Powell, who grew up in New York City as the son of Jamaican immigrants, served in the Army for 35 years. He was a man of many firsts: He was the first Black national security adviser, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and secretary of state. “I think it shows to the world what is possible in this country,” Powell said during his Senate confirmation hearing for secretary of state. “It shows to the world that: Follow our model, and over a period of time from our beginning, if you believe in the values that espouse, you can see things as miraculous as me sitting before you to receive your approval.” Powell, along with former president George W. Bush and former vice president Dick Cheney, was key in the American invasion of Iraq in 2003, a war which is still ongoing more than 18 years later: Powell delivered what he later called a “painful” speech at the United Nations in an effort to gain foreign support for qhat they called Operation Iraqi Freedom, falsely alleging that Saddam Hussein was hiding weapons of mass destruction. He later expressed regret, noting, “I’m the one who presented it on behalf of the United States to the world … [it] will always be a part of my record.” More than 4,400 American troops have died and more than 31,000 were wounded in the Iraq War as of July 2021, in addition to more than 16,000 Iraqi security forces and thousands of civilian casualties. Powell considered himself a political moderate, and while he served for Republican presidents, he later endorsed Barack Obama for president in 2008. In addition to his military and governmental careers, Powell also served his community, founding the charity America’s Promise Alliance to aid at-risk children. He once said of himself, “Powell is a problem-solver. He was taught as a soldier to solve problems. So he has views, but he’s not an ideologue. He has passion, but he’s not a fanatic. He’s first and foremost a problem-solver.” Get to know the problem-solver with this collection of Colin Powell quotes.
Colin Powell Quotes
1. “Don’t bother people for help without first trying to solve the problem yourself.” 2. “Always focus on the front windshield and not the rearview mirror.” 3. “No battle plan survives contact with the enemy.” 4. “Organization charts and fancy titles count for next to nothing.” 5. “It’s a disgrace that we have millions of people who are uninsured.” 6. “Never let your ego get so close to your position that when your position goes, your ego goes with it.” 7. “If you are going to achieve excellence in big things, you develop the habit in little matters. Excellence is not an exception, it is a prevailing attitude.” 8. “The chief condition on which, life, health and vigor depend on, is action. It is by action that an organism develops its faculties, increases its energy, and attains the fulfillment of its destiny.” 9. “Just as they did in Philadelphia when they were writing the constitution, sooner or later, you’ve got to compromise. You’ve got to start making the compromises that arrive at a consensus and move the country forward.” 10. “War should be the politics of last resort.” 11. “Experts often possess more data than judgment.” 12. “In other words, don’t expect to always be great. Disappointments, failures and setbacks are a normal part of the lifecycle of a unit or a company and what the leader has to do is constantly be up and say, ‘We have a problem, let’s go and get it.’” 13. “f a leader doesn’t convey passion and intensity then there will be no passion and intensity within the organization and they’ll start to fall down and get depressed.” 14. “Trying to get everyone to like you is a sign of mediocrity.” 15. “I try to be the same person I was yesterday.“Colin Powell: Why We Serve 16. “When we go to war, we should have a purpose that our people understand and support.” 17. “Success is the result of perfection, hard work, learning from failure, loyalty to those for whom you work, and persistence.” 18. “Politics is not bean bags. It’s serious, tough stuff.” 19. “We need to understand that we as citizens and as a government in any community throughout this country have no more important obligation than to educate those who are going to replace us.” 20. “The ties that bind us are stronger than the occasional stresses that separate us.” 21. “Surround yourself with people who take their work seriously, but not themselves.” 22. “It takes more courage to send men into battle than to fight the battle yourself.” 23. “If you get the dirty end of the stick, sharpen it and turn it into a useful tool.” 24. “I think whether you’re having setbacks or not, the role of a leader is to always display a winning attitude.” 25. “Look at the world. There is no pure competitor to the United States of America.” 26. “Never neglect details.” 27. “When everyone’s mind is dulled or distracted the leader must be doubly vigilant.” 28. “Keep looking below surface appearances. Don’t shrink from doing so just because you might not like what you find.” 29. “Wouldn’t it be great if we could look forward to a whole world in which no child will be left behind?” 30. “Get mad, then get over it.” 31. “It ain’t as bad as you think. It will look better in the morning.” 32. “The healthiest competition occurs when average people win by putting above average effort.” 33. “I’m not perfect, but I’ll be the creator of perfection.” 34. “We can seldom get our children to do what we tell them, but they almost never fail to imitate us.” 35. “Being responsible sometimes means pissing people off.” 36. “The commander in the field is always right and the rear echelon is wrong, unless proved otherwise.” 37. “Giving back involves a certain amount of giving up.” 38. “Leadership is solving problems. The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help or concluded you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership.” 39. “You can’t just have slogans, you can’t just have catchy phrases. You have to have an agenda.” 40. “There are no secrets to success. Don’t waste time looking for them.” 41. “Don’t be afraid to challenge the pros, even in their own backyard.” 42. “It isn’t enough just to scream at the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations. We need our political system to start reflect this anger back into, ‘How do we fix it? How do we get the economy going again?’” 43. “Ninety percent of my time is spent on 10% of the world.” 44. “Have fun in your command. Don’t always run at a breakneck pace. Take leave when you’ve earned it, spend time with your families.” 45. “Great leaders are almost always great simplifiers who can cut through the argument debate and doubt to offer a solution everybody can understand.” 46. “Today I can declare my hope and declare it from the bottom of my heart that we will eventually see the time when that number of nuclear weapons is down to zero and the world is a much better place.” 47. “You don’t know what you can get away with until you try.” 48. “Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier.” 49. “Bad news isn’t wine. It doesn’t improve with age.” 50. “I don’t want to spend the rest of my life giving speeches.” Next, check out Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s most powerful and supreme quotes.
