The Search for Détente: Nixon and the Ford Transition

Abstract

Richard M. Nixon, in assuming the presidency in January 1969, inherited a body of Cold War policies that had changed little since mid-century. To discourage feared Soviet expansionism in Europe, successive administrations, with variations in language and style, had sustained the precepts of containment as they proclaimed the country’s adherence to NATO. To protect the non-European world against Communist encroachment, U.S. officials sustained the nation’s undying opposition to Communist-led governments and movements everywhere, as manifestations of the Kremlin’s expansive power. That said, Nixon informed the nation, “In light of the recent advances in bilateral and multilateral negotiations involving the two countries, it has been agreed that a meeting [between the leaders of the United States and the Soviet Union] will take place in Moscow in the latter part of May 1972.” A new era of arms control had begun, one that focused on attempts to limit, and eventually, to reduce strategic nuclear weapons systems—one that lasted until the end of the Cold War.