General Colin Powell
"That's not really a number I'm terribly interested in." - General Colin Powell, Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, on being asked his assessment of Iraqi military and civilian casualties, April 1991
“We burned down the thatched huts, starting the blaze with Ronson and Zippo lighters......Why were we torching houses and destroying crops? Ho Chi Minh had said the people were like the sea in which his guerrillas swam. ... We tried to solve the problem by making the whole sea uninhabitable. In the hard logic of war, what difference did it make if you shot your enemy or starved him to death?” ---General Colin Powell
See: Phoenix programme My Lai massacre
How did Colin Powell get in there? We may never know the whole story, but one critical piece of information is he served to conceal the My Lai massacre, proving his "trustworthiness". My Lai did become public despite his efforts to smother it, but his credentials were sealed by his attempt. 500 civilians were murdered, as we all know, but the Powells of the world kept the 60,000 others just like them killed in Operation Phoenix from coming to light. The death tolls from the daily body counts merged into a blur, and nobody noticed mass murders orchestrated by the US power elites.
External
Behind Colin Powell's Legend The
Original Five-Part Series
Behind Colin
Powell's Legend: Part One
Retired Gen. Colin Powell has given some legitimacy to George W. Bush's dubious
election. But what's the real story behind the Powell legend, from My Lai to
Iran-contra to the Persian Gulf War? By Robert Parry & Norman Solomon. December
17, 2000.
Behind Colin
Powell's Legend: Part Two
Colin Powell emerged from the Iran-contra scandal with his reputation intact,
but a review of the secret evidence shows that the scandal might never have
happened but for Powell's circumventing Pentagon rules -- and flouting the law.
December 19, 2000
Behind Colin
Powell's Legend: Part Three
In late 1986, the desperate call went out to Gen. Colin Powell at his command in
West Germany. He was needed back in Washington to save Ronald Reagan. December
22, 2000
Behind Colin
Powell's Legend: Part Four
Colin Powell achieved his icon status through his command of U.S. forces in the
Panama invasion and the Persian Gulf War. But his acclaim came at a price.
December 26, 2000
Behind Colin
Powell's Legend: Part Five
Gen. Powell's reputation for integrity dodged a bullet when President George H.W.
Bush halted the Iran-contra investigation in late 1992. This last segment of the
series shows how Powell went on to near-universal acclaim with the Washington
press corps. December 27, 2000
More Recent Updates
The Truth about
Colin Powell
Few modern Americans have enjoyed better press clippings than Colin Powell,
which made him the perfect choice to sell the Iraq War. But there was a
troubling side of Powell's history that Americans should have known, as this
excerpt from Neck Deep reveals. November 28, 2007
Death of an American
Hero
At one of America's darkest moments -- the My Lai massacre of Vietnamese
civilians in 1968 -- an American helicopter pilot named Hugh Thompson risked his
life and his reputation to do the right thing, placing himself and his
door-gunner between rampaging U.S. soldiers and fleeing Vietnamese civilians.
Thompson's death last week at the age of 62 stirs timely thoughts about the
meaning of true heroism and the danger of false hero-worship. January 10, 2006
Powell's Widening
Credibility Gap
Former Secretary of State Colin Powell's latest attempt to shift the blame for
his false Iraq testimony onto mid-level intelligence analysts has prompted more
questions about Powell's credibility. The evidence indicates that the savvy
Powell knew the shortcomings of his 2003 speech to the United Nations before he
delivered it. September 17, 2005
Colin Powell Being
Colin Powell
In his first in-depth interview since resigning as secretary of state, Colin
Powell blames lower-level CIA analysts for his false testimony to the United
Nations about Iraqi WMD. Powell also confides that he's in pain over the blot
that the UN speech has left on his reputation. To critics, the interview is just
the latest example of Powell's lifetime of political opportunism. September 13,
2005
Colin Powell: Failed
Opportunist
The U.S. news media is having trouble understanding how longtime hero, Secretary
of State Colin Powell, let himself be used and now dumped by George W. Bush and
his neoconservative administration. But the answer lies in a clear-eyed
examination of Powell's career history: he's always been an opportunist, only
this time he outsmarted himself. A Special Report. November 26, 2004
Trust Colin Powell?
The U.S. news media couldn't heap enough praise on Colin Powell's Iraq war
presentation to the United Nations. But there are two historical precedents that
should give pause about Powell's trustworthiness. A retrospective. February 6,
2003