W. Joseph Campbell

Archive for July, 2016|Monthly archive page

, , , , , , , , , ,

Trump, Nixon, and the ‘secret plan’ media myth

In Debunking, Error, Media myths, Quotes on July 20, 2016 at 7:47 pm

The hoary myth of Richard Nixon’s “secret plan” to end the war in Vietnam has surfaced with some frequency in recent days as commentators across the political spectrum stretch for parallels between Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and the campaign Nixon ran in 1968.

These commentators — writing for such diverse sources as the New York Post, the National Interest, the Daily Beast, History News Network, among others — have referred to Nixon’s “secret plan” as if such a pledge figured in his run for the White House 48 years ago.

What 'secret plan'?

What ‘secret plan’?

It didn’t.

Nixon never said he had a secret plan.

This is a media myth that won’t die, partly because “secret plan” seems so Nixonian in duplicity and deceit. It is, like many media myths, almost too good to be false.

So of late, we’ve had the New York Post declaring flatly that Nixon in 1968 “ran against the Vietnam War by claiming he had a ‘secret plan’ to end it.” We’ve had the National Interest — in a commentary headlined, “Can Trump Follow Nixon to Victory?” — asserting that “Nixon said he had a ‘secret plan’ to end” the war.

We’ve had a political columnist writing in the Lowell Sun in Massachusetts that Nixon “said he had a secret plan to end the war in Vietnam — a war that was tearing the country apart.”

And we’ve had the History News Network, which seeks to place “current events into historical perspective,” stating that “Richard Nixon won the presidency, mainly based on his ‘secret plan’ to end the Vietnam War and his tough stance on law and order.”

What has encouraged those and other outsize references to Nixon’s “secret plan” has been Trump’s repeated if vague promise to wipe out ISIS, the radical Islamic terror organization that has seized portions of Syria and Iraq and has taken responsibility for murderous attacks in Europe and the United States. Trump, for example, declared in an interview that aired Sunday on 60 Minutes, “We’re going to declare war against ISIS. We have to wipe out ISIS.”
Trump offered few details on occasions he has spoken about ISIS — a vagueness that seemed redolent of candidate Nixon’s saying he had a “secret plan” for Vietnam.
But Nixon pointedly and publicly dismissed such a notion: In an article published March 28, 1968, in the Los Angeles Times, he was quoted as saying he had “no gimmicks or secret plans” for Vietnam.

“If I had any way to end the war,” Nixon was further quoted as saying, “I would pass it on to President [Lyndon] Johnson.” (Nixon’s remarks were made just days before Johnson announced he would not seek reelection.)

Now Nixon may or may not have had a “secret plan” in mind in 1968. But such a claim wasn’t a feature of his campaign. That becomes quite clear in reviewing the search results of a full-text database of leading U.S. newspapers in 1968, including the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Baltimore Sun, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, and Chicago Tribune.

The search terms “Nixon” and “secret plan” returned no articles during the period from January 1, 1967, to January 1, 1969, in which Nixon was quoted as saying he had a “secret plan” for Vietnam. (The search period included the months of Nixon’s presidential campaign and its aftermath.)

As I’ve noted several times at Media Myth Alert, if Nixon had campaigned in 1968 on a “secret plan” for Vietnam, the country’s leading newspapers certainly would have reported it.

The “secret plan” anecdote is likely derived from a speech Nixon made on March 5, 1968, in Hampton, New Hampshire, in which he declared that “new leadership” in Washington would “end the war” in Vietnam.

The wire service United Press International, in reporting on Nixon’s remarks, pointed out that the candidate “did not spell out how” he would “end the war.” The UPI account also noted that “Nixon’s promise recalled Dwight D. Eisenhower’s pledge in 1952, when Nixon was his running mate, to end the war in Korea.” Eisenhower was elected president that year.

A New York Times account of Nixon’s speech, published March 6, 1968, quoted the candidate as saying he “could promise ‘no push-button technique’ to end the war. Nixon also said he was not suggesting ‘withdrawal’ from Vietnam.” A brief follow-on report published in the Times that day quoted Nixon as saying he envisioned applying military pressure as well as diplomatic efforts in seeking to end the war.

A fine recent book about the tumultuous 1968 presidential election briefly takes up, and promptly dismisses, the “secret plan” claim.

