The late US VP Dick Cheney, who has died at the age of 84, was seen as one of the most powerful incumbents of that office in American history. Although countless VPs were confined to marginal or figurehead roles, Cheney held enormous power during the term of George W Bush, to the point that he was commonly described as the "actual president".
Bush objected to this portrayal and stated the connection was more complicated. He noted that Cheney was deferential, consistently addressing him in public settings as the President, while he called him as Dick. Bush disputed even portrayals of their relationship as a partnership because it implied that they were equals. In spite of such protestations, Cheney considered the relaxed president malleable on a broad range of administrative determinations.
A Aftermath of 9/11
In charge of a faction of conservative hawks that encompassed Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been attending a meeting at a elementary school in Florida. While Bush headed for a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, ordering the destruction of any unresponsive airplanes heading toward the US Capitol.
Cheney stated the assaults transformed him, making him become intent on retribution. Together with other neo-conservatives, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a invasion of Afghanistan in an endeavor to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the armed intervention of Iraq, although there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Disputed Actions
He showed no remorse about the military campaign, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis died, nor about the enhanced interrogation of individuals captured after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was predicated on faulty information echoed by Cheney, was the right path to take. "It represented the right thing to do at that time. I had faith back then and I hold that view today."
However even then, there were contrary opinions at a top tier 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 reappointed from the role. "I observed, at a minimum," he later wrote "clear negligence, negligence, and unaccountability: at worst, lying, ineptitude, and dishonesty."
Wider Perspective
Cheney was not completely to blame for the Iraq invasion. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had advocated for comparable steps. He had composed a document outlining scenarios in which American interests might be threatened (encompassing "access to essential resources, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "America should be positioned to act independently when collective action cannot be arranged," particularly citing military moves against Iraq.
Bush also had assumed the White House somewhat determined on carrying out what his father had notably declined to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Following he had been dismissed by the president, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his plan of lowering America's engagement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and suggested defense operations against Iraq.
Bush held a individual resentment against Saddam, thinking he had been behind a plot to assassinate his father, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally disliked that one of the largest establishments in Baghdad had a floor mural with a likeness of his predecessor's face that each person had to walk over.
Questioning Techniques
Yet it was Cheney who was among the most outspoken supporting attacking Iraq, frequently citing agency briefings that were both insubstantial or entirely misleading. He supported what the Bush administration euphemistically referred to as "advanced techniques", the application of waterboarding and physical pressure.
Addressing a Senate analysis in 2014 that concluded that no valuable data had been obtained through the torture, Cheney disregarded the report as "loaded with crap". He informed Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to implement measures and create procedures to capture the bastards who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it was not repeated. That was specifically what they did and they deserve a lot of recognition."
Public Image
Cheney enjoyed nicknames given to him by critics such as the dark character and the dark figure, and by the notion that he was a sinister influence manipulating Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Is it me who is the evil genius in the shadows that nobody ever sees come out of his lair? That is a nice way to operate, truthfully."
Commercial Ties
Dispute over his business interests followed him throughout his time as second-in-command. Although he had minimal expertise in corporate affairs but good contacts in defence, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's largest energy corporations, in 1995 as chairman and chief executive.
In 2000 he became Bush's VP candidate for the executive branch. Debatably, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was granted US contracts valued at substantial sums.
It made him rich. His annual income during his period at the firm grew from his previous salary when he was defence secretary to over four million. When he left in 2000 he had a compensation package valued at in excess of $20m|twenty
