Richard Nixon

Résumé du document

A one recto/verso biography of the 37th President of the US, covering his family background, education, career path before presidency, personal philosophy and character as well as the major foreign policy challenge he faced during his mandate and the domestic issues that influenced it (1,700 words).

Extraits

[...] - Nixon came back in 1968 and won the Republican presidential nomination. He is the first president of the US to have run for presidency a second time after loosing a first campaign. This time, he called for the help of the best media consultants who succeeded in building up the image of a new and more mature Nixon. - He eventually won the election of 1968 against H. Humphrey by a margin of less than 1 percent of the popular vote. [...]

[...] - In 1946, a group of Southern Californian Republican drafted him as a Congressional candidate. Eventually, he got a seat on the House Un- American Activities Committee. He was re-elected in 1948. - Ran for the Senate in 1950. During his campaigns, Nixon always tried to unscrupulously discredit his opponents by portraying them as having connections with the Soviets or with communism at least. - In 1952, D. Eisenhower gave him the vice presidential nomination. As vice-president, he burnished his reputation for foreign policy expertise with travelling to dozens of countries. [...]

[...] You should hear us more on yours. Khrushchev: That's a good idea. Let's do it like this. You appear before our people. We will appear before your people. People will see and appreciate this. [...]

[...] - Withdrawal from Vietnam: He first tried to threaten the North Vietnamese through covert actions and even nuclear threat but to no avail (“Madman strategy” portraying Nixon as unpredictable) Eventually, he adopted a strategy aimed at training and arming the South Vietnamese to take over responsibility for their own defence (Vietnamization), thus enabling US troops to progressively withdraw. - Yom Kippur War showed US taking Israel's side. - In Chile, Nixon opposed the democratically elected president, socialist Salvador Allende, and supported a political coup in 1973 which led General Pinochet replaced Chile's democracy with despotism. Key Advisers: - Because of his distaste towards intellectuals and bureaucracy, Nixon tried to tightly control his foreign policy. His main operative was National Security Council director, Henry Kissinger, with whom he settled numerous coverts actions. [...]

[...] Both were often referred to “Nixinger”. - In 1973, Kissinger replaced William Rogers as Secretary of State while remaining as National Security Adviser a way to concentrate power in the White House. - Treasury Secretary John Connally helped Nixon settling his New Economic Program from 1971 on in response to the economic crisis of that period. Nixon: There are some instances where you may be ahead of us, for example in the development of the thrust of your rockets for the investigation of outer space; there may be some instances in which we are ahead of you in color television, for instance. [...]