The late US VP Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was seen as one of the most influential occupants of that office in the nation's history. Whereas many VPs were limited to peripheral or ceremonial positions, Cheney exercised enormous power during the term of George W Bush, so much so that he was commonly called as the "real president".
Bush resented such a characterisation and stated the connection was more complex. He observed that Cheney was courteous, consistently addressing him in public as Mr President, while he called him as Dick. Bush questioned even characterisations of their association as a collaboration because it indicated that they were peers. Despite these objections, Cheney found the laidback president malleable on a wide array of administrative determinations.
A Post-9/11 Era
At the head of a group of neo-conservatives that featured Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been taking part in a session at a school in Florida. Whereas Bush headed for a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, ordering the destruction of any unidentified airplanes approaching the Capitol building.
Cheney stated the strikes altered his perspective, causing him to be focused on revenge. In conjunction with other neo-conservatives, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a takeover of Afghanistan in an endeavor to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the armed intervention of Iraq, even though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Debated Decisions
He showed no remorse about the invasion, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis died, and not about the harsh treatment of detainees captured after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was founded on misleading intelligence circulated by Cheney, was the correct course of action. "It was the right thing to do back then. I believed it at the time and I maintain that stance today."
However during that period, there were contrary opinions at a high level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the White House's own delegates to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the role. "I saw, at a minimum," he subsequently stated "true dereliction, inaction, and recklessness: in the worst case, deception, unfitness, and corruption."
Wider Perspective
Cheney was not completely accountable for the Iraq campaign. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for similar measures. He had composed a document outlining scenarios in which American interests might be threatened (featuring "access to essential resources, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "the US should be prepared to take unilateral action when cooperative measures prove impossible," specifically referencing defense operations against Iraq.
Bush too had assumed the Oval Office somewhat determined on carrying out what his predecessor had famously refused to do in 1991; remove Saddam. After he had been fired by the administration, the finance chief Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his objective of diminishing America's involvement in the Middle East dispute and mooted military action against Iraq.
Bush held a personal grudge against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a plot to murder his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore objected to that one of the largest hotels in Baghdad had a ground design with a likeness of his parent's countenance that each person had to walk over.
Investigation Approaches
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most vociferous behind striking Iraq, frequently citing intelligence reports that were both thin or completely inaccurate. He supported what the Bush government politely called as "enhanced interrogation", the employment of simulated drowning and harsh treatment.
Answering a Senate document in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had been obtained through the torture, Cheney dismissed the report as "loaded with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to take steps and create procedures to capture the perpetrators who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they merit a lot of praise."
Public Image
Cheney took pleasure in nicknames imposed on him by critics such as Darth Vader and the sinister presence, and by the notion that he was a dark force controlling Bush. In the journalist's 2013 book about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Do I represent the evil genius in the shadows that operates invisibly leave his hole? It's a nice way to work, actually."
Commercial Ties
Dispute over his corporate affiliations followed him throughout his time as vice-president. Even though he had minimal expertise in commerce but established relationships in military, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's biggest oil and gas conglomerates, in 1995 as leader and top executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's running mate for the White House. Controversially, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was granted US contracts valued at substantial sums.
It significantly boosted his finances. His yearly earnings during his tenure at the corporation increased from his $258,394 when he was defence secretary to $4.4m. When he resigned in 2000 he had a severance arrangement worth in excess of $20m|twenty
