Colin Powell Says Iraq ‘Blot’ Teaches Need for Skepticism [View all]

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Source: Bloomberg

Colin Powell Says Iraq ‘Blot’ Teaches Need for Skepticism

Colin Powell says his erroneous address to the United Nations about Iraq having weapons of mass destruction provides a lesson to business leaders on the importance of staying skeptical and following their intuition.

“Yes, a blot, a failure will always be attached to me and my UN presentation,” the former U.S. secretary of state writes in a new book of leadership parables that draws frequently on his Iraq war experience. “I am mad mostly at myself for not having smelled the problem. My instincts failed me.”


Powell, 75, laments that no intelligence officials had the “courage” to warn that he was given false information that Iraq had such weapons during preparations for his February 2003 speech before the U.S. invasion the following month. Regrets are sprinkled through “It Worked For Me,” along with lessons gleaned from a career that carried him from foxholes in Vietnam to senior positions at the Pentagon and the State Department.

In uncorrected page proofs of the book scheduled to be published May 22 and written with Tony Koltz, Powell advises on the virtues of kindness for a leader and a balanced life that shuns an obsession with work. He recommends taking care of and getting to know the “troops,” citing State Department garage attendants he paid a surprise visit and impromptu chats with employees.

Read more: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-05-03/colin-powell-says-iraq-blot-teaches-need-for-skepticism.html