The late US vice-president Dick Cheney, who has died at age 84, was considered among the most significant holders of that position in US history. Whereas numerous vice-presidents were limited to marginal or symbolic functions, Cheney held enormous sway during the administration of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was frequently described as the "real president".
Bush disliked such a characterisation and claimed the relationship was more complex. He noted that Cheney was courteous, invariably addressing him in official appearances as President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush disputed even portrayals of their partnership as a partnership because it indicated that they were peers. Despite these denials, Cheney viewed the relaxed president malleable on a wide array of policy decisions.
The Period Following the Attacks
At the head of a contingent of conservative hawks that featured defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been participating in a session at a school in Florida. Whereas Bush headed for a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, ordering the destruction of any non-communicating planes nearing the US Capitol.
Cheney stated the assaults transformed him, leading him to become determined on retaliation. Together with other neo-cons, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an attempt to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the armed intervention of Iraq, though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Disputed Decisions
He voiced no apologies about the armed intervention, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, or about the harsh treatment of suspects apprehended after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was predicated on misleading information circulated by Cheney, was the proper decision. "It was the correct action to do at that time. I believed it back then and I hold that view presently."
Yet even at the time, there were opposing views at a senior level about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the White House's own representatives to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the role. "I witnessed, at a minimum," he later wrote "clear negligence, inaction, and recklessness: in the worst case, falsehoods, unfitness, and corruption."
Broader Context
Cheney was not entirely responsible for the Iraq military action. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for comparable steps. He had composed a document outlining situations in which US concerns might be compromised (featuring "obtaining essential resources, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the US should be prepared to act independently when joint efforts cannot be arranged," specifically referencing military moves against Iraq.
Bush also had arrived in the Oval Office vaguely intent on executing what his parent had notably declined to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. After he had been sacked by the administration, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his plan of diminishing America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and mooted armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush held a personal grudge against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a plot to assassinate his parent, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He also disliked that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a ground design with a likeness of his predecessor's countenance that each person had to step on.
Questioning Techniques
But it was Cheney who was one of the most vociferous supporting attacking Iraq, consistently citing information documents that were whether thin or totally misleading. He endorsed what the Bush White House euphemistically referred to as "enhanced interrogation", the application of waterboarding and physical pressure.
Responding to a Senate document in 2014 that found that no useful information had come from the harsh techniques, Cheney dismissed the findings as "full of crap". He stated to Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to take steps and put in place programmes to apprehend the perpetrators who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it would not recur. That's exactly what they did and they merit a lot of credit."
External Perception
Cheney reveled in monikers imposed on him by opponents such as Darth Vader and the sinister presence, and by the concept that he was a sinister influence controlling Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Do I represent the sinister strategist in the background that operates invisibly emerge from his domain? It's a nice way to operate, actually."
Business Interests
Debate over his commercial relationships accompanied him throughout his time as VP. Even though he had minimal expertise in corporate affairs but good contacts in military, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial petroleum companies, in 1995 as chair and chief executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's running mate for the executive branch. Controversially, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was given US contracts totaling multiple billions.
It significantly boosted his finances. His annual income during his period at the firm increased from his quarter-million dollars when he was defence secretary to over four million. When he resigned in 2000 he had a severance arrangement worth over $20m|twenty
