MY AMERICAN JOURNEY (1995) POWELL, COLIN and JOSEPH E. PERSICO (New York, Ballantine Books) 644 pages.

BIOGRAPHY

This lengthy autobiography traces Powell from a Jamaican village to (Hunt’s Point) South Bronx through CCNY to the military and then the White house. Colin finds that his love of geology and ROTC placed him on the road to success. As a mediocre undergrad, his grades flourished in graduate school as his social skills and military acumen placed him at the top. The Powell Doctrine of massive overwhelming force against an enemy still appears to viable if not more important today.

Powell felt the sting of race, but kept fighting to become the best. He is today probably one of the most known Americans in the world. He found that the military since the Truman days (when integrated forces was mandated) to today allowed him to grow. Although a person of importance on a military base, he found that once he left headquarters, he had to go to the back door of a resturant to get a meal.

Both Colin and Alma had 3 children. All are successful today. His only son is head of the FCC.

Powell became a senior fellow in the Nixon white house and has been in almost every presidential administration including Clinton. He held no animosity toward President Clinton, because most of the Republican stateside warriors never served in the military and in the Vietnam War.

He found that Clinton’s earliest Defense Department administrators were just too disorganized, but in Woodward’s PLAN OF ACTION, he saw an overly organized setting in the Bush White House that was headed into a war without a clear cut ending. That is Iraq. He found that he could not delay or stop the frantic effort from day one to go after Saddam Hussein.

His leap to fame came in the first Iraq war when he articulated the resolve to overthrow Saddam and stop his invasion of Kuwait. From then on he has become a household name.

COLOR

You can not talk about Powell without talking about color. Colin is Scotch-African. For the purpose of this article only, we will create a continuum of color to demonstrate where Powell fits in the larger picture of white Americana.

“Those who pass” There are more Africans with white skin than Africans with tan, brown or black skin. You don’t know who they are and some do not know themselves because the black ancestor “disappears” in the white family genealogy. If he wants to, Michael Powell (Colin’s son) could easily pass. The most famous is Jennifer Beals (movie star) and Carol Chaning (theatrical artist), both have black heritage. Halle Berry if she wanted to could probably pass, but is a premiere star that anymore rarely plays “black roles” in Hollywood. Yet, she is considered a black Hollywood star. Her mom is white.

‘Those who blend” There are numerous Blacks who Whites see everyday in the print media, internet, and on cable. They have a light complexion and easily fit in with the majority of whites who are the main characters in the media. This is Secretary of State Powell. There are numerous pictures in MY AMERICAN JOURNEY of Powell. Many may show a lot of whites with perhaps one or two blacks. You can not see Colin as one of the blacks. He blends with the whites. Depending on the time of the year, Powell is the same color as President Bush. However, his features are mildly African and thus he can not pass, but he can blend. It is always uncomfortable for him to be with whites, because they first introduce the color issue. He has to go through that with them, before all parties move onto something better.

“Those who transition” These individuals have African characteristics and are tan or brown. They overwhelm the white majority by their talent and their importance. Their speech has been Anglicized and they outwardly appear comfortable in white settings, black ones, and mixed. Think Oprah Winfrey. The American, most folks (that means white) want to talk to if they had her as a fellow passenger on a plane. Although she is
brown, she is also white in her persona. She has come into so many white folks’ homes by way of television that she is like a neighbor in an all white neighborhood.

“Those who don’t transition” They are black and have all African characteristics. They reach the white majority by being black. However, most don’t. They are outside the ring of acceptance. Their speech, gait, countenance, and related are black. In this instance only, black means ghetto. It is a persona that helps a person survive in a very tough culture.
Many of the males die or are in prison. Longevity is a rarity. If they are in a white setting, they may be there as Irving Goff man calls “non-persons.” That is they wear a uniform, remain quiet, and serve the white community. People who are being served look through them, around them, and talk as is if they were not there. When a black/Black American makes it that is something big.

IRAQ

This book was written in the mid 90’s. Powell had to defend his policy of stopping Iraq at the border of Kuwait. The US forces did not enter Baghdad and numerous critics maintained that many who opposed Saddam were slaughtered after the war.
Powell’s position is that setting a clear goal is not only militarily smart but appealing to the American public. Vietnam lacked those concerns. Further, most Arabian countries did not want an American occupation of Iraq. Numerous other countries had tried to do so and failed.

Further, the victory was overwhelming and the continued killing (for the sake of killing) would look monstrous to the rest of the world on the “highway of death” to Baghdad. Indeed all of the Bush I administration was in agreement to leave. However briefly, Norm Schwarzkopf suggested otherwise to David Frost of the BBC, but then he distanced himself from his first statement.

Iraq as we found out within the last few years (at the time this is written) was a paper tiger. In Bush II, Powell tried to thwart Bush and Cheney from attacking and going inside Iraq. As was noted in Woodward’s PLAN OF ACTION, Powell told Bush II that
“ if you break it, you own it.” The younger Bush did not appear to either understand or did not show a cognitive connection with the abstraction that years of rebuilding would be required. That a military victory is not a victory in terms changing one’s culture and polity.

Powell felt that Iraq did not have the pre-conditions to a democracy and that ultimately killing Saddam would only mean that another just like him or of similar persuasion would replace him. Time and events have yet to play out relative to the second Iraq war and so will see how a sovereign Iraq will function. The Middle East is not a Mecca for parliamentary democracies. However, Iraq’s ongoing story has not yet been written at this time that this book is being reviewed.

MY AMERICAN JOURNEY

Although Powell’s book is almost 10 years old, it is worth the read. You may be able to backorder it from the internet or find a good used book store that has it. A good library card may get this excellent find. Powell is at his best.