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

The former US vice-president Dick Cheney, who passed away at the age of 84, was seen as arguably the most significant holders of the vice-presidency in American history. Although many vice-presidents had to settle for peripheral or figurehead functions, Cheney exercised huge power during the presidency of George W Bush, to such an extent that he was commonly referred to as the "real president".

Bush resented this portrayal and claimed the dynamic was more complex. He observed that Cheney was courteous, invariably addressing him in official appearances as Mr President, while he called him as Dick. Bush disputed even characterisations of their association as a team because it indicated that they were peers. In spite of these objections, Cheney considered the relaxed president malleable on a broad range of governmental choices.

A Aftermath of 9/11

Leading of a faction of neo-cons that featured Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in response to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been participating in a meeting at a elementary school in Florida. Whereas Bush made his way to a secure location in Nebraska, Cheney took command, directing the shooting down of any non-communicating planes nearing the government building.

Cheney said the attacks transformed him, leading him to become determined on revenge. Along with other neo-conservatives, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a occupation of Afghanistan in an effort to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the armed intervention of Iraq, although there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein playing a role.

Controversial Decisions

He showed no remorse about the invasion, in which an estimated 100,000 Iraqis perished, or about the enhanced interrogation of detainees captured after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was founded on faulty information echoed by Cheney, was the proper decision. "It represented the proper decision to do then. I had faith then and I maintain that stance today."

But even then, there were dissenting voices at a high level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the administration's own special envoys to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the position. "I saw, at the very least," he wrote later "clear negligence, carelessness, and irresponsibility: at worst, deception, unfitness, and graft."

Additional Factors

Cheney was not completely to blame for the Iraq military action. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had pushed for similar measures. He had written a document setting out situations in which national priorities might be threatened (encompassing "access to vital raw materials, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had asserted that "the US should be positioned to act independently when collective action cannot be arranged," explicitly citing armed actions against Iraq.

Bush too had arrived in the presidency vaguely intent on implementing what his father had specifically avoided to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Following he had been fired by the president, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill disclosed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his objective of diminishing America's engagement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and proposed armed intervention against Iraq.

Bush carried a individual resentment against Saddam, thinking he had been involved in a scheme to assassinate his father, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He additionally objected to that one of the biggest establishments in Baghdad had a floor mural with a likeness of his predecessor's face that all visitors had to step on.

Investigation Approaches

But it was Cheney who was part of the most outspoken behind invading Iraq, repeatedly citing intelligence reports that were both weak or entirely deceptive. He backed what the Bush administration euphemistically referred to as "enhanced interrogation", the use of waterboarding and torture.

Responding to a Senate document in 2014 that determined that no valuable data had come from the interrogation methods, Cheney dismissed the report as "full of crap". He informed Fox News: "We requested [the CIA] to take steps and create programmes to catch 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 deserve a lot of credit."

Public Image

Cheney enjoyed monikers assigned to him by critics such as Darth Vader and the sinister presence, and by the idea that he was a sinister influence controlling Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 volume about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Am I the evil genius in the shadows that operates invisibly come out of his lair? That is a effective way to work, truthfully."

Commercial Ties

Dispute over his commercial relationships pursued him through his period as vice-president. Even though he had minimal expertise in commerce but strong connections in military, particularly in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's biggest petroleum companies, in 1995 as chairman and chief executive.

In 2000 he became Bush's election partner for the executive branch. Controversially, during the military campaign, Halliburton was awarded US contracts totaling multiple billions.

It significantly boosted his finances. His annual income during his period at the corporation increased from his $258,394 when he was Pentagon chief to over four million. When he left in 2000 he had a package valued at over $20m|twenty