The late US VP Dick Cheney, who has died at the age of 84, was regarded as arguably the most influential occupants of the vice-presidency in American history. Whereas countless second-in-commands were confined to marginal or figurehead roles, Cheney exercised substantial influence during the administration of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was often called as the "true president".
Bush objected to such a characterisation and said the dynamic was more complex. He pointed out that Cheney was respectful, always referring to him in public settings as President, while he called him as Dick. Bush disputed even portrayals of their relationship as a team because it indicated that they were equals. Despite these denials, Cheney considered the laidback president pliable on a wide array of governmental choices.
The Aftermath of 9/11
At the head of a faction of conservative hawks that included defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been attending a session at a school in Florida. As Bush made his way to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, ordering the shooting down of any unresponsive aircraft heading toward the government building.
Cheney said the assaults changed him, causing him to be intent on revenge. Together with other neo-conservatives, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a invasion of Afghanistan in an endeavor to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the military action of Iraq, although there was little proof of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Debated Actions
He showed no remorse about the armed intervention, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, nor about the waterboarding of detainees captured after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was founded on inaccurate intelligence echoed by Cheney, was the proper decision. "It represented the proper decision to do back then. I was convinced then and I believe it today."
Yet during that period, there were contrary opinions at a senior level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the White House's own special envoys to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the role. "I witnessed, at the very least," he wrote later "obvious failure, inaction, and irresponsibility: in the worst case, deception, ineptitude, and graft."
Broader Context
Cheney was not entirely to blame for the Iraq campaign. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for such action. He had drafted a document outlining situations in which national priorities might be endangered (featuring "obtaining essential resources, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "the United States should be postured to act independently when collective action prove impossible," particularly mentioning military moves against Iraq.
Bush additionally had arrived in the Oval Office generally inclined on carrying out what his parent had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Following he had been fired by the White House, the finance chief Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his plan of diminishing America's participation in the regional tensions and suggested military action against Iraq.
Bush carried a individual resentment against Saddam, convinced he had been behind a plot to murder his parent, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He also disliked that one of the most prominent establishments in Baghdad had a floor mural with a image of his parent's countenance that all visitors had to tread upon.
Investigation Approaches
Yet it was Cheney who was among the most outspoken supporting striking Iraq, frequently citing agency briefings that were both weak or totally misleading. He backed what the Bush government euphemistically referred to as "intensive questioning", the employment of waterboarding and physical pressure.
Responding to a Senate analysis in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had come from the harsh techniques, Cheney rejected the findings as "riddled with crap". He informed Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to establish protocols and create procedures to apprehend the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it was not repeated. That is precisely what they did and they merit a lot of praise."
Public Image
Cheney reveled in monikers given to him by critics such as the Star Wars villain and the dark figure, and by the concept that he was a sinister influence controlling Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Is it me who is the malevolent mastermind in the shadows that remains unseen leave his hole? It's a nice way to function, truthfully."
Business Interests
Debate over his corporate affiliations pursued him during his tenure as VP. While he had little experience in commerce but good contacts in security, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's largest petroleum conglomerates, in 1995 as leader and CEO.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's election partner for the White House. Debatably, during the military campaign, Halliburton was given US contracts valued at billions.
It made him rich. His yearly compensation during his period at the corporation increased from his quarter-million dollars when he was Pentagon chief to over four million. When he departed in 2000 he had a package valued at over $20m|twenty
