FREE ESSAY ON THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN FIGHTING COMMUNISM BETWEEN AMERICAN PRESIDENTS

THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN FIGHTING COMMUNISM BETWEEN AMERICAN PRESIDENTS

The differences between fighting Communism for American Presidents
Many years passed between the presidential terms of Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan yet
the fight against Communism endured. Each president had his unique way of defining the
importance of fighting Communism, Nixon attempted to contain the spread of Communism
while Reagan tried to transcend it. Nixon succeeded when using intelligent and friendly
diplomacy in China and the Soviet Union, yet failed in Southeast Asia with his
'Vietnamization' program. Reagan found little success in the application of his foreign
policy, which was mainly based on the raising of defense spending. Nixon and Reagan had
different foreign policies and very different methods of carrying out what they promised,
therefore it cannot be said that they had similar ways of fighting Communism.
The attitudes of fighting Communism contributed to the differences in defining the
importance and urgency with which each president acted. Nixon had a more passive attitude
of containment, as shown through his policy of 'Vietnamization' in 1970, under which he
stated that "American troop strength would be reduced systematically in Vietnam while the
South Vietnamese received more military equipment so that they could fight their own war"
(LPW, 465). This attempt at slowly backing out of the war indicated the direction that
Nixon was heading in the fight against Communism, he took his attention off of Vietnam
and moved it to China and the Soviet Union. Whereas Nixon took the passive route, Reagan
used powerful anti-Communist rhetoric to set the tone for his approach towards fighting
Communists. Of his projected changes "none was more important to Reagan than building up
tremendous military strength and then demonstrating that the "Vietnam syndrome," American
reluctance to use military force because of the Vietnam debacle, no longer existed" (LPW,
524). With this message, President Reagan put America on the offensive for fighting
against Communism, which differed from Nixon, who took the less violent approach to
solving the problem.
Nixon had failed to ameliorate the problem in Vietnam through Vietnamization because he
decided to invade Cambodia on April 30, 1970 therefore extending the war to peripheral
countries rather than shrinking U.S. involvement as was originally planned. The Cambodia
Incursion sparked much anti-war action at home and the infamous Kent State University
incident ensued, where four students were killed. The result of the Cambodia Incursion
consisted of the Communist North Vietnamese moving into the area occupied by the
Americans, thus moving closer to the South Vietnamese army and indicating the failure of
the attempted containment. It took Nixon one more lesson to change his foreign policy,
this time the South Vietnamese invaded Communist bases in Laos in February 1971 and
fought without the help of American troops. It resulted in failure by the South
Vietnamese and "by the middle of the year, the Communists controlled more of Laos than
before" (LPW, 466).
The change that followed in foreign policy for Nixon resulted in a string of
international successes at containing Communism, by realizing that there were five
economic superpowers in the world: U.S., Japan, China, Russia, EEC. His first move was to
befriend China and consequently use this friendship to contain Communist Russia. Nixon
was the first American President to visit China and the people at home overwhelmingly
applauded this effort. He succeeded in containing Communism by getting Russia and China
out of the way due to the American shipment of desperately needed wheat to both
countries, consequently pitting the two largest Communist powers against each other for
American favors. Therefore when Nixon responded to a North Vietnam offensive in April
1972 with the heaviest bombing of the war on Hanoi and the mining of North Vietnamese
harbors, there were no objections from the Communist Chinese or Soviets. This resulted in
the first military success in Southeast Asia for Nixon and swayed public opinion about
the president just in time for his reelection. Nixon was also helped by SALT I(Strategic
Arms Limitation Talks) where he became the first American President to visit Russia and
sign "an important pact limiting the number of defensive missiles each could possess and
putting a five year freeze on testing and the deployment of intercontinental missiles"
(LPW, 468). This direction of peaceful diplomacy won over many voters in the 1972
election and differed greatly from Reagan's aggressive foreign policy of the 1980's.
Ronald Reagan had a different approach to fighting Communism, rather than trying to
peacefully contain it, he wanted to transcend it. His ideas were to actively pursue
Communism and use a 40% increase in military spending during his first term to intimidate
and forcefully attack the problem areas. "Reagan decided that spending on arms was going
to be the cornerstone of his foreign policy"(LPW, 524), different from Nixon who avoided
military pursuit of Communism and took care of the problems by talking to the foreign
leaders. Actually, Reagan cared less about an arms treaty than his military buildup, and
finally had the opportunity to demonstrate that he was not afraid to use force by
invading Grenada and protecting the island and its neighbors from Communist Cuba. The
invasion of Grenada was popular with the public because the unwritten rule was to win
quickly and get out, nobody wanted a protracted war of any sort. Then Reagan began to
slip by attacking and trying to overthrow the Sandinista Government in Nicaragua for
Cuban ties, aid to Salvadoran leftists, and their reluctance to hold elections. The U.S.
aggression however produced the opposite effect it was hoping for because the Sandinista
army increased in number and the government grew closer to Cuba and the Communist bloc
for help as a result. As Nixon had pulled out troops from Vietnam and failed, conversely
Reagan put soldiers in and actually made the situation worse.
Nixon attempted to better relations between the Soviet Union and the United States, but
Reagan used powerful anti-Communist rhetoric stating in 1980 that "the Soviet Union
underlies all the unrest that is going on" (LPW, 527). By 1983 Reagan was denouncing the
Soviets as the "evil empire" and continued to accelerate his military build up. The
President attempted to talk to Soviet leaders about limiting nuclear arms but nothing
would come of these talks. A Democratic notion of a "nuclear freeze" forced Reagan to
reconsider his military policy because the election of 1984 was approaching and he had to
appease the American public.
In conclusion, Nixon and Reagan had different ideas and strategies for fighting Communism
around the world. Each were given different circumstances and acted in their own unique
ways, Nixon dealt with the foreign problems successfully by speaking to leaders while
Reagan tried using military intimidation to get the desired result.