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In the army, all combat officers are taught the Estimate of the Situation: When you are faced with a problem - take that hill, or in business maybe grow your market share - the first thing you do is to make an analysis of your environment.

Colin Powell

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Colin Powell
Age: 87
Born: 1937
Born: April 5
Diplomat
Former United States Secretary Of State
Politician
Soldier
New York City
New York
Colin Luther Powell
Thing
Grows
Hills
Make
Maybe
Analysis
Situation
Market
Business
Army
Estimate
Problem
Grow
Hill
Firsts
Environment
Faced
First
Taught
Officers
Take
Share
Combat

More quotes by Colin Powell

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Preferring members of any one group for no reason other than race or ethnic origin is discrimination for its own sake. This the Constitution forbids.
Colin Powell
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I think the American people want to see what we want to see, and that is for the Iraqi people to have a free, open, fair election, for their forces to be built up, for our reconstruction money to be used well, and for Iraqi security forces to take over so we can start bringing our troops home.
Colin Powell
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It was President [Bill] Clinton and the United States congress in 1998 which said that the regime has to be changed because the regime would not give up its weapons of mass destruction. We came into office in 2001 and kept that policy because Saddam Hussein had not changed.
Colin Powell
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Leaders have followers. The primary role of a leader is to convey to those followers a sense of purpose, vision, and mission.
Colin Powell
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In my 35 years in the army I was in school for 6 years. I think corporations should take a look at whether they are investing enough in the development of their human capital.
Colin Powell
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Policies that emanate from ivory towers often have an adverse impact on the people out in the field who are fighting the wars or bringing in the revenues.
Colin Powell
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We all hoped in 2001 that we could put in place an Afghan government under President Karzai that would be able to control the country, make sure al-Qaeda didn't come back, and make sure the Taliban wasn't resurging. It didn't work out.
Colin Powell
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Even the greatest of all strategists must occasionally take into account the presence of an enemy.
Colin Powell
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Ladies and gentlemen, these are not assertions. These are facts, corroborated by many sources, some of them sources of the intelligence services of other countries.
Colin Powell
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Maybe we don't put our young people in situations often enough where they're allowed to fail. When you fail you gain experience, and with enough experience, you don't fail as often.
Colin Powell
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The United States has every intention of continuing to do the kind of reconnaissance and surveillance work we have done for decades, well known to everyone, that is essential to protect our national security, and frankly, the security of our friends in various regions of the world. It is part of our collection system.
Colin Powell
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Many interviewers when they come to talk to me, think they're being progressive by not mentioning in their stories any longer that I'm black. I tell them, 'Don't stop now. If I shot somebody you'd mention it.'
Colin Powell
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Don't bother people for help without first trying to solve the problem yourself.
Colin Powell
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Some people naturally have a sense of empathy and an understanding of how to bring their followers to do things. They become great politicians.
Colin Powell
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War is never a happy solution, but it may be the only solution. We must exhaustively explore other possible solutions before we make the choice for war. Every political and diplomatic effort should be made to avoid war while achieving your objective.
Colin Powell
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I don't want to spend the rest of my life giving speeches.
Colin Powell
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The president's personal staff has a unique role.
Colin Powell
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I think you can improve on that natural ability with training and exposure to great leaders of the past and to management theories.
Colin Powell
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There are lots of countries that are having these kinds of internal civil wars in other parts of the world and nobody is talking about intervening.
Colin Powell
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There can be no doubt that Saddam Hussein has biological weapons and the capability to rapidly produce more, many more.
Colin Powell