Nixon's War in Vietnam - A new approach to foreign policy

Pre-University Paper from the year 2007 in the subject Politics - International Politics - Region: USA, , language: English, abstract: Whoever wins the upcoming election and becomes President of the United States, will have to face the considerable challenge of pacifying Iraq. Although the war has officially ended four years ago, there still is no peace in sight. No one seems to know how long the U.S. soldiers will have to stay in Iraq and up to now, no candidate has been able to present an elaborated plan. In a way, the current events bear some striking similarities to the situation in 1968 when the most urgent question was, how to end the war in Vietnam. In June of 2007, the approval ratings of the present office holder George W. Bush fell to 26 percent. There has been only one President who has ever received an even worse rating. His name was Richard Nixon and he was the man who won the 1968 election. He was supposed to bring peace to Vietnam. However, this conflict can only be seen and examined in the context of the Cold War. In order to understand the measures which Nixon took in Vietnam, one has to take a closer look at his overall concept of foreign policy. Nixon was one of the most influential and formative politicians of the Cold War era; a key figure for almost thirty years who essentially defined the politics of his time 'by his successes and by his failures' Much has been written about him and his presidency but nevertheless, Nixon remains a mysterious character, full of contradictions and open questions. The aim of this term paper is to respond to the following questions: Who was this man who polarized the United States like hardly any other president of the 20th century? What were the cornerstones of his policy? What were his motives, what were his goals? And in which way did his personality influence or even derogate his actions?