A 40 year old Nixon becomes the POTUS in 1954

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Richard "tricky dick" Nixon was the american President from '69 to '74, and many threads discuss what could have happened if he had won the 1960 presidential campaign

That being said, here come I with another question, since he was Einsenhower VP, let's assume Einsenhower dies somehow on his first year and Nixon becomes the youngest american president to date, how he rules? How he reacts to the crisis of the 50s like the launch of the Sputnik? Can be get reelected? How would his legacy be seen today?
 
Indochina War 1954?
Pro-Triple Alliance during Suez?
Intervening in Hungary?

More pro-Civil Rights at home after Brown comes down?
 
Wasn't Nixon a hardcore Anti-Communist in the early 50's?

I imagine that the Cold War would start significantly hotter in this ATL
 

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Eisenhower did have a serious heart attack in September of 1955. If he hadn't survived that, Richard Nixon would've become President 14 years earlier than IOTL.

NIXON IN 1955
Suez Crisis - probably takes a pro-British stance if not a neutral stance; in private, Nixon had said that betraying the British and French was not the right thing to do.
Hungary - probably a similar stance to Ike, strong denunciations but little else. The US wasn't going to start World War III over Hungary.
1958 Recession - much more aggressive response, probably some sort of 'We Are All Keynesians Now' speech and probably pump priming the economy

Civil Rights - stronger response to Civil Rights than under Ike. Probably a stronger 1957 Civil Rights Act (possibly passed in 1958 and with more political capital put into it, there'd likely be no 1960 Civil Rights Act). Possible he'd go for a Voting Rights Act after the 1960 Election. Probably more of a colourblind approach to Civil Rights rather than Affirmative Action.
Cuba - Nixon in '54 either butterflies the Cuban Revolution entirely or butterflies its success. In the event that it does succeed, the US will intervene in a fairly short amount of time (probably before the 1960 Election to improve Nixon's public image).



1956 Election - Nixon vs. Stevenson: Nixon wins by similar margins to Ike. He'd be less popular than the man who was the engineer of the Normandy landings, but he would have the sympathy vote.

1960 Election - I don't think JFK would run against an incumbent, likely LBJ, HHH, or Stevenson get the nomination. Nixon would likely win due to the stronger economic response, enacting a CRA, and defeating Communism in Cuba.
 
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Eisenhower did have a serious heart attack in September of 1955. If he hadn't survived that, Richard Nixon would've become President 14 years earlier than IOTL.

NIXON IN 1955
Suez Crisis - probably takes a pro-British stance if not a neutral stance; in private, Nixon had said that betraying the British and French was not the right thing to do.
Hungary - probably a similar stance to Ike, strong denunciations but little else. The US wasn't going to start World War III over Hungary.
1958 Recession - much more aggressive response, probably some sort of 'We Are All Keynesians Now' speech and probably pump priming the economy

Civil Rights - stronger response to Civil Rights than under Ike. Probably a stronger 1957 Civil Rights Act (possibly passed in 1958 and with more political capital put into it, there'd likely be no 1960 Civil Rights Act). Possible he'd go for a Voting Rights Act after the 1960 Election. Probably more of a colourblind approach to Civil Rights rather than Affirmative Action.
Cuba - Nixon in '54 either butterflies the Cuban Revolution entirely or butterflies its success. In the event that it does succeed, the US will intervene in a fairly short amount of time (probably before the 1960 Election to improve Nixon's public image).



1956 Election - Nixon vs. Stevenson: Nixon wins by similar margins to Ike. He'd be less popular than the man who was the engineer of the Normandy landings, but he would have the sympathy vote.

1960 Election - I don't think JFK would run against an incumbent, likely LBJ, HHH, or Stevenson get the nomination. Nixon would likely win due to the stronger economic response, enacting a CRA, and defeating Communism in Cuba.

Yep have notes for a Space timeline with the premise that Ike's wife gets into a car accident when taking him to the hospital and he dies on-scene.

My only quibble is possibly Cuba as initially Castro wasn't clearly a Communist which is why Ike and the US kept hands off. While Nixon didn't LIKE Castro personally at first the revolution had popular support in the US which Nixon would have to take into consideration. The other problem was that it WAS popular and well supported in Cuba itself and the chances are that any US intervention, (keep in mind our conventional forces at the time were still pretty anemic and to really push things would probably require either allies, which is where a more supportive stance during Suez might come back to help out, or we may have withdraw forces from Europe to get it done which is not going to go over well) is likely to be a quagmire pretty quickly.

Randy
 
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