GEN. COLIN POWELL: His past,
present and future
by B.Raman
Gen.Colin Powell, the US
Secretary of State-designate, was born to Jamaican immigrant parents in
Harlem, New York, in 1937. The family shifted to the Bronx after his
birth. Studied in the Morris High School and the City College of New
York's Kings College, where he joined the Reserve Officers Training
Corps (ROTC). After his graduation in 1958, he joined the US Army as
Second Lieutenant and was trained at Fort Benning, Georgia.
On completion of his training, he was
posted to West Germany for two years and then stationed in
Massachusetts, where he met and married Alma Vivian Johnson, a young
speech pathologist, in 1962. The couple had three children: Michael,
Linda, and Anne Marie.
Shortly after his marriage, he was
posted as Captain to Vietnam, where he was awarded the Purple Heart
after being injured by a Vietcong booby-trap.
In 1963, Powell was transferred to
Fort Benning as an instructor at the Infantry School. He was promoted as
a Major in 1966. After doing a course at the Army Command and General
Staff College, he was posted back to Vietnam in 1968 to work under
General Charles Gettys. In recognition of his action in saving fellow
soldiers from a burning helicopter, he was awarded his second Purple
Heart and a Soldier's Medal.
He was transferred back to the US in
1969 and promoted as Lieutenant Colonel. He earned an M.B.A. degree from
the George Washington University in 1971.
In 1972, he was posted as an aide in
the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) under the
administration of President Richard Nixon, where he worked under OMB
Director, Mr. Caspar Weinberger, and Deputy Director, Mr. Frank Carlucci,
both of whom were to help him in his later years in his career
advancement.
He was subsequently sent to South
Korea to take command of an infantry battalion on the verge of revolt
due to drug abuse and racial tensions. After re-enforcing discipline in
the battalion, he returned to Washington to serve in the Pentagon. After
he had done a nine-month program at the National War College, he was
made a full Colonel, and in 1976, was assigned to lead the 2nd Brigade
of the 101st Airborne Division at Fort Campbell, Kentucky.
He again returned to the Pentagon in
1977 and, in 1979, was promoted as Brigadier-General and transferred as
an aide to Mr.Charles Duncan, the then Energy Secretary.
In 1981,he was transferred to command
the 4th Infantry Division at Fort Carson, Colorado.
Thereafter, President Reagan's Secretary of Defense, Mr.Caspar
Weinberger, had him transferred back to Washington to work as his senior
military assistant.
In mid-1986, he was promoted as
Lieutenant-General and sent to command the 5th Corps in Frankfurt,
Germany. After the resignation of Admiral Pointdexter as the National
Security Adviser in the wake of the Iran-Contra controversy, Mr.Reagan
appointed Mr.Frank Carlucci as the National Security Adviser. Mr.Carlucci had Gen.Powell recalled to Washington to serve as his deputy.
Following the resignation of Mr.Weinberger as the Defence Secretary in
1987, Mr.Reagan appointed Mr. Carlucci in his place and elevated
Gen.Powell as the National Security Adviser. In this position, Gen.
Powell, while strongly advocating an enhanced military budget, opposed
the heavy spending on the space-based Strategic Defense Initiative
(nicknamed Star Wars).
In 1989, he was promoted as a
four-star General and appointed by President George Bush (Sr) as the
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, thus becoming the youngest
officer and the first Afro-American to be appointed to that post.
In that post, he reportedly opposed
Mr. Bush's plan for the invasion of Panama, but was over-ruled. His
tenure also saw the US involvement in the Gulf War of 1991 and the
disastrous Somalia role in 1993, resulting in the withdrawal of the
battered US troops from there.
In 1993, Gen. Powell opposed President
Clinton's proposal to lift the ban on homosexuals in the US Armed
Forces, but suggested the compromise "don't ask, don't tell"
policy under which homosexuals were allowed in the armed forces as long
as they did not reveal their sexual orientation. This was accepted. Mr.
Clinton and Gen. Powell also disagreed over Mr. Clinton's proposal to
drastically cut the military budget.
