The late US VP Dick Cheney, who died at age 84, was considered one of the most influential incumbents of the vice-presidency in American history. Whereas numerous second-in-commands were confined to marginal or figurehead positions, Cheney wielded enormous sway during the term of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was commonly referred to as the "real president".
Bush objected to such a characterisation and said the connection was more nuanced. He noted that Cheney was deferential, consistently referring to him in public as Mr President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush challenged even portrayals of their association as a partnership because it suggested that they were peers. Regardless of these objections, Cheney viewed the easygoing president pliable on a broad range of governmental choices.
A Post-9/11 Era
In charge of a faction of neo-conservatives that featured defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been attending a meeting at a educational institution in Florida. Whereas Bush headed for a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, commanding the shooting down of any non-communicating planes approaching the government building.
Cheney stated the attacks altered his perspective, making him become focused on retaliation. In conjunction with other neo-conservatives, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an effort to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the invasion of Iraq, even though there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Debated Policies
He expressed no regrets about the armed intervention, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis died, or about the enhanced interrogation of suspects captured after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was founded on faulty reports echoed by Cheney, was the right course of action. "It was the right thing to do back then. I was convinced back then and I believe it now."
Yet during that period, there were contrary opinions at a senior level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the government's own delegates to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the post. "I observed, as a baseline," he later wrote "obvious failure, negligence, and unaccountability: potentially, falsehoods, incompetence, and corruption."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not solely to blame for the Iraq invasion. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had advocated for similar measures. He had composed a document setting out scenarios in which national priorities might be endangered (encompassing "availability of crucial commodities, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "America should be prepared to take unilateral action when collective action prove impossible," specifically mentioning armed actions against Iraq.
Bush too had arrived in the presidency generally inclined on implementing what his predecessor had famously refused to do in 1991; remove Saddam. After he had been fired by the White House, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his plan of diminishing America's engagement in the Middle East dispute and suggested defense operations against Iraq.
Bush bore a personal grudge against Saddam, believing he had been responsible for a plot to murder his father, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally resented that one of the largest establishments in Baghdad had a floor mural with a image of his parent's visage that everyone had to step on.
Questioning Techniques
However it was Cheney who was among the most vociferous supporting striking Iraq, consistently referencing intelligence reports that were both weak or entirely inaccurate. He endorsed what the Bush White House politely called as "intensive questioning", the employment of interrogation method and torture.
Answering a Senate document in 2014 that found that no valuable data had been obtained through the interrogation methods, Cheney dismissed the report as "loaded with crap". He told Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to take steps and create initiatives to capture the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it never happened again. That is precisely what they did and they merit a lot of praise."
Public Image
Cheney took pleasure in labels assigned to him by opponents such as the dark character and the sinister presence, and by the notion that he was a sinister influence manipulating Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 volume about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Do I represent the sinister strategist in the shadows that remains unseen come out of his domain? That is a nice way to work, truthfully."
Business Interests
Controversy over his commercial relationships followed him throughout his time as VP. Although he had little experience in business but good contacts in defence, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's largest petroleum companies, in 1995 as chairman and CEO.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's running mate for the presidency. Controversially, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was given US agreements valued at billions.
It significantly boosted his finances. His yearly earnings during his period at the company rose from his previous salary during his time as military head to over four million. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement worth more than $20m|twenty
