The deceased US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was seen as among the most significant incumbents of the vice-presidency in the nation's history. Whereas countless second-in-commands had to settle for marginal or figurehead functions, Cheney exercised enormous sway during the term of George W Bush, to the point that he was commonly called as the "actual president".
Bush disliked this portrayal and stated the connection was more complicated. He noted that Cheney was deferential, invariably addressing him in public as the President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush questioned even descriptions of their relationship as a collaboration because it suggested that they were equals. In spite of such protestations, Cheney found the laidback president pliable on a whole raft of administrative determinations.
A Aftermath of 9/11
In charge of a group of conservative hawks that featured defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been participating in a meeting at a educational institution in Florida. As Bush headed for a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took command, commanding the shooting down of any unresponsive airplanes approaching the US Capitol.
Cheney claimed the attacks transformed him, making him become determined on retaliation. Together with other neo-cons, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a invasion of Afghanistan in an effort to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the armed intervention of Iraq, although there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Disputed Actions
He voiced no apologies about the military campaign, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis perished, and not about the waterboarding of suspects apprehended after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was predicated on misleading reports repeated by Cheney, was the right course of action. "It proved to be the right thing to do at that time. I believed it at the time and I believe it now."
But even then, there were dissenting voices at a top tier about the poor management of Iraq. One of the administration's own special envoys to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the role. "I witnessed, as a baseline," he wrote later "obvious failure, inaction, and recklessness: in the worst case, falsehoods, unfitness, and graft."
Broader Context
Cheney was not entirely accountable for the Iraq invasion. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for similar measures. He had written a memo outlining situations in which American interests might be threatened (encompassing "obtaining crucial commodities, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "the US should be prepared to take unilateral action when collective action prove impossible," explicitly citing armed actions against Iraq.
Bush also had arrived in the Oval Office generally inclined on implementing what his predecessor had specifically avoided to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Subsequent to he had been fired by the administration, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his objective of lowering America's engagement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and proposed military action against Iraq.
Bush held a personal grudge against Saddam, thinking he had been behind a conspiracy to murder his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore disliked that one of the biggest establishments in Baghdad had a ground design with a likeness of his father's face that all visitors had to step on.
Interrogation Methods
Yet it was Cheney who was among the most outspoken supporting attacking Iraq, frequently citing intelligence reports that were whether thin or totally deceptive. He endorsed what the Bush White House politely called as "intensive questioning", the employment of waterboarding and harsh treatment.
Answering a Senate report in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had come from the torture, Cheney rejected the conclusions as "full of crap". He told Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and put in place procedures to capture the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it would not recur. That is precisely what they did and they merit a lot of recognition."
Public Image
Cheney took pleasure in labels given to him by opponents such as the dark character and the sinister presence, and by the concept that he was a shadow power manipulating Bush. In the author's 2013 book about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Am I the evil genius in the shadows that nobody ever sees emerge from his domain? It's a nice way to work, in fact."
Business Interests
Controversy over his corporate affiliations accompanied him through his period as vice-president. Although he had limited background in commerce but strong connections in security, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's biggest oil and gas conglomerates, in 1995 as chairman and CEO.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's election partner for the presidency. Contentiously, during the military campaign, Halliburton was given US deals totaling billions.
It made him rich. His annual income during his tenure at the corporation grew from his $258,394 when he was military head to over four million. When he resigned in 2000 he had a compensation package valued at in excess of $20m|twenty
