Memorial Page for George H. W. Bush (née George Herbert Walker Bush)

George H. W. Bush (born 12 June 1924 in Milton, Massachusetts; died 30 November 2018 in Houston, Texas) was the 41st president of the United States. Before his presidency he was a naval aviator in the Second World War, a businessman in Texas, a member of Congress, ambassador to the United Nations, head of the U.S. liaison office in China, CIA director and vice president under Ronald Reagan. His presidency from 1989 to 1993 coincided with a major turning point in world politics: the end of the Cold War, German unity, the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Gulf War.

Family, war and Yale

Bush grew up in a wealthy family with a tradition of public service. His father, Prescott Bush, later became a senator from Connecticut. After graduating from Phillips Academy, George H. W. Bush enlisted in the U.S. Navy on his eighteenth birthday. As a torpedo bomber pilot he flew numerous combat missions in the Pacific. On 2 September 1944 his aircraft was hit; Bush bailed out and was rescued by an American submarine. He received the Distinguished Flying Cross for his service. In 1945 he married Barbara Pierce. After the war he studied at Yale and then moved to Texas to work in the oil industry.

Texas and public service

In Texas Bush built a career as a businessman and Republican. In 1966 he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives. A series of offices followed that gave his political profile a strong international cast: ambassador to the United Nations, chairman of the Republican National Committee during Watergate, head of the U.S. liaison office in Beijing and director of the CIA. These posts did not make him a grand ideologue, but a politician of institutions, contacts and briefing papers. He knew Washington, diplomacy and security agencies at close range.

Vice president under Reagan

In 1980 Bush first ran for the Republican presidential nomination and criticized Ronald Reagan's economic program as voodoo economics. After losing, he became Reagan's running mate. From 1981 to 1989 Bush served as vice president. In that role he appeared loyal, restrained and internationally experienced. He became part of the Reagan era while remaining less ideologically charged than many of its leading voices. In 1988 he won the presidency against Michael Dukakis and promised a kinder, gentler nation.

A presidency in transition

Bush took office in 1989 during an extraordinary period. Communist regimes collapsed in Eastern Europe, the Berlin Wall fell, Germany was reunified and the Soviet Union dissolved. Bush generally acted with caution and diplomacy. He avoided triumphalist gestures, worked with Mikhail Gorbachev and European partners, and supported German unity within NATO. That restraint was one of his strengths: it helped accompany a historic transfer of power without a major war between the blocs.

Panama and the Gulf War

Not all foreign-policy decisions were so uncontested. In December 1989 Bush ordered the invasion of Panama to remove Manuel Noriega; the operation was internationally criticized and cost lives, especially among Panamanian civilians. In 1990 Iraq occupied Kuwait. Bush then built a broad international coalition, relied on UN resolutions and sent troops to Saudi Arabia. Operation Desert Storm began in January 1991 and led to the liberation of Kuwait. The rapid military success strengthened Bush's standing, but it also became part of a Middle Eastern order whose consequences occupied the United States for many years.

Domestic policy and limits

Domestically Bush was less defining, though individual decisions mattered. In 1990 he signed the Americans with Disabilities Act, a central civil rights law for people with disabilities. That same year he accepted a budget compromise that raised taxes, breaking his campaign pledge read my lips: no new taxes. The step could be justified fiscally, but it badly damaged him politically. Recession, unemployment and the impression of weak domestic energy shaped the 1992 campaign. Bush lost to Bill Clinton; Ross Perot's independent candidacy also drew votes away.

Later years

After his presidency Bush remained publicly present, but usually less loudly than many successors. Together with Bill Clinton he helped lead relief efforts after natural disasters. In 2001 he saw his son George W. Bush become president, making the Bushes only the second father-son pair to hold the White House after John Adams and John Quincy Adams. In 2011 Barack Obama awarded George H. W. Bush the Presidential Medal of Freedom. In his final years he lived with health limitations but remained connected to his family, his presidential library in College Station and public ceremonies.

Farewell

George H. W. Bush died in Houston on 30 November 2018. He was 94 years old and was buried at his presidential library in College Station, beside Barbara Bush and their daughter Robin, who had died as a child. His legacy lies above all in foreign policy: the transition out of the Cold War, German unity and the coalition against Saddam Hussein. At the same time, his record includes a president who persuaded less strongly at home and failed against an economic mood that military success could not offset.