The deceased US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was regarded as among the most influential holders of that position in the nation's history. Although numerous VPs were limited to marginal or figurehead roles, Cheney exercised enormous influence during the presidency of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was often described as the "true president".
Bush resented that description and said the relationship was more complex. He pointed out that Cheney was courteous, consistently referring to him in public as President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush disputed even characterisations of their partnership as a partnership because it indicated that they were equals. Despite these denials, Cheney found the laidback president accommodating on a broad range of administrative determinations.
The Post-9/11 Era
Leading of a contingent of neo-cons that encompassed defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been taking part in a gathering at a school in Florida. While Bush headed for a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took command, ordering the downing of any non-communicating aircraft nearing the US Capitol.
Cheney stated the assaults transformed him, causing him to be focused on retaliation. Together with other neo-conservatives, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a invasion of Afghanistan in an endeavor to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the invasion of Iraq, though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Controversial Decisions
He voiced no apologies about the armed intervention, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis died, nor about the enhanced interrogation of detainees rounded up after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was predicated on faulty information echoed by Cheney, was the proper course of action. "It proved to be the right thing to do at that time. I believed it then and I believe it presently."
But even then, there were contrary opinions at a top tier about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the government's own delegates to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the role. "I saw, at a minimum," he wrote later "obvious failure, negligence, and recklessness: in the worst case, deception, unfitness, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not completely accountable for the Iraq campaign. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for comparable steps. He had composed a document setting out circumstances in which American interests might be compromised (encompassing "obtaining essential resources, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "America should be prepared to act independently when collective action cannot be orchestrated," particularly citing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush too had assumed the White House vaguely intent on executing what his father had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. After he had been dismissed by the administration, the finance chief Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his objective of lowering America's involvement in the regional tensions and mooted armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush carried a individual resentment against Saddam, believing he had been involved in a scheme to murder his father, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally objected to that one of the largest accommodations in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a portrait of his predecessor's face that all visitors had to walk over.
Interrogation Methods
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken advocating attacking Iraq, consistently referencing information documents that were either insubstantial or completely misleading. He backed what the Bush White House euphemistically referred to as "enhanced interrogation", the application of waterboarding and harsh treatment.
Addressing a Senate document in 2014 that found that no useful information had come from the interrogation methods, Cheney disregarded the findings as "full of crap". He informed Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to establish protocols and put in place initiatives to catch the individuals who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it never happened again. That is precisely what they did and they merit a lot of recognition."
Public Image
Cheney took pleasure in monikers assigned to him by detractors such as the dark character and the sinister presence, and by the concept that he was a dark force manipulating Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication 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 background that remains unseen come out of his lair? It's a advantageous way to function, truthfully."
Business Interests
Controversy over his commercial relationships accompanied him through his period as second-in-command. While he had minimal expertise in business but good contacts in military, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's biggest petroleum corporations, in 1995 as chairman and chief executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's VP candidate for the White House. Contentiously, during the military campaign, Halliburton was awarded US contracts worth multiple billions.
It made him rich. His annual income during his time at the corporation grew from his $258,394 during his time as Pentagon chief to over four million. When he departed in 2000 he had a compensation package worth more than $20m|twenty
