Former US Secretary of State Colin Powell dies of Covid-19 complications

Colin Powell who served Democratic and Republican presidents in war and peace but whose sterling reputation was forever stained when he went before the UN and made faulty claims to justify the US war in Iraq has died of Covid19 complications He was 84A veteran of the Vietnam War Powell rose to the rank of fourstar general and in 1989 became the first Black chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff In that role he oversaw the US invasion of Panama and later the US invasion of Kuwait to oust the Iraqi army in 1991But his legacy was marred when in 2003 he went before the UN Security Council as secretary of state and made the case for US war against Iraq at a moment of great international skepticismHe cited faulty information claiming Saddam Hussein had secretly stashed away weapons of mass destructionIraqs claims that it had no such weapons represented iquesta web of lies he told the world bodyIn announcing his death on social media Powells family said he had been fully vaccinatedWe have lost a remarkable and loving husband father and grandfather and a great American the family said Powell had been treated at Walter Reed National Medical Center in Bethesda MarylandNYT MSNBC Newsweek amp AP all mention Colin Powell being fully vaccinated in their headlines but donrsquot mention that he was immunocompromised from multiple myeloma pictwittercomvSdQu7iMQ5mdash Caroline Orr Bueno PhD RVAwonk October 18 2021Also Read WHO to meet next week to consider emergency use listing of Indias CovaxinPowell was the first American official to publicly lay the blame for the 911 terrorist attacks on Osama bin Ladens alQaida network and made a lightning trip to Pakistan in October 2001 to demand that thenPakistani President Pervez Musharraf cooperate with the United States in going after the Afghanistanbased group which also had a presence in Pakistan where bin Laden was later killedAs President George W Bushs first secretary of state Powell led a State Department that was dubious of the military and intelligence communities conviction that Saddam Hussein possessed or was developing weapons of mass destructionAnd yet despite his reservations he presented the administrations case that Saddam indeed posed a major regional and global threat in a speech to the UN Security Council in the runup to the warThat speech replete with his display of a vial of what he said could have been a biological weapon was later derided as a lowpoint in Powells career although he had removed some elements that he deemed to have been based on poor intelligence assessmentsBush said Monday that he and former first lady Laura Bush were deeply saddened by Powells deathHe was a great public servant and widely respected at home and abroad Bush saidAnd most important Colin was a family man and a friend Laura and I send Alma and their children our sincere condolences as they remember the life of a great manPowell rose to national prominence under Republican presidents and considered a presidential bid of his own but ultimately moved away from the partyHe endorsed Democrats in the last four presidential elections starting with former President Barack Obama He emerged as a vocal Donald Trump critic in recent years describing Trump as iquesta national disgraceiquest who should have been removed from office through impeachmentFollowing the January 6 storming of the US Capitol Powell said he no longer considers himself a RepublicanPowell rose from a childhood in a fraying New York neighbourhood to become the nations chief diplomat iquestMine is the story of a black kid of no early promise from an immigrant family of limited means who was raised in the South Bronxiquest he wrote in his 1995 autobiography iquestMy American JourneyiquestAt City College Powell discovered the ROTC When he put on his first uniform iquestI liked what I sawiquest he wroteHe joined the Army and in 1962 he was one of more than 16000 military advisers sent to South Vietnam by President John F KennedyA series of promotions led to the Pentagon and assignment as a military assistant to Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger who became his unofficial sponsorHe later became commander of the Armys 5th Corps in Germany and later was national security assistant to President Ronald ReaganDuring his term as Joint Chiefs chairman his approach to war became known as the Powell Doctrine which held that the United States should only commit forces in a conflict if it has clear and achievable objectives with public support sufficient firepower and a strategy for ending the warDefense Secretary Lloyd Austin a retired Army general said the news of Powells death left iquesta hole in my heartiquestThe world lost one of the greatest leaders that we have ever witnessediquest Austin said while traveling in EuropeAlma lost a great husband and the family lost a tremendous father and I lost a tremendous personal friend and mentor He has been my mentor for a number of years He always made time for me and I can always go to him with tough issues he always had great counselPowells appearances at the United Nations as secretary of state including his Iraq speech were often accompanied by fond reminiscing of his childhood in the city where he grew up the child of Jamaican immigrants who got one of his first jobs at the PepsiCola bottling plant directly across the East River from the UN headquartersA fan of calypso music Powell was the subject of criticism from among others singing legend Harry Belafonte who likened Powell to a iquesthouse slaveiquest for going along with the decision to invade Iraq Powell declined to get into a public spat with Belafonte but made it known that he was not a fan and much preferred theTrinidadian calypso star the iquestMighty SparrowiquestPowell maintained in a 2012 interview with The Associated Press that on balance US succeeded in IraqI think we had a lot of successes Powell saidIraqs terrible dictator is goneSaddam was captured by US forces while hiding out in northern Iraq in December 2003 and later executed by the Iraqi governmentBut the insurgency grew and the war dragged on far longer than had been foreseen Obama pulled US troops out of Iraq in 2011 but he sent advisers back in 2014 after the Islamic State group swept into the country from Syria and captured large swaths of Iraqi territoryThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever