The former US VP Dick Cheney, who passed away at the age of 84, was regarded as arguably the most significant occupants of that position in US history. While many VPs were limited to peripheral or symbolic positions, Cheney wielded substantial power during the presidency of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was commonly referred to as the "actual president".
Bush resented this portrayal and claimed the connection was more complicated. He pointed out that Cheney was courteous, consistently calling him in official appearances as President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush disputed even characterisations of their association as a collaboration because it suggested that they were on equal footing. Regardless of these denials, Cheney found the easygoing president accommodating on a whole raft of administrative determinations.
A Post-9/11 Era
Leading of a faction of neo-conservatives that encompassed military head Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been participating in a meeting at a elementary school in Florida. Whereas Bush made his way to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took command, directing the destruction of any unidentified planes nearing the Capitol building.
Cheney claimed the attacks transformed him, causing him to be intent on revenge. Together with other neo-cons, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a takeover of Afghanistan in an endeavor to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the military action of Iraq, even though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Debated Actions
He showed no remorse about the invasion, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis died, and not about the enhanced interrogation of individuals apprehended after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was founded on faulty intelligence repeated by Cheney, was the proper course of action. "It was the correct action to do then. I was convinced at the time and I believe it now."
But even at the time, there were opposing views at a senior level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the government's own delegates to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the role. "I witnessed, at the very least," he later wrote "obvious failure, inaction, and irresponsibility: in the worst case, lying, ineptitude, and corruption."
Wider Perspective
Cheney was not completely responsible for the Iraq military action. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had advocated for comparable steps. He had written a memorandum detailing circumstances in which national priorities might be threatened (encompassing "obtaining crucial commodities, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the United States should be positioned to act independently when joint efforts cannot be arranged," explicitly referencing military moves against Iraq.
Bush also had arrived in the presidency generally inclined on carrying out what his father had specifically avoided to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Following he had been sacked by the president, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his plan of reducing America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and mooted defense operations against Iraq.
Bush carried a private grievance against Saddam, convinced he had been responsible for a conspiracy to murder his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally resented that one of the largest accommodations in Baghdad had a ground design with a likeness of his parent's countenance that everyone had to walk over.
Investigation Approaches
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken behind invading Iraq, frequently quoting intelligence reports that were either insubstantial or totally inaccurate. He supported what the Bush White House euphemistically referred to as "advanced techniques", the employment of interrogation method and torture.
Addressing a Senate analysis in 2014 that determined that no valuable data had come from the torture, Cheney rejected the report as "riddled with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to implement measures and put in place programmes to capture the bastards who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it never happened again. That is precisely what they did and they deserve a lot of praise."
Public Image
Cheney enjoyed labels imposed on him by detractors such as the Star Wars villain and the sinister presence, and by the idea that he was a shadow power controlling Bush. In the author's 2013 book about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Do I represent the malevolent mastermind in the corner that remains unseen come out of his lair? That is a nice way to work, in fact."
Corporate Connections
Debate over his business interests accompanied him during his tenure as vice-president. Even though he had minimal expertise in business but good contacts in defence, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial petroleum corporations, in 1995 as chair and CEO.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's running mate for the White House. Contentiously, during the military campaign, Halliburton was granted US deals worth substantial sums.
It significantly boosted his finances. His yearly compensation during his tenure at the firm rose from his $258,394 while Pentagon chief to millions. When he left in 2000 he had a compensation package valued at in excess of $20m|twenty
