The former US VP Dick Cheney, who has died at the age of 84, was considered among the most powerful occupants of the vice-presidency in US history. While countless VPs were confined to marginal or symbolic functions, Cheney held enormous sway during the administration of George W Bush, so much so that he was often called as the "actual president".
Bush disliked that description and stated the connection was more complex. He observed that Cheney was deferential, invariably referring to him in public as President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush questioned even characterisations of their relationship as a partnership because it suggested that they were on equal footing. Regardless of these objections, Cheney viewed the easygoing president pliable on a whole raft of policy decisions.
A Post-9/11 Era
In charge of a faction of neo-cons that encompassed Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been taking part in a session at a educational institution in Florida. As Bush traveled to a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, directing the destruction of any unidentified planes heading toward the Capitol building.
Cheney said the attacks transformed him, causing him to be determined on retaliation. Along with other neo-cons, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a invasion of Afghanistan in an attempt 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 expressed no regrets about the invasion, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis perished, or about the harsh treatment of individuals rounded up after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was based on faulty reports repeated by Cheney, was the correct path to take. "It represented the correct action to do at that time. I believed it at the time and I believe it now."
Yet even then, there were opposing views 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 dismissed from the position. "I witnessed, as a baseline," he wrote later "clear negligence, negligence, and unaccountability: in the worst case, lying, unfitness, and corruption."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not entirely responsible for the Iraq campaign. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for similar measures. He had drafted a memorandum outlining scenarios in which US concerns might be threatened (encompassing "obtaining crucial commodities, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "America should be postured to take unilateral action when collective action cannot be orchestrated," particularly citing defense operations against Iraq.
Bush additionally had entered the White House vaguely intent on implementing what his parent had notably declined to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Subsequent to he had been fired by the White House, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his intention of lowering America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and proposed defense operations against Iraq.
Bush held a personal grudge against Saddam, believing he had been responsible for a scheme to murder his parent, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He also objected to that one of the largest hotels in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a image of his parent's countenance that all visitors had to walk over.
Questioning Techniques
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most vehement advocating striking Iraq, frequently quoting intelligence reports that were either weak or completely inaccurate. He supported what the Bush government indirectly described as "intensive questioning", the application of waterboarding and physical pressure.
Responding to 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 told Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and put in place initiatives to apprehend the bastards who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it never happened again. That is precisely what they did and they merit a lot of credit."
External Perception
Cheney reveled in nicknames given to him by detractors such as Darth Vader and the sinister presence, and by the notion that he was a dark force manipulating Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 volume about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Am I the malevolent mastermind in the corner that operates invisibly leave his lair? That is a advantageous way to function, truthfully."
Corporate Connections
Debate over his commercial relationships pursued him throughout his time as VP. While he had little experience in business 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 corporations, in 1995 as chairman and chief executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's VP candidate for the executive branch. Contentiously, during the military campaign, Halliburton was granted US agreements worth substantial sums.
It greatly increased his wealth. His yearly compensation during his period at the firm increased from his previous salary while Pentagon chief to over four million. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at over $20m|twenty