The book, written by Michael A. Cohen and titled American Maelstrom: The 1968 Election and the Politics of Division, says:

“Though it is often claimed that Nixon spoke of a ‘secret plan’ to end the war, he never uttered those words. Even suggesting that he had a plan would have been too much for Nixon.”

WJC

 

More from Media Myth Alert:

, , , , , , , , ,

The campaign pledge Nixon never made

In Debunking, Error, Media myths, Newspapers, Quotes on July 10, 2016 at 9:31 am

When it comes to cynical campaign pledges, few top Richard Nixon’s assertion that he had a “secret plan” to end the Vietnam War, a plan he wouldn’t reveal while running for president in 1968.

Nixon 1968

What ‘secret plan’?

It’s a great story, quintessentially Nixon in its deceit and duplicity.

But it’s a claim Nixon never made.

Like many other media-driven myths, it’s a tale almost too good, and too delicious, to resist. (William Safire, a former Nixon speechwriter and columnist for the New York Times, periodically called attention to the “secret plan” myth, once observing: “Like the urban myth of crocodiles in the sewers, the [Nixon] non-quotation never seems to go away ….”)

Most recently, the bogus anecdote found its way into a USA Today article about campaign promises presidential candidates failed to keep.

The article, which was re-posted yesterday at the Web site of a New Orleans television station, declared, flatly:

“Richard Nixon, campaigning in 1968, claimed he had a ‘secret plan’ to end the Vietnam War.”

No source or citation was offered.

Nixon never touted a “secret plan” to end the war. In fact, he pointedly and publicly disavowed such a notion. In an article published March 28, 1968, in the Los Angeles Times, Nixon was quoted as saying he had “no gimmicks or secret plans” for Vietnam.

“If I had any way to end the war,” he was further quoted as saying, “I would pass it on to President [Lyndon] Johnson.” (Nixon’s remarks were made just a few days before Johnson announced he would not seek reelection.)

Nixon may or may not have had a “secret plan” in mind in 1968. But he did not make such a claim a feature of his campaign that year. That much is clear in reviewing the search results of a full-text database of leading U.S. newspapers in 1968, including the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Baltimore Sun, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, and Chicago Tribune.

The search terms “Nixon” and “secret plan” returned no articles during the period from January 1, 1967, to January 1, 1969, in which Nixon was quoted as saying he had a “secret plan” for Vietnam. (The search period included the months of Nixon’s presidential campaign and its aftermath.)

If Nixon had claimed during the 1968 campaign to possess a “secret plan” for Vietnam, the country’s leading newspapers surely would have publicized it.

It is clear that Nixon’s  foes tried to foist the “secret plan” calumny on him. For example, supporters of Democratic presidential candidate Hubert H. Humphrey took out a display advertisement in the New York Times on October 23, 1968; the ad included this statement: “Last March he said he had a secret plan to end the war.”

The ad included no reference to exactly when or where Nixon had made such a statement. And it carried the headline, “Trust Humphrey.”

The derivation of the “secret plan” anecdote can be traced to March 5, 1968, and a speech in Hampton, New Hampshire, in which Nixon declared that “new leadership” in Washington — a Nixon administration, in other words — would “end the war” in Vietnam.

The wire service United Press International, in reporting on Nixon’s remarks, pointed out that the candidate “did not spell out how” he would “end the war.” The UPI dispatch also said “Nixon’s promise recalled Dwight D. Eisenhower’s pledge in 1952, when Nixon was his running mate, to end the war in Korea.” Eisenhower was elected president that year.

The New York Times account of Nixon’s speech, published March 6, 1968, quoted him as saying he “could promise ‘no push-button technique’ to end the war. Nixon also said he was not suggesting ‘withdrawal’ from Vietnam.” A brief, follow-on report published in the Times that day quoted Nixon as saying he envisioned applying military pressure as well as diplomatic efforts in ending the war.

But Nixon wasn’t inclined to say much specifically about Vietnam. Michael A. Cohen writes in American Maelstrom, a recently published book about political upheaval in America in 1968:

“Nixon knew he had little to gain by talking about Vietnam. Doing so would give his opponents the ammunition with which to attack him; not doing so allowed potential supporters to believe whatever they wanted about his intentions. And if elected president he would enter office with no embarrassing campaign pronouncements to explain away.”

WJC

More from Media Myth Alert: