Leading US politicians from both major parties led tributes on Monday after Colin Powell, America’s first Black secretary of state, military chief and national security adviser, died from COVID-19 complications. He was 84.
Powell suffered from multiple myeloma, a blood cancer that reduces the body’s ability to fight infection and puts people at higher risk of severe COVID-19.
“Colin embodied the highest ideals of both warrior and diplomat,” US President Joe Biden said. He described Powell as a “patriot of unmatched honor and dignity” and a man who “could drive his Corvette Stingray like nobody’s business.”
Former President George W. Bush, who appointed Powell secretary of state, said: “Many presidents relied on Gen. Powell’s counsel and experience. He was such a favorite of presidents that he earned the Presidential Medal of Freedom — twice.”
One of America’s leading military and political figures for decades, Powell served three presidents in senior posts and climbed to the top of the US military as it recovered from the trauma of the war in Vietnam, where he served two tours.
His career in public office was bookended by America’s two wars in Iraq. As a four-star army general, Powell was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under President George H.W. Bush during the 1991 Gulf War in which US-led forces expelled Iraqi troops from Kuwait.
Twelve years later, as secretary of state, he defended spurious intelligence about weapons of mass destruction on which the US based its March 2003 invasion of Iraq. Powell’s reputation will forever be tarnished by his controversial presentation to the UN Security Council in February 2003, making Bush’s case that Saddam Hussein was an imminent global threat because of his stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons.
He admitted later that the presentation was rife with lies provided by others in the Bush administration, and was “a blot” that would “always be a part of
my record.”