The late US VP Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was considered among the most powerful occupants of the vice-presidency in US history. While many VPs had to settle for peripheral or symbolic functions, Cheney wielded huge influence during the presidency of George W Bush, to the point that he was commonly referred to as the "actual president".
Bush objected to that description and claimed the dynamic was more complex. He pointed out that Cheney was courteous, invariably referring to him in official appearances as the President, while he called him as Dick. Bush questioned even portrayals of their association as a collaboration because it indicated that they were peers. Regardless of these objections, Cheney considered the easygoing president accommodating on a whole raft of policy decisions.
The Aftermath of 9/11
In charge of a contingent of conservative hawks that included defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in response to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been taking part in a meeting at a school in Florida. As Bush made his way to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, directing the downing of any unresponsive planes heading toward the government building.
Cheney stated the assaults transformed him, leading him to become focused on retribution. Together with other neo-conservatives, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a occupation of Afghanistan in an effort to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the armed intervention of Iraq, although there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Disputed Policies
He expressed no regrets about the military campaign, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis died, or about the enhanced interrogation of suspects apprehended after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was predicated on inaccurate information repeated by Cheney, was the correct decision. "It represented the correct action to do then. I had faith at the time and I believe it now."
However even then, there were contrary opinions at a high level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the government's own special envoys to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the role. "I observed, as a baseline," he wrote later "clear negligence, carelessness, and recklessness: potentially, deception, unfitness, and graft."
Broader Context
Cheney was not completely to blame for the Iraq campaign. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for similar measures. He had written a memo outlining circumstances in which US concerns might be threatened (encompassing "access to vital raw materials, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the US should be prepared to act independently when collective action prove impossible," specifically citing military moves against Iraq.
Bush also had assumed the White House somewhat determined on executing what his parent had specifically avoided to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Subsequent to he had been dismissed by the White House, the finance chief Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his objective of diminishing America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and proposed military action against Iraq.
Bush carried a private grievance against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a conspiracy to murder his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore objected to that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a ground design with a image of his parent's visage that all visitors had to step on.
Questioning Techniques
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken behind striking Iraq, repeatedly quoting information documents that were either insubstantial or entirely misleading. He endorsed what the Bush government indirectly described as "intensive questioning", the employment of simulated drowning and physical pressure.
Responding to a Senate document in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had come from the interrogation methods, Cheney dismissed the findings as "loaded with crap". He informed Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to implement measures and create initiatives to apprehend the bastards who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it would not recur. That is precisely what they did and they deserve a lot of credit."
External Perception
Cheney took pleasure in nicknames given to him by detractors such as the dark character and The Prince of Darkness, and by the notion that he was a dark force directing Bush. In the journalist's 2013 book about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Do I represent the malevolent mastermind in the shadows that nobody ever sees leave his hole? That is a nice way to operate, truthfully."
Business Interests
Controversy over his business interests followed him during his tenure as VP. While he had little experience in commerce but good contacts in military, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's biggest petroleum companies, in 1995 as leader and chief executive.
In 2000 he became Bush's running mate for the executive branch. Contentiously, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was awarded US deals valued at billions.
It significantly boosted his finances. His yearly earnings during his time at the company grew from his previous salary during his time as military head to millions. When he resigned in 2000 he had a compensation package valued at more than $20m|twenty
