Colin Powell, the previous chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, a key determine in a number of Republican administrations, and the primary Black particular person to function secretary of state, has died of issues from covid-19 on the age of 84.

According to the New York Times, Powell was totally vaccinated and was combating a breakthrough case of the virus earlier than his loss of life. He had been handled at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, his household posted to Facebook.

“We want to thank the medical staff at Walter Reed National Medical Center for their caring treatment,” the family wrote. “We have lost a remarkable and loving husband, father, grandfather, and a great American.”

Powell was each the youngest and first Black chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff underneath President George H.W. Bush from 1989 to 1993, and on the time of his appointment as secretary of state underneath President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2005, the highest-ranking Black member of the federal government department in U.S. historical past.

As CNN noted, following the U.S. victory within the first Gulf War he turned one of the most popular leaders within the nation and was extensively thought of a possible candidate for the presidency. But Powell’s file took severe blows when (in response to Powell, against his better judgment) he used that repute to promote the United Nations on defective intelligence regarding weapons of mass destruction that was utilized by the Bush Administration to justify the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Powell informed the UN in a now-infamous speech, “There can be no doubt that Saddam Hussein has biological weapons and the capability to rapidly produce more, many more.” This conclusion, as was then recognized behind the scenes by top Bush officials and is now extensively recognized to be the case, lacked any convincing proof and was not true. Powell resigned from his federal posts in 2005 and later referred to the occasion in his autobiography as “one of my most momentous failures, the one with the widest-ranging impact.”

“The event will earn a prominent paragraph in my obituary,” Powell added, in response to CNN. More pressingly, his speech helped sway public opinion and that of Congress in the direction of the practically two-decade U.S. occupation of Iraq, which resulted in hundreds of thousands of violent deaths at a minimal (extra deaths are possible at over half a million) and is still ongoing.

In his later years, Powell endorsed Democrats reminiscent of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. In the wake of the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol by Donald Trump supporters, he mentioned he might no longer consider himself a member of the Republican Party.