The deceased US vice-president Dick Cheney, who has died at the age of 84, was seen as among the most influential occupants of that office in the nation's history. While numerous second-in-commands were limited to minor or symbolic positions, Cheney wielded enormous influence during the administration of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was frequently called as the "actual president".
Bush disliked such a characterisation and claimed the connection was more nuanced. He pointed out that Cheney was respectful, consistently calling him in public settings as Mr President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush disputed even descriptions of their association as a team because it indicated that they were equals. Regardless of these objections, Cheney considered the relaxed president malleable on a wide array of governmental choices.
A Aftermath of 9/11
At the head of a contingent of neo-conservatives that included Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been attending a gathering at a elementary school in Florida. Whereas Bush traveled to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took command, ordering the downing of any non-communicating airplanes nearing the US Capitol.
Cheney claimed the strikes altered his perspective, causing him to be intent on revenge. In conjunction with other neo-cons, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an endeavor to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the military action of Iraq, though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Controversial Decisions
He showed no remorse about the invasion, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis died, and not about the waterboarding of detainees captured after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was founded on inaccurate reports repeated by Cheney, was the correct course of action. "It was the proper decision to do then. I had faith back then and I hold that view presently."
Yet during that period, there were opposing views at a senior level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the government's own special envoys to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the post. "I observed, at the very least," he wrote later "true dereliction, inaction, and unaccountability: potentially, deception, unfitness, and corruption."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not solely responsible for the Iraq military action. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for comparable steps. He had written a memo detailing situations in which US concerns might be threatened (encompassing "obtaining essential resources, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "America should be prepared to operate alone when joint efforts prove impossible," particularly citing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush additionally had arrived in the Oval Office vaguely intent on executing what his parent had notably declined to do in 1991; remove Saddam. After he had been dismissed by the president, the finance chief Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his plan of lowering America's participation in the regional tensions and proposed armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush bore a personal grudge against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a scheme to murder his parent, 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 parent's face that each person had to tread upon.
Questioning Techniques
But it was Cheney who was among the most vociferous behind striking Iraq, frequently citing intelligence reports that were either thin or entirely inaccurate. He endorsed what the Bush administration indirectly described as "advanced techniques", the employment of interrogation method and physical pressure.
Answering a Senate report in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had been obtained through the harsh techniques, Cheney disregarded the conclusions as "full of crap". He told Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to take steps and establish programmes to capture the perpetrators who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it would not recur. That is precisely what they did and they deserve a lot of praise."
Public Persona
Cheney enjoyed monikers imposed on him by critics such as the dark character and the dark figure, and by the notion that he was a shadow power manipulating Bush. In the author's 2013 book about the two, 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 leave his domain? That is a nice way to work, actually."
Business Interests
Debate over his corporate affiliations accompanied him during his tenure as vice-president. While he had little experience in business but established relationships in defence, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's biggest oil and gas corporations, in 1995 as chairman and chief executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's running mate for the White House. Contentiously, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was awarded US contracts worth billions.
It significantly boosted his finances. His yearly earnings during his time at the firm increased from his previous salary while Pentagon chief to over four million. When he left in 2000 he had a compensation package totaling over $20m|twenty
