The former US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who died at age 84, was regarded as among the most powerful occupants of the vice-presidency in the nation's history. Whereas numerous VPs were limited to minor or symbolic functions, Cheney held substantial influence during the presidency of George W Bush, so much so that he was commonly referred to as the "real president".
Bush resented that description and claimed the relationship was more complicated. He observed that Cheney was courteous, invariably calling him in public as Mr President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush challenged even characterisations of their partnership as a team because it indicated that they were peers. Regardless of these objections, Cheney considered the laidback president pliable on a broad range of administrative determinations.
A Period Following the Attacks
In charge of a faction of conservative hawks that encompassed Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in response to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been participating in a gathering at a school in Florida. As Bush made his way to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, ordering the destruction of any unresponsive aircraft nearing the Capitol building.
Cheney stated the assaults transformed him, causing him to be focused on retaliation. In conjunction with other neo-cons, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an endeavor to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the military action of Iraq, though there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Disputed Decisions
He expressed no regrets about the armed intervention, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, or about the waterboarding of detainees apprehended after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was predicated on faulty intelligence echoed by Cheney, was the right path to take. "It represented the right thing to do back then. I was convinced back then and I believe it today."
However even at the time, there were dissenting voices at a top tier about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the administration's own representatives to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the position. "I saw, as a baseline," he subsequently stated "true dereliction, carelessness, and irresponsibility: potentially, lying, unfitness, and corruption."
Wider Perspective
Cheney was not completely responsible for the Iraq invasion. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for comparable steps. He had composed a memo setting out situations in which national priorities might be threatened (encompassing "obtaining essential resources, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "America should be prepared to take unilateral action when cooperative measures cannot be arranged," specifically referencing military moves against Iraq.
Bush also had entered the White House generally inclined on carrying out what his predecessor had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Following he had been sacked by the administration, the finance chief Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his objective of reducing America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and suggested armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush carried a individual resentment against Saddam, thinking he had been involved in a conspiracy to murder his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally disliked that one of the most prominent accommodations in Baghdad had a ground design with a likeness of his parent's visage that all visitors had to walk over.
Questioning Techniques
But it was Cheney who was one of the most vehement behind striking Iraq, consistently quoting intelligence reports that were either thin or completely misleading. He supported what the Bush administration politely called as "advanced techniques", the employment of waterboarding and torture.
Responding to a Senate report in 2014 that determined that no useful information had come from the harsh techniques, Cheney dismissed the findings as "loaded with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to establish protocols and establish procedures to catch the bastards who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it was not repeated. That was specifically what they did and they merit a lot of recognition."
Public Image
Cheney reveled in monikers given to him by opponents such as the dark character and The Prince of Darkness, and by the concept that he was a dark force manipulating 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: "Is it me who is the sinister strategist in the shadows that nobody ever sees come out of his domain? This represents a advantageous way to function, actually."
Business Interests
Controversy over his business interests pursued him during his tenure as VP. Even though he had minimal expertise in commerce but established relationships in defence, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's largest petroleum corporations, in 1995 as leader and top executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's running mate for the White House. Controversially, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was given US deals totaling multiple billions.
It greatly increased his wealth. His yearly compensation during his period at the firm rose from his quarter-million dollars when he was defence secretary to over four million. When he left in 2000 he had a package valued at in excess of $20m|twenty
