George Herbert Walker Bush

Biography

George Bush is the son of Prescott Bush and his wife, born Dorothy Walker, moderate Republican senator of the Connecticut and business man who builds family fortune in the bank and finance.

George Bush grows with Greenwich with the Connecticut and makes her studies with the Philips Academy with Andover, in the Massachusetts, of 1936 to 1942. He is captain of the team of Baseball and member of a very closed fraternity, the Auctoritas, Unitas, Veritas (Authority, unit, truth). But, although allowed with Yale, it decides following the attack Pearl Harbor in 1941 to engage the June 12th 1942, the shortly after its baccalaureat, in the US Navy, of which he is then the youngest pilot.

It carries out fifty-eight air missions in the Pacific during which it is cut down with four recoveries and four times helped. The last time, on September 2nd, 1944, its apparatus is reached by the anti-aircraft defense Japanese E and it is saved by the Sous-marin US Finback. Following this last incident, it is demobilized. Thus, accepted it, during the Second world war, of many decorations, of which the Distinguished Flying Cross, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal and the World War II Victory Medal.

After the war, it enters to the Université Yale where it joined fraternity Delta Kappa Epsilon and is, such his father Prescott Bush (1917) then her son George W. Bush (1968), allowed in 1948 in the very secret Skull and Bones Society what enables him to initiate the construction of a political solid network.

He marries Barbara Pierce the January 6th 1945. Together, they have six children: George Walker, Robin (deceased at the 4 years age of the continuations of a Leukemia), John (Jeb), Neil, Marvin and Dorothy. According to the traces of their father and their grandfather in policy, George Walker is elected Gouverneur Texas of 1995 with 2000 then President in 2000, John as for him, is made fortune in the real estate and is elected governor of Florida in 1999.

After the war, George Bush launches out in the industry of the Pétrole to the Texas and created the Zapata Petroleum Company in 1953, with an old agent of the CIA, Thomas J. Guesses. He works for the company Dresser Industries which amalgamates in 1998 with the company Halliburton Energy Services whose Dick Cheney, which will become her Ministre of the Défense, was at the time the general president-director.

Political career

Its moral engagement in the policy goes back to June 1940, when it attends the speech of Henry Stimson, secretary with the war of president Roosevelt, come to the Philips Academy, speech of the chancellor Adolf Hitler and the role which should hold the the United States in the defense of the Western democratic values.

The beginnings (1964-1980)

In 1964, George Bush enters in policy while being presented against the Democratic senator Ralph Yarborough to Texas. Its countryside is in particular centered on the vote of Yarborough in favor of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 , to which all the politicians of the south of the United States were opposed. It taxes Yarborough with extremist and of demagog gauchist, this one is defended by taxing it with opportunist. Bush loses her first election at the time of the republican defeat of 1964.

However, he is finally elected in 1966 and 1968 with the Chambre of the representatives in the 7th district of the Texas. During its mandate, it is perceived like a Centriste and votes in favor of the " Voting Rights Act" envisaging lowering at eighteen years of the age necessary for the Right to vote. In 1970, he is candidate with the Sénat of the United States with James Baker as campaign director. However, it fails in its attempt vis-a-vis the democratic candidate Lloyd Bentsen. It is found then without elective function.

In 1971, Richard Nixon names it like ambassador of the United States at the United Nations. Its choice is unanimously approved by the senators. It is at this station that it exposes a project of an international force aiming at guaranteeing peace with the the Middle East and is opposed so that the mode of Beijing occupies the seat of the China, to the detriment of the government of Taiwan.

Throughout the Years 1970, under the presidencies of Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, it occupies many other political stations, of which those of president of the republican National committee (Republican National Committee) in 1973, of envoy of the United States in China in 1974 - 1975 and of director of the CIA in 1975 - 1976.

In 1976, at the time of the election of the democrat Jimmy Carter with the presidency, George Bush decides to be put for some time in withdrawal of the political matters and to assume the chairmanship of the First National Bank with Houston.

Vice-presidencies (1980-1988)

In May 1979, George Bush is candidate with the republican primary elections of 1980 vis-a-vis Ronald Reagan. It must quickly be inclined vis-a-vis the former governor of California. This one, after having hesitated, in particular in favor of Gerald Ford, chooses finally George Bush like fellow candidate for the post of vice-president, because it estimates that it could be a companion précieux ; moderated republican, it could bring his international experiment at the United Nations and of China, as well as a vision of the interior of the CIA.

In November 1980, Ronald Reagan is elected president vis-a-vis Jimmy Carter. In January 1981, George Bush enters to her sides to the White House as a vice-president.

In 1981, George Bush, is the first vice-president to ensure an interim for the presidency when Ronald Reagan is victim of an attack, interim which renews in 1985, at the time of the second presidency, when Reagan is operated for a cancer of the colon.

The tandem ( ticket ) Bush/Reagan again gains the elections in 1984 vis-a-vis the democratic tandem Walter Mondale/Geraldine Ferraro. During these two mandates, the vice-president traverses more than seventy countries where it represents the Reagan administration and exposes the policy of the United States.

The October 12th 1987, George Bush launches out again in the presidential campaign. It raid the republican nomination vis-a-vis the senator of Kansas Bob Dole and with Pasteur Pat Robertson.

The August 18th 1988, after having selected the senator of Indiana, daN Quayle, for candidate with the vice-presidency, it is officially invested by its party with the republican convention of the Orleans News. They then have as an adversary the democratic candidate Michael Dukakis, governor of Massachusetts and his fellow candidate, Lloyd Bentsen, senator of Texas.

The November 8th 1988, George Bush carries it with 53,4% of the voices and 426 Great Electors against 46% with Dukakis (111 Great Electors).

