The late US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who has died at age 84, was regarded as arguably the most influential incumbents of that position in the nation's history. While countless second-in-commands were confined to peripheral or ceremonial functions, Cheney exercised enormous sway during the term of George W Bush, so much so that he was often described as the "real president".
Bush resented such a characterisation and claimed the connection was more complicated. He observed that Cheney was deferential, consistently referring to him in public settings as President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush disputed even descriptions of their relationship as a collaboration because it suggested that they were peers. Despite these objections, Cheney considered the easygoing president malleable on a wide array of administrative determinations.
A Aftermath of 9/11
In charge of a group of neo-cons that encompassed military head Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been taking part in a session at a school in Florida. Whereas Bush made his way to a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took command, ordering the shooting down of any unidentified airplanes nearing the Capitol building.
Cheney stated the attacks transformed him, causing him to be focused on retribution. Along with other conservative figures, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an endeavor to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the armed intervention of Iraq, though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Disputed Actions
He expressed no regrets about the military campaign, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, or about the waterboarding of individuals captured after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was founded on misleading intelligence echoed by Cheney, was the proper path to take. "It proved to be the correct action to do then. I believed it at the time and I believe it today."
However even at the time, there were contrary opinions at a top tier about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the government's own delegates to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the post. "I saw, as a baseline," he wrote later "obvious failure, inaction, and unaccountability: in the worst case, deception, unfitness, and dishonesty."
Broader Context
Cheney was not completely accountable for the Iraq campaign. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for comparable steps. He had drafted a document setting out situations in which US concerns might be compromised (featuring "availability of vital raw materials, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "America should be prepared to operate alone when cooperative measures cannot be arranged," specifically mentioning armed actions against Iraq.
Bush also had arrived in the White House somewhat determined on executing what his predecessor had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Subsequent to he had been sacked by the administration, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his intention of reducing America's participation in the Middle East dispute and proposed armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush held a individual resentment against Saddam, thinking he had been behind a plot to kill his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He also objected to that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a floor mural with a portrait of his father's countenance that all visitors had to step on.
Interrogation Methods
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most vehement advocating invading Iraq, repeatedly citing intelligence reports that were whether thin or totally misleading. He backed what the Bush White House euphemistically referred to as "enhanced interrogation", the use of waterboarding and physical pressure.
Answering a Senate document in 2014 that found that no valuable data had come from the torture, Cheney dismissed the report as "full of crap". He informed Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to establish protocols and put in place procedures to capture the bastards who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it was not repeated. That was specifically what they did and they deserve a lot of praise."
Public Image
Cheney took pleasure in nicknames given to him by critics such as Darth Vader and the sinister presence, and by the concept that he was a dark force controlling Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 volume 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 shadows that nobody ever sees emerge from his domain? It's a advantageous way to work, truthfully."
Corporate Connections
Controversy over his business interests accompanied him during his tenure as VP. Although he had minimal expertise in business but good contacts in security, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's largest oil and gas conglomerates, in 1995 as chair and chief executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's VP candidate for the White House. Debatably, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was awarded US contracts valued at billions.
It greatly increased his wealth. His yearly compensation during his period at the firm rose from his $258,394 during his time as defence secretary to over four million. When he left in 2000 he had a package worth over $20m|twenty
