One-time VP Dick Cheney: An Examination on His Powerful Time in Office

The deceased US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who died at age 84, was seen as arguably the most influential incumbents of the vice-presidency in American history. Whereas countless vice-presidents were confined to marginal or symbolic roles, Cheney held enormous power during the administration of George W Bush, so much so that he was frequently referred to as the "true president".

Bush objected to that description and claimed the dynamic was more nuanced. He pointed out that Cheney was respectful, always calling him in official appearances as the President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush disputed even descriptions of their relationship as a team because it implied that they were on equal footing. Regardless of these objections, Cheney viewed the easygoing president malleable on a whole raft of administrative determinations.

A Post-9/11 Era

At the head of a group of neo-cons that encompassed defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. When of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been taking part in a meeting at a elementary school in Florida. As Bush traveled to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took command, commanding the downing of any non-communicating planes heading toward the US Capitol.

Cheney said the assaults changed him, making him become intent on retribution. Along with other neo-conservatives, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a invasion of Afghanistan in an effort to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the military action of Iraq, although there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein having involvement.

Controversial Policies

He showed no remorse about the armed intervention, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, nor about the harsh treatment of individuals captured after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was based on faulty reports circulated by Cheney, was the right course of action. "It proved to be the correct action to do back then. I was convinced at the time and I believe it presently."

Yet even then, there were opposing views at a high level about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the government's own special envoys to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the post. "I witnessed, as a baseline," he later wrote "true dereliction, negligence, and recklessness: potentially, falsehoods, incompetence, and graft."

Additional Factors

Cheney was not solely accountable for the Iraq military action. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for such action. He had written a memorandum outlining circumstances in which US concerns might be endangered (including "obtaining crucial commodities, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "America should be prepared to take unilateral action when cooperative measures prove impossible," specifically citing defense operations against Iraq.

Bush also had assumed the White House generally inclined on implementing what his parent had specifically avoided to do in 1991; remove Saddam. After he had been dismissed by the president, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his objective of lowering America's participation in the Middle East dispute and suggested military action against Iraq.

Bush bore a private grievance against Saddam, thinking he had been behind a scheme to murder his father, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally disliked that one of the largest accommodations in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a likeness of his father's countenance that everyone had to step on.

Questioning Techniques

But it was Cheney who was part of the most outspoken behind striking Iraq, frequently citing information documents that were whether insubstantial or entirely deceptive. He supported what the Bush White House euphemistically referred to as "enhanced interrogation", the application of interrogation method and torture.

Answering a Senate report in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had been obtained through the interrogation methods, Cheney disregarded the conclusions as "riddled with crap". He told Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to establish protocols and establish procedures to catch the bastards who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they deserve a lot of praise."

Public Persona

Cheney reveled in labels imposed on him by detractors such as the Star Wars villain and the dark figure, and by the notion that he was a shadow power manipulating Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 book about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Is it me who is the sinister strategist in the corner that operates invisibly leave his hole? This represents a nice way to function, actually."

Commercial Ties

Debate over his corporate affiliations followed him through his period as vice-president. Although he had limited background in corporate affairs but good contacts in military, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's largest petroleum companies, in 1995 as chair and CEO.

In 2000 he became Bush's VP candidate for the presidency. Contentiously, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was granted US contracts valued at substantial sums.

It made him rich. His yearly earnings during his tenure at the company grew from his quarter-million dollars during his time as defence secretary to over four million. When he left in 2000 he had a severance arrangement worth more than $20m|twenty