No Vietnam War: Johnson runs for re-election in 1968

Presuming that the US involvement in Vietnam remains at the 1963 level or, at the very least, that US combat troops are not dispatched to South Vietnam in 1965 and later years, how would the 1968 election go?

Without Vietnam, LBJ's path to the Democratic nomination would likely be as smooth as in 1964, but there would still be the backlash against the civil rights movement and legislation. How good would Johnson's chances for victory be, and what might the electoral map look like?
 
Presuming that the US involvement in Vietnam remains at the 1963 level or, at the very least, that US combat troops are not dispatched to South Vietnam in 1965 and later years, how would the 1968 election go?

Without Vietnam, LBJ's path to the Democratic nomination would likely be as smooth as in 1964, but there would still be the backlash against the civil rights movement and legislation. How good would Johnson's chances for victory be, and what might the electoral map look like?

Surprised on one responded to this, I can't comment on the amp but I think his chances are likely as the Republicans specifically Nixon) won on an anti-war platform and I don't thin going against Civil Rights would be helpful for them.
 
Very importantly, Bobby Kennedy does not run in 1968 and lives. Maybe RFK is elected President in 1976 and/or 1980.
 

Deleted member 92121

Without Vietnam to tarnish Johnson's term, coupled with the democrats not destroying themselves in the 1968 DNC with fights between Humphrey and McCarthy, LBJ would certainly win. Without the war his term would be seen in a very positive light.
 
If Johnson's biggest reason for declining to run in '68 was Vietnam, then he probably gets roped into running for another term, and he probably faces Nixon. And he probably wins, albeit by a slimmer margin than in '64. Nixon quietly goes away, Vietnam winds down (and if Diem gets deposed, maybe there's a South Vietnam.)

This also averts a big reason for American distrust of the government - no Watergate. I can't imagine the Dems winning in '72; America will have had about enough of them for the time being, but one has to wonder who runs in '72 for the GOP (probably beating Humphrey.) Reagan wasn't ready for the Presidency and is probably too conservative for a VP pick unless the GOP sees him as a ticket-balancer. I'd go with James Rhodes out of Ohio with either Reagan or Rockefeller as his VP.

Rhodes wins and gets re-elected in '76, but the economy still goes to hell, and if the Iran hostage crisis happens much like OTL, the 80s are ushered in with moderate Democrats, law and order, a War on Drugs, and probably less dramatic tax cuts. Perhaps the 80s are marked with more focus on mental health, especially if John Hinckley Jr. still shoots the President but fails to kill him.
 
The problem is that the American public at the time was fairly hawkish on Vietnam before the TV crews went in and the casualties began to mount, which means that Johnson would be under a lot of pressure to do more to support the South Vietnamese, with Republicans and even some Democrats inferring that he is making the same kind of mistake Truman made with China and putting all of Southeast Asia in jeopardy by holding back. Conversely the Great Society will get proper funding, but if foreign policy is the big issue going into the '66 Midterms and the '68 Presidential Election, especially if South Vietnam seems on the verge of falling to communism if not fallen, then Johnson is probably going to be in as hard a spot as he was historically.
 
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