LBJ Runs & Wins in 1968?

First, is it feasible? What would it take to dampen opposition to LBJ's Vietnam policies within the Democratic party? Let's go with the minimum possible change there, so the Vietnam war doesn't become the only focus.

Second, what would he have done differently from Nixon in his new term? Vietnam? Space program (Does he still keep putting political capital behind it? What shape does it take? More moon missions--at least the planned series through Apollo 20? Maybe restarting Saturn produce--my understanding is that the halt in 1967 was supposed to temporary--for a continuing series of moon mission? Maybe a moon base of sorts--one was proposed using modified Apollo hardware?) Domestic policy?

And, of course, spin-offs. Who would oppose him? Presumably Nixon. Would another defeat end Nixon's career or would he somehow land on his feet and run in 1972? Who does run in 1972? Humphrey? Bobby Kennedy (who hopefully wouldn't have been assassinated)?
 
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The most important thing that LBJ would need is an ego transplant. If he had stuck to his original position of limiting American presence in Vietnam to military advisers and told the South Vietnamese that they had to fight the North Vietnamese and get their act together, there would be fewer protests. And Johnson would be in a much better political position in 1968. Nixon would probably sit out 1968, but Wallace would still go third party.

RFK would then endorse Johnson's reelection in spite of their mutual personal feelings toward each other.

An LBJ victory in 1968 means that Republicans will most likely tack back Congress or get very close to it. After 12 years of Democrats in the White House, the country will be ready to turn to the Republicans. Very likely, the GOP nominates Nixon because that party always nominates the person next in line. Despite his popularity with the conservative wing of the Republican party, Governor Reagan most likely defers to Nixon.

In a close race, Nixon/Bush defeats Humphrey/Bayh in 1972.
 
The most important thing that LBJ would need is an ego transplant. If he had stuck to his original position of limiting American presence in Vietnam to military advisers and told the South Vietnamese that they had to fight the North Vietnamese and get their act together, there would be fewer protests. And Johnson would be in a much better political position in 1968. Nixon would probably sit out 1968, but Wallace would still go third party.

RFK would then endorse Johnson's reelection in spite of their mutual personal feelings toward each other.

I concur w/you.

Another question to ponder is, does President Johnson live until 1/20/73 or does something happen (or not happen) during his '68 re-election campaign or 2nd full term to bring on a fatal heart attack?

If Nixon is the GOP nominee in '68 I look for Reagan to get the nod in '72. If he doesn't and runs in '72 I give him the edge against Reagan for the nomination. If Nixon is nominated in '68 and loses, he will not be the nominee in '72.

Humphrey (either as VP or as POTUS) will almost certainly be the Democratic Party nominee in '72. If he loses, then I imagine that RFK would run in '76.

Regarding the space program between 1969 & 1973, I believe that LBJ would continue to put significant political capital behind it. I also think that the program would look very much like OTL. Any real changes (better or worse) wouldn't be noticeable until after LBJ has left office.

As a POD that enables LBJ to win in '68 will need to occur in late 1966 and will result in a different "roadmap" for the Vietnam War, one that the American public - especially the youth - can either embrace or at least tolerate (or not rebel against), the social/cultural butterflies of TTL will become evident immediately.
 
Getting into the outermost fringes of ASB in my view. I was 16 in '68, and remember it well. Johnson was cordially despised by a sizable fraction of the voting population, to say nothing of youth. Further, although (only [?]) 60 at the time, after about '66 he aged very rapidly. When he took office in '63 in Dallas, he was a healthy (reasonably) middle-aged man. By '68 he looked and sounded old beyond age 60; I'd bet that physiologically he was at least in his early 70s. Remember he didn't live long after leaving office; I suspect the strain of continuing as president might have proven fatal.

That's presuming he could even be nominated and elected. Combine a gargantuan ego that wouldn't take advice from anyone, a snake oil salesman wheeler-dealer attitude, and the extant repugnance felt by a large fraction of the electorate and it's a recipe to rip the Democrats apart. Had he insisted on running, perhaps the Chicago convention would have gone multiple ballots and very likely split, with McCarthy as a "peace Democrat" nominee. Humphrey would have been the odd man out; as good a soldier as he was, I don't think he could have sat still for another term as Johnson's VP. You're looking at essentially a three way split among the Dems (assuming Wallace still counts as one at this point), pretty much ensuring Nixon's victory.
 
in 1968 Johnson was tire to be President.
He wanted stay with his Family and watch his grandchild grew up
But there is Very interesting quote attributed to Johnson, was something like this:
If i had knew what this Tricky Dick (Richard m. Nixon) was up to, i had run again for President!

So what was Richard m. Nixon up to ?
He sabotage the Vietnam Peace negotiations, to defame the Democrats during US President election.
with help of the diplomat Henry Kissinger, the future National Security Advisor under Nixon

I don't know if this quote is real from johnson
but that Richard m. Nixon was tempering with the Vietnam Peace negotiations, is a Fact.
it would nice POD, were Johnson figure it about Robert Nixon / Henry Kissinger connection and decide to run for President again.
 
