Former Vice-President Dick Cheney: An Examination on the Impactful Time in Office

The deceased US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was regarded as arguably the most influential holders of the vice-presidency in the nation's history. While many vice-presidents were confined to minor or figurehead functions, Cheney exercised enormous sway during the administration of George W Bush, so much so that he was often referred to as the "actual president".

Bush disliked such a characterisation and claimed the dynamic was more complex. He noted that Cheney was deferential, always referring to him in public settings as the President, while he called him as Dick. Bush challenged even portrayals of their partnership as a collaboration because it suggested that they were peers. Despite such protestations, Cheney viewed the easygoing president accommodating on a wide array of governmental choices.

A Aftermath of 9/11

Leading of a contingent of neo-cons that included defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he pushed hard for the armed incursion 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 taking part in a meeting at a elementary school in Florida. As Bush made his way to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, ordering the downing of any unidentified planes nearing the US Capitol.

Cheney stated the assaults changed him, causing him to be determined on revenge. Along with other conservative figures, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an effort to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the armed intervention of Iraq, though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein playing a role.

Controversial Decisions

He expressed no regrets about the armed intervention, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis perished, and not about the waterboarding of detainees rounded up after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq military action, which was founded on misleading reports echoed by Cheney, was the proper course of action. "It was the right thing to do then. I believed it back then and I believe it now."

But during that period, there were contrary opinions at a high level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the administration's own delegates to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the post. "I witnessed, as a baseline," he wrote later "obvious failure, carelessness, and unaccountability: at worst, deception, incompetence, and corruption."

Wider Perspective

Cheney was not solely to blame for the Iraq military action. Before 9/11, Wolfowitz had advocated for comparable steps. He had drafted a document setting out situations in which American interests might be endangered (encompassing "obtaining vital raw materials, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the US should be positioned to take unilateral action when cooperative measures cannot be arranged," particularly citing military moves against Iraq.

Bush also had arrived in the Oval Office generally inclined on executing what his parent had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Subsequent to he had been sacked by the president, the finance chief Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his objective of lowering America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and mooted military action against Iraq.

Bush carried a personal grudge against Saddam, thinking he had been behind a conspiracy to kill his parent, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He also disliked that one of the largest hotels in Baghdad had a floor mural with a image of his predecessor's countenance that everyone had to walk over.

Investigation Approaches

Yet it was Cheney who was one of the most vehement advocating striking Iraq, repeatedly citing agency briefings that were either weak or entirely inaccurate. He endorsed what the Bush administration indirectly described as "advanced techniques", the application of interrogation method and physical pressure.

Addressing a Senate report in 2014 that found that no valuable data had come from the interrogation methods, Cheney disregarded the conclusions as "riddled with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to establish protocols and create initiatives to catch the individuals who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they earn a lot of credit."

Public Persona

Cheney enjoyed nicknames given 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 pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Do I represent the evil genius in the shadows that operates invisibly leave his domain? That is a nice way to work, truthfully."

Business Interests

Controversy over his commercial relationships pursued him during his tenure as second-in-command. Although he had minimal expertise in corporate affairs but good contacts in defence, notably in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial petroleum companies, in 1995 as leader and CEO.

In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's running mate for the presidency. Debatably, during the military campaign, Halliburton was granted US agreements worth billions.

It made him rich. His annual income during his tenure at the company rose from his quarter-million dollars when he was military head to over four million. When he departed in 2000 he had a package valued at in excess of $20m|twenty