The deceased US VP Dick Cheney, who has died at age 84, was regarded as among the most powerful incumbents of the vice-presidency in US history. While many vice-presidents were limited to peripheral or ceremonial functions, Cheney exercised enormous power during the administration of George W Bush, to the point that he was frequently referred to as the "true president".
Bush objected to such a characterisation and said the relationship was more complicated. He pointed out that Cheney was deferential, always addressing him in public as Mr President, while he called him as Dick. Bush disputed even descriptions of their association as a collaboration because it suggested that they were equals. Regardless of such protestations, Cheney viewed the relaxed president pliable on a whole raft of policy decisions.
A Period Following the Attacks
Leading of a group of conservative hawks that encompassed Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the invasion 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 participating in a gathering at a elementary school in Florida. As Bush made his way to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, commanding the downing of any non-communicating planes approaching the Capitol building.
Cheney said the strikes altered his perspective, leading him to become focused on retribution. Along with other neo-cons, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an endeavor to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the invasion of Iraq, even though there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Controversial Policies
He showed no remorse about the military campaign, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis died, and not about the enhanced interrogation of detainees rounded up after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was predicated on misleading intelligence circulated by Cheney, was the right path to take. "It proved to be the right thing to do then. I believed it at the time and I believe it presently."
But even at the time, there were dissenting voices at a top tier about the poor management of Iraq. One of the White House's own delegates to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the position. "I observed, at a minimum," he subsequently stated "clear negligence, negligence, and unaccountability: potentially, falsehoods, ineptitude, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not solely to blame for the Iraq military action. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for such action. He had drafted a document detailing situations in which national priorities might be compromised (featuring "access to vital raw materials, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the US should be positioned to act independently when collective action prove impossible," specifically referencing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush too had arrived in the Oval Office generally inclined on implementing what his predecessor had notably declined to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Following he had been sacked by the White House, the finance chief Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his plan of lowering America's engagement in the Middle East dispute and proposed military action against Iraq.
Bush held a private grievance against Saddam, believing he had been behind a scheme to kill his father, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He also resented that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a ground design with a image of his father's countenance that everyone had to step on.
Questioning Techniques
However it was Cheney who was part of the most vociferous behind attacking Iraq, repeatedly referencing agency briefings that were either insubstantial or entirely inaccurate. He endorsed what the Bush administration indirectly described as "enhanced interrogation", the application of simulated drowning and physical pressure.
Addressing a Senate document in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had been obtained through the interrogation methods, Cheney rejected the conclusions as "loaded with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to establish protocols and establish programmes to apprehend the perpetrators who took the lives of 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."
External Perception
Cheney took pleasure in monikers given to him by critics such as the Star Wars villain and the dark figure, and by the notion that he was a sinister influence manipulating Bush. In the journalist's 2013 volume about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Is it me who is the sinister strategist in the corner that operates invisibly come out of his hole? That is a advantageous way to operate, truthfully."
Business Interests
Dispute over his business interests accompanied him during his tenure as vice-president. Even though he had limited background in corporate affairs but established relationships in security, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's biggest petroleum companies, in 1995 as leader and chief executive.
In 2000 he became Bush's VP candidate for the presidency. Controversially, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was awarded US contracts worth multiple billions.
It significantly boosted his finances. His yearly earnings during his period at the corporation grew from his previous salary while Pentagon chief to $4.4m. When he resigned in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at over $20m|twenty
