The deceased US vice-president Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was considered arguably the most influential occupants of that office in US history. Although numerous vice-presidents were confined to peripheral or figurehead functions, Cheney exercised enormous power during the presidency of George W Bush, so much so that he was frequently referred to as the "actual president".
Bush disliked that description and stated the relationship was more complex. He observed that Cheney was respectful, always calling him in public settings as Mr President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush questioned even portrayals of their partnership as a collaboration because it suggested that they were equals. In spite of such protestations, Cheney viewed the easygoing president pliable on a wide array of governmental choices.
A Period Following the Attacks
At the head of a group of neo-conservatives that featured Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been participating in a meeting at a elementary school in Florida. As Bush traveled to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, directing the shooting down of any unidentified planes approaching the US Capitol.
Cheney stated the attacks changed him, leading him to become intent on revenge. Together with other neo-cons, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a takeover of Afghanistan in an endeavor to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the armed intervention of Iraq, although there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Debated Actions
He expressed no regrets about the armed intervention, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, nor about the waterboarding of individuals apprehended after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was founded on misleading reports echoed by Cheney, was the right course of action. "It proved to be the proper decision to do back then. I believed it then and I hold that view today."
However even at the time, there were dissenting voices at a senior level about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the administration's own representatives to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the role. "I witnessed, at the very least," he later wrote "clear negligence, inaction, and irresponsibility: at worst, deception, incompetence, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not completely to blame for the Iraq military action. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for similar measures. He had composed a memo setting out scenarios in which American interests might be endangered (including "availability of essential resources, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the United States should be postured to operate alone when joint efforts prove impossible," specifically mentioning defense operations against Iraq.
Bush too had arrived in the presidency somewhat determined on implementing what his predecessor had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Following he had been dismissed by the White House, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his plan of diminishing America's engagement in the Middle East dispute and proposed military action against Iraq.
Bush carried a personal grudge against Saddam, believing he had been behind a scheme to kill his father, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He also resented that one of the most prominent hotels in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a portrait of his parent's face that everyone had to tread upon.
Interrogation Methods
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most vehement advocating striking Iraq, consistently referencing agency briefings that were either insubstantial or entirely deceptive. He endorsed what the Bush government indirectly described as "enhanced interrogation", the application of simulated drowning and physical pressure.
Answering a Senate report in 2014 that found that no useful information had been obtained through the harsh techniques, Cheney dismissed the findings as "riddled with crap". He informed Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and create programmes to catch the bastards who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it was not repeated. That's exactly what they did and they deserve a lot of credit."
External Perception
Cheney took pleasure in monikers assigned to him by opponents such as Darth Vader and the sinister presence, and by the concept that he was a sinister influence manipulating Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 book about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Do I represent the sinister strategist in the background that remains unseen come out of his lair? That is a nice way to work, in fact."
Business Interests
Dispute over his business interests pursued him during his tenure as VP. Although he had minimal expertise in business but good contacts in security, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's largest energy corporations, in 1995 as chair and CEO.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's running mate for the presidency. Contentiously, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was granted US deals worth billions.
It made him rich. His yearly compensation during his tenure at the firm increased from his quarter-million dollars when he was defence secretary to millions. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement totaling more than $20m|twenty
