The deceased US VP Dick Cheney, who died at age 84, was seen as among the most powerful occupants of that position in US history. Whereas numerous VPs were confined to marginal or symbolic positions, Cheney exercised huge influence during the term of George W Bush, so much so that he was frequently described as the "real president".
Bush objected to this portrayal and said the connection was more complicated. He observed that Cheney was deferential, consistently referring to him in public as Mr President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush questioned even portrayals of their relationship as a team because it implied that they were equals. Regardless of these objections, Cheney found the laidback president pliable on a whole raft of administrative determinations.
The Period Following the Attacks
Leading of a contingent of neo-conservatives that encompassed Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been taking part in a meeting at a school in Florida. As Bush traveled to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, ordering the downing of any unidentified airplanes heading toward the US Capitol.
Cheney claimed the attacks altered his perspective, causing him to be intent on retribution. In conjunction with other neo-cons, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a invasion of Afghanistan in an effort to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the invasion of Iraq, although there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Debated Actions
He showed no remorse about the military campaign, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, nor about the enhanced interrogation of suspects captured after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was based on misleading reports circulated by Cheney, was the right path to take. "It was the right thing to do back then. I was convinced at the time and I hold that view today."
But even then, there were contrary opinions at a high level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the administration's own representatives to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the role. "I saw, at a minimum," he wrote later "clear negligence, negligence, and unaccountability: potentially, deception, unfitness, and corruption."
Broader Context
Cheney was not entirely responsible for the Iraq campaign. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for comparable steps. He had composed a document outlining scenarios in which US concerns might be endangered (including "obtaining crucial commodities, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the US should be prepared to act independently when collective action prove impossible," specifically citing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush also had assumed the White House generally inclined on implementing what his father had specifically avoided to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Following he had been fired by the president, the finance chief Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his plan of lowering America's engagement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and mooted armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush bore a private grievance against Saddam, convinced he had been responsible for a plot to kill his father, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He also disliked that one of the most prominent accommodations in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a portrait of his parent's countenance that all visitors had to step on.
Investigation Approaches
But it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken behind invading Iraq, consistently citing information documents that were both insubstantial or completely deceptive. He endorsed what the Bush government euphemistically referred to as "enhanced interrogation", the employment of interrogation method and physical pressure.
Answering a Senate document in 2014 that found that no actionable intelligence had been obtained through the interrogation methods, Cheney rejected the report as "full of crap". He informed Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and create initiatives to apprehend the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it was not repeated. That was specifically what they did and they merit a lot of credit."
Public Image
Cheney reveled in monikers assigned to him by critics such as the Star Wars villain and the sinister presence, and by the idea that he was a shadow power directing Bush. In the journalist's 2013 volume about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Do I represent the sinister strategist in the corner that remains unseen emerge from his domain? That is a advantageous way to function, in fact."
Business Interests
Controversy over his business interests followed him during his tenure as vice-president. Even though he had little experience in business but established relationships in military, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's biggest oil and gas companies, in 1995 as chair and top executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's running mate for the presidency. Contentiously, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was awarded US deals valued at multiple billions.
It significantly boosted his finances. 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 package valued at in excess of $20m|twenty
