The Honorable Thomas E. White became the 18th Secretary of the Army on May 31, 2001, after nomination to that post by President George W. Bush and confirmation by the United States Senate.
After 23 years, White retired from the U.S. Army as a Brigadier General. He served as Executive Assistant to General Colin Powell while he served as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 1989 to 1990 and served as Director of the Armor/Anti-Armor Special Task Force in the Office of the Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army. He is a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy, the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School, the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College and the War College.
As for his 40-year journey from a paper carrier for the now defunct Detroit Times, riding the Fenkell bus from the west side to Cass Tech High School, all the way to the top position in the Army and oversight of 1.2 million people from a large office in the Pentagon, White, the son of a bus driver, can say only: "I would have never guessed it."
White, a 1967 Westpoint graduate and Vietnam veteran, resigned from his post in April of 2003 after philosophical differences with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
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K Troop
Detroiter Commands Army
Speech by White
White Resigns
