MY AMERICAN JOURNEY: Colin Powell

RISING FROM HARLEM TO THE HIGHEST COUNCILS OF POWER, COLIN POWELL LOOKS TO HIS--AND THE COUNTRY'S--FUTURE

  • Share
  • Read Later

(14 of 16)

After 35 years in uniform, Powell retired from the military on Sept. 30, 1993. Though Powell legally could have served a third two-year term as Chairman, he felt "ready to go. I had had a good run. And though President Clinton's national-security team was now working reasonably well, I was sure my departure would not be mourned.''

For his retirement ceremony at Fort Myer, Virginia, Powell donned his "suit of lights" for the last time. As thousands of guests, including George and Barbara Bush, looked on, Clinton awarded Powell the Presidential Medal of Freedom with Distinction. "Drum and bugle corps played, cannons fired a 19-gun salute, a flyover of jets and helicopters roared above the parade ground. As I looked over this spectacle of color and pageantry, I would have to be soul-dead not to marvel at the trajectory my life had followed, from an rotc second lieutenant out of ccny to the highest-ranking officer in the U.S. armed forces; from advising a few hundred men in the jungles of Vietnam to responsibility for over 2 million soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines; from growing up with tough kids in the South Bronx to association with leaders from all over the world. My only regret was that I could not do it all over again."

During my service in both military and civilian national-security posts, I studiously avoided doing or saying anything political, and it has taken me a while to shed the lifetime habits of a soldier. Gradually, however, as I speak around the country, the reticence is leaving.

To sum up my political philosophy, I am a fiscal conservative with a social conscience. Neither of the two major parties, however, fits me comfortably in its present state. Granted, politics is the art of compromise, but for now I prefer not to compromise just so that I can say I belong to this or that party. I am troubled by the political passion of those on the extreme right who seem to claim divine wisdom on political as well as spiritual matters. God provides us with guidance and inspiration, not a legislative agenda. I am disturbed by the class and racial undertones beneath the surface of their rhetoric. On the other side of the spectrum, I am put off by patronizing liberals who claim to know what is best for society but devote little thought to who will eventually pay the bills. I question the priorities of those liberals who lavish so much attention on individual license and entitlements that little concern is left for the good of the community at large. I distrust rigid ideology from any direction, and I am discovering that many Americans feel just as I do. The time may be at hand for a third major party to emerge to represent this sensible center of the American political spectrum.

As I speak around the country, I am constantly questioned about my future: specifically, am I going to run for President? I am flattered by my standing in public-opinion polls. To be a successful politician, however, requires a calling that I do not yet hear. I believe that I can serve my country in other ways, through charities, educational work or appointive posts.

  1. 1
  2. 2
  3. 3
  4. 4
  5. 5
  6. 6
  7. 7
  8. 8
  9. 9
  10. 10
  11. 11
  12. 12
  13. 13
  14. 14
  15. 15
  16. 16