence, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's biggest petroleum corporations, in 1995 as leader and top executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's VP candidate for the executive branch. Debatably, during the military campaign, Halliburton was given US deals totaling multiple billions.
It greatly increased his wealth. His yearly compensation during his period at the corporation grew from his previous salary when he was Pentagon chief to millions. When he left in 2000 he had a package worth in excess of $20m|twenty
