Dick Cheney, widely regarded as the most influential vice president in modern U.S. politics, died at the age of 84 on the 3rd (local time), according to AP and CNN.

His family said he passed away that night due to pneumonia and complications from heart and vascular disease.

Serving as the 46th vice president from 2001 to 2009 alongside President George W. Bush for two terms, he was a key figure who designed the ‘war on terror’ and the invasion of Iraq.

AP described him as “the most powerful and controversial vice president in modern American political history.”

Born in Nebraska in 1941 and raised in Wyoming, Cheney left Yale University and earned bachelor and master degrees in political science from the University of Wyoming. Rising to the center of power in Washington after holding key posts in the Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford administrations, he served as chief of staff to President Ford, later became a U.S. Representative from Wyoming, and served as Secretary of Defense during the presidency of ‘Bush Senior’, President George H. W. Bush.

He was charged with vetting the running mate for George W. Bush, then was selected himself, and, while assisting the politically inexperienced President Bush, drove substantive policy decisions. For this, he was nicknamed the ‘shadow president’ or the ‘real president’ in Washington.

During the 9·11 attacks, he directed the response from the White House underground bunker and reportedly issued the order, “If there is a hijacked plane heading for Washington, shoot it down.” He then pushed a course of ‘preemptive strike·regime change’ backed by U.S. military power. He also claimed that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction, playing a decisive role in building the case for the 2003 invasion of Iraq. After the war, when related intelligence proved false, he was criticized as a ‘symbol of faulty judgment’. Yet he said he would make the same decision “even if he went back to that time,” expressing no regret.

His hard-line counterterrorism policies that justified surveillance, torture, and the operation of the Guantanamo detention facility drew international condemnation. Cheney countered that they were “an unavoidable choice for national security.” He defended the surveillance, interrogation, and detention system he led as “a tool that kept America from being attacked again.”

Though he wielded immense power within the Republican Party, in his later years he defined President Donald Trump as the greatest threat to the United States and clashed with him. In the 2024 presidential election, he voted for Kamala Harris, the Democratic candidate. His daughter Liz Cheney likewise served as a Republican member of the House and, in the last election, supported Harris and campaigned for the Democrats.

Throughout his adult life, Cheney battled heart disease and suffered five heart attacks, but continued his activities after a heart transplant in 2012. In one interview, he said life after the surgery “was a gift in itself.” He is survived by his wife Lynne, daughters Liz and Mary, and seven grandchildren.