Nixon's Gamble

August 31, 2015
Locker, a USA Today investigative reporter focusing on politics and Congress, reconstructs the rise and fall of Richard Nixon. His well-conceived thesis is that Nixon believed the entrenched, self-interested forces of Washington—the national press corps, Congress, and the CIA, FBI, and Pentagon—were making it impossible for him to achieve his goals: reaching an arms agreement with the Soviets, establishing a détente with China, and ending the Vietnam War. Determined to succeed at any cost, Nixon stealthily created a shadow government adept at secret foreign policy initiatives. According to Locker, Nixon’s commitment to secrecy generated a culture of domestic spying, fostering the infamous break-ins, until “cover-up begat cover-up” and led to Nixon’s demise. Locker describes Nixon’s machinations in minute detail, and readers may be overwhelmed by the narrative’s parade of large and small players, but they will marvel at Nixon’s drive, paranoia, duplicity, and accomplishments. Surprisingly, while the unfolding of the world events makes for captivating reading, the debacles of the Pentagon Papers and Watergate seem like an old story. In Locker’s view, Nixon’s successes place him high in the pantheon of effective presidents, but his perfidy makes an equally compelling narrative of failure.

September 1, 2015

Richard Nixon (1913-94) remains a fascinating subject for historians of all stripes. Locker, an investigative reporter for USA Today, applies his ample research skills to exploring Nixon's penchant for secrecy and deception during his six years as president. The focus centers on Nixon's three primary foreign policy goals: ending the Vietnam War, restoring diplomatic relations with China, and reducing Cold War tensions with the Soviet Union. In order to accomplish these disparate objectives, Locker maintains, Nixon created a complex secretive network so extensive that even his closest advisors, such as Henry Kissinger, didn't know the whole truth behind his actions. The author utilizes a wide range of primary and secondary resources to spin his tale, and at times the facts are indeed stranger than fiction as he lists the consequences of the National Security Decision Memoranda and concludes that Nixon's "climate of secrecy" continues to impact politics today. VERDICT A well-told, detailed account that will satisfy even the most dedicated Nixon scholar. Recommended for most collections.--Ed Goedeken, Iowa State Univ. Lib., Ames

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