What if Richard Nixon, Vice President of the United States from 1953-61 and two time Republican Presidential nominee (1960, 1968) had defeated Hubert Humphrey in the 1968 Presidential election? Would Nixon have pulled out of Vietnam in 1971 like Humphrey did? Would the economy have fared better under Nixon, thus preventing him from being denied a 2nd term like Humphrey was? How different would the Supreme Court be going forward? Would the Democrats maintain control of Congress through the 1970s or would they one or both chambers of congress at some point like they did OTL (1970 for the Senate, narrowly in 1972 for the House)?
DBWI: Richard Nixon Elected President in 1968?
- Thread starter dw93
- Start date
Yup. one has to wonder if the trend of one term Presidents of the '70s (Humphrey, Reagan, Muskie) would've happened if Nixon were elected 12 years earlier. Reagan making him Secretary of State really helped Nixon re invent himself even more than he did between 1960 and 1968.
I think Nixon in the 1980’s was really the best time to have him as president. He was conservative enough that he couldn’t be easily smeared as a communist sympathizer but pragmatic enough to seek detente. It’s hard to imagine someone like Reagan working on initiatives with Gorbachev or Humphrey/Muskie being able to pursue such things without getting viciously smeared. The saying ‘only Nixon could go to Moscow’ exists for good reason IMO.
If he wins in 1968, the window isn’t really there for US-Soviet deescalation. Perhaps he’d try some other grand gesture of foreign policy realism-there was a timeline on here where he won and attempted to improve relations with China which was interesting given his hardline stance on Madame Mao in the 1980’s.
If he wins in 1968, the window isn’t really there for US-Soviet deescalation. Perhaps he’d try some other grand gesture of foreign policy realism-there was a timeline on here where he won and attempted to improve relations with China which was interesting given his hardline stance on Madame Mao in the 1980’s.
Dolan
Banned
Being the recipient of 1990 Nobel Peace Prize for basically the mastermind of peaceful end of the Cold War and the subsequent Nuclear deproliferation is pretty much Nixon's Magnum Opus of his political career.
The old statesman will be forever remembered and written in history books as the mind behind NATO-Soviet de-escalation and permanent peace
Yeah, I read that timeline, and I gotta say, it's pretty unrealistic. It's true, Nixon was somewhat more pragmatic than his anti-communist rhetoric would suggest. But seriously, that ATL's author suggested Nixon would try to exploit Sino-Soviet tensions to make an opening to China in the early 1970s. I just can't see this happening. For one thing, China was in the middle of the Cultural Revolution. Tens of thousands were being thrown out of windows, exiled, jailed and purged for even slight deviations from Maoist orthodoxy. Secondly, in the Sino-Soviet split, Mao and the Gang of 4 positioned themselves *to the left* of the USSR and Brezhnev. Why would a Cold War Hawk like Nixon want an opening with such a Regime? I know people hate when the term is overused, so forgive me in advance, but really, it's almost ASB.
ASUKIRIK
Banned
Considering the Soviet Union and European Warsaw Pact nations undergoing peaceful transition into Democratic Communism during the 80s, while the People's Republic of China remains a poor, backward, totalitarian nation until the China Crisis, if this ATL Nixon tried to court China, he'll definitely in for a shock when Chinese system inevitably crashed and fall apart, but there is a way to do that too...
Nixon IOTL started "Going to Moscow" only after Gorbachev already going halfway through the Democratic Communist Reform, in an alternate timeline where it was China who started experimenting with "Giving the People their own voice under the guidance of Communism", it won't be a stretch if Nixon ends up started to pursue closer relations with the promising Democracy. Considering Mao, and his immediate successors though, it was an impossibility.
Nixon really did have a successful Presidency (for a Republican). He won in 1980 with both Houses of Congress in Republican control and while he did lose the House in 1982, he kept the Senate until 1987. While it is true that Reagan won with both houses in 1972, the GOP got stomped in 1974 and lost both houses and then lost to Muskie in 1976. I will say though, despite my opinion of his Presidency being somewhat positive (for a Republican), I'm glad his handpicked successor Vice President Rumsfeld lost in 1988. Sam Nunn was much better equipped to deal with the challenges of the early 90's (and not an obnoxious asshole like Rumsfeld).