The late US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was considered one of the most influential holders of the vice-presidency in US history. Whereas many VPs were limited to peripheral or ceremonial functions, Cheney held huge power during the term of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was often called as the "real president".
Bush resented that description and said the dynamic was more complicated. He noted that Cheney was respectful, consistently addressing him in public settings as the President, while he called him as Dick. Bush questioned even portrayals of their partnership as a partnership because it implied that they were equals. Regardless of such protestations, Cheney found the easygoing president pliable on a broad range of policy decisions.
A Post-9/11 Era
In charge of a group of neo-cons that featured defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been taking part in a meeting at a school in Florida. As Bush headed for a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, commanding the shooting down of any unresponsive aircraft approaching the US Capitol.
Cheney claimed the attacks changed him, causing him to be focused on retribution. Together with other neo-conservatives, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a occupation of Afghanistan in an endeavor to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the military action of Iraq, even though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Disputed Actions
He voiced no apologies about the invasion, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis died, nor about the harsh treatment of individuals captured after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was based on inaccurate information echoed by Cheney, was the right course of action. "It proved to be the proper decision to do back then. I believed it at the time and I hold that view presently."
But during that period, there were dissenting voices at a senior level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the White House's own delegates to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the position. "I witnessed, at the very least," he later wrote "obvious failure, carelessness, and recklessness: in the worst case, falsehoods, incompetence, and dishonesty."
Wider Perspective
Cheney was not completely accountable for the Iraq military action. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had advocated for comparable steps. He had drafted a memo setting out situations in which national priorities might be endangered (encompassing "obtaining essential resources, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the US should be postured to operate alone when cooperative measures cannot be orchestrated," specifically citing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush also had entered the White House vaguely intent on executing what his predecessor had notably declined to do in 1991; remove Saddam. After he had been sacked by the White House, the finance chief Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his plan of lowering America's participation in the Middle East dispute and proposed defense operations against Iraq.
Bush held a private grievance against Saddam, believing he had been involved in a scheme to assassinate his parent, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He also resented that one of the biggest establishments in Baghdad had a ground design with a image of his parent's visage that all visitors had to tread upon.
Questioning Techniques
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken supporting attacking Iraq, repeatedly referencing information documents that were whether insubstantial or totally misleading. He supported what the Bush administration indirectly described as "enhanced interrogation", the employment of interrogation method and harsh treatment.
Responding to a Senate document in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had come from the torture, Cheney dismissed the findings as "full of crap". He informed Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to implement measures and establish initiatives to apprehend the perpetrators who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it would not recur. That's exactly what they did and they deserve a lot of recognition."
Public Image
Cheney took pleasure in labels assigned to him by opponents such as the dark character and The Prince of Darkness, 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 cited as commenting: "Am I the evil genius in the shadows that nobody ever sees emerge from his hole? It's a nice way to work, truthfully."
Business Interests
Dispute over his business interests accompanied him during his tenure as vice-president. While he had little experience in commerce but good contacts in defence, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial petroleum corporations, in 1995 as chairman and chief executive.
In 2000 he became Bush's running mate for the White House. Debatably, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was given US contracts totaling billions.
It made him rich. His yearly earnings during his tenure at the firm rose from his quarter-million dollars during his time as Pentagon chief to over four million. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at more than $20m|twenty