In September 1993, Gen. Powell retired
from the military. There was intense speculation that he intended to run
for President against Mr.Clinton in 1996, by taking advantage of his
Gulf War popularity. Initially, Gen.Powell did not refute the rumours,
but subsequently, after a promotional tour for his autobiography, My
American Journey (1995), he announced that he would not run for the
presidency, and retired to private life. His autobiography sold two
million copies, of which the largest sales were in the US itself and the
second largest in China. The lowest sales were in India.
Because of his perceived contribution
to the Gulf War success and his being the first Afro-American to raise
to the top post in the Armed Forces, Gen.Powell is a hero figure to
large sections of the US. It is widely accepted that he is a man of
great personal charm and captivating dignity. However, his supporters
tend to paint him in a larger than life image and project him as a
role-model for the American youth, particularly Afro-American.
Gen.Powell projects himself as a positive-thinker and a permanent
optimist and describes optimism as the greatest force-multiplier.
But, he has many detractors too who
allege that, being an Afro-American, the deficiencies in his
personality, judgements and achievements are not subjected by media and
non-media analysts to the same intense scrutiny as they would have those
of a White, lest they be thought of as racist or anti-minority.
His critics project him as a play-safe
type, over-cautious, indecisive, averse to risk-taking and as more a
bureaucrat than a soldier. They also highlight the fact that he has
spent more years in staff jobs in Washington than in the field and
allege that he owes his spectacular career rise as much to the web of
personal relations that he had built up with Mr.George Bush (Sr) and
other influential Republican leaders as to his professional competence.
In reference to his perceived proximity to Mr.George Bush (Sr), they
used to sarcastically refer to him as SOB (son of a Bush).
In 1995, before he publicly renounced
his Presidential aspirations, there were embarrassing allegations by his
detractors that he had played a role in the cover-up of the My Lai
massacre in Vietnam, that even though Col.Oliver North had kept him
fully informed of the Iran-Contra clandestine operation, Gen. Powell did
not have the moral courage to admit it before the Congressional enquiry
and frequently took cover under pleas of gaps in memory and so on. His
alleged mishandling was also blamed by his critics for the massacre of
US troops in Somalia in 1993.
Apart from Mr. Casper Weinberger and
Mr.Frank C. Carlucci, amongst others, who had reportedly helped
Gen.Powell in his career advancement were Mr.J. Bruce Llewellyn,
Mr.Richard L. Armitage, Mr.Kenneth M. Duberstein, Mr.Vernon E. Jordan,
Jr., Mr.David Hale, Mr.Richard Lamm, Mr.George Bush, Mr.Dick Cheney, Ms.
Marybel Batjer, Col. Bill Smullen and Mr.Ronald Lauder.
Like Gen. Powell, Mr. Bruce Llewellyn,
the son of immigrant Jamaicans, was born in New York City and an old boy
of the City College. He was reputed to be amongst the wealthiest
Afro-Americans, with wide business interests. He had flourished more
under the Democrats than under the Republicans. He was appointed by
President Carter to the Overseas Private Investment Corporation and by
Mr.Clinton to a five-member board to assist U.S. corporations doing
business in Russia, called the Fund for Large Enterprises, which
received a $100 million government grant.
Mr.Richard L. Armitage served as the
Senior Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs
and as Special U.S. Envoy to the Phillipines and the Middle East in the
Reagan and Bush administrations. A long-time confidant of Mr.George Bush
(Sr), he also used to be referred to by his detractors as another SOB
(Son of a Bush). In his best-seller, My American Journey, Gen.Powell
refers to him as "my brother and my bodyguard". Mr.Armitage's
detractors had alleged that in the Reagan administration he supervised
the implementation of a top secret CIA operation for the transfer of
opium cultivation and heroin extraction expertise from the Golden
Triangle to the Golden Crescent to use heroin against the Soviet troops
in Afghanistan. In a book titled "Called To Serve" (1991),
Col.James Bo Gritz, a former officer of the US Green Berets, alleges
that Mr.Armitage was a close personal friend of Khun Sa, the Opium
warlord of the Golden Triangle, and that the US Embassy in Bangkok was
very unhappy over his alleged links with the narcotics world.
Mr.Kenneth M. Duberstein, who served
as the White House Chief of Staff during the sunset years of President
Reagan, was reputed to be a close political adviser of Gen.Powell.
