Dick Cheney’s death a loss to the nation, says George W Bush

Former US President George W Bush has led tributes to Dick Cheney, saying his death is “a loss to the nation and a sorrow to his friends”.

Cheney died from complications of pneumonia and cardiac and vascular disease on Monday night at the age of 84, his family said in a statement.

He became one of the most powerful US vice-presidents in history under Bush, and leaves behind a controversial legacy as a key architect of the “war on terror”, and an early advocate of the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

“History will remember him as among the finest public servants of his generation,” Bush said in a statement.

Cheney was “a patriot who brought integrity, high intelligence, and seriousness of purpose to every position he held”, Bush added.

“I counted on him for his honest, forthright counsel, and he never failed to give his best. He held to his convictions and prioritized the freedom and security of the American people.”

Condoleezza Rice, who served as Secretary of State alongside Cheney in the Bush administration, said she admired him “for his integrity and his love of our country”.

“He was an inspiring presence and mentor who taught me a great deal about public service,” she wrote on X.

Former President Bill Clinton, a Democrat, said: “Though we often disagreed, I always respected his dedication to our country and his unwavering sense of duty.”

Despite being a stalwart figure in the Republican party for many years, Cheney became a bitter critic of it under the leadership of Donald Trump.

The president has yet to comment on his death, but the White House says Trump is “aware” of it.

Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson said: “Scripture is very clear, we give honour where honour is due.”

“Even when we had political differences as somebody later in life, you have to honour the sacrifices and the service they gave to their country,” he said.

Flags at the White House were lowered to half-staff on Tuesday morning, shortly after his death was announced.

In their statement announcing his death, Cheney’s family said that he was a “great and good man who taught his children and grandchildren to love our country, and to live lives of courage, honour, love, kindness, and fly fishing”.

Cheney was a controversial political figure, particularly in his role behind the “war on terror”, which saw the US invade Iraq in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.

Iraqi writer Sinan Antoon said that Cheney’s lasting legacy in the country is of “chaos and terrorism”.

“In a different world Dick Cheney would definitely be a war criminal and would be standing trial,” he told the BBC’s Newshour programme.

Kristofer Goldsmith, a US Army veteran who was deployed to Iraq, also told the BBC that “most people recognise Dick Cheney as someone who created a massive problem that ended up in hundreds of thousands of deaths.”

Richard “Dick” Cheney was born in Lincoln, Nebraska in 1941 and later attended the prestigious Yale University on a scholarship but failed to graduate.

He went on to gain a Master’s degree in political science from the University of Wyoming.

His first taste of Washington came in 1968, when he worked for William Steiger, a young Republican representative from Wisconsin.

Cheney became chief of staff under Gerald Ford in 1975, when he was just 34 years old, before spending a decade in the House of Representatives.

As secretary of defence under George Bush Snr, he presided over the Pentagon during the 1990-91 Gulf War, in which a US-led coalition evicted Iraqi troops from Kuwait.

He became VP to George W Bush in 2001, and played a greater role in making major policy decisions than most of his predecessors.

It is for this role that he will be remembered best and most controversially.

During the younger Bush’s administration, he singlehandedly turned his role as vice-president from what was traditionally an empty role, with little formal power, into a de-facto deputy presidency, overseeing American foreign policy and national security in the wake of the 11 September attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon in 2001.

He was a leading advocate of US military action in both Afghanistan and Iraq.

In the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq, Cheney said that Saddam Hussein’s regime possessed so-called weapons of mass destruction. Such weapons were never found during the military campaign.

He also repeatedly claimed there were links between Iraq and al-Qaeda, the terror group led by Osama bin Laden that claimed responsibility for the 9/11 attacks. He said the attackers would incur the “full wrath” of American military might.

Cheney’s key role in the campaign heavily affected his political legacy, after the US took years to extricate itself from its costly war in Iraq, which resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people.

His political career later became the subject of a major feature film in 2018’s Vice – with actor Christian Bale receiving a Golden Globe for his portrayal of the former vice-president.

Cheney had numerous heart problems throughout his life.

He suffered the first of many heart attacks in 1978, when he was just 37. Cheney was campaigning for a seat in the House of Representatives at the time – and smoking three packets of cigarettes a day.

In 2010 he underwent surgery to install a small heart pump to try to combat “increasing congestive heart failure”.

At this point he had already suffered five heart attacks. Two years later, Cheney had a full heart transplant.

He is survived by his wife Lynne, his daughters Liz and Mary Cheney, and seven grandchildren.

Despite decades working for Republican presidents, he became a bitter opponent of President Donald Trump.

Having initially endorsed him in 2016, Cheney was appalled by allegations of Russian interference in the presidential election and Trump’s seemingly casual attitude towards Nato.

He supported his older daughter, Liz, as she became a leading Republican “never Trump” in the House of Representatives – and condemned the refusal to accept the result of the 2020 election.

Two months before last year’s US presidential election, Cheney staged a major intervention: announcing that he would vote for the Democrats’ Kamala Harris.

He said there had “never been an individual who is a greater threat to our republic than Donald Trump”.

In return, Trump called Cheney “irrelevant RINO” – an acronym which stands for “Republican in name only”.

Reacting to Cheney’s death, Harris said “his passing marks the loss of a figure who, with a strong sense of dedication, gave so much of his life to the country he loved.”

In his final years, Cheney would become a persona non grata in his own party, which had been reshaped in Trump’s image.

In an odd final twist, his own Trump criticism – and endorsement of Harris – would win him praise from some on the left who had once denounced him decades earlier.