One-time Second-in-Command Dick Cheney: A Look Back on the Influential Government Service

The former US second-in-command Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was seen as arguably the most powerful incumbents of the vice-presidency in US history. Although numerous VPs were limited to marginal or figurehead roles, Cheney wielded huge sway during the term of George W Bush, to the point that he was commonly described as the "real president".

Bush objected to such a characterisation and stated the dynamic was more complex. He noted that Cheney was deferential, consistently referring to him in public settings as the President, while he called him as Dick. Bush questioned even portrayals of their association as a partnership because it indicated that they were equals. In spite of these denials, Cheney considered the laidback president pliable on a broad range of policy decisions.

A Post-9/11 Era

At the head of a group of conservative hawks that included defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and assistant defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the military intervention 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 participating in a meeting at a school in Florida. As Bush headed for a secret bunker in Nebraska, Cheney took charge, directing the shooting down of any unresponsive planes heading toward the government building.

Cheney claimed the attacks altered his perspective, causing him to be determined on retribution. Together with other neo-cons, such as Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he advocated for a invasion of Afghanistan in an endeavor to capture Osama bin Laden. Cheney then strongly advocated for the military action of Iraq, though there was little proof of Saddam Hussein playing a role.

Controversial Decisions

He showed no remorse about the invasion, in which an approximated 100,000 Iraqis perished, or about the waterboarding of suspects captured after 9/11. He told CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion, which was based on misleading intelligence echoed by Cheney, was the proper course of action. "It represented the right thing to do back then. I was convinced then and I hold that view now."

However even then, there were opposing views at a high level about the mishandling of Iraq. One of the government's own representatives to the Middle East, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was not reappointed from the position. "I saw, at a minimum," he wrote later "obvious failure, carelessness, and irresponsibility: potentially, deception, ineptitude, and corruption."

Additional Factors

Cheney was not solely to blame for the Iraq military action. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had called for similar measures. He had drafted a memo setting out scenarios in which national priorities might be threatened (featuring "access to crucial commodities, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had contended that "America should be positioned to operate alone when joint efforts cannot be arranged," particularly referencing military moves against Iraq.

Bush too had arrived in the Oval Office vaguely intent on carrying out what his predecessor had notably declined to do in 1991; topple Saddam. After he had been fired by the president, the Treasury head Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the first meeting of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his objective of lowering America's involvement in the Middle East dispute and mooted defense operations against Iraq.

Bush carried a personal grudge against Saddam, convinced he had been involved in a plot to assassinate his father, President George HW Bush, on a trip to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore objected to that one of the biggest hotels in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a likeness of his predecessor's visage that all visitors had to tread upon.

Interrogation Methods

But it was Cheney who was one of the most vehement supporting striking Iraq, repeatedly citing agency briefings that were whether weak or completely deceptive. He backed what the Bush administration euphemistically referred to as "intensive questioning", the employment of simulated drowning and harsh treatment.

Answering a Senate analysis in 2014 that concluded that no valuable data had been obtained through the torture, Cheney dismissed the report as "full of crap". He informed Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to implement measures and put in place initiatives to apprehend the perpetrators who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and guarantee it was not repeated. That was specifically what they did and they earn a lot of recognition."

Public Persona

Cheney reveled in labels imposed on him by critics such as the Star Wars villain and the dark figure, and by the idea that he was a dark force manipulating Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 publication about the duo, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is cited as commenting: "Am I the malevolent mastermind in the background that nobody ever sees leave his hole? This represents a nice way to operate, actually."

Corporate Connections

Dispute over his corporate affiliations accompanied him through his period as vice-president. Although he had limited background in corporate affairs but good contacts in military, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's largest energy corporations, in 1995 as chairman and chief executive.

In 2000 he became Bush's election partner for the presidency. Debatably, during the military campaign, Halliburton was awarded US contracts totaling substantial sums.

It significantly boosted his finances. His yearly compensation during his tenure at the firm grew from his previous salary when he was Pentagon chief to over four million. When he departed in 2000 he had a package worth over $20m|twenty