11. THE 1970s: AMERICA DIVIDED

NIXON'S CHAOTIC SECOND PRESIDENTIAL TERM

An event that occurred during the summer's presidential election campaign would provide exactly the opportunity to undo the results of the election that had just delivered the humiliating defeat to the Democratic Party in its attempts to capture the presidency.  Fairly high-level staff members of Nixon's re-election committee decided it would be a cool [yet quite unnecessary]^[1] trick to raid the Democratic Party offices in the Watergate apartment complex in order to plant listening devices – sadly rather typical of the "dirty tricks" that go on with political campaigns.  Except that their prank got detected by Watergate security police – and a number of these pranksters were caught and arrested.

The Watergate burglars

James McCord,  Virgilion Gonzales,  Frank Sturgis, 
Eugenio Martinez,  Bernard Baker

Woodward and Bernstein.  This event would likely have gone largely unnoticed, except that two young crusading journalists of The Washington Post, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, saw a headliner story in this event, one that might reach all the way up to the president himself.  And with some inside help from an FBI informant, they began to develop the story into a full-blown presidential scandal.

Washington Post reporters Carl Bernstein (left)
and Bob Woodward (right)

Congress goes to war.  With the beginning of the trials of the culprits in January of 1973, the call went out for a complete Congressional investigation into the affair.  Kennedy sponsored a resolution calling for the creation of a select committee of four Democrats and three Republicans to undertake a full investigation of Nixon's re-election committee.  Senator Sam Erwin, rather than Kennedy, would however head up this committee – as Kennedy's moral credentials were not themselves all that great – and he had ambitions to run for the 1976 presidential race and did not want the committee to look like it was part of his personal electoral strategy.

Actually, of course, as with everything that goes on in Washington, this was all indeed pure politics.  Although Nixon was likely not part of the Watergate prank, the committee was hunting for something, anything, that would lead directly to a Nixon involvement that they could then bring him down with.

The Senate Watergate Hearings – Summer of 1973
(Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities)

Republican Senator Howard Baker and Democratic Senator 
and Committee Chairman Sam Ervin directing the Senate
Watergate Hearings
 

Nixon paranoia.  Nixon did not help his own case – paranoia in dealing with the Democratic Congress and an equally hostile and aggressive press having completely overtaken Nixon at this point.  At first Nixon tried to head off the investigation – the very thing that the Democrats would be looking for in their efforts to find impeachable "high crimes and misdemeanors" on the part of the president.  Then (April 1973) he fired a number of his staff – merely further conveying the image to the press of Nixon conducting a cover-up.

John Dean.  At the same time, Nixon's young Legal Counsel, John Dean, decided at this point that it was wise to switch sides in this political contest and offer himself as a witness before Congress (June 1973) to Nixon's attempted cover-up of the criminal investigation.  Dean did not have any actual evidence to offer, other than the assurance that Nixon certainly knew about the Watergate coverup and also tried himself to keep things hidden away.  And he suspected that there was taped evidence that would corroborate his story.

White House Legal Counsel John Dean – September 17, 1970

John Dean testifying against his former boss Nixon 
at the Senate Watergate hearings

Dean was describing a series of taped recordings that Nixon had been making over the years of White House operations – with the intent of eventually using those tapes to help him write and publish his memoirs.  Congress wanted to get their hands on those tapes – in order to find actual evidence of an attempted coverup of the investigation.  A battle over the tapes ensued.

The "Saturday Night Massacre."  Attorney General Elliot Richardson had earlier, in May – in agreement with the House Judiciary Committee – appointed Archibald Cox to look into the Watergate affair.  Understandably, tensions in the White House grew over Cox's wide-ranging investigation, when it became apparent that Cox was clearly also looking for broader instances of corruption in Nixon's Administration (even the president himself), and was particularly interested in getting his hands on Nixon's tapes.  When Cox finally insisted that Nixon had to turn over taped copies of his White House conversations, Nixon refused, offering instead to turn them over to Senator John Stennis to review and summarize.  But Cox refused the "compromise."  Thus on the night of October 19th, Nixon at that point demanded that Richardson fire Cox.  But Richardson refused, and instead resigned.  The same would also hold true that same night with Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus – who also resigned rather than carry out the Nixon request.  Finally the matter fell to Solicitor General Robert Bork, who complied with the order, firing Cox, though Bork would fairly quickly appoint Leon Jaworski to fill Cox's position.

This event finally began to swing American public opinion in favor of impeaching the president.^[2]  But even more importantly, it finally gave the House of Representatives justification for undertaking the process of impeachment when Nixon refused to comply with a congressional subpoena to turn over those tapes.

