The late US VP Dick Cheney, who has died at age 84, was considered one of the most influential occupants of that position in American history. Although countless VPs were confined to marginal or symbolic roles, Cheney wielded substantial influence during the presidency of George W Bush, to the point that he was frequently referred to as the "real president".
Bush resented that description and claimed the dynamic was more complex. He noted that Cheney was courteous, consistently referring to him in public settings as the President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush challenged even descriptions of their partnership as a team because it suggested that they were equals. Regardless of these denials, Cheney considered the laidback president accommodating on a wide array of governmental choices.
A Aftermath of 9/11
At the head of a contingent of neo-conservatives that included military head Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been taking part in a meeting at a elementary school in Florida. While Bush traveled to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took command, commanding the destruction of any unidentified aircraft heading toward the Capitol building.
Cheney stated the assaults transformed him, making him become determined on retaliation. Together with other neo-cons, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a occupation of Afghanistan in an endeavor to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the invasion of Iraq, though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Controversial Policies
He voiced no apologies about the armed intervention, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis died, and not about the harsh treatment of detainees apprehended after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was based on faulty reports repeated by Cheney, was the proper path to take. "It represented the correct action to do back then. I believed it at the time and I believe it now."
But during that period, there were contrary opinions at a senior level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the White House's own representatives to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the position. "I observed, at the very least," he wrote later "clear negligence, carelessness, and recklessness: potentially, lying, unfitness, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not completely to blame for the Iraq campaign. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for such action. He had written a memorandum detailing scenarios in which US concerns might be endangered (including "availability of essential resources, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the United States should be prepared to operate alone when cooperative measures prove impossible," particularly referencing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush additionally had arrived in the White House vaguely intent on carrying out what his father had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. After he had been dismissed by the White House, the finance chief Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his intention of lowering America's involvement in the Middle East dispute and suggested military action against Iraq.
Bush held a private grievance against Saddam, thinking he had been responsible for a conspiracy to kill his father, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally disliked that one of the largest establishments in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a image of his father's visage that everyone had to walk over.
Questioning Techniques
However it was Cheney who was part of the most vehement behind invading Iraq, frequently referencing information documents that were both insubstantial or entirely deceptive. He supported what the Bush government euphemistically referred to as "intensive questioning", the application of simulated drowning and harsh treatment.
Addressing a Senate document in 2014 that concluded that no valuable data had come from the torture, Cheney disregarded the conclusions as "loaded with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to take steps and put in place procedures to capture the perpetrators who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they merit a lot of recognition."
Public Persona
Cheney took pleasure in monikers imposed on him by critics such as the Star Wars villain and the sinister presence, and by the idea that he was a dark force controlling Bush. In the author's 2013 volume about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Do I represent the sinister strategist in the background that remains unseen come out of his domain? That is a nice way to work, actually."
Corporate Connections
Dispute over his business interests followed him during his tenure as VP. Although he had minimal expertise in business but strong connections in military, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial oil and gas conglomerates, in 1995 as chair and CEO.
In 2000 he became Bush's election partner for the executive branch. Debatably, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was granted US contracts worth substantial sums.
It significantly boosted his finances. His annual income during his time at the corporation rose from his quarter-million dollars while military head to over four million. When he left in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at over $20m|twenty