Mr.Vernon E. Jordan, Jr. is among the
most influential Afro-Americans in the US with wide business, social and
intellectual interests and Mr.David Hale served as the Chief Economist
at the Kemper Financial Services in Chicago. Mr.Richard Lamm had served
as the Governor of Colorado, and then as a Professor at the University
of Denver.
Before coming to the White House in
the 1980s, Mr.Frank C. Carlucci III had served for more than two decades
in the CIA. As Second Secretary in the U.S. Embassy in Stanleyville, The
Congo (now Zaire), Mr.Carlucci was alleged to have supervised the
implementation of the CIA plot to assassinate Mr.Patrice Lumumba in
1961. He was a widely disliked figure in the Congo and was once stabbed
in the back of his neck after his involvement in a traffic accident.
Five months after the assassination of Mr. Lumumba, Mr.Carlucci was
arrested and expelled from the Congo. The CIA then posted him to
Tanzania from where too he was expelled in 1965, after being accused of
plotting the assassination of the Burundi Prime Minister, Mr.Pierre
Ngendandumwe.
Mr.Ronald Lauder, son of Estee Lauder,
the cosmetics tycoon, had served in the Department of Defense and then
as US Ambassador to Austria.
Both Gen.Powell and Ms. Condoleezza
Rice, the National Security Adviser-designate of President-elect Bush,
are both Afro-Americans, but Gen.Powell is a poor contrast to Ms. Rice.
She is a person with an intellect of scintillating brilliance and with a
breath-taking lucidity and depth of understanding and analysis.
Gen.Powell has not been as prolific as Ms.Rice in his statements and
writings on foreign policy matters, but from what little he has said and
written, it is difficult to avoid an impression that he is not beyond
tailoring his views to suit his career aspirations of the moment.
He used to be soft on China, but now
shares the hard stance of Mr.Bush and Ms.Rice. During the Senate debate
on the ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), a
Democratic Senator had circulated a list of retired senior military
officers who, according to him, supported the CTBT. Gen.Powell's name
figured in that list, but he now shares the strong opposition of Mr.Bush
and Ms.Rice.
On the nuclear issue, there is
unwarranted optimism in India that Mr.Bush's opposition to the CTBT
means pressures on India on the nuclear and missile proliferation issues
would now lessen and that there could even be a lifting of the sanctions
and the restrictions on sensitive technology transfer. A careful reading
of Mr.Bush's election manifesto and the various campaign statements
would indicate that, while rejecting the CTBT as not in US national
interest, the incoming Bush administration might oppose nuclear and
missile proliferation by other countries as vigorously as the Clinton
administration did. The election manifesto has been critical of the CIA,
inter alia, for failing to effectively monitor India's nuclear
preparations.
Given below is a collation of
Gen.Powell's interviews on foreign policy issues:
Interview to "The
Herald", Sharon, Pa, published on April 21, 1998
Skeptical of Mr. Mikhail Gorbachev's
policies of glasnost and perestroika, Gen.Powell considered them to be
tricks or traps. It wasn't until he met with Mr. Gorbachev in Moscow and
the Communist reformer said that he was going to end the Cold War that
Gen.Powell came to realize that revolutionary change was at hand.
Acknowledging that Gen.Powell was a soldier and understanding his mode
of thinking, Mr.Gorbachev said, ``I'm very, very sorry. You will have to
find a new enemy."I thought to myself, `I don't want to,'''
Gen.Powell recalled.
Gen.Powell credited containment with
bringing about that change. ``We contained them on the field of battle.
We beat them on the field of ideas. The end of Communism laid the
groundwork for many other changes, such as the end of apartheid in South
Africa and Nelson Mandela's ascendancy to the presidency, and the peace
process in the Middle East. Despite the apparent stalled talks, Israeli
President Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestine Liberation Organization
leader Yassir Arafat know they can't go back to warring in the desert.
Peace and reconciliation is the answer. I'm a very optimistic person
about the world we live in. There are still our Iraqs and our Irans and
our Libyas. None of these raise to the level of the Cold War. None of
these threaten our lives. The Cold War has been replaced by economic
competition and the free flow of money and ideas. We're entering a world
system. We can't stop it. We don't want to stop it because we are the
leaders of the new system.''
