George Pratt Shultz, an architect of American foreign policy in the 1980s, who served three Republican presidents and helped bring about the end of the Cold War, died at the age of 100 on Feb. 7 (Singapore time).

Shultz is perhaps best known as President Ronald Reagan's Secretary of State, helping to strengthen relations after rising tensions with the Soviet Union.

After continuously meeting with his Soviet counterpart, the U.S. and the Soviet Union agreed upon a significant nuclear arms treaty, the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty in 1988.

It banned various types of missiles, leading the two powers to shrink their arsenals. The treaty remained in force until it was scrapped in 2019 by President Donald Trump.

Friendship with Lee Kuan Yew

Born in 1920, the young Shultz served in World War 2 as an officer in the U.S. Marine Corps in the Pacific campaign.

After the war, he became an academic, teaching economics. This earned him a spot on President Dwight Eisenhower's Council of Economic Advisors. Shultz then joined President Richard Nixon's Administration as the Secretary of Labor.

Under Nixon, Shultz would later serve as the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, and then Secretary of the Treasury. He helped set up what would become the annual G7 meeting, and refused Nixon's demands to use tax records to undermine political opponents.

It was in this role that he got to know the late Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew.

In his book "Third World to First", Lee writes, "I knew Shultz when he was Secretary of the Treasury under President Nixon in the early 1970s and we had become friends."

Lee mentions Shultz several times in his book, usually in his role as Reagan's chief diplomat. They discussed, among other things, arms sales to Taiwan, aid to the Philippines, and the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union.

Shultz proposed that Lee make a state visit to the United States in 1985, and he and Reagan persuaded then-Speaker of the House Tip O'Neill to invite Lee to address a joint session of Congress.

Later years

In 2013, the Straits Times reported that Lee hosted Shultz to a private dinner at Marina Bay Sands.

Shultz was in Singapore to attend a meeting on nuclear threats.

In 2015, when Lee died, Shultz offered his condolences and effusively praised the late prime minister.

"I have always considered him one of the wisest and most intelligent people I have ever known. We met together many times and I was the better for it.

I often traveled to Singapore and, with all due respect to the appeal of the city, the real reason is to see Harry Lee.

I am so glad that I was able to visit Singapore and see Harry once more in late 2013."