The late US VP Dick Cheney, who has died at the age of 84, was regarded as one of the most powerful incumbents of that position in American history. Although numerous second-in-commands were confined to minor or figurehead functions, Cheney wielded enormous influence during the presidency of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was frequently referred to as the "real president".
Bush objected to such a characterisation and said the connection was more complicated. He observed that Cheney was deferential, invariably calling him in public as Mr President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush questioned even characterisations of their relationship as a partnership because it indicated that they were equals. Regardless of these objections, Cheney considered the laidback president malleable on a whole raft of administrative determinations.
A Period Following the Attacks
At the head of a contingent of neo-conservatives that featured Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been attending a gathering at a school in Florida. While Bush headed for a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, ordering the destruction of any unidentified airplanes heading toward the government building.
Cheney stated the strikes altered his perspective, leading him to become determined on retribution. Along with other conservative figures, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a occupation of Afghanistan in an attempt to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the invasion of Iraq, although there was little proof of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Controversial Policies
He expressed no regrets about the invasion, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis perished, nor about the harsh treatment of suspects captured after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was predicated on misleading reports echoed by Cheney, was the correct course of action. "It represented the correct action to do at that time. I believed it then and I believe it today."
Yet even at the time, there were dissenting voices at a high level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the White House's own representatives to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the position. "I saw, at a minimum," he wrote later "clear negligence, inaction, and irresponsibility: at worst, falsehoods, unfitness, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not entirely accountable for the Iraq invasion. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for such action. He had composed a memo detailing circumstances in which US concerns might be compromised (including "availability of crucial commodities, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the US should be postured to operate alone when joint efforts cannot be orchestrated," explicitly mentioning defense operations against Iraq.
Bush also had assumed the White House vaguely intent on executing what his father had specifically avoided to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Following he had been fired by the administration, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his objective of reducing America's participation in the regional tensions and mooted defense operations against Iraq.
Bush held a private grievance against Saddam, thinking he had been involved in a scheme to assassinate his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally objected to that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a floor mural with a image of his father's visage that each person had to tread upon.
Interrogation Methods
However it was Cheney who was among the most outspoken supporting attacking Iraq, consistently citing intelligence reports that were either thin or completely misleading. He endorsed what the Bush White House indirectly described as "intensive questioning", the employment of waterboarding and torture.
Responding to a Senate document in 2014 that concluded that no actionable intelligence had come from the interrogation methods, Cheney dismissed the conclusions as "riddled with crap". He told Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to establish protocols and put in place procedures to catch the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it never happened again. That is precisely what they did and they earn a lot of recognition."
Public Persona
Cheney reveled in monikers imposed on him by detractors such as the dark character and The Prince of Darkness, and by the notion that he was a shadow power controlling Bush. In the journalist's 2013 volume about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Is it me who is the sinister strategist in the corner that nobody ever sees come out of his lair? That is a effective way to operate, truthfully."
Commercial Ties
Controversy over his business interests followed him throughout his time as second-in-command. Even though he had limited background in business but established relationships in security, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial oil and gas conglomerates, in 1995 as leader and CEO.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's VP candidate for the presidency. Controversially, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was awarded US contracts valued at substantial sums.
It made him rich. His yearly earnings during his period at the company rose from his quarter-million dollars while Pentagon chief to $4.4m. When he departed in 2000 he had a compensation package totaling in excess of $20m|twenty