INTERVIEW ON AUGUST 11,1998, ON THE
EXPLOSIONS NEAR THE US EMBASSIES IN KENYA & TANZANIYA:
"Exposure to bombings and other
acts of terrorism is unfortunately the cost of doing business in today's
world. Friday's bombings at two U.S. embassies in Africa and the 1995
bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building show that Americans can
become targets anywhere. That is the cost of doing business and it's not
just something that can happen only overseas but, as this community
knows better than anyone, it can happen here. All possible steps should
be taken to protect against such attacks, but embassies and other
government buildings cannot be made into fortified bastions and continue
to fulfill their purpose. I think there are limits to what you can do in
a free society."
INTERVIEW TO A NEWS AGENCY ON MAY
24,1999, ON US POLICY ON KOSOVO:
" I would have argued strongly
against the Clinton administration's decision to take the threat of
ground troops off the table. The lack of such a threat has left the
initiative to cease fighting with the enemy. If I had been part of the
decision process, I would have argued strongly not to tell him (the then
Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic) what we might or might not do
with ground troops. Why tell him? The single dimension NATO campaign has
permitted Milosevic to anticipate the damage to his forces while waiting
for a break in the political will of the NATO coalition. He's watching
what's happening in Russia and Germany and elsewhere. The Serbians
clearly believe it is a vital interest of theirs to continue to accept
this punishment. With this kind of pounding, one would think there's a
point beyond which the Serbs would have to change their position, but I
don't know where that point is and, unfortunately, neither does NATO.For
political reasons we have decided that we can only use one component of
our military power, and that's air power. We're bombing every day and
Mr. Milosevic and the Serbians are suffering greatly as a result of
this, but its up to Mr. Milosevic to decide when he has had more than he
can bear. And he has not reached that point.''
INTERVIEW TO REUTERS ON APRIL 12,2000:
"The more we can do to pull China
into the new, changing world economic system the better off we'll be...
We can grant them permanent normal trading relations, and in the same
voice, criticize their human rights position, let them know that we are
very disturbed when they issue threats toward Taiwan... [But] suppose we
stiff them. Is that going to make China more likely to be a contributing
and positive member of the world organizations? Or is it going to make
them more isolated, truculent and more aggressive?... So I think from
every standpoint--from the strategic standpoint, from the standpoint of
our national interests, from the standpoint of our trading interests and
our economic interests--it serves all of our purposes to grant permanent
normal trading relations to China."
EXTRACTS FROM AN INTERVIEW GIVEN ON
JUNE 9,2000, to Ms.Rebecca Spires, of the Sandia National Laboratories,
Albuquerque, New Mexico:
Q. Do you think there is still a place
for nuclear weapons in this information technology age?
A. Yes, but at a reduced level than
today. I don't see any new big initiatives in the immediate future.
In response to other questions, he
said: "You know, the world has changed. It changed in 1987. It used
to be that we had a unifying theory of the world; a coherent idea of the
world. The US had a containment strategy towards communism and we all
knew the rules of the road. But the new Russian leader, Gorbachev,
didn't follow the script. He believed in openness and restructuring. He
left the country in disarray, but there is no going back to the former
system of government. All countries are on the path towards democracy
and capitalism; some are kind of on a messy path, but they still walk it
because it is an ideology that works. There is no competing ideology.
Q. How do you feel about the trading
policies with China?
A. Keep trading with China; tell them
what we don't like about them, but keep trading and talking. Last I
knew, a person was less likely to shoot at you if you are trading with
him.
Q. Is there a new azimuth? A new
direction and purpose as a nation?
A.Yes, the power of example. We are
leading the world. And there are still dangers. Other nations look to us
for leadership; we need to show that we can bind together.
Q. What should the new Secretary of
State do?
A. First, you need to understand that
Russia is not coming back. But you can't have a vacuum of mission. That
leads to anxiety and dread. Dig deep and rip out that old mission and
fill it immediately with a new mission and then start training for it.
You cannot tolerate a vacuum!
A Secretary of State should do three
things:
- Keep the military strong
- Don't look for new enemies
- Keep the economy strong."