I think he can pull a Trumanesque upset. He would probably stop the bombing earlier than OTL, and unlike Humphrey would go for Nixon's throat when it was found Nixon was illegally trying to provoke the war. There won't really be a peace candidate then, which will have interesting effects on the turnout.

He won't smoke anymore, but even so the stress of the Presidency leads me to highly doubt he'll survive his term, so Humphrey will most likely become POTUS. Reagan v. Humphrey in 1972. Now Reagan is an unpolished conservative, who comes across as a Goldwaterite much more than in 1980. But he also has 12 years of fatigue. I think Humphrey can win, but it ultimately depends on what happens in LBJ's second term and when he dies. For instance, Humphrey will go to China, and Reagan will condemn it and look like a fool. LBJ won't go to China, but will probably end the war similarly to Nixon, but earlier. Humphrey might have to finish ending the war though. Also, Bobby is still alive, which is quite significant. If Humphrey wins in '72, he won't run until 1980, otherwise he could win in '76 or '80.
 
I'm mostly with LaSalle except that LBJ would be nominated relatively easily in the pure mathematical sense because Dick Daley would crowbar him in. Plus given his crap health he'd have almost certainly died in office by 1971 latest. One of his greatest fears was becoming a 25th case like Wilson- literally had nightmares about it.

Vietnam: You'd need to change the strategy.

If we handwave and IMO, use ASBs to reelect LBJ then I don't see much of a policy shift. Especially domestically. He told his staff that he and Congress had worn each other out and that they wouldn't respond to him anymore, a new POTUS was needed to get things through.

HHH is the Dem nominee in 1972, he loses to Reagan. RFK runs in '76 or '80 depending on how successful Reagan is as POTUS.
 
I've run across something that may help LBJ win:

The Nixon-Agnew campaign recieved half a million dollars from the Greek dictatorship.
http://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/issues/98apr/lbj.htm said:
At this charged moment in the campaign Elias P. Demetracopoulos, a Greek journalist who had fled Athens in 1967 after the colonels' coup, provided the President with a chance to damage, if not sink, Nixon's campaign. Demetracopoulos had learned that Greece's military dictators had funneled more than half a million dollars into the Nixon-Agnew campaign. He gave this information to Larry O'Brien, Humphrey's campaign manager. Demetracopoulos urged O'Brien to put this potentially incendiary news before Johnson; CIA Director Richard Helms, Demetracopoulos said, could confirm its accuracy. O'Brien took the story to the President, but Johnson, according to what O'Brien told Demetracopoulos, refused to act on it. He would neither ask Helms to investigate the report nor leak it to the press should it prove to be true. Johnson wanted something to use against Nixon if the Nixon Justice Department started to comb the Johnson Administration for scandal, and Nixon's Greek connection would serve that purpose handsomely.

And of course, there's always the fact that Nixon sabotaged peace talks by promising South Vietnam he'd get them a better deal than Humphrey would. While revealing that would risk revealing the secret means by which the information was acquired (wiretaps and bugs), that could also be something LBJ could use to take down Nixon.
 
Personally, I don't think it's ASB for LBJ to win in 68, but it's extremely dificult. I imagine if LBJ believed he could win, then he'd run.

If LBJ goes for the nomination, the odds are better than even that he'd get it at the convention. However, this will mean Mccarthy or Mcgovern will split and go third party.

You'd probably need multiple scandles to blow up in Nixon's face and a major Nixon stumble for LBJ to win in these circumstances. Having said that, I think that an LBJ/Nixon match-up would be one of the dirtiest races in modern times-and you can rest asured that LBJ would be on the lookout for anything scandelless he could pounce on. Is there any chance the Agnew Scandles could come out in the 68 campaign? This would discreddit Nixon by asociation, calling his judgement into question.

So basically, it'd probably take the perfect storm for LBJ to win.

I'm not sure if he dies in office actually. It's logical to assume that, given the increased stress he'd be under as president for another term, but I remember hearing somewhere that after his term had finished, he pretty much went into self-destruct moad, which is less likely to happen if he's still in power. I think it's more likely that he dies in office, but when is anyone's guess.

If LBJ dies and Humphrey is the encumbent in 72, he probably beats whoever he's up against, but if LBJ is still alive, I think the election would tilt to the republicans.
 
I don't think that Johnson is anyone's favorite president, for a long list of reasons, but he was incredibly effective at getting legislation through Congress, and he was a major supporter of the Apollo-era space program.

I've thought about the challenge and done some reading. I think Johnson could have won the Democratic nomination if he had handled the Tet offensive more effectively. Actually, a lot of the blame for his failings should fall on Westmoreland. He got outmaneuvered by the Viet Cong and North Vietnam--gearing up to keep them from taking a major US base near the frontier while they geared up to assault the cities. He had ample intelligence to see the real Tet offensive coming. He also didn't clearly tell Johnson that the Viet Cong were gearing up for a maximum effort.

