The late US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who passed away at the age of 84, was regarded as among the most powerful occupants of that position in US history. Whereas countless second-in-commands had to settle for minor or ceremonial roles, Cheney wielded huge sway during the administration of George W Bush, so much so that he was commonly referred to as the "actual president".
Bush disliked that description and stated the relationship was more complicated. He observed that Cheney was courteous, always calling him in public as President, while he called him as Dick. Bush disputed even portrayals of their relationship as a team because it implied that they were equals. Regardless of these objections, Cheney viewed the laidback president malleable on a whole raft of governmental choices.
A Period Following the Attacks
Leading of a contingent of neo-conservatives that featured military head Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been attending a gathering at a school in Florida. As Bush headed for a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took command, ordering the shooting down of any non-communicating aircraft nearing the Capitol building.
Cheney stated the strikes transformed him, leading him to become focused on retaliation. In conjunction with other neo-cons, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a occupation of Afghanistan in an attempt to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the military action of Iraq, even though there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Controversial Decisions
He expressed no regrets about the military campaign, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis died, and not about the waterboarding of suspects captured after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was based on inaccurate intelligence repeated by Cheney, was the correct course of action. "It represented the proper decision to do then. I was convinced then and I believe it presently."
But even at the time, there were dissenting voices at a senior level about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the government's own special envoys to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the role. "I saw, as a baseline," he later wrote "clear negligence, negligence, and recklessness: in the worst case, lying, unfitness, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not entirely to blame for the Iraq invasion. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for such action. He had composed a memo outlining scenarios in which American interests might be threatened (including "availability of essential resources, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the United States should be postured to take unilateral action when cooperative measures cannot be orchestrated," explicitly citing military moves against Iraq.
Bush also had entered the White House somewhat determined on executing what his father had notably declined to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Following he had been dismissed 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 objective of reducing America's engagement in the regional tensions and proposed defense operations against Iraq.
Bush bore a private grievance against Saddam, believing he had been behind a plot to assassinate his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He also objected to that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a image of his predecessor's countenance that each person had to tread upon.
Investigation Approaches
Yet it was Cheney who was part of the most outspoken behind striking Iraq, consistently quoting agency briefings that were either weak or entirely inaccurate. He backed what the Bush administration euphemistically referred to as "advanced techniques", the employment of interrogation method and torture.
Answering a Senate document in 2014 that determined that no actionable intelligence had been obtained through the harsh techniques, Cheney dismissed the findings as "riddled with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to establish protocols and create procedures to catch the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it never happened again. That was specifically what they did and they earn a lot of praise."
Public Persona
Cheney reveled in labels imposed on him by detractors such as the Star Wars villain and The Prince of Darkness, and by the concept that he was a dark force manipulating Bush. In the author's 2013 volume about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Is it me who is the evil genius in the corner that remains unseen come out of his lair? That is a nice way to function, in fact."
Business Interests
Dispute over his corporate affiliations pursued him throughout his time as vice-president. Even though he had minimal expertise in commerce but established relationships in defence, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's biggest oil and gas companies, in 1995 as leader and top executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's election partner for the presidency. Debatably, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was granted US agreements worth multiple billions.
It made him rich. His yearly compensation during his tenure at the corporation increased from his $258,394 during his time as Pentagon chief to over four million. When he departed in 2000 he had a package valued at over $20m|twenty