Then as things seemed to Nixon that they could not possibly grow worse, the Department of Justice came out with an announcement that it was investigating Vice President Agnew for having taken large bribes for government contracts.  In October Agnew resigned – and Nixon appointed the popular Michigan Congressman Gerald Ford to replace him.  The next month Congress gave a strong vote of confirmation to the widely-admired Ford.

In the midst of all of this turmoil, the world was shocked to hear that on October 6th, the Egyptian Army crossed the Suez Canal to attack Israeli forces holding the East bank of the Canal.  Another Arab-Israeli war was underway.

Egyptian President Anwar as-Sadat was hoping to draw the larger world into the Egyptian standoff with the Israelis – because despite the United Nations Resolution 242 calling for Israel to return to its 1967 boundaries, the Israelis had refused to move from their position at the Canal – or for that matter their control of Syria's Golan Heights or the Palestinian West Bank region.  The Israeli explanation was that they would not move until the other part of the Resolution – Arab recognition of Israel's right to exist within certain defined borders – had taken place.  No such recognition had been forthcoming from the Arabs.  So Israel was not moving. 

Egyptian President Anwar as-Sadat

In the years since the 1967 war, Egyptian President Nasser had died (1970), Sadat had taken the presidency and – with considerable Soviet help – had upgraded the Egyptian military defenses (air and ground) quite considerably.  But Sadat's loyalty to the Soviets was rather limited.  And he was willing to play a round or two of the Realpolitik game himself – forcing some 20,000 Soviet advisors out of Egypt in July of 1972 in order to keep a free hand in his own doings.  He then undertook the holding of huge military exercises – which put the Israelis on edge wondering if Sadat was about to start something.  Apparently he was not, and everyone backed down.

But this time, October 6th, he was not just conducting an exercise.  It was an actual attack – and timed for the Jewish celebration of Yom Kippur – when the Jews would be more focused on religious celebrations than war (but oddly enough it was also the beginning of Ramadan, the Muslims' month of fasting).  At first the Egyptians made huge advances against the Israelis.  But the war was costly to both sides.  Both sides were losing jet planes, tanks, trucks and soldiers rapidly – and began to look to their military suppliers for help: Israel to America and Egypt to Soviet Russia. 

An American C-5 Galaxy unloads an M-60 Patton tank at Ben
Gurion International Airport during Operation Nickel Grass

Yom Kippur War - October 1973
Israeli paratroops breaking through an Egyptian commando
ambush in a sandspit leading to Fort Budapest on the Sinai front

   
Egyptian soldiers killed during the war

Syria and Jordan joined the conflict ... and Israel turned its attention to these less prepared foes – humiliating both countries with swift Israeli counteraction.  Then the Israelis began a strong counteroffensive against the Egyptians.

   
Syrian tanks at an Israeli anti-tank ditch in the Golan

At this point the Arab oil-exporting countries jumped into action – especially when Nixon went to Congress with a request for $2.2 billion in aid to Israel.  The Arabs now moved to impose an immediate slowdown in oil sales – putting America's allies in Europe in a very tight spot – but also putting the squeeze on America's energy supplies as well.  Very quickly the price of gasoline at the pump went up and up (fourfold), when it was even available.

Gas lines

Gas shortage during the 1973 OPEC oil embargo
 imposed on the West

This in turn brought the United Nations into action, with both America and Russia agreeing to terms for a cease fire – which Israel ignored in its effort to surround and crush the Egyptian Third Army.  At this point the Russians threatened to intervene directly if the Israelis did not back down.  Thus something of a cease fire came into effect.  The war was (more or less) over.

In the end, the real benefactors of this event were the Arab oil exporters – who now found their small populations among the richest in the world.  This would work to the great benefit of the regimes governing these societies – mostly.  But one country that would actually find itself in trouble because of this sudden wealth was Iran.  Eventually this would be a key factor bringing down America's most important ally in the Muslim East, the Shah of Iran.

   

Saudi King Khalid overlooking a model of a $8.5 billion military
city, to be paid for with increased oil revenues – mid-1970s. 

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CONGRESS TAKES OVER AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY

Meanwhile, Congress was busy attempting to undo the Nixon legacy in American foreign policy – by curtailing the "imperialistic" powers of the American presidency – and restoring American "democracy" by placing foreign policy activity fully in the hands of the Democratic-Party-controlled Congress.  In June of 1973 Congress passed the Case-Church Amendment to the government budget bill, preventing the president from providing any kind of direct military aid to Vietnam – aimed particularly at Nixon's use of the threat of air attack to make the North Vietnamese respect the Paris Peace Accords protecting the sovereignty of the South Vietnamese society and government.

