The former US VP Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was regarded as arguably the most influential holders of that position in American history. While numerous vice-presidents were confined to peripheral or ceremonial positions, Cheney exercised substantial power during the presidency of George W Bush, to the point that he was often described as the "real president".
Bush resented that description and stated the relationship was more complex. He pointed out that Cheney was deferential, consistently referring to him in public as Mr President, while he called him as Dick. Bush questioned even characterisations of their partnership as a collaboration because it suggested that they were on equal footing. In spite of these denials, Cheney viewed the relaxed president malleable on a whole raft of administrative determinations.
A Period Following the Attacks
Leading of a contingent of neo-cons that included Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been attending a meeting at a school in Florida. As Bush made his way to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, commanding the shooting down of any unidentified airplanes approaching the Capitol building.
Cheney claimed the assaults transformed him, causing him to be determined on revenge. Along with other conservative figures, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a takeover of Afghanistan in an effort to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the armed intervention of Iraq, even though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Debated Decisions
He showed no remorse about the armed intervention, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis perished, or about the enhanced interrogation of suspects captured after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was founded on misleading intelligence repeated by Cheney, was the right path to take. "It proved to be the proper decision to do at that time. I believed it then and I maintain that stance 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 area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the position. "I witnessed, at a minimum," he wrote later "clear negligence, carelessness, and irresponsibility: potentially, deception, incompetence, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not completely accountable for the Iraq invasion. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for comparable steps. He had composed a memorandum outlining circumstances in which national priorities might be compromised (featuring "availability of essential resources, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the United States should be postured to operate alone when collective action prove impossible," specifically citing military moves against Iraq.
Bush too had assumed the presidency generally inclined on executing what his parent had notably declined to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Subsequent to he had been sacked by the president, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his plan of diminishing America's involvement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and mooted armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush bore a individual resentment against Saddam, believing he had been responsible for a plot to kill his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He also disliked that one of the biggest hotels in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a portrait of his father's countenance that everyone had to step on.
Questioning Techniques
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most vociferous behind striking Iraq, repeatedly citing intelligence reports that were whether thin or totally deceptive. He supported what the Bush administration euphemistically referred to as "enhanced interrogation", the application of interrogation method and torture.
Answering a Senate analysis in 2014 that determined that no useful information had been obtained through the torture, Cheney rejected the conclusions as "loaded with crap". He told Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to take steps and create initiatives to capture the perpetrators who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it was not repeated. That is precisely what they did and they deserve a lot of credit."
External Perception
Cheney took pleasure in labels given to him by detractors such as the Star Wars villain and the dark figure, and by the idea that he was a sinister influence manipulating Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 publication about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Is it me who is the sinister strategist in the shadows that operates invisibly leave his domain? This represents a effective way to function, in fact."
Commercial Ties
Debate over his business interests pursued him through his period as VP. Even though he had minimal expertise in commerce but established relationships in military, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's biggest energy companies, in 1995 as chairman and CEO.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's running mate for the White House. Controversially, during the military campaign, Halliburton was granted US agreements valued at substantial sums.
It greatly increased his wealth. His yearly earnings during his time at the corporation grew from his previous salary when he was defence secretary to over four million. When he left in 2000 he had a compensation package worth over $20m|twenty
