The former US VP Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was considered among the most significant holders of the vice-presidency in US history. Whereas numerous VPs were limited to marginal or symbolic positions, Cheney exercised substantial power during the term of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was frequently described as the "real president".
Bush disliked that description and said the relationship was more complicated. He pointed out that Cheney was courteous, invariably addressing him in public settings as the President, while he called him as Dick. Bush questioned even descriptions of their association as a team because it suggested that they were peers. In spite of these objections, Cheney considered the relaxed president malleable on a whole raft of governmental choices.
The Aftermath of 9/11
Leading of a faction of neo-conservatives that included military head Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been participating in a meeting at a educational institution in Florida. Whereas Bush traveled to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, commanding the destruction of any unidentified planes heading toward the US Capitol.
Cheney said the attacks changed him, leading him to become intent on retaliation. Together with other conservative figures, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a occupation of Afghanistan in an endeavor to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the invasion of Iraq, although there was little proof of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Debated Policies
He voiced no apologies about the invasion, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis perished, and not about the harsh treatment of individuals captured after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was predicated on inaccurate information circulated by Cheney, was the correct decision. "It represented the proper decision to do back then. I had faith back then and I believe it today."
However even at the time, there were dissenting voices at a high level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the White House's own representatives 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, inaction, and unaccountability: potentially, deception, incompetence, and corruption."
Broader Context
Cheney was not solely responsible for the Iraq military action. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for such action. He had composed a memorandum outlining circumstances in which US concerns might be compromised (encompassing "obtaining vital raw materials, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the US should be prepared to take unilateral action when collective action prove impossible," specifically mentioning military moves against Iraq.
Bush too had entered the Oval Office generally inclined on executing what his parent had notably declined to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Subsequent to he had been fired by the White House, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his objective of diminishing America's participation in the Middle East dispute and proposed military action against Iraq.
Bush carried a individual resentment against Saddam, convinced he had been responsible for a scheme to kill his father, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore disliked that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a floor mural with a likeness of his father's visage that everyone had to step on.
Questioning Techniques
Yet it was Cheney who was among the most vociferous advocating striking Iraq, repeatedly citing intelligence reports that were both insubstantial or completely deceptive. He endorsed what the Bush government indirectly described as "advanced techniques", the use of waterboarding and torture.
Addressing a Senate document in 2014 that determined that no useful information had come from the interrogation methods, Cheney disregarded the report as "loaded with crap". He informed Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and establish initiatives to catch the bastards who took the lives of 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 praise."
External Perception
Cheney enjoyed labels assigned to him by detractors such as the dark character and the sinister presence, and by the notion that he was a dark force controlling Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 volume about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Do I represent the sinister strategist in the shadows that remains unseen emerge from his domain? This represents a effective way to work, in fact."
Commercial Ties
Dispute over his business interests followed him during his tenure as second-in-command. Although he had minimal expertise in corporate affairs but good contacts in security, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial energy corporations, in 1995 as leader and top executive.
In 2000 he became Bush's election partner for the executive branch. Debatably, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was awarded US agreements valued at multiple billions.
It significantly boosted his finances. His annual income during his period at the company grew from his quarter-million dollars while military head to $4.4m. When he left in 2000 he had a package totaling in excess of $20m|twenty