Then just to make matters even worse for America's friends in South Vietnam, the following May (1974) Congress turned down a Nixon request for a small amount of additional funding for South Vietnam – to carry that country until June when a new round of funding (supposedly) would be forthcoming.  With the huge price hike in energy costs, the South Vietnamese government had run out of money to buy fuel for its military.  But Congress gave Nixon (and Vietnam) a flat "no" as its answer to this request.  And worse, it announced that as of 1976, South Vietnam would receive no further financial support from America!

What was Congress's thinking on this matter?  It already had Nixon pinned against the wall.  Russia was still giving serious financial and military backing to North Vietnam.  Why would Congress desert America's allies in South Vietnam?  What was to be gained by this "anti-imperialist" move?

Obviously Nixon, not the Vietnamese themselves, was the target of this move by Congress.  But it would be the Vietnamese who would ultimately pay for this piece of incredibly poor and politically-blinded policy, pay dearly.

Nixon – The "Imperialist" President

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STRIPPING THE PRESIDENT OF HIS DISCETIONARY SPENDING POWERS

Much to the annoyance of Congress, Nixon had pledged to cut back on government spending – and was simply refusing to release funding for various programs and projects approved by Congress (to the tune of some $12 billion).  But many of these programs were pet programs of Congressional legislators, ones that they liked to remind folks at home about at election time, jobs for the many and favors for the special few that were considered absolutely necessary in order for these Congressmen to remain in office in Washington.  Nixon's crippling of this game infuriated them, of course.

Thus in July Congress put into effect the 1974 Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act – which required Congress to approve any desire of the president to hold off spending for any part of the national budget.  In this they stripped presidential powers that reached all the way back to 1801 during Jefferson's presidency – this too done in the name of promoting democracy.

In addition, Congress set up the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) specifically to see that the president was actually spending the money as Congress directed.  But what they inadvertently had done was to set up a budgetary enforcing agency that would end up being just as interested in the curious ways the Congressmen themselves might be using their fiscal powers.  Thus Congress's favorite system of political rewards – the "pork barrel" system – found itself as well under detailed scrutiny!  Ooops!

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WATERGATE FINALLY BRINGS NIXON TO RESIGN (AUGUST 1974)

During all this time, the Watergate battle continued to focus on Nixon's White House tapes.  But the nation was also following closely the trials of the "Watergate burglars" presided over by Washington, D.C. District Court Judge John Sirica ... who used his own legal authority to subpoena those tapes.   Thus some of the tapes were turned over.  It was at this point (November) that it was discovered that some 18 minutes on one of the tapes was missing, blanked out by some unknown source.  That in itself fueled even more speculative fire.

Meanwhile Congress (and the press) pushed ahead with its own investigation, in April (1974) subpoenaing those tapes, all of them.  Nixon ultimately offered Congress 1200 pages of edited transcripts of those tapes.  But this hardly satisfied his accusers.  When Nixon again refused to turn the tapes over, Jaworski turned to the Supreme Court, which finally on July 24th (1974) in an 8-0 decision ruled against Nixon's claim that he had executive privilege allowing him to keep those tapes personal and private.

Thus the full array of tapes were finally released on August 5th.  And yes, one tape in particular pointed to a discussion that Nixon had with his Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman soon after the Watergate event – concerning what it was that they needed to do to make a potential scandal go away.  With that disclosure Nixon lost all ability to defend himself.

Republicans in Congress were now panicking.  Watergate – and just the general political tenor in Washington – had destroyed not only Nixon, but was also undermining the Republican Party's chance of any kind of good results in the Congressional elections coming up that November (indeed, the Republicans would take a big hit that fall).  It was quite obvious that Nixon was not going to be able to avoid impeachment by the House. And enough Republicans were considering switching sides so that it appeared most likely that the Senate would find the 2/3rds vote needed to convict.  Thus Republican advisors pleaded with Nixon simply to step down.

This he did in going before TV cameras on August 8th.

Richard Nixon announces his resignation – August 9, 1974

Richard Nixon departs from the White House 
before Gerald Ford was sworn in as President

Nixon bids good-bye

Ford's first steps toward his new duties as President
August 9, 1974

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Go on to the next section:

The Brief Ford Presidency (1974-1977)

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  Miles H. Hodges