The former US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who passed away at the age of 84, was regarded as arguably the most powerful holders of that position in the nation's history. While countless VPs were confined to marginal or symbolic positions, Cheney exercised enormous power during the presidency of George W Bush, to the point that he was commonly called as the "true president".
Bush objected to that description and said the connection was more nuanced. He observed that Cheney was respectful, invariably calling him in public as the President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush disputed even portrayals of their association as a partnership because it indicated that they were peers. Despite these denials, Cheney considered the easygoing president pliable on a broad range of administrative determinations.
The Period Following the Attacks
In charge of a group of neo-cons that encompassed Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been participating in a meeting at a school in Florida. Whereas Bush made his way to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, commanding the destruction of any non-communicating airplanes heading toward the US Capitol.
Cheney said the assaults altered his perspective, causing him to be intent on retribution. Together with other neo-conservatives, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a occupation of Afghanistan in an endeavor to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the invasion of Iraq, though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Controversial Decisions
He showed no remorse about the invasion, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis perished, or about the waterboarding of detainees apprehended after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was predicated on inaccurate reports repeated by Cheney, was the correct path to take. "It proved to be the right thing to do back then. I was convinced at the time and I hold that view presently."
Yet during that period, there were dissenting voices at a high level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the government's own delegates to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the role. "I witnessed, as a baseline," he wrote later "clear negligence, carelessness, and unaccountability: at worst, deception, incompetence, and dishonesty."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not completely responsible for the Iraq military action. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for similar measures. He had composed a document detailing situations in which US concerns might be threatened (featuring "obtaining essential resources, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the United States should be postured to take unilateral action when cooperative measures prove impossible," explicitly referencing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush too had entered the presidency generally inclined on implementing what his predecessor had notably declined to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. After he had been dismissed by the White House, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his objective of reducing America's involvement in the regional tensions and mooted armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush bore a personal grudge against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a scheme to assassinate his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He also resented that one of the biggest establishments in Baghdad had a floor mural with a portrait of his father's visage that all visitors had to tread upon.
Questioning Techniques
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken behind attacking Iraq, repeatedly citing information documents that were whether weak or entirely inaccurate. He supported what the Bush administration euphemistically referred to as "enhanced interrogation", the use of waterboarding and physical pressure.
Responding to a Senate document in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had been obtained through the torture, Cheney rejected the report as "riddled with crap". He told Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and create procedures to catch 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 earn a lot of credit."
Public Persona
Cheney enjoyed labels assigned to him by critics such as Darth Vader and the sinister presence, and by the concept that he was a shadow power directing 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 shadows that remains unseen come out of his domain? It's a advantageous way to function, actually."
Commercial Ties
Debate over his commercial relationships followed him through his period as vice-president. Even though he had minimal expertise in corporate affairs but strong connections in military, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial oil and gas companies, in 1995 as leader and chief executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's election partner for the White House. Debatably, during the military campaign, Halliburton was given US deals totaling substantial sums.
It made him rich. His yearly earnings during his tenure at the corporation rose from his quarter-million dollars when he was Pentagon chief to $4.4m. When he left in 2000 he had a compensation package worth over $20m|twenty
