Former VP Dick Cheney: A Retrospective on His Influential Government Service

The late US VP Dick Cheney, who died at age 84, was considered arguably the most powerful incumbents of the vice-presidency in American history. Although many vice-presidents were confined to marginal or figurehead positions, Cheney held substantial sway during the term of George W Bush, so much so that he was frequently referred to as the "real president".

Bush disliked this portrayal and stated the dynamic was more complicated. He noted that Cheney was deferential, always referring to him in public settings as President, while he addressed him as Dick. Bush disputed even portrayals of their relationship as a partnership because it implied that they were equals. Despite these denials, Cheney found the laidback president pliable on a wide array of governmental choices.

A Aftermath of 9/11

At the head of a group of neo-conservatives that included military head Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he vigorously promoted the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 assault, Bush had been participating in a meeting at a school in Florida. As Bush traveled to a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, ordering the downing of any unidentified aircraft nearing the US Capitol.

Cheney claimed the attacks changed him, causing him to be determined on revenge. Together with other neo-conservatives, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a invasion of Afghanistan in an endeavor to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the invasion of Iraq, even though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein being involved.

Controversial Policies

He voiced no apologies about the armed intervention, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis died, or about the waterboarding of suspects apprehended after 9/11. He stated to CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was founded on misleading reports repeated by Cheney, was the right decision. "It proved to be the proper decision to do at that time. I believed it at the time and I hold that view presently."

Yet even then, there were dissenting voices at a high level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the government's own special envoys to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the post. "I observed, at the very least," he wrote later "obvious failure, inaction, and recklessness: potentially, deception, unfitness, and corruption."

Broader Context

Cheney was not solely to blame for the Iraq military action. Even before 9/11, Wolfowitz had advocated for similar measures. He had written a memorandum outlining scenarios in which US concerns might be threatened (including "obtaining essential resources, mostly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "America should be prepared to act independently when collective action cannot be orchestrated," explicitly citing military moves against Iraq.

Bush also had assumed the Oval Office vaguely intent on carrying out what his predecessor had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Following he had been fired by the administration, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had declared his plan of reducing America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and mooted military action against Iraq.

Bush bore a personal grudge against Saddam, thinking he had been responsible for a plot to assassinate his predecessor, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He also objected to that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a ground design with a image of his predecessor's countenance that each person had to walk over.

Questioning Techniques

However it was Cheney who was among the most outspoken supporting attacking Iraq, consistently citing information documents that were whether thin or completely deceptive. He endorsed what the Bush administration politely called as "enhanced interrogation", the application of waterboarding and physical pressure.

Answering a Senate report in 2014 that found that no valuable data had come from the harsh techniques, Cheney rejected the conclusions as "full of crap". He stated to Fox News: "We asked [the CIA] to take steps and establish programmes to catch the bastards who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it was not repeated. That was specifically what they did and they deserve a lot of recognition."

Public Image

Cheney enjoyed nicknames assigned to him by critics such as Darth Vader and the dark figure, and by the concept that he was a sinister influence controlling Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 volume about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Is it me who is the evil genius in the background that nobody ever sees emerge from his hole? That is a effective way to work, actually."

Business Interests

Debate over his commercial relationships accompanied him during his tenure as VP. Even though he had minimal expertise in business but established relationships in defence, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was offered a position at Halliburton, one of the world's biggest petroleum corporations, in 1995 as chairman and CEO.

In 2000 he became Bush's VP candidate for the White House. Debatably, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was given US deals valued at substantial sums.

It made him rich. His annual income during his period at the corporation increased from his previous salary during his time as defence secretary to $4.4m. When he resigned in 2000 he had a package totaling over $20m|twenty