The deceased US VP Dick Cheney, who passed away at the age of 84, was seen as arguably the most influential occupants of the vice-presidency in the nation's history. While numerous VPs were confined to peripheral or figurehead positions, Cheney held enormous sway during the presidency of George W Bush, so much so that he was often described as the "real president".
Bush disliked such a characterisation and claimed the dynamic was more complicated. He observed that Cheney was courteous, consistently referring to him in official appearances as President, while he called him as Dick. Bush challenged even characterisations of their relationship as a team because it suggested that they were equals. Despite such protestations, Cheney considered the relaxed president accommodating on a whole raft of policy decisions.
The Post-9/11 Era
At the head of a group of conservative hawks that included Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in response to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been taking part in a meeting at a educational institution in Florida. As Bush made his way to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, directing the shooting down of any non-communicating aircraft nearing the government building.
Cheney stated the strikes altered his perspective, causing him to be focused on retaliation. In conjunction with other neo-conservatives, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an effort to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the armed intervention of Iraq, though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Debated Decisions
He voiced no apologies about the armed intervention, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis died, nor about the harsh treatment of suspects apprehended after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was predicated on inaccurate intelligence repeated by Cheney, was the correct decision. "It proved to be the right thing to do back then. I believed it then and I believe it now."
Yet during that period, there were contrary opinions at a senior level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the White House's own representatives to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the post. "I saw, at a minimum," he later wrote "obvious failure, carelessness, and irresponsibility: potentially, falsehoods, unfitness, and dishonesty."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not solely responsible for the Iraq military action. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had advocated for similar measures. He had written a document setting out scenarios in which national priorities might be compromised (encompassing "obtaining vital raw materials, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the US should be positioned to operate alone when collective action cannot be arranged," specifically mentioning defense operations against Iraq.
Bush too had assumed the White House generally inclined on carrying out what his father had famously refused to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Following he had been sacked by the White House, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his objective of reducing America's engagement in the regional tensions and suggested defense operations against Iraq.
Bush bore a personal grudge against Saddam, thinking he had been behind a scheme to kill his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally disliked that one of the most prominent accommodations in Baghdad had a floor mural with a image of his parent's face that all visitors had to walk over.
Questioning Techniques
Yet it was Cheney who was among the most outspoken behind striking Iraq, frequently quoting agency briefings that were either thin or entirely misleading. He endorsed what the Bush government politely called as "intensive questioning", the use of interrogation method and harsh treatment.
Answering a Senate document in 2014 that determined that no valuable data had come from the torture, Cheney rejected the findings as "riddled with crap". He told Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to establish protocols and establish programmes to apprehend the bastards who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it never happened again. That's exactly what they did and they merit a lot of credit."
External Perception
Cheney took pleasure in monikers imposed on him by opponents such as the Star Wars villain and the sinister presence, and by the idea that he was a dark force directing Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Do I represent the evil genius in the corner that remains unseen leave his hole? That is a nice way to function, in fact."
Corporate Connections
Dispute over his commercial relationships followed him during his tenure as VP. Even though he had minimal expertise in business but established relationships in military, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial oil and gas corporations, in 1995 as chair and top executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's VP candidate for the White House. Contentiously, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was awarded US deals totaling billions.
It significantly boosted his finances. His annual income during his tenure at the firm increased from his previous salary during his time as Pentagon chief to millions. When he resigned in 2000 he had a package worth more than $20m|twenty
