The former US vice-president Dick Cheney, who has died at the age of 84, was seen as arguably the most significant incumbents of that position in US history. While many VPs had to settle for marginal or ceremonial functions, Cheney exercised huge influence during the administration of George W Bush, so much so that he was commonly called as the "true president".
Bush objected to such a characterisation and stated the connection was more complicated. He noted that Cheney was courteous, invariably addressing him in public settings as President, while he called him as Dick. Bush questioned even characterisations of their relationship as a collaboration because it indicated that they were equals. Regardless of these objections, Cheney viewed the easygoing president accommodating on a whole raft of administrative determinations.
A Aftermath of 9/11
At the head of a faction of conservative hawks that featured Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been attending a gathering at a educational institution in Florida. Whereas Bush headed for a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, commanding the downing of any unidentified planes heading toward the US Capitol.
Cheney claimed the strikes transformed him, causing him to be focused on retaliation. In conjunction with other conservative figures, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a takeover of Afghanistan in an effort to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the military action of Iraq, though there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Disputed Policies
He expressed no regrets about the invasion, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis perished, and not about the enhanced interrogation of individuals apprehended after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was predicated on inaccurate information repeated by Cheney, was the right decision. "It was the proper decision to do at that time. I had faith at the time and I hold that view today."
Yet even at the time, there were contrary opinions at a high level about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the administration's own special envoys to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the position. "I saw, as a baseline," he wrote later "clear negligence, carelessness, and unaccountability: at worst, falsehoods, ineptitude, and corruption."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not entirely responsible for the Iraq invasion. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for comparable steps. He had drafted a memorandum outlining scenarios in which American interests might be threatened (encompassing "obtaining crucial commodities, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the United States should be postured to operate alone when collective action prove impossible," specifically citing military moves against Iraq.
Bush too had arrived in the presidency vaguely intent on carrying out what his predecessor had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Subsequent to he had been sacked by the president, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his plan of diminishing America's engagement in the Middle East dispute and suggested defense operations against Iraq.
Bush held a personal grudge against Saddam, thinking he had been responsible for a scheme to murder his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally objected to that one of the biggest establishments in Baghdad had a ground design with a image of his father's visage that each person had to step on.
Investigation Approaches
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most vociferous supporting attacking Iraq, repeatedly quoting agency briefings that were either insubstantial or totally deceptive. He endorsed what the Bush administration indirectly described as "intensive questioning", the employment of interrogation method and torture.
Responding to a Senate analysis in 2014 that determined that no valuable data had been obtained through the interrogation methods, Cheney disregarded the conclusions as "riddled with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to take steps and establish procedures to capture the bastards who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it never happened again. That's exactly what they did and they merit a lot of credit."
Public Image
Cheney reveled in monikers imposed on him by critics such as Darth Vader and the sinister presence, and by the notion that he was a dark force directing Bush. In the journalist's 2013 book about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Do I represent the evil genius in the background that operates invisibly leave his lair? This represents a nice way to work, actually."
Corporate Connections
Debate over his business interests followed him during his tenure as second-in-command. Although he had little experience in business but good contacts in defence, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's biggest oil and gas companies, in 1995 as chair and top executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's election partner for the presidency. Debatably, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was granted US deals valued at substantial sums.
It made him rich. His yearly compensation during his period at the company increased from his quarter-million dollars during his time as Pentagon chief to millions. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at more than $20m|twenty
