The late US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was seen as one of the most significant incumbents of that position in the nation's history. Although numerous second-in-commands were limited to minor or symbolic roles, Cheney wielded enormous sway during the administration of George W Bush, to the point that he was commonly referred to as the "true president".
Bush resented this portrayal and stated the relationship was more nuanced. He noted that Cheney was respectful, always addressing him in public settings as Mr President, while he called him as Dick. Bush challenged even characterisations of their partnership as a team because it suggested that they were peers. Regardless of these objections, Cheney considered the relaxed president accommodating on a whole raft of governmental choices.
The Period Following the Attacks
Leading of a contingent of neo-conservatives that encompassed military head Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been attending a meeting at a elementary school in Florida. Whereas Bush headed for a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took command, ordering the shooting down of any unidentified airplanes heading toward the government building.
Cheney said the attacks changed him, causing him to be intent on retribution. Along with other neo-cons, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an effort to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the armed intervention of Iraq, though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein having involvement.
Controversial Actions
He showed no remorse about the armed intervention, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, nor about the waterboarding of detainees captured after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was founded on misleading information echoed by Cheney, was the right course of action. "It proved to be the correct action to do at that time. I believed it at the time and I hold that view today."
But during that period, there were dissenting voices at a senior level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the White House's own delegates to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the role. "I saw, as a baseline," he later wrote "true dereliction, negligence, and irresponsibility: at worst, lying, ineptitude, and graft."
Broader Context
Cheney was not entirely accountable for the Iraq campaign. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for similar measures. He had written a memo setting out scenarios in which American interests might be endangered (encompassing "access to essential resources, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "the United States should be positioned to take unilateral action when joint efforts cannot be arranged," particularly mentioning armed actions against Iraq.
Bush additionally had assumed the presidency somewhat determined on implementing what his father had famously refused to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Subsequent to 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 stated his plan of reducing America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and proposed military action against Iraq.
Bush bore a personal grudge against Saddam, believing he had been responsible for a plot to murder his parent, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally objected to that one of the largest hotels in Baghdad had a ground design with a image of his father's face that all visitors had to tread upon.
Interrogation Methods
Yet it was Cheney who was part of the most vehement advocating invading Iraq, consistently referencing information documents that were either insubstantial or totally inaccurate. He supported what the Bush administration politely called as "advanced techniques", the application of interrogation method and harsh treatment.
Responding to a Senate analysis in 2014 that determined that no valuable data had resulted from the torture, Cheney dismissed the findings as "riddled with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to take steps and establish programmes to catch the bastards who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it never happened again. That was specifically what they did and they merit a lot of credit."
Public Persona
Cheney took pleasure in nicknames assigned to him by opponents such as Darth Vader and the sinister presence, and by the idea that he was a dark force directing Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 publication about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Do I represent the evil genius in the corner that nobody ever sees come out of his hole? It's a effective way to function, in fact."
Corporate Connections
Controversy over his commercial relationships accompanied him through his period as second-in-command. While he had minimal expertise in commerce but strong connections in security, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's biggest petroleum companies, in 1995 as chairman and chief executive.
In 2000 he became Bush's election partner for the White House. Debatably, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was given US agreements valued at substantial sums.
It greatly increased his wealth. His yearly earnings during his period at the firm grew from his quarter-million dollars while Pentagon chief to over four million. When he resigned in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at more than $20m|twenty
