Late, President Bush
Tributes to former U.S. President George H.W. Bush, who died at the age of 94, poured in from around the world on Saturday as global leaders honored him for his role in helping to end the Cold War and reduce the danger of nuclear annihilation.
Bush, the 41st U.S. president, also routed President Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi army in the 1991 Gulf War but lost his chance for a second term in the White House after breaking a no-new-taxes pledge.
“Many of my memories are linked to him,” said Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the Soviet Union, with whom Bush signed a strategic arms reduction treaty that scaled back the two countries’ nuclear arsenals.
“We happened to work together in years of great changes. It was a dramatic time demanding huge responsibility from everyone,” Russia’s Interfax news agency cited Gorbachev as saying.
Speaking in Buenos Aires, U.S. President Donald Trump said Bush was “a high-quality man.”
“He was a very fine man. I met him on numerous occasions. He was just a high quality man who truly loved his family. One thing that came through loud and clear, he was very proud of his family and very much loved his family. He was a terrific guy and he’ll be missed. He led a full life, and a very exemplary life, too,” Trump told reporters at a G20 summit.
Bush’s death on Friday night was announced by longtime spokesman Jim McGrath. No further details about the circumstances of his death were immediately available.
The White House said a state funeral is being arranged at the National Cathedral in Washington. The president, who plans to attend the funeral with first lady Melania Trump, also designated a national day of mourning on Wednesday, Dec. 5, and ordered the lowering of the American flag for 30 days.
Former presidents remembered Bush as a leader of grace and humility. “His administration was marked by grace, civility and social conscience,” Jimmy Carter, a Bush predecessor, said in a statement.
Barack Obama described Bush as “a patriot and humble servant” while Bill Clinton, who defeated Bush in the 1992 presidential election, recalled his “great long life of service, love and friendship.”
Bush was the father of former President George W. Bush, who served two terms in the White House in the 2000s, and former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, who unsuccessfully sought the 2016 Republican nomination for president. Like his sons, he was a Republican.
His death came seven months after that of his wife, former first lady Barbara Bush, to whom he was married for 73 years. He was admitted to a Houston hospital with a blood infection that led to sepsis a day after her funeral in April.
“The entire Bush family is deeply grateful for 41’s life and love, for the compassion of those who have cared and prayed for Dad, and for the condolences of our friends and fellow citizens,” George W. Bush said in a statement.
A U.S. naval aviator during World War Two, the elder Bush also served as vice president for eight years during Ronald Reagan’s two terms as president.
“His ethos of public service was the guiding thread of his life and an example to us all,” said British Prime Minister Theresa May. “In navigating a peaceful end to the Cold War, he made the world a safer place for generations to come.”
At the G20 summit in Buenos Aires, German Chancellor Angela Merkel recalled visiting him in the White House. “He was the father or one of the fathers of German reunification and we will never forget that,” she said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said Bush “faithfully served his country all his life – with a gun in his hand during the war years and in high government roles in peace time,” according to Russian state news agency TASS.
REUTERS
