The late US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was regarded as arguably the most powerful incumbents of that position in the nation's history. Whereas countless vice-presidents were confined to peripheral or symbolic roles, Cheney wielded enormous influence during the presidency of George W Bush, to the point that he was often referred to as the "true president".
Bush resented such a characterisation and said the dynamic was more complicated. He pointed out that Cheney was respectful, always calling him in official appearances as President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush challenged even portrayals of their partnership as a team because it suggested that they were on equal footing. Regardless of these denials, Cheney viewed the relaxed president accommodating on a broad range of administrative determinations.
A Post-9/11 Era
Leading of a group of conservative hawks that encompassed military head Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been taking part in a gathering at a educational institution in Florida. Whereas Bush headed for a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took command, commanding the destruction of any unidentified aircraft heading toward the Capitol building.
Cheney said the attacks changed him, leading him to become intent on retaliation. Together with other conservative figures, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a takeover of Afghanistan in an effort to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the invasion of Iraq, although there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Disputed Decisions
He expressed no regrets about the armed intervention, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis died, nor about the enhanced interrogation of individuals captured after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was founded on faulty information echoed by Cheney, was the correct path to take. "It proved to be the correct action to do then. I believed it back then and I believe it presently."
But even at the time, there were opposing views at a high level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the government's own representatives to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the role. "I saw, as a baseline," he later wrote "true dereliction, carelessness, and recklessness: at worst, falsehoods, ineptitude, and graft."
Broader Context
Cheney was not completely to blame for the Iraq military action. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for such action. He had drafted a document setting out circumstances in which national priorities might be compromised (encompassing "availability of vital raw materials, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the United States should be prepared to take unilateral action when collective action cannot be orchestrated," specifically citing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush too had arrived in the presidency generally inclined on carrying out what his father had specifically avoided to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Following he had been dismissed by the administration, the finance chief Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his objective of diminishing America's participation in the Middle East dispute and proposed military action against Iraq.
Bush carried a individual resentment against Saddam, convinced he had been behind a conspiracy to assassinate his parent, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore resented that one of the most prominent establishments in Baghdad had a ground design with a portrait of his predecessor's countenance that everyone had to walk over.
Investigation Approaches
Yet it was Cheney who was among the most outspoken advocating invading Iraq, repeatedly referencing information documents that were either insubstantial or completely inaccurate. He supported what the Bush administration politely called as "intensive questioning", the application of waterboarding and physical pressure.
Responding to a Senate analysis in 2014 that determined that no valuable data had been obtained through the interrogation methods, Cheney rejected the conclusions as "full of crap". He told Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to take steps and create programmes to catch the bastards who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it was not repeated. That was specifically what they did and they deserve a lot of credit."
Public Persona
Cheney took pleasure in labels given to him by critics such as the Star Wars villain and The Prince of Darkness, and by the idea that he was a dark force controlling Bush. In the author's 2013 volume about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Do I represent the malevolent mastermind in the background that remains unseen come out of his domain? That is a effective way to operate, truthfully."
Corporate Connections
Dispute over his commercial relationships accompanied him through his period as vice-president. Although he had minimal expertise in corporate affairs but established relationships in defence, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial energy companies, in 1995 as chairman and CEO.
In 2000 he became Bush's running mate for the executive branch. Contentiously, during the military campaign, Halliburton was granted US agreements valued at billions.
It greatly increased his wealth. His yearly earnings during his tenure at the company grew from his $258,394 when he was defence secretary to millions. When he left in 2000 he had a package valued at over $20m|twenty