In the spring of 1968, the US public still generally supported the war, though people who lived through that time like to pretend they were against it all along. It was a fragile support, contingent on progress. Nobody, right or left wanted to keep pouring lives and treasure into Vietnam indefinitely.

Minorities on the left and right did oppose the war, on the left because it looked like pointless bullying of what should be a natural US ally against China and on the right because it seemed immoral to send US kids to die in a war with so many arbitrary restrictions on their ability to fight.

Johnson and his advisers were ambiguous about the war. Johnson didn't want to be involved--thought it was a pointless drain, but he didn't want to be the president who "lost Vietnam." That was political suicide given the cold war rhetoric of both parties since the late Truman administration. A large part of the American electorate was convinced that "International Communism" was an enemy on par with the World War II Axis and we were losing the cold war. People who didn't live through the period view that as fringe belief, but from what I gather from talking to people who were adults at the time, much of the electorate held it, both Republicans and Democrats, and it tied Johnson's hands.

So: Let's say Westmoreland figures out what the Viet Cong are up to, pulls significant US forces back into the cities and Tet is either aborted/delayed or is much less effective. Support for the war seeps away through 1968 instead of dropping sharply.

Johnson win handily in New Hampshire and gets the Democratic nomination. Whatever his other traits, Johnson was hardball campaigner. He could position himself as the lesser of two evils to anti-war Democrats. Would they risk a Nixon presidency by supporting a third-party bid? Some might, but I suspect most wouldn't.

At that point, you end up with another four years for LBJ, assuming he lives. What does he do with them? Almost certainly starts pulling troops out of Vietnam, does Vietnamization. Probably does not go into Cambodia. Probably continues Apollo at least through Apollo 20 and possibly into the Apollo applications stuff (improvised short-stay moonbases, among other things) unless opposition to the war cuts his political power.
 
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Personally, I don't think it's ASB for LBJ to win in 68, but it's extremely dificult. I imagine if LBJ believed he could win, then he'd run.

If LBJ goes for the nomination, the odds are better than even that he'd get it at the convention. However, this will mean Mccarthy or Mcgovern will split and go third party.

You'd probably need multiple scandles to blow up in Nixon's face and a major Nixon stumble for LBJ to win in these circumstances. Having said that, I think that an LBJ/Nixon match-up would be one of the dirtiest races in modern times-and you can rest asured that LBJ would be on the lookout for anything scandelless he could pounce on. Is there any chance the Agnew Scandles could come out in the 68 campaign? This would discreddit Nixon by asociation, calling his judgement into question.

So basically, it'd probably take the perfect storm for LBJ to win.

Agnew's illegalities didn't come to light until Watergate was already well under way as a scandal / crisis in the Nixon presidency. I don't doubt for a minute that Johnson would have had the FBI probing discreetly to see what if anything could have been dug up on the Republicans in OTL, so I can't see a different result here.

I agree that this would likely be one of the nastiest, lowest, crotch-kicking campaigns in history--worse than '64 for the two majors going against each other, and both of the majors getting downright vicious against the third "peace" party. Funny, though, how nobody seems to think that it might have been 1948 all over again in that a four-way race could have resulted. Is there a tacit assumption that Wallace would have stayed in line and supported Johnson?
 
I'm mostly with LaSalle except that LBJ would be nominated relatively easily in the pure mathematical sense because Dick Daley would crowbar him in. Plus given his crap health he'd have almost certainly died in office by 1971 latest. One of his greatest fears was becoming a 25th case like Wilson- literally had nightmares about it.

Vietnam: You'd need to change the strategy.

If we handwave and IMO, use ASBs to reelect LBJ then I don't see much of a policy shift. Especially domestically. He told his staff that he and Congress had worn each other out and that they wouldn't respond to him anymore, a new POTUS was needed to get things through.

HHH is the Dem nominee in 1972, he loses to Reagan. RFK runs in '76 or '80 depending on how successful Reagan is as POTUS.

What was your scenario for A Land of Milk and Honey again RB? I think LBJ served two terms in that TL as well.
 
He was certainly arrogant but not enough to guarantee Nixon's election. Wallace runs no matter what. One offshoot of an LBJ nomination is no McGovern-Fraser but eventually both parties democratize under public pressure. By 1968 Daley's machine is the only one that's still functional and once he's gone it shrinks back into a purely state/local role.
 
He was certainly arrogant but not enough to guarantee Nixon's election. Wallace runs no matter what. One offshoot of an LBJ nomination is no McGovern-Fraser but eventually both parties democratize under public pressure. By 1968 Daley's machine is the only one that's still functional and once he's gone it shrinks back into a purely state/local role.
That's what I thought, but I don't pay too much attention to McCarthy.
 
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