One-time Vice-President Dick Cheney: A Look Back on His Powerful Time in Office
The late US vice-president Dick Cheney, who has died at the age of 84, was seen as one of the most significant incumbents of that position in American history. Whereas many vice-presidents were confined to minor or figurehead functions, Cheney held substantial influence during the term of George W Bush, to the point that he was frequently called as the "true president".
Bush disliked that description and claimed the relationship was more nuanced. He noted that Cheney was courteous, always referring to him in public as Mr President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush disputed even characterisations of their association as a partnership because it implied that they were equals. In spite of these objections, Cheney considered the relaxed president accommodating on a whole raft of policy decisions.
A Period Following the Attacks
Leading of a faction of conservative hawks that featured Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the armed incursion of Iraq in 2003 in answer to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. At the time of the 9/11 attack, Bush had been taking part in a session at a school in Florida. While Bush made his way to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took command, commanding the shooting down of any unidentified aircraft approaching the government building.
Cheney stated the strikes altered his perspective, making him become focused on revenge. In conjunction with other neo-conservatives, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he lobbied for a occupation of Afghanistan in an attempt to seize Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the armed intervention of Iraq, though there was insufficient indication of Saddam Hussein being involved.
Debated Actions
He voiced no apologies about the military campaign, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives, nor about the harsh treatment of individuals apprehended after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was founded on inaccurate intelligence repeated by Cheney, was the correct course of action. "It proved to be the right thing to do then. I had faith at the time and I maintain that stance today."
Yet during that period, there were dissenting voices at a top tier about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the White House's own delegates to the region, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not retained from the role. "I saw, at the very least," he subsequently stated "clear negligence, carelessness, and unaccountability: potentially, deception, unfitness, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not entirely to blame for the Iraq invasion. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for comparable steps. He had composed a memorandum setting out scenarios in which American interests might be endangered (including "availability of vital raw materials, primarily Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "the United States should be positioned to take unilateral action when joint efforts cannot be orchestrated," specifically referencing defense operations against Iraq.
Bush additionally had entered the Oval Office vaguely intent on implementing what his predecessor had famously refused to do in 1991; topple Saddam. Following he had been dismissed by the administration, the treasury secretary Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the initial gathering of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had stated his objective of diminishing America's participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and suggested armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush bore a personal grudge against Saddam, believing he had been behind a scheme to murder his parent, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore resented that one of the biggest accommodations in Baghdad had a ground design with a portrait of his predecessor's visage that everyone had to tread upon.
Investigation Approaches
But it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken supporting attacking Iraq, frequently citing intelligence reports that were whether weak or entirely deceptive. He endorsed what the Bush White House indirectly described as "advanced techniques", the application of waterboarding and torture.
Addressing a Senate document in 2014 that found that no actionable intelligence had resulted from the torture, Cheney dismissed the report as "loaded with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to take steps and put in place initiatives to capture the perpetrators who murdered 3,000 of us on 9/11 and make sure it would not recur. That was specifically what they did and they earn a lot of praise."
External Perception
Cheney enjoyed labels given to him by detractors such as the dark character and the sinister presence, and by the concept that he was a shadow power manipulating Bush. In the journalist's 2013 publication 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 corner that remains unseen come out of his domain? That is a advantageous way to operate, truthfully."
Commercial Ties
Dispute over his commercial relationships pursued him through his period as second-in-command. Even though he had minimal expertise in business but good contacts in defence, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was invited to join Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial petroleum conglomerates, in 1995 as chairman and CEO.
In 2000 he was selected as Bush's running mate for the presidency. Debatably, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was given US contracts totaling multiple billions.
It greatly increased his wealth. His annual income during his period at the corporation grew from his quarter-million dollars when he was Pentagon chief to $4.4m. When he resigned in 2000 he had a severance arrangement totaling in excess of $20m|twenty
