One-time Vice-President Dick Cheney: An Examination on the Impactful Time in Office

The former US VP Dick Cheney, who died at age 84, was seen as one of the most powerful incumbents of that position in American history. Whereas numerous second-in-commands had to settle for peripheral or ceremonial positions, Cheney held enormous power during the presidency of George W Bush, to the point that he was often called as the "real president".

Bush objected to such a characterisation and said the relationship was more complex. He noted that Cheney was respectful, always referring to him in official appearances as the President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush disputed even characterisations of their partnership as a collaboration because it indicated that they were equals. Regardless of such protestations, Cheney considered the relaxed president pliable on a broad range of policy decisions.

The Period Following the Attacks

In charge of a group of conservative hawks that encompassed Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been attending a gathering at a elementary school in Florida. Whereas Bush traveled to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, directing the destruction of any unresponsive aircraft nearing the US Capitol.

Cheney said the attacks transformed him, making him become focused on retaliation. Together with other neo-cons, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a occupation of Afghanistan in an attempt to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the military action of Iraq, even though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein playing a role.

Disputed Decisions

He showed no remorse about the armed intervention, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis perished, and not about the harsh treatment of individuals captured after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was predicated on misleading reports echoed by Cheney, was the correct course of action. "It proved to be the right thing to do at that time. I believed it then and I believe it today."

Yet even at the time, there were opposing views at a top tier about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the White House's own special envoys to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the role. "I witnessed, as a baseline," he wrote later "true dereliction, carelessness, and recklessness: at worst, falsehoods, unfitness, and corruption."

Broader Context

Cheney was not entirely to blame for the Iraq campaign. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for such action. He had drafted a memorandum setting out circumstances in which national priorities might be endangered (encompassing "availability of essential resources, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the US should be positioned to act independently when collective action prove impossible," explicitly citing armed actions against Iraq.

Bush also had arrived in the presidency vaguely intent on carrying out what his parent had specifically avoided to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Subsequent to he had been sacked by the president, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his plan of diminishing America's engagement in the regional tensions and suggested armed intervention against Iraq.

Bush carried a private grievance against Saddam, thinking he had been behind a scheme to assassinate his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore resented that one of the biggest establishments in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a image of his predecessor's countenance that all visitors had to tread upon.

Questioning Techniques

Yet it was Cheney who was among the most vehement supporting invading Iraq, frequently referencing intelligence reports that were whether insubstantial or totally misleading. He supported what the Bush White House politely called as "enhanced interrogation", the employment of interrogation method and torture.

Answering a Senate report in 2014 that determined that no actionable intelligence had resulted from the harsh techniques, Cheney disregarded the conclusions as "full of crap". He stated to Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to take steps and create initiatives to capture the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it would not recur. That's exactly what they did and they merit a lot of recognition."

Public Persona

Cheney reveled in nicknames given to him by detractors such as the Star Wars villain and The Prince of Darkness, and by the notion that he was a sinister influence directing Bush. In the author's 2013 publication about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Am I the evil genius in the background that remains unseen come out of his hole? This represents a nice way to work, in fact."

Commercial Ties

Debate over his business interests followed him during his tenure as vice-president. Even though he had limited background in commerce but strong connections in military, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's biggest energy corporations, in 1995 as leader and CEO.

In 2000 he became Bush's VP candidate for the executive branch. Controversially, during the military campaign, Halliburton was given US deals worth substantial sums.

It greatly increased his wealth. His annual income during his time at the firm grew from his $258,394 while Pentagon chief to over four million. When he left in 2000 he had a severance arrangement totaling more than $20m|twenty