Former Vice President Dick Cheney dies, 84

WASHINGTON Dick Cheney the hard-charging conservative who became one of the majority powerful and polarizing vice presidents in U S history and a leading advocate for the invasion of Iraq has died at Cheney died Monday due to complications of pneumonia and cardiac and vascular disorder his family disclosed Tuesday The quietly forceful Cheney led the armed forces as defense secretary during the Persian Gulf War under President George H W Bush before returning to residents life as vice president under Bush s son George W Bush Cheney was in effect the chief operating officer of the younger Bush s presidency He often had a commanding hand in implementing decisions majority key to the president and various of surpassing interest to himself all while living with decades of heart ailment and post-administration a heart transplant Cheney consistently defended the extraordinary tools of surveillance detention and inquisition employed in response to the Sept attacks History will remember him as among the finest society servants of his generation a patriot who brought integrity high intelligence and seriousness of purpose to every position he held Bush explained Years after leaving office Cheney became a target of President Donald Trump especially after his daughter Liz Cheney became the leading Republican critic and examiner of Trump s attempts to stay in power after his referendum defeat and his actions in the Jan Capitol riot Trump commented nothing about Cheney publicly in the hours after his death was disclosed The White House lowered flags to half-staff in remembrance of him but without the usual announcement or proclamation praising the deceased Cheney explained last year he was voting for Democrat Kamala Harris for president against Trump For all his conservatism Cheney was privately and publicly supportive of his daughter Mary Cheney after she came out as gay years before same-sex marriage was broadly supported Freedom means freedom for everyone he declared In his time in office no longer was the vice presidency merely a ceremonial afterthought Instead Cheney made it a architecture of back channels from which to influence initiative on Iraq terrorism presidential powers and potency A hard-liner on Iraq Cheney was proved wrong about the rationale for the Iraq War a point he didn t acknowledge He alleged links between the attacks and prewar Iraq that didn t exist He explained U S troops would be welcomed as liberators they weren t He declared the Iraqi insurgency in its last throes in May when U S function members had been killed not even half the toll by the war s end Cheney and Bush struck an odd bargain unspoken but well understood Shelving ambitions he might have had to succeed Bush Cheney was accorded extraordinary power His penchant for secrecy had a price He came to be seen as a Machiavelli orchestrating a bungled response to criticism of the Iraq War And when he shot a hunting companion with an errant shotgun blast in he and his coterie were slow to disclose that episode The victim his friend Harry Whittington recovered and forgave him Bush requested Cheney to lead a search for his vice president eventually deciding the job should go to Cheney himself Their poll in was ultimately sealed by the Supreme Court after a protracted legal fight On Capitol Hill Cheney lobbied for the president s programs where he had once served as a deeply conservative member of Congress and the No Republican House leader On Sept with Bush out of town the president gave Cheney approval to authorize the military to shoot down hijacked planes By then two airliners had hit the World Contract Center and a third was bearing down on the capital A Secret Arrangement agent burst into the West Wing room grabbed Cheney by the belt and shoulder and led him to a bunker underneath the White House Cheney s career in Washington started with a congressional fellowship in He became a prot g of Rep Donald Rumsfeld R-Ill serving under him in Gerald Ford s White House before he was elevated to chief of staff the youngest ever at age He later returned to Casper Wyoming and won the state s lone congressional seat the first of six terms In Cheney became defense secretary and led the Pentagon during the - Persian Gulf War Between the two Bush administrations Cheney led Dallas-based Halliburton Corp an oil industry services company Cheney was born in Lincoln Nebraska son of a longtime Agriculture Department worker Senior class president and football co-captain in Casper he went to Yale on a full scholarship for a year but failed out He moved back to Wyoming and renewed a relationship with high school sweetheart Lynne Anne Vincent marrying her in He is survived by his wife and daughters Charles Dharapak file The Associated PressPresident Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney embrace following President Bush's acceptance speech in Madison Square Garden during the final night of the Republican National Convention Thursday Sept in New York Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney left and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen Colin Powell huddle prior to testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee Thursday Feb on Capitol Hill in Washington AP Photo John Duricka file