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

The late US vice-president Dick Cheney, who has died at age 84, was regarded as arguably the most influential occupants of that office in US history. Whereas many second-in-commands were limited to marginal or figurehead functions, Cheney exercised huge power during the presidency of George W Bush, so much so that he was frequently called as the "true president".

Bush resented this portrayal and said the connection was more complicated. He pointed out that Cheney was respectful, consistently referring to him in official appearances as President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush disputed even descriptions of their partnership as a partnership because it indicated that they were on equal footing. Regardless of these denials, Cheney viewed the relaxed president accommodating on a broad range of policy decisions.

The Period Following the Attacks

At the head of a faction of neo-conservatives that featured Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in response to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been participating in a meeting at a educational institution in Florida. While Bush traveled to a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took command, commanding the downing of any non-communicating airplanes nearing the US Capitol.

Cheney stated the attacks transformed him, causing him to be determined on retaliation. Along with other conservative figures, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a invasion of Afghanistan in an attempt to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the invasion of Iraq, even though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein playing a role.

Controversial Actions

He expressed no regrets about the military campaign, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis perished, nor about the harsh treatment of suspects apprehended after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was predicated on misleading reports repeated by Cheney, was the proper course of action. "It represented the correct action to do at that time. I believed it at the time and I maintain that stance now."

Yet even then, there were contrary opinions at a senior level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the government's own delegates to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the post. "I witnessed, at a minimum," he subsequently stated "clear negligence, carelessness, and recklessness: potentially, deception, incompetence, and graft."

Broader Context

Cheney was not completely responsible for the Iraq campaign. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had advocated for similar measures. He had composed a memo outlining situations in which national priorities might be compromised (encompassing "access to vital raw materials, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the US should be positioned to take unilateral action when collective action cannot be orchestrated," specifically citing armed actions against Iraq.

Bush also had arrived in the presidency generally inclined on executing what his predecessor had specifically avoided to do in 1991; remove Saddam. After he had been sacked by the president, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his plan of reducing America's involvement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and mooted armed intervention against Iraq.

Bush bore a individual resentment against Saddam, thinking he had been behind a scheme to kill his parent, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally resented that one of the most prominent establishments in Baghdad had a ground design with a likeness of his parent's countenance that everyone had to walk over.

Interrogation Methods

But it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken behind invading Iraq, consistently referencing information documents that were whether thin or completely inaccurate. He endorsed what the Bush White House euphemistically referred to as "advanced techniques", the application of simulated drowning and physical pressure.

Addressing a Senate document in 2014 that concluded that no useful information had been obtained through the interrogation methods, Cheney disregarded the conclusions as "full of crap". He informed Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to establish protocols and create procedures to capture the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it never happened again. That was specifically what they did and they earn a lot of praise."

Public Image

Cheney took pleasure in labels imposed on him by critics such as the dark character and the sinister presence, and by the notion that he was a dark force directing Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 book about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Do I represent the evil genius in the background that operates invisibly emerge from his domain? It's a effective way to function, actually."

Corporate Connections

Debate over his business interests followed him through his period as second-in-command. Although he had little experience in business but good contacts in security, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial petroleum corporations, in 1995 as chair and chief executive.

In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's running mate for the presidency. Controversially, during the military campaign, Halliburton was awarded US agreements totaling multiple billions.

It greatly increased his wealth. His annual income during his period at the company grew from his $258,394 while defence secretary to $4.4m. When he resigned in 2000 he had a severance arrangement totaling in excess of $20m|twenty