The late US vice-president Dick Cheney, who has died at the age of 84, was regarded as among the most significant incumbents of the vice-presidency in the nation's history. Although numerous vice-presidents had to settle for minor or figurehead roles, Cheney held enormous sway during the administration of George W Bush, so much so that he was often called as the "true president".
Bush disliked that description and stated the relationship was more nuanced. He noted that Cheney was respectful, always referring to him in official appearances as Mr President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush challenged even portrayals of their association as a team because it implied that they were equals. Regardless of these objections, Cheney found the relaxed president accommodating on a broad range of administrative determinations.
The Period Following the Attacks
At the head of a group of neo-cons that featured Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been attending a meeting at a school in Florida. Whereas Bush headed for a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took command, directing the shooting down of any unidentified planes approaching the US Capitol.
Cheney claimed the attacks transformed him, leading him to become determined on retribution. Together with other conservative figures, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an effort to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the armed intervention of Iraq, although there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Disputed Decisions
He expressed no regrets about the military campaign, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis perished, nor about the enhanced interrogation of individuals apprehended after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was predicated on inaccurate information echoed by Cheney, was the correct course of action. "It was the right thing to do then. I was convinced at the time and I hold that view today."
Yet during that period, there were dissenting voices at a top tier about the poor management of Iraq. One of the administration's own delegates to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the post. "I observed, at a minimum," he wrote later "obvious failure, negligence, and recklessness: potentially, falsehoods, unfitness, and corruption."
Broader Context
Cheney was not entirely responsible for the Iraq military action. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for comparable steps. He had drafted a memo outlining scenarios in which US concerns might be endangered (encompassing "obtaining crucial commodities, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the United States should be prepared to take unilateral action when collective action prove impossible," explicitly mentioning military moves against Iraq.
Bush too had assumed the presidency vaguely intent on executing what his father had specifically avoided to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Following he had been dismissed by the administration, the finance chief Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his objective of reducing America's involvement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and suggested defense operations against Iraq.
Bush held a private grievance against Saddam, thinking he had been behind a conspiracy to murder his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore disliked that one of the most prominent hotels in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a image of his parent's face that each person had to walk over.
Investigation Approaches
But it was Cheney who was part of the most vociferous supporting attacking Iraq, frequently quoting intelligence reports that were both insubstantial or completely inaccurate. He supported what the Bush government euphemistically referred to as "intensive questioning", the use of interrogation method and physical pressure.
Addressing a Senate document in 2014 that determined that no actionable intelligence had come from the torture, Cheney dismissed the report as "full of crap". He stated to Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and create programmes to capture the bastards who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it was not repeated. That is precisely what they did and they earn a lot of recognition."
Public Image
Cheney took pleasure in nicknames given to him by opponents such as the Star Wars villain and the sinister presence, and by the notion that he was a dark force directing Bush. In the journalist's 2013 book about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Am I the evil genius in the shadows that operates invisibly leave his domain? That is a advantageous way to function, actually."
Commercial Ties
Debate over his commercial relationships accompanied him during his tenure as second-in-command. While he had little experience in business but good contacts in defence, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial oil and gas conglomerates, in 1995 as chairman and top executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's running mate for the presidency. Contentiously, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was granted US agreements valued at substantial sums.
It greatly increased his wealth. His annual income during his tenure at the firm increased from his quarter-million dollars while defence secretary to over four million. When he resigned in 2000 he had a severance arrangement totaling in excess of $20m|twenty
