The former US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was regarded as among the most powerful holders of that position in US history. While many vice-presidents were confined to minor or figurehead positions, Cheney held substantial power during the presidency of George W Bush, to the point that he was often called as the "real president".
Bush disliked this portrayal and claimed the connection was more nuanced. He observed that Cheney was respectful, invariably referring to him in official appearances as the 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. Despite such protestations, Cheney found the laidback president accommodating on a wide array of policy decisions.
The Period Following the Attacks
Leading of a faction of conservative hawks that encompassed Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been attending a meeting at a elementary school in Florida. While Bush made his way to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took command, ordering the shooting down of any non-communicating aircraft nearing the Capitol building.
Cheney claimed the assaults transformed him, making him become determined on revenge. Together with other neo-conservatives, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a invasion of Afghanistan in an attempt to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the military action of Iraq, even though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Controversial Decisions
He voiced no apologies about the invasion, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis perished, or about the enhanced interrogation of detainees captured after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was predicated on inaccurate information repeated by Cheney, was the proper course of action. "It proved to be the proper decision to do back then. I had faith then and I maintain that stance presently."
But during that period, there were dissenting voices at a senior level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the White House's own delegates to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the position. "I observed, at the very least," he later wrote "true dereliction, inaction, and unaccountability: potentially, lying, unfitness, and corruption."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not entirely to blame for the Iraq military action. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for similar measures. He had drafted a memo detailing scenarios in which national priorities might be threatened (including "access to essential resources, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "America should be positioned to take unilateral action when cooperative measures cannot be orchestrated," specifically citing military moves against Iraq.
Bush additionally had assumed the White House somewhat determined on carrying out what his predecessor had notably declined to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Following he had been fired by the president, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his plan of diminishing America's involvement in the regional tensions and suggested armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush carried a individual resentment against Saddam, thinking he had been involved in a scheme to assassinate his father, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore resented that one of the biggest hotels in Baghdad had a floor mural with a portrait of his parent's countenance that each person had to tread upon.
Interrogation Methods
Yet it was Cheney who was among the most vociferous behind invading Iraq, repeatedly quoting intelligence reports that were either insubstantial or completely inaccurate. He endorsed what the Bush government indirectly described as "enhanced interrogation", the use of interrogation method and torture.
Addressing a Senate document in 2014 that determined that no valuable data had come from the interrogation methods, Cheney disregarded the conclusions as "loaded with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to establish protocols and put in place initiatives to apprehend the perpetrators who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it was not repeated. That was specifically what they did and they deserve a lot of credit."
Public Persona
Cheney reveled in nicknames assigned to him by detractors such as Darth Vader and the dark figure, and by the idea that he was a dark force manipulating 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 sinister strategist in the background that operates invisibly leave his hole? It's a nice way to work, truthfully."
Commercial Ties
Dispute over his corporate affiliations followed him during his tenure as VP. While he had little experience in business but good contacts in defence, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's biggest energy companies, in 1995 as leader and CEO.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's election partner for the executive branch. Contentiously, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was given US agreements valued at multiple billions.
It made him rich. His annual income during his tenure at the company increased from his quarter-million dollars while Pentagon chief to millions. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at more than $20m|twenty