Colin Powell lent his prestige to make a case for the Iraq war: 'I will always regret it,' he later said

WASHINGTON – Colin Powell's life was marked by firsts: the first and only Black officer to become Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the first Black man to become Secretary of State, a man respected by those in and out of uniform. It was his prestige that lent credibility to the faulty case for the war to rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction, a cause that he was reluctant to push and for which he later expressed regret.

The September 11 terror attacks defined Powell's tenure at the State Department.  But the February 2003 speech to the United Nations may have defined his legacy, some say, reflecting on his death at age 84. 

The Bush administration had shifted its attention from Afghanistan to Iraq and warned that Saddam Hussein was manufacturing weapons of mass destruction. Powell pressed for U.N. inspectors to investigate. It was Powell's speech, citing intelligence community assessments that Iraq had WMDs and could produce more, that helped swing public opinion. He warned about the cost of inaction.

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