President of the United States

With the presidency, he is the continuator of the policies of his predecessor Ronald Reagan, while attaching a great importance to the foreign politics and the diplomacy.

National policy

At the beginning of his mandate, president George Bush must manage enormous a Budget deficit, inherited the years Reagan and Carter. He passes a compromise with the Congrès of the United States to democratic majority, combining a reduction of the public expenditure of the federal state with a light increase in the taxes. This compromise alienates the support of the preserving republicans to him, who reproach him for reconsidering his electoral promise not increase the tax pressure.

Its mandate on the internal plan is also marked by a reform of the Civil law in favor of the handicapped people, the increase in the public funds intended for education and the child welfare and adpotion of the Clean Air Act to fight against pollution.

It also on the occasion to name two judges with the Supreme court of the United States (David Souter and Clarence Thomas).

Lastly, it concluded with the Canada and the Mexico an Agreement from North-American free trade (ALENA).

Foreign politics

In 1989 the fall of the Berlin Wall mark a first step towards the end of the Cold war between the the United States and the the USSR. George Bush supports walk towards the German Réunification and maintains the dialog with Mikhaïl Gorbatchev.

The same year, it authorizes an American military intervention with the Panama, to relieve the president Manuel Noriega of which the mode threatens the American interests. This one, initially taken refuge to the embassy of the the Vatican, is delivered finally and is brought back in Florida to be there judged and imprisoned for drug trafficking and corruption. When the August 2nd 1990, the Iraq, then controlled by Saddam Hussein invades the emirate close to the Kuwait, the Bush government reacts then with greatest firmness. With the downstream of the Congress and the United Nations, George Bush sends troops in the Gulf and convinces the Saoudi leaders to accept on their ground of the North-American defensive forces. From a defensive formation, the coalition passes to the offensive after a few months of Embargo economic total on Iraq intended to make fold the Iraqi ray.

The operation Tempête of the desert begins in the night from the from January 16th to 17th 1991 with for goal to prevent the invasion of the Saudi Arabia. This first war of the Gulf against the Iraq is then an armed immense operation carried out under the aegis of UNO.

After one month of intense bombardments, the terrestrial offensive lasts only a few days and of the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi soldiers prisoners are made. The operation is a success. The coalition does not support the insurrectionists who then threaten the capacity of Saddam Hussein, destabilized by his defeat in Kuwait. Probably fearing a too great instability in this exporting area of Hydrocarbon S and the bursting of Iraq, the communautée international one lets make the repression carried out by the troops baasists against the populations Kurdish S and to the Shiites. A zone in the Kurdish territories of the north of the country nevertheless is placed under air converture of the coalition. The partisans of the destituion of Saddam Hussein then reproach George Bush for not having not to have continued to Baghdad in order to reverse the Iraqi dictator, it what he will answer that the invasion of Iraq “would have had human costs and incalculable financier” . In addition, the mandate quela coalition had received UNO did not envisage a military invasion of Iraq and a regime change by the armed force in Baghdad.

The Bush administration also worried about the events which proceeded in the Balkan S and which threatened their stability seriously.

A few months later, in August 1991, at the time of the Putsch of Moscow in Soviet Union and sequestration in the Crimea of Mikhail Gorbatchev, it gives its support for the Russian president immediately Boris Eltsine, immediately followed by the United Kingdom, whereas Helmut Kohl to Germany gives her support for Gorbatchev and that the France via François Mitterrand remains in the expectancy, going even initially to want to await the intentions of “new the Soviet leaders” recognizing de facto the government resulting from the putsch. The crisis is untied finally by the escape of the putschists and the implosion of the the USSR depriving the United States of their legendary enemy, giving birth, according to George Bush, with a “Nouvel world order” ( New World Order ) in which the the United States, de facto the single super power world, must start to redefine their role. This difficult task was not completed in its totality at the end of the mandate of George Bush.

Presidential campaign of 1992

After its intervention in the Gulf, the popularity of George Bush is with most, but it is exhausted quickly, because one reproaches him for having neglected the interior problems, the Emploi and the economic situation. In 1992, if interest rates and the Inflation are low, the country counts nevertheless 7,8% of its active population to unemployment, a level record since 1984. Its plans to leave the country the economic recession are enlisent with the Congress.

The preserving republicans reproach him for having disavowed its engagements of 1988 out of tax matter when he had proclaimed “Read my lips, not new taxes” (“Read my lips: No new taxes”) . Those decide to give their support for another independent candidate Ross Perot.

Thus, although very popular and haloed her victory over Iraq, George Bush misses her countryside and her re-election. The democrat Bill Clinton, favoured by the candidature of Perot (18% of the voices) which cuts down the preserving vote with George Bush (38%), is elected in November 1992 with just 43% of the voices.

Its personality

Raised in the Protestant religion, George Bush, is also an enthusiastic practitioner. It is convinced that the world is a theater where the good and the evil clash. In 1944, it estimates that it does not fight only for the glory of the the United States and its values, but especially against the “forces of the evil”.

He is the friend of the preacher Billy Graham, whom he consults the day before the release of the hostilities to the Iraq in January 1991. For him, the war of the Gulf “ it is still neither more nor less than one confrontation between the good and the evil ”, entrusts it to the magazine U.S. News & World Report . Therefore it made a point of giving to the war, all appearances of a crusade for the right, leaving in the second plan the other justifications: protection of the supplies oil of the Occident, protection of the State of Israel and prevention of the proliferation of the nuclear weapons, chemical and bacteriological in the Third World countries.

Its belief in the rule of the law, pushed it to multiply the international negotiating procedures (vote of twelve resolutions of the Safety advice of the United Nations and the diplomatic play (alliance without precedent of twenty-eight nations), before beginning in the action.

See too

Internal bonds

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