Former Vice-President Dick Cheney: A Look Back on the Impactful Government Service

The former US VP Dick Cheney, who has died at the age of 84, was regarded as among the most influential occupants of the vice-presidency in US history. While numerous VPs had to settle for minor or ceremonial functions, Cheney wielded enormous influence during the presidency of George W Bush, so much so that he was often described as the "true president".

Bush objected to that description and claimed the connection was more nuanced. He noted that Cheney was deferential, invariably addressing him in official appearances as President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush disputed even portrayals of their association as a team because it suggested that they were equals. Regardless of these denials, Cheney found the relaxed president pliable on a wide array of administrative determinations.

The Post-9/11 Era

Leading of a group of conservative hawks that featured 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. When of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been attending a meeting at a elementary school in Florida. As Bush made his way to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took command, directing the destruction of any unidentified planes heading toward the government building.

Cheney said the assaults altered his perspective, making him become determined on retaliation. Along with other neo-conservatives, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a occupation of Afghanistan in an attempt to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the armed intervention of Iraq, even though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein having involvement.

Debated Actions

He voiced no apologies about the armed intervention, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis died, nor about the harsh treatment of detainees rounded up after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was founded on faulty intelligence echoed by Cheney, was the correct course of action. "It was the proper decision to do back then. I believed it then and I hold that view today."

But during that period, there were opposing views at a top tier about the botched execution of Iraq. One of the White House's own representatives to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the position. "I saw, at a minimum," he later wrote "clear negligence, carelessness, and recklessness: in the worst case, deception, incompetence, and dishonesty."

Wider Perspective

Cheney was not completely responsible for the Iraq campaign. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had advocated for such action. He had composed a document outlining scenarios in which national priorities might be threatened (featuring "availability of vital raw materials, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the US should be positioned to take unilateral action when cooperative measures prove impossible," specifically citing defense operations against Iraq.

Bush additionally had arrived in the presidency generally inclined on implementing what his parent had specifically avoided to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Following he had been fired by the White House, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his intention of lowering America's involvement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and mooted armed intervention against Iraq.

Bush held a private grievance against Saddam, thinking he had been involved in a plot to assassinate his parent, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally objected to that one of the most prominent hotels in Baghdad had a ground design with a image of his parent's visage that everyone had to walk over.

Interrogation Methods

However it was Cheney who was among the most vociferous advocating invading Iraq, frequently referencing agency briefings that were both insubstantial or totally misleading. He endorsed what the Bush White House indirectly described as "enhanced interrogation", the employment of simulated drowning and torture.

Addressing a Senate report in 2014 that determined that no useful information had resulted from the interrogation methods, Cheney disregarded the findings as "riddled with crap". He told Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to establish protocols and establish programmes to apprehend the bastards who killed 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it never happened again. That's exactly what they did and they earn a lot of recognition."

External Perception

Cheney reveled in monikers assigned to him by critics such as Darth Vader and the sinister presence, and by the notion that he was a sinister influence manipulating Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 book about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Do I represent the sinister strategist in the background that remains unseen emerge from his lair? This represents a nice way to work, in fact."

Corporate Connections

Debate over his business interests accompanied him during his tenure as VP. Although he had limited background in corporate affairs but good contacts in military, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's largest energy conglomerates, in 1995 as chairman and CEO.

In 2000 he became Bush's VP candidate for the executive branch. Contentiously, during the military campaign, Halliburton was granted US deals totaling billions.

It significantly boosted his finances. His annual income during his tenure at the company increased from his $258,394 during his time as Pentagon chief to over four million. When he departed in 2000 he had a package valued at over $20m|twenty