EXTRACT FROM HIS ADDRESS TO THE
REPUBLICAN NOMINATING CONVENTION ON JULY 31,2000:
"We stand at an historic turning
point in world history. For the first time in almost a century, America
does not face an enemy fueled by an ideology claiming to be superior to
our beloved system of democracy, free enterprise and the rights of men
and women to pursue their individual destinies. We defeated communism.
We defeated fascism. We defeated them on the field of battle, and we
defeated them on the field of ideas. The sick nations that still pursue
the fool's goal of tyranny and weapons of mass destruction will soon
find themselves left behind in the dustbin of history. They are
investing in their own demise as surely as the Soviet Union did by
investing in the Red Army. They are of the past, and we are of the
future. Count on it. Today, we are the most powerful nation on
earth--militarily, economically, by any measure. We are that rarity in
history, a trusted nation whose power is tempered by compassion, whose
leadership is earned by example and whose foreign affairs will be guided
by common interests and common sense. The world is watching to see if
all this power and wealth is just for the well-to-do, the comfortable,
the privileged, or are we a nation that can make our dream real for all
Americans so that all share in what we have been given by a generous
God. We must show to the rest of the world, the beauty and potential of
democracy. Our greatest strength is the power of our example to be that
shining city on the hill that Ronald Reagan spoke of and that the whole
world looks up to. Mr.Bush will win respect on the world stage by
exemplifying the best ideals of America. He will not repeat the mistakes
of the past and let our insurance policy, our armed forces, fall into
disrepair. Ronald Reagan and George Bush didn't let that happen, and I
know that President George W. Bush will not let that happen
either."
Extracts From Interview given on
August 1,2000, at the Republican nominating convention to Ms.Gwen Ifill:
GWEN IFILL: People have already
started to say you would be too cautious to be Secretary of State.
GEN. COLIN POWELL: Oh, there are
always those. I have a cottage industry of critics who say that. But I
think I know a little bit about national security policy. I know a
little bit about the use of the armed forces of the United States. And I
think I know how to use the armed forces well and correctly. And I think
I would bring quite a bit of experience, useful experience to that job.
EXTRACTS FROM HIS ACCEPTANCE SPEECH
AFTER BEING NAMED BY MR.BUSH AS SECRETARY OF STATE-DESIGNATE ON DECEMBER
16,2000:
"Wonderful opportunities await
us. Opportunities that have been brought about by the end of the Cold
War; by the spread of democracy and the free enterprise system around
the world; opportunities that come to us because we held steadfast in
our belief in democracy; opportunities that will come to us because of
the information technology revolutions that are reshaping the world as
we know it, destroying political boundaries and all kinds of other
boundaries...
"The new map is a mosaic, a
mosaic of many different pieces. The old world map as we knew it of a
red side and a blue side, that competed for something called the Third
World is gone, and the new map is a mosaic, a mosaic of many different
pieces and many different colors spreading around the world, a world
that has seen that communism did not work, fascism did not work, Nazism
did not work.
"If you want to be successful in
the 21st century, you must find your path to democracy, market
economics, and a system which frees the talents of men and women to
pursue their individual destinies. And at the centre of this revolution,
America stands, inspiration for the world that wants to be free, and we
will continue to be that inspiration by uniquely American
internationalism, as President-elect Bush has stated it.
"Not by using our strength and
our position of power to get back behind our walls, but by being engaged
with the world. By first and foremost, letting our allies know that we
appreciate all we have been through over the last 50 years, and our
alliances are as strong now as they ever have been, and they are as
needed now as they ever have been, and we'll work with our allies to
expand and make those alliances the centre of our foreign policy
activity.
"We will work with those nations
in the world that are transforming themselves, nations such as China and
Russia. We will work with them not as potential enemies, and not as
adversaries, but not yet as strategic partners, but as nations that are
seeking their way.
"We will have areas of agreement
and areas of difference, and we will discuss them in rational ways,
letting them know of our values, letting them know of the principles
that we hold dear.
"For those nations that are not
yet on this path of democracy and freedom, for those nations who are
poorly led, led by failed leaders pursing failed policies that will give
them failed results, we will stand strong.
