The deceased US VP Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was regarded as among the most powerful holders of that office in American history. While numerous VPs were limited to peripheral or symbolic roles, Cheney exercised enormous influence during the presidency of George W Bush, to the point that he was frequently called as the "real president".
Bush objected to this portrayal and claimed the connection was more nuanced. He pointed out that Cheney was respectful, consistently referring to him in public as the President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush disputed even descriptions of their partnership as a team because it implied that they were peers. Regardless of these denials, Cheney found the relaxed president pliable on a broad range of administrative determinations.
The Post-9/11 Era
In charge of a contingent of neo-cons that featured military head Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in response to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been taking part in a meeting at a school in Florida. Whereas Bush made his way to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, directing the shooting down of any non-communicating aircraft heading toward the US Capitol.
Cheney said the attacks altered his perspective, making him become intent on revenge. In conjunction with other neo-conservatives, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a invasion of Afghanistan in an endeavor to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the invasion of Iraq, though there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Controversial Actions
He showed no remorse about the armed intervention, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis perished, and not about the harsh treatment of individuals apprehended after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was based on misleading intelligence repeated by Cheney, was the proper decision. "It proved to be the correct action to do back then. I believed it back then and I believe it today."
However during that period, there were dissenting voices at a top tier about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the government's own special envoys to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the role. "I witnessed, at a minimum," he subsequently stated "obvious failure, inaction, and irresponsibility: in the worst case, falsehoods, ineptitude, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not solely accountable for the Iraq military action. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for similar measures. He had drafted a memo setting out circumstances in which American interests might be threatened (including "obtaining vital raw materials, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the United States should be postured to operate alone when cooperative measures prove impossible," specifically citing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush too had entered the Oval Office vaguely intent on implementing what his predecessor had specifically avoided to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Following he had been fired by the administration, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his intention of reducing America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and proposed military action against Iraq.
Bush carried a private grievance against Saddam, thinking he had been behind a conspiracy to murder his father, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore objected to that one of the largest accommodations in Baghdad had a ground design with a likeness of his father's countenance that each person had to step on.
Questioning Techniques
But it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken advocating striking Iraq, repeatedly referencing information documents that were either weak or entirely deceptive. He supported what the Bush White House euphemistically referred to as "advanced techniques", the use of waterboarding and physical pressure.
Responding to a Senate analysis in 2014 that determined that no valuable data had come from the torture, Cheney dismissed the report as "full of crap". He informed Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to take steps and establish initiatives to catch the individuals who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they deserve a lot of recognition."
External Perception
Cheney enjoyed nicknames given to him by detractors such as the Star Wars villain and the sinister presence, and by the concept that he was a dark force manipulating Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 book about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Am I the malevolent mastermind in the background that operates invisibly emerge from his hole? This represents a effective way to work, in fact."
Corporate Connections
Controversy over his commercial relationships accompanied him through his period as second-in-command. While he had little experience in commerce but strong connections in security, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's biggest petroleum conglomerates, in 1995 as chairman and chief executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's running mate for the presidency. Debatably, during the military campaign, Halliburton was granted US agreements totaling multiple billions.
It made him rich. His yearly compensation during his tenure at the corporation grew from his $258,394 while Pentagon chief to millions. When he left in 2000 he had a severance arrangement worth more than $20m|twenty
