The deceased US vice-president Dick Cheney, who passed away at the age of 84, was considered among the most powerful holders of that position in American history. While numerous second-in-commands were limited to minor or figurehead functions, Cheney exercised enormous power during the presidency of George W Bush, so much so that he was commonly described as the "actual president".
Bush objected to such a characterisation and said the dynamic was more complicated. He pointed out that Cheney was courteous, always calling him in public settings as the President, while he called him as Dick. Bush questioned even characterisations of their association as a team because it implied that they were on equal footing. Despite these objections, Cheney viewed the laidback president pliable on a whole raft of governmental choices.
The Post-9/11 Era
Leading of a group of conservative hawks that encompassed defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been participating in a meeting at a school in Florida. As Bush made his way to a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, directing the shooting down of any unresponsive airplanes approaching the Capitol building.
Cheney claimed the attacks transformed him, making him become determined on retaliation. Along with other neo-conservatives, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a occupation of Afghanistan in an effort to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the invasion of Iraq, though there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Debated Policies
He voiced no apologies about the military campaign, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, and not about the harsh treatment of detainees apprehended after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was predicated on misleading information repeated by Cheney, was the proper decision. "It represented the correct action to do at that time. I was convinced back then and I believe it presently."
But even then, there were dissenting voices at a top tier about the poor management of Iraq. One of the government's own delegates to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the position. "I observed, as a baseline," he wrote later "obvious failure, carelessness, and irresponsibility: in the worst case, lying, unfitness, and corruption."
Wider Perspective
Cheney was not solely responsible for the Iraq military action. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for such action. He had written a memo outlining scenarios in which American interests might be endangered (encompassing "availability of vital raw materials, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "the US should be prepared to act independently when cooperative measures cannot be arranged," specifically mentioning military moves against Iraq.
Bush additionally had entered the Oval Office vaguely intent on carrying out what his father had specifically avoided to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Subsequent to he had been sacked by the administration, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his intention of lowering America's engagement in the Middle East dispute and proposed military action against Iraq.
Bush carried a personal grudge against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a scheme to murder his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore resented that one of the largest hotels in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a portrait of his father's face that all visitors had to step on.
Investigation Approaches
But it was Cheney who was one of the most vociferous supporting striking Iraq, frequently citing agency briefings that were both insubstantial or completely deceptive. He endorsed what the Bush administration indirectly described as "enhanced interrogation", the employment of waterboarding and harsh treatment.
Responding to a Senate document in 2014 that determined that no actionable intelligence had resulted from the harsh techniques, Cheney dismissed the findings as "riddled with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and create initiatives to apprehend the individuals who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it never happened again. That was specifically what they did and they earn a lot of credit."
External Perception
Cheney enjoyed labels assigned to him by critics such as the dark character and the sinister presence, and by the concept that he was a sinister influence manipulating 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: "Is it me who is the sinister strategist in the corner that remains unseen emerge from his lair? It's a nice way to operate, actually."
Corporate Connections
Debate over his commercial relationships pursued him throughout his time as vice-president. While he had minimal expertise in corporate affairs but good contacts in defence, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's largest oil and gas corporations, in 1995 as leader and CEO.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's VP candidate for the presidency. Contentiously, during the military campaign, Halliburton was given US deals valued at multiple billions.
It made him rich. His yearly compensation during his period at the company grew from his quarter-million dollars when he was military head to $4.4m. When he left in 2000 he had a severance arrangement worth in excess of $20m|twenty
