The deceased US vice-president Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was considered arguably the most significant incumbents of that position in American history. Although many VPs were limited to marginal or ceremonial functions, Cheney exercised huge power during the administration of George W Bush, so much so that he was often called as the "true president".
Bush objected to this portrayal and said the connection was more complex. He pointed out that Cheney was respectful, invariably addressing him in public settings as the President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush challenged even descriptions of their relationship as a team because it suggested that they were equals. Despite such protestations, Cheney viewed the easygoing president accommodating on a broad range of governmental choices.
A Post-9/11 Era
Leading of a faction of neo-cons that encompassed military head Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been attending a session at a school in Florida. Whereas Bush headed for a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, ordering the shooting down of any non-communicating airplanes nearing the Capitol building.
Cheney said the assaults altered his perspective, causing him to be intent on revenge. Along with other neo-conservatives, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a takeover of Afghanistan in an attempt to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the invasion of Iraq, although there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Controversial Decisions
He showed no remorse about the invasion, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, and not about the waterboarding of detainees apprehended after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was predicated on misleading information repeated by Cheney, was the right path to take. "It represented the proper decision to do at that time. I was convinced then and I hold that view today."
However even then, there were contrary opinions at a senior level about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the White House's own delegates to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the role. "I saw, at the very least," he wrote later "obvious failure, carelessness, and unaccountability: potentially, lying, ineptitude, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not entirely to blame for the Iraq invasion. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for comparable steps. He had written a memo setting out circumstances in which American interests might be endangered (featuring "availability of essential resources, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the US should be prepared to act independently when joint efforts cannot be arranged," explicitly citing defense operations against Iraq.
Bush additionally had entered the White House vaguely intent on carrying out what his parent had famously refused to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Following he had been fired by the administration, the finance chief Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his intention of lowering America's participation in the regional tensions and mooted armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush carried a personal grudge against Saddam, believing he had been behind a plot to murder his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He also disliked that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a ground design with a portrait of his father's visage that everyone had to step on.
Questioning Techniques
However it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken advocating attacking Iraq, frequently referencing agency briefings that were either insubstantial or completely misleading. He supported what the Bush administration euphemistically referred to as "advanced techniques", the employment of waterboarding and harsh treatment.
Responding to a Senate document in 2014 that determined that no useful information had been obtained through the torture, Cheney dismissed the report as "full of crap". He told Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to take steps and establish procedures to capture the bastards who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it never happened again. That was specifically what they did and they deserve a lot of recognition."
External Perception
Cheney took pleasure in monikers assigned to him by critics such as the dark character and The Prince of Darkness, and by the concept that he was a shadow power directing Bush. In the journalist's 2013 volume about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Am I the malevolent mastermind in the background that operates invisibly leave his lair? This represents a effective way to operate, in fact."
Corporate Connections
Controversy over his commercial relationships pursued him during his tenure as vice-president. Even though he had minimal expertise in commerce but good contacts in military, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's biggest oil and gas companies, in 1995 as chairman and chief executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's VP candidate for the White House. Controversially, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was given US deals totaling billions.
It greatly increased his wealth. His yearly earnings during his time at the corporation increased from his quarter-million dollars when he was military head to $4.4m. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement totaling over $20m|twenty