Former Vice-President Dick Cheney: A Retrospective on His Influential Government Service

The late US VP Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was considered among the most influential incumbents of that position in the nation's history. Although countless VPs were limited to minor or figurehead functions, Cheney held huge power during the administration of George W Bush, so much so that he was frequently referred to as the "true president".

Bush objected to this portrayal and said the connection was more complex. He pointed out that Cheney was deferential, invariably addressing him in public settings as the President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush questioned even characterisations of their association as a partnership because it implied that they were peers. Regardless of such protestations, Cheney viewed the easygoing president accommodating on a wide array of governmental choices.

A Post-9/11 Era

In charge of a contingent of neo-cons that featured defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been participating in a gathering at a elementary school in Florida. While Bush made his way to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney assumed control, ordering the downing of any non-communicating airplanes approaching the US Capitol.

Cheney stated the assaults altered his perspective, causing him to be focused on revenge. Along with other conservative figures, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an attempt to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the invasion of Iraq, even though there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein playing a role.

Debated Actions

He voiced no apologies about the invasion, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis died, and not about the waterboarding of suspects rounded up after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was founded on faulty intelligence echoed by Cheney, was the right course of action. "It was the correct action to do at that time. I had faith at the time and I maintain that stance now."

Yet even then, there were opposing views at a high level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the White House's own delegates to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the role. "I witnessed, as a baseline," he later wrote "true dereliction, carelessness, and irresponsibility: potentially, deception, incompetence, and graft."

Additional Factors

Cheney was not solely to blame for the Iraq campaign. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for comparable steps. He had drafted a document detailing circumstances in which American interests might be threatened (featuring "obtaining vital raw materials, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "America should be postured to act independently when collective action cannot be arranged," explicitly referencing military moves against Iraq.

Bush also had assumed the presidency vaguely intent on carrying out what his predecessor had notably declined to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Following he had been fired by the administration, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his objective of diminishing America's engagement in the Middle East dispute and mooted armed intervention against Iraq.

Bush bore a individual resentment against Saddam, believing he had been involved in a conspiracy to murder his father, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally resented that one of the largest accommodations in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a likeness of his parent's countenance that each person had to tread upon.

Questioning Techniques

But it was Cheney who was one of the most vehement behind attacking Iraq, repeatedly referencing agency briefings that were either thin or completely inaccurate. He backed what the Bush administration euphemistically referred to as "advanced techniques", the use of waterboarding and harsh treatment.

Responding to a Senate document in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had resulted from the harsh techniques, Cheney rejected the conclusions as "full of crap". He informed Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to implement measures and put in place procedures to apprehend the perpetrators who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it never happened again. That's exactly what they did and they earn a lot of praise."

Public Persona

Cheney enjoyed nicknames given to him by opponents such as the dark character and the dark figure, and by the idea that he was a shadow power controlling Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Do I represent the sinister strategist in the shadows that remains unseen emerge from his hole? This represents a effective way to work, actually."

Corporate Connections

Dispute over his business interests followed him during his tenure as second-in-command. Although he had minimal expertise in commerce but good contacts in defence, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's largest oil and gas companies, in 1995 as chairman and chief executive.

In 2000 he was selected as Bush's election partner for the executive branch. Debatably, during the military campaign, Halliburton was awarded US agreements worth billions.

It made him rich. His yearly compensation during his period at the firm rose from his quarter-million dollars during his time as defence secretary to $4.4m. When he resigned in 2000 he had a compensation package worth more than $20m|twenty