The former US vice-president Dick Cheney, who has died at the age of 84, was considered one of the most powerful occupants of that position in American history. Whereas many VPs were confined to marginal or symbolic functions, Cheney wielded huge influence during the administration of George W Bush, to the point that he was often referred to as the "actual president".
Bush resented such a characterisation and stated the dynamic was more nuanced. He pointed out that Cheney was courteous, invariably addressing him in public settings as President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush questioned even descriptions of their association as a team because it indicated that they were equals. Despite these objections, Cheney considered the easygoing president malleable on a wide array of policy decisions.
The Post-9/11 Era
At the head of a contingent of conservative hawks that included military head Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been participating in a session at a elementary school in Florida. While Bush made his way to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, commanding the downing of any unidentified planes heading toward the US Capitol.
Cheney claimed the strikes transformed him, causing him to be focused on revenge. Along with other neo-cons, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a invasion of Afghanistan in an effort to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the invasion of Iraq, although there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Debated Policies
He showed no remorse about the armed intervention, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, or about the waterboarding of suspects rounded up after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was founded on misleading information circulated by Cheney, was the proper course of action. "It was the right thing to do back then. I had faith back then and I maintain that stance presently."
However during that period, there were opposing views at a top tier about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the administration's own delegates to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the post. "I witnessed, at a minimum," he wrote later "true dereliction, inaction, and unaccountability: at worst, deception, unfitness, and dishonesty."
Wider Perspective
Cheney was not entirely responsible for the Iraq military action. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for such action. He had written a memo setting out scenarios in which US concerns might be endangered (featuring "availability of essential resources, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the United States should be prepared to operate alone when cooperative measures cannot be arranged," explicitly referencing military moves against Iraq.
Bush also had arrived in the Oval Office generally inclined on carrying out what his father had notably declined to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Following he had been fired by the president, the finance chief Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his intention of diminishing America's participation in the Middle East dispute and suggested military action against Iraq.
Bush held a private grievance against Saddam, convinced he had been behind a plot to assassinate his father, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He also resented that one of the largest establishments in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a image of his predecessor's visage that all visitors had to step on.
Questioning Techniques
However it was Cheney who was one of the most vociferous supporting striking Iraq, consistently citing agency briefings that were whether insubstantial or completely deceptive. He supported what the Bush government euphemistically referred to as "advanced techniques", the employment of waterboarding and torture.
Answering a Senate analysis in 2014 that determined that no valuable data had resulted from the harsh techniques, Cheney disregarded the report as "loaded with crap". He informed Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to take steps and create initiatives to apprehend the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they earn a lot of credit."
Public Persona
Cheney reveled in nicknames given to him by detractors such as Darth Vader and the dark figure, and by the idea that he was a dark force directing Bush. In the author's 2013 volume about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Am I the malevolent mastermind in the background that nobody ever sees leave his lair? That is a nice way to function, actually."
Commercial Ties
Controversy over his commercial relationships accompanied him during his tenure as vice-president. Although he had little experience in corporate affairs but established relationships in security, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial oil and gas corporations, in 1995 as leader and top executive.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's running mate for the executive branch. Debatably, during the military campaign, Halliburton was granted US contracts worth billions.
It made him rich. His annual income during his tenure at the company rose from his quarter-million dollars while military head to over four million. When he resigned in 2000 he had a severance arrangement totaling over $20m|twenty
