Ex- VP Dick Cheney: An Examination on His Powerful Government Service

The former US vice-president Dick Cheney, who passed away at the age of 84, was regarded as one of the most influential incumbents of the vice-presidency in American history. Although countless second-in-commands were confined to marginal or symbolic positions, Cheney wielded substantial power during the term of George W Bush, so much so that he was often described as the "actual president".

Bush resented such a characterisation and stated the relationship was more complex. He noted that Cheney was respectful, always addressing him in public settings as Mr President, while he called him as Dick. Bush questioned even descriptions of their relationship as a collaboration because it implied that they were equals. In spite of these objections, Cheney viewed the easygoing president accommodating on a whole raft of administrative determinations.

The Post-9/11 Era

At the head of a faction of conservative hawks that encompassed defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the military intervention of Iraq in 2003 in response to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been taking part in a gathering at a educational institution in Florida. Whereas Bush traveled to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, commanding the destruction of any unidentified airplanes approaching the Capitol building.

Cheney claimed the assaults changed him, leading him to become intent on revenge. Along with other neo-cons, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a invasion of Afghanistan in an endeavor 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 Actions

He expressed no regrets about the armed intervention, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, and not about the harsh treatment of individuals captured after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was based on faulty information repeated by Cheney, was the proper course of action. "It represented the correct action to do at that time. I was convinced back then and I believe it today."

However even then, there were dissenting voices at a top tier about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the government's own special envoys to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the position. "I witnessed, as a baseline," he later wrote "clear negligence, negligence, and recklessness: in the worst case, deception, unfitness, and graft."

Broader Context

Cheney was not solely accountable for the Iraq invasion. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for comparable steps. He had composed a memorandum setting out situations in which national priorities might be endangered (featuring "obtaining crucial commodities, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "America should be postured to act independently when joint efforts cannot be orchestrated," specifically referencing military moves against Iraq.

Bush additionally had entered the Oval Office vaguely intent on executing what his parent had specifically avoided to do in 1991; overthrow Saddam. Subsequent to he had been fired by the administration, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill recounted how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his plan of diminishing America's participation in the Middle East dispute and proposed defense operations against Iraq.

Bush held a individual resentment against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a plot to assassinate his parent, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore objected to that one of the most prominent establishments in Baghdad had a floor mural with a likeness of his parent's face that all visitors had to walk over.

Questioning Techniques

Yet it was Cheney who was part of the most vehement advocating striking Iraq, frequently citing agency briefings that were both weak or completely deceptive. He supported what the Bush government euphemistically referred to as "intensive questioning", the application of simulated drowning and torture.

Addressing a Senate document in 2014 that concluded that no actionable intelligence had been obtained through the torture, Cheney disregarded the report as "full of crap". He informed Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to establish protocols and put in place programmes to apprehend the perpetrators 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 merit a lot of credit."

External Perception

Cheney took pleasure in monikers given to him by detractors such as the dark character and the dark figure, and by the notion that he was a shadow power directing Bush. In the author's 2013 volume about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is quoted as saying: "Is it me who is the malevolent mastermind in the shadows that remains unseen come out of his hole? That is a nice way to operate, in fact."

Corporate Connections

Debate over his corporate affiliations pursued him during his tenure as VP. Even though he had minimal expertise in commerce but strong connections in defence, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's biggest energy corporations, in 1995 as leader and chief executive.

In 2000 he became Bush's election partner for the presidency. Contentiously, during the conflict in Iraq, Halliburton was granted US deals totaling billions.

It greatly increased his wealth. His annual income during his time at the company grew from his quarter-million dollars during his time as defence secretary to over four million. When he left in 2000 he had a package worth in excess of $20m|twenty