"We will stand strong with our
friends and allies against those nations that pursue weapons of mass
destruction
" We will stand strong with our
friends and allies against those nations that pursue weapons of mass
destruction, that practise terrorism. We will not be afraid of them. We
will not be frightened by them. We will meet them. We will match them.
We will contend with them. We will defend our interests from a position
of strength. That strength comes to us from the power of our system, the
democracy and free enterprise system. It comes to us from our economic
power. It comes to us from our military power. And as we go into this
new century, and as we begin this new administration, we have to make
sure that all of those elements of power are protected and allowed to
thrive even more.
"So I think these are promising
times, times of great opportunity, but times, also, of challenge and
danger. We are up to the task."
In response to questions from
pressmen, he said:
"It is absolutely a given fact
that under a Bush administration, America will remain very much engaged
in the Middle East. I expect it to be a major priority of mine, and of
the department. It will be based on the principle that we must always
ensure that Israel lives in freedom, and in security and peace. But at
the same time, we have to do everything we can to deal with the
aspirations of the Palestinians and the other nations in the region who
have an interest in this. And so I think America will continue to be a
friend to all sides. America will continue to put forward ideas. America
will remain engaged until we can find that solution to this most
difficult problem.
"But at the end of the day, it's
going to be the parties in the region who will have to find that
solution and come into agreement. They are going to have to live with
each other, and hopefully, in the near future, we can find ways that
they can accommodate their differences, and find that elusive solution.
It is elusive, but it is out there somewhere, and hopefully, if it
doesn't happen in the very near future and becomes something for us to
manage, you can be sure that we'll be fully engaged in trying to find a
solution to that problem.
"They [the Iraqis] have not yet
fulfilled those agreements [an accounting for all weapons of mass
destruction] and my judgment is that sanctions in some form must be kept
in place until they do so. We're not doing this to hurt the Iraqi
people. We will work with our allies to re-energise the sanctions
regime. And I will make the case in every opportunity I get that we're
not doing this to hurt the Iraqi people, we're doing this to protect the
peoples of the region, the children of the region, who would be the
targets of these weapons of mass destruction if we didn't contain them
and get rid of them.
"Saddam Hussein is sitting on a
failed regime that is not going to be around in a few years' time. The
world is going to leave him behind, and that regime behind, as the world
marches to new drummers, drummers of democracy and the free enterprise
system. And I don't know what it will take to bring him to his senses,
but we are in the strong position, he is in the weak position.
"Our plan is to undertake a
review of the Balkans right after the President is inaugurated, and take
a look not only at our deployments in Bosnia, but in Bosnia and Kosovo
and many other places around the world, and make sure those deployments
are proper. Our armed forces are stretched rather thin, and there is a
limit to how many of these deployments we can sustain. So, we're going
to take a look at that. We're going to talk to our allies. We're going
to consult.
"We're going to make
on-the-ground assessments of what we're doing now, what's needed now,
but also, what is really going to be needed in the future, and see if we
can find ways that it is less of a burden on our armed forces, not as a
way of running out, but as a way of substituting others, or substituting
other kinds of organisations and units and perhaps police organisations
to handle the remaining missions. So, we're not cutting and running.
We're going to make a careful assessment of it in consultation with our
allies, and then make some judgments after that assessment is completed.
"I think a national missile
defence is an essential part of our overall strategic force posture,
which consists of offensive weapons, command and control systems,
intelligence systems and a national missile defence. And I still hark
back to the original purpose of such a defence, and that is to start
diminishing the value of offensive weapons. These will be tough
negotiations [with our allies]. So, we're going to go forward. We have
to spend time discussing it with our allies, discussing it with other
nations in the world that possess strategic offensive weapons and don't
yet understand our thinking with respect to national missile defence.
These will be tough negotiations; I don't expect them to be easy.
"But they will have to come to
the understanding that we feel this is in the best interests of the
American people, and not only the American people, the people of the
world, to finally start to move in the direction where we can take away
the currency associated with strategic offensive weapons, and the
blackmail that is inherent in some regime having that kind of weapon and
thinking they can hold us hostage."
(19-12-00)
(The writer is Additional Secretary (retd),
Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, and, presently, Director, Institute
For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-Mail: corde@vsnl.com).
