Summary of Jeffrey E. Garten's Three Days at Camp David

Everest Media

Description

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.
Sample Book Insights:
#1 When Nixon took office, America had been fighting for the past several years to defend South Vietnam from being taken over by the Communist regime of North Vietnam, which itself was supported by China and the Soviet Union. America’s goal was to make sure South Vietnam and its neighbors in Southeast Asia did not fall into the Communist camp.
#2 In his first two years in office, Nixon faced many challenges. He began working on arms control agreements with the Soviet Union and the opening of relations between the United States and China. But he would not produce any real breakthroughs until 1971.
#3 The New Isolationism was a negative congressional and public reaction to the tragic and unwinnable Vietnam War. It stemmed from the desire to bring back all troops stationed in Western Europe, as well as reduce American defenses abroad.
#4 Nixon knew that to keep isolationism and protectionism at bay and respond effectively to intensifying globalization, he needed to change America’s foreign policy.

Sujets

• 20th Century
• Histoire
• United States
• History

Informations

• Publié par: Everest Media LLC
• Date de parution: 23 juillet 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9798822546585
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Insights on Jeffrey E. Garten's Three Days at Camp David
Contents Insights from Chapter 1
Insights from Chapter 1

#1

When Nixon took office, America had been fighting for the past several years to defend South Vietnam from being taken over by the Communist regime of North Vietnam, which itself was supported by China and the Soviet Union. America’s goal was to make sure South Vietnam and its neighbors in Southeast Asia did not fall into the Communist camp.

#2

In his first two years in office, Nixon faced many challenges. He began working on arms control agreements with the Soviet Union and the opening of relations between the United States and China. But he would not produce any real breakthroughs until 1971.

#3

The New Isolationism was a negative congressional and public reaction to the tragic and unwinnable Vietnam War. It stemmed from the desire to bring back all troops stationed in Western Europe, as well as reduce American defenses abroad.

#4

Nixon knew that to keep isolationism and protectionism at bay and respond effectively to intensifying globalization, he needed to change America’s foreign policy.

#5

The foreign holders of dollars were especially concerned with the American inflation rate, which they believed was destroying the value of their dollars. In addition, the trade-offs between financing the Vietnam War and funding the Great Society programs worried them.

#6

The Nixon administration had two ways to quell inflation: raising interest rates and tightening the budget. However, the government was not willing to take any fundamental monetary or fiscal measures for trade reasons alone.

#7

By the end of 1970, it was clear that gradualism was a failure. Everything was going wrong. A recession was looming, while both inflation and unemployment were rising. The economy was experiencing stagflation, which meant that there was no solution to the problem.

#8

By the end of 1970, even Nixon’s Council of Economic Advisers was brutally frank about where the economy stood. In its February 1971 report, it said that the economy disappointed many expectations and intentions, and that the momentum of rising costs and prices was extremely powerful.

#9

The United States was obligated to exchange dollars into gold at $35 an ounce when asked to do so by foreign governments and central banks. The United States didn’t have enough gold to make the exchange, and a potential crisis was looming because the country didn’t have enough gold to make the exchange.

#10

The world of currency management at Bretton Woods was based on devaluations and revaluations, but only in exceptional situations and within rules and processes governed by the IMF. The more such fundamental shifts in currency values occurred, the more doubt was cast on the viability of the fixed exchange rates established at Bretton Woods.

#11

As 1971 began, America’s rising budget deficits and low interest rates produced larger balance-of-payments deficits, which meant more dollars were being sent abroad than coming in. The real problem had been in the capital account, where billions of dollars were being sent abroad by multinational companies, long-term investors, and short-term speculators.

#12

In 1969, the United States began to suffer from a major negative structural change in its trading position, which led to a decline in its merchandise trade surplus. This meant that the United States was losing dollars into the world economy with no end in sight.

#13

In May 1971, a crisis erupted in West Germany that involved everything that had been discussed in the previous chapters: loss of foreign confidence in the dollar due to inflation and drain on the merchandise trade balance, the pressure that private capital exerted on the value of currencies, and the dilemmas that foreign governments and central banks faced in defending their currencies.

#14

On May 4, huge amounts of dollars flowed out of the United States and the Eurodollar markets and into the Bundesbank, West Germany’s central bank. This was a sign that markets had more confidence in the West German currency than in the American dollar.

#15

The currency crisis was causing great difficulties for the German government. On May 11, Brandt wrote to Nixon saying that the crisis was causing his country great difficulties. On Monday, May 17, Paul McCracken, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, wrote Nixon that There is a widespread concern in Europe that we have no interest or concern about the international financial and economic system.

#16

In 1971, Richard Nixon led a team of men with diverse backgrounds and economic philosophies, who all had strong views about America’s role in the world and the dollar. They had to find a consensus that overcame several underlying tensions.

#17

Nixon was a president with incalculable power in foreign affairs and national security, but he also needed a broad base of support to act effectively. He was dealing with a world of independent central banks, countless finance ministries, and millions of traders, bankers, and investors.

#18

Nixon was a politician who was always looking out for number one, and he was very aggressive in his pursuit of it. He was very successful, winning the Republican nomination for president in 1960 and the presidency in 1968.

#19

Nixon’s goal was to replace the bipolar Cold War between the United States and the USSR by bringing China into the global power mix. He saw that the two Communist powers were hardly allies, but were instead deeply wary of one another.

#20

The Nixon Doctrine had strong implications for trade, as America would no longer tolerate the situation of its markets being more open to its trading partners than vice versa. America wanted the dollar to be weaker relative to the mark and the yen.

#21

Nixon had the ability to act alone in foreign policy, but not in economic policy. He felt that for Republicans, economics was not a winning issue because their conservatism was at odds with popular expectations of what government should do.

#22

Nixon was very concerned with avoiding a recession, and he was convinced that jobs equaled votes. He was opposed to mandatory wage and price controls, which he never tired of pooh-poohing.

#23