A couple of pretty good profiles of some of the iconic men of the last 50 years in the October GQ. These quotes from the article on Colin Powell

So what is the great threat we are facing?

I would approach this differently in almost Marshall-like terms. What are the great opportunities out there – ones that we can take advantage of?

And this…

Avoid war – and if that’s not possible, and it’s necessary to use arms to solve a political problem, then do it in a decisive way. You remove as much doubt as you can about the outcome. In addition, you need to have a clearly defined mission, and you must have some understanding of how it’s going to end.