The former US VP Dick Cheney, who died at age 84, was considered arguably the most significant incumbents of that office in US history. Whereas countless VPs were limited to minor or symbolic roles, Cheney held huge power during the presidency of George W Bush, so much so that he was often called as the "real president".
Bush resented this portrayal and stated the connection was more complex. He pointed out that Cheney was deferential, always calling him in public settings as President, while he called him as Dick. Bush challenged even characterisations of their association as a collaboration because it implied that they were peers. In spite of these objections, Cheney considered the easygoing president malleable on a whole raft of governmental choices.
A Period Following the Attacks
At the head of a faction of conservative hawks that featured military head Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been attending a gathering at a elementary school in Florida. While Bush headed for a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, ordering the shooting down of any unidentified aircraft approaching the US Capitol.
Cheney stated the assaults changed him, making him become determined on retribution. Together with other neo-conservatives, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a takeover of Afghanistan in an effort to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the armed intervention of Iraq, even though there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Disputed Actions
He showed no remorse about the armed intervention, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis perished, nor about the harsh treatment of detainees rounded up after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was predicated on misleading information repeated by Cheney, was the proper path to take. "It was the right thing to do then. I had faith then and I hold that view today."
Yet even then, there were contrary opinions 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 reappointed from the post. "I saw, at a minimum," he later wrote "obvious failure, inaction, and irresponsibility: potentially, lying, incompetence, and graft."
Wider Perspective
Cheney was not solely responsible for the Iraq campaign. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for similar measures. He had drafted a memorandum setting out circumstances in which American interests might be compromised (featuring "availability of crucial commodities, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "America should be positioned to act independently when cooperative measures prove impossible," specifically mentioning defense operations against Iraq.
Bush too had entered the presidency generally inclined on executing what his father had famously refused to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Subsequent to he had been dismissed by the White House, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his intention of reducing America's involvement in the regional tensions and mooted armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush carried a private grievance against Saddam, thinking he had been behind a scheme to murder his parent, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He also disliked that one of the largest accommodations in Baghdad had a floor mural with a likeness of his parent's countenance that everyone had to walk over.
Questioning Techniques
Yet it was Cheney who was among the most vehement advocating attacking Iraq, consistently referencing information documents that were whether insubstantial or entirely misleading. He backed what the Bush government politely called as "enhanced interrogation", the application of interrogation method and harsh treatment.
Responding to a Senate document in 2014 that concluded that no valuable data had resulted from the interrogation methods, Cheney dismissed the conclusions as "riddled with crap". He told Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and create procedures to apprehend the bastards who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it never happened again. That was specifically what they did and they merit a lot of credit."
External Perception
Cheney enjoyed nicknames assigned to him by critics such as Darth Vader and the sinister presence, and by the notion that he was a dark force directing Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 book about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Am I the evil genius in the background that operates invisibly emerge from his domain? It's a advantageous way to operate, in fact."
Commercial Ties
Controversy over his corporate affiliations accompanied him during his tenure as second-in-command. While he had minimal expertise in business but good contacts in security, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial oil and gas conglomerates, in 1995 as chairman and CEO.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's election partner for the executive branch. Controversially, during the military campaign, Halliburton was given US deals valued at multiple billions.
It made him rich. His yearly earnings during his period at the corporation grew from his previous salary when he was defence secretary to millions. When he departed in 2000 he had a package worth over $20m|twenty
