The late US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who passed away at age 84, was considered one of the most influential incumbents of that position in US history. Although countless second-in-commands were confined to peripheral or symbolic roles, Cheney wielded enormous influence during the term of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was commonly called as the "actual president".
Bush objected to this portrayal and stated the relationship was more complicated. He noted that Cheney was deferential, invariably calling him in public as the President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush disputed even descriptions of their partnership as a team because it suggested that they were equals. In spite of such protestations, Cheney viewed the relaxed president malleable on a whole raft of administrative determinations.
A Period Following the Attacks
At the head of a faction of neo-cons that included military head Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been attending a meeting at a elementary school in Florida. Whereas Bush made his way to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took command, directing the downing of any unresponsive aircraft heading toward the US Capitol.
Cheney stated the strikes transformed him, causing him to be intent on retaliation. In conjunction with other neo-cons, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a takeover of Afghanistan in an attempt to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the armed intervention of Iraq, though there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Debated Decisions
He expressed no regrets about the invasion, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis perished, or about the waterboarding of detainees rounded up after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was founded on faulty information echoed by Cheney, was the correct course of action. "It was the correct action to do at that time. I was convinced back then and I believe it now."
Yet even at the time, there were opposing views at a senior level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the White House's own special envoys to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the position. "I observed, at a minimum," he later wrote "clear negligence, negligence, and unaccountability: in the worst case, falsehoods, incompetence, and dishonesty."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not completely responsible for the Iraq campaign. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for comparable steps. He had drafted a memo setting out scenarios in which American interests might be endangered (featuring "access to essential resources, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the US should be positioned to take unilateral action when joint efforts prove impossible," explicitly citing defense operations against Iraq.
Bush also had assumed the White House somewhat determined on implementing what his father had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Following he had been sacked by the White House, the finance chief Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his objective of lowering America's involvement in the Middle East dispute and mooted defense operations against Iraq.
Bush bore a personal grudge against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a conspiracy to assassinate his parent, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore disliked that one of the biggest hotels in Baghdad had a floor mural with a image of his predecessor's visage that each person had to step on.
Interrogation Methods
Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most vehement advocating invading Iraq, frequently quoting agency briefings that were either insubstantial or completely deceptive. He supported what the Bush White House politely called as "intensive questioning", the employment of simulated drowning and torture.
Addressing a Senate analysis in 2014 that found that no useful information had come from the harsh techniques, Cheney dismissed the findings as "loaded with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to implement measures and create procedures to capture the perpetrators who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it would not recur. That's exactly what they did and they deserve a lot of praise."
Public Persona
Cheney took pleasure in labels imposed on him by critics such as the dark character and the dark figure, and by the concept that he was a shadow power controlling Bush. In the author's 2013 volume about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Is it me who is the malevolent mastermind in the corner that operates invisibly come out of his hole? This represents a effective way to operate, actually."
Business Interests
Debate over his corporate affiliations accompanied him through his period as second-in-command. Although he had minimal expertise in commerce but good contacts in military, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial petroleum corporations, in 1995 as leader and CEO.
In 2000 he became Bush's VP candidate for the White House. Controversially, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was given US deals totaling billions.
It made him rich. His annual income during his period at the corporation grew from his $258,394 while defence secretary to $4.4m. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at in excess of $20m|twenty
