Ex- Vice-President Dick Cheney: A Look Back on the Influential Time in Office

The deceased US VP Dick Cheney, who has died at age 84, was seen as arguably the most powerful incumbents of that position in the nation's history. While countless second-in-commands were confined to marginal or ceremonial roles, Cheney held substantial influence during the presidency of George W Bush, to the point that he was frequently called as the "true president".

Bush disliked that description and claimed the connection was more nuanced. He pointed out that Cheney was deferential, invariably addressing him in public as President, while he called him as Dick. Bush challenged even descriptions of their partnership as a team because it suggested that they were peers. Despite these denials, Cheney viewed the easygoing president pliable on a whole raft of governmental choices.

A Period Following the Attacks

Leading of a faction of conservative hawks that featured defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been participating in a meeting at a educational institution in Florida. Whereas Bush traveled to a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took command, ordering the shooting down of any non-communicating planes approaching the US Capitol.

Cheney said the strikes changed him, making him become determined on retribution. Along with other neo-conservatives, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a invasion of Afghanistan in an attempt to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then pressed fiercely for the armed intervention of Iraq, though there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein being involved.

Controversial Decisions

He expressed no regrets about the armed intervention, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis perished, nor about the enhanced interrogation of individuals apprehended after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was based on faulty intelligence circulated by Cheney, was the correct decision. "It was the proper decision to do back then. I was convinced at the time and I hold that view now."

Yet during that period, there were dissenting voices at a top tier about the poor management of Iraq. One of the White House's own representatives to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the role. "I witnessed, at the very least," he later wrote "true dereliction, carelessness, and irresponsibility: potentially, falsehoods, unfitness, and dishonesty."

Broader Context

Cheney was not solely accountable for the Iraq invasion. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for such action. He had composed a document detailing scenarios in which American interests might be threatened (encompassing "obtaining crucial commodities, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the United States should be positioned to take unilateral action when collective action prove impossible," specifically referencing defense operations against Iraq.

Bush additionally had arrived in the presidency generally inclined on executing what his father had specifically avoided to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. After he had been sacked by the president, the finance chief Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his intention of lowering America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and suggested defense operations against Iraq.

Bush carried a private grievance against Saddam, thinking he had been responsible for a plot to assassinate his father, President George HW Bush, on a visit to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore disliked that one of the largest accommodations in Baghdad had a ground design with a image of his father's countenance that all visitors had to tread upon.

Questioning Techniques

However it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken advocating attacking Iraq, repeatedly citing information documents that were either weak or entirely deceptive. He endorsed what the Bush government indirectly described as "intensive questioning", the application of interrogation method and physical pressure.

Answering a Senate report in 2014 that determined that no useful information had been obtained through the harsh techniques, Cheney dismissed the report as "riddled with crap". He told Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to take steps and establish programmes to capture the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it was not repeated. That was specifically what they did and they earn a lot of praise."

Public Persona

Cheney enjoyed monikers given to him by detractors such as the Star Wars villain and the sinister presence, and by the notion that he was a sinister influence directing Bush. In the journalist's 2013 book about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Am I the evil genius in the shadows that remains unseen leave his hole? That is a advantageous way to function, in fact."

Corporate Connections

Controversy over his business interests accompanied him through his period as VP. Although he had little experience in business but established relationships in security, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial petroleum corporations, in 1995 as chairman and chief executive.

In 2000 he became Bush's running mate for the presidency. Controversially, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was granted US contracts totaling substantial sums.

It greatly increased his wealth. His yearly compensation during his period at the firm grew from his $258,394 while military head to $4.4m. When he departed in 2000 he had a severance arrangement valued at in excess of $20m|twenty