The deceased US vice-president Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was considered one of the most powerful incumbents of that position in American history. Whereas countless VPs had to settle for peripheral or figurehead roles, Cheney exercised substantial sway during the administration of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was often described as the "actual president".
Bush disliked that description and claimed the connection was more nuanced. He observed that Cheney was respectful, always referring to him in public as President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush questioned even characterisations of their association as a partnership because it indicated that they were equals. Regardless of these denials, Cheney considered the laidback president pliable on a broad range of policy decisions.
The Period Following the Attacks
Leading of a group of conservative hawks that encompassed Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been attending a meeting at a school in Florida. Whereas Bush headed for a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, directing the downing of any unidentified aircraft nearing the Capitol building.
Cheney said the assaults changed him, leading him to become focused on revenge. Together with other neo-conservatives, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a occupation of Afghanistan in an effort to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the armed intervention of Iraq, though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Debated Policies
He voiced no apologies about the armed intervention, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, nor about the harsh treatment of individuals apprehended after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was founded on faulty information repeated by Cheney, was the right course of action. "It represented the right thing to do back then. I had faith back then and I believe it now."
But even at the time, there were contrary opinions at a senior level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the administration's own representatives to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the position. "I observed, at a minimum," he later wrote "obvious failure, carelessness, and irresponsibility: at worst, deception, ineptitude, and corruption."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not solely to blame for the Iraq campaign. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for similar measures. He had composed a memorandum detailing scenarios in which US concerns might be endangered (encompassing "availability of vital raw materials, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "the US should be prepared to operate alone when joint efforts cannot be orchestrated," explicitly citing defense operations against Iraq.
Bush also had assumed the White House vaguely intent on carrying out what his predecessor had notably declined to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Following he had been fired by the White House, 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 engagement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and suggested military action against Iraq.
Bush held a personal grudge against Saddam, convinced he had been behind a scheme to murder his parent, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He also objected to that one of the most prominent establishments in Baghdad had a floor mural with a image of his parent's face that everyone had to tread upon.
Questioning Techniques
Yet it was Cheney who was among the most vociferous advocating invading Iraq, frequently referencing information documents that were either weak or entirely inaccurate. He endorsed what the Bush government indirectly described as "enhanced interrogation", the application of interrogation method and harsh treatment.
Addressing a Senate analysis in 2014 that concluded that no valuable data had come from the torture, Cheney disregarded the report as "loaded with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and establish initiatives to capture the bastards who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it never happened again. That was specifically what they did and they deserve a lot of credit."
External Perception
Cheney took pleasure in labels given to him by opponents such as Darth Vader and the sinister presence, and by the idea that he was a dark force manipulating Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication about the two, 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 shadows that nobody ever sees leave his hole? This represents a nice way to work, truthfully."
Business Interests
Debate over his business interests followed him throughout his time as second-in-command. While he had minimal expertise in corporate affairs but good contacts in defence, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's largest oil and gas conglomerates, in 1995 as chair and CEO.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's election partner for the executive branch. Contentiously, during the military campaign, Halliburton was granted US contracts valued at substantial sums.
It made him rich. His annual income during his time at the company rose from his quarter-million dollars when he was military head to millions. When he left in 2000 he had a compensation package totaling over $20m|twenty
