Colin Powell’s ’13 Rules of Leadership’ and other famous quotes
Quick bit: Statesman whose legacy was complicated by pivotal role in making case for Iraq War otherwise known for trailblazing military career and love of aphorisms on strategy and personal conduct
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Colin Powell, the first black American to serve as chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and US secretary of state, has died of Covid 19-related health complications at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Maryland aged 84.
A Vietnam War veteran and four-star general, Mr Powell was also the first Black national security adviser when he served Ronald Reagan in that capacity between 1987 and 1989, before becoming chairman of the joint chiefs under George HW Bush and then Bill Clinton between 1989 and 1993.
But, for many, Mr Powell will inevitably be best remembered around the world for his tenure as secretary of state under George W Bush between 2001 and 2005, a period that saw him become one of the faces of the quixotic War on Terror in response to 9/11.
Mr Powell himself admitted in September 2005 that the Bush administration falsely accusing Saddam Hussein’s Iraq of hoarding weapons of mass destruction, a charge based on faulty intelligence that led to a disastrous and bloody war, constituted a “blot” on his reputation, telling interviewer Barbara Walters: “It will always be a part of my record. It was painful. It’s painful now.”
Nevertheless, the soldier-turned-statesman remained a hugely respected figure within American military and Republican circles, despite his outspoken disapproval of the Donald Trump era.
His famous “13 Rules of Leadership”, which first appeared alongside a 13 August 1989 profile of him in Parade magazine and subsequently provided the opening chapter for his 2012 memoir, It Worked For Me: In Life and Leadership, remain widely quoted.
The book itself contains detailed elaboration on each point from the author but here are his 13 dictates in outline.
Perhaps less well known, but no less pithy, are the aphorisms included in Powell’s first autobiography My American Journey (1995), which recounts his early life as the son of Jamaican immigrants growing up in 1940s Harlem, New York City, and the day he joined the US Army in 1958.
The following selections preach positivity, moderation, pragmatism, restraint and attention to detail as key principles for personal conduct in both military and civilian life.
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