Former Vice-President Dick Cheney: A Retrospective on the Powerful Time in Office

The late US VP Dick Cheney, who died at age 84, was regarded as among the most powerful incumbents of that position in American history. While numerous second-in-commands had to settle for peripheral or figurehead roles, Cheney held substantial power during the term of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was often described as the "real president".

Bush objected to this portrayal and claimed the dynamic was more complicated. He observed that Cheney was courteous, consistently calling him in public as the President, while he called him as Dick. Bush disputed even portrayals of their partnership as a collaboration because it indicated that they were on equal footing. Regardless of these denials, Cheney viewed the easygoing president pliable on a wide array of governmental choices.

A Post-9/11 Era

Leading of a group of neo-cons that encompassed defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been taking part in a meeting at a school in Florida. As Bush headed for a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, commanding the downing of any non-communicating airplanes nearing the government building.

Cheney said the attacks transformed him, leading him to become determined on retribution. Along with other neo-conservatives, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a occupation of Afghanistan in an endeavor to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the armed intervention of Iraq, although there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein having involvement.

Controversial Decisions

He showed no remorse about the military campaign, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis died, nor about the waterboarding of individuals apprehended after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was predicated on faulty reports circulated by Cheney, was the correct decision. "It proved to be the right thing to do then. I was convinced at the time and I believe it presently."

However even at the time, there were opposing views at a top tier about the poor management of Iraq. One of the White House's own special envoys to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the position. "I observed, at the very least," he subsequently stated "true dereliction, carelessness, and recklessness: potentially, falsehoods, unfitness, and dishonesty."

Wider Perspective

Cheney was not solely to blame for the Iraq campaign. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for such action. He had drafted a document outlining circumstances in which American interests might be endangered (including "access to vital raw materials, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "America should be prepared to act independently when collective action cannot be arranged," specifically citing defense operations against Iraq.

Bush too had entered the White House generally inclined on executing what his predecessor had notably declined to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Subsequent to he had been dismissed by the White House, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his intention of diminishing America's engagement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and mooted military action against Iraq.

Bush held a private grievance against Saddam, convinced he had been responsible for a scheme to murder his parent, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally disliked that one of the largest hotels in Baghdad had a ground design with a image of his predecessor's visage that all visitors had to step on.

Interrogation Methods

Yet it was Cheney who was part of the most vehement supporting attacking Iraq, repeatedly referencing intelligence reports that were whether insubstantial or totally inaccurate. He endorsed what the Bush administration indirectly described as "enhanced interrogation", the application of interrogation method and physical pressure.

Answering a Senate report in 2014 that determined that no actionable intelligence had resulted from the torture, Cheney disregarded the report as "riddled with crap". He told Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to establish protocols and put in place initiatives to apprehend the perpetrators who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it was not repeated. That was specifically what they did and they merit a lot of recognition."

External Perception

Cheney enjoyed monikers assigned to him by critics such as the Star Wars villain and The Prince of Darkness, and by the concept that he was a dark force controlling Bush. In the journalist's 2013 volume about the two, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Do I represent the malevolent mastermind in the shadows that nobody ever sees leave his domain? This represents a advantageous way to operate, actually."

Commercial Ties

Dispute over his corporate affiliations pursued him during his tenure as second-in-command. While he had little experience in business but good contacts in defence, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's biggest energy corporations, in 1995 as leader and top executive.

In 2000 he became Bush's VP candidate for the presidency. Contentiously, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was granted US agreements worth billions.

It greatly increased his wealth. His yearly compensation during his tenure at the company rose from his quarter-million dollars during his time as defence secretary to $4.4m. When he departed in 2000 he had a package totaling in excess of $20m|twenty