President Lyndon Johnson and Soviet Communism

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This major new study fills a significant gap in the academic literature on the Cold War by considering President Lyndon Johnson's policy towards the Soviet Union. The author examines the attitudes of Johnson and his leading advisers toward the Soviet leadership, taking into account the effects of Moscow's growing splits with Beijing, the impact on US-Soviet relations of nuclear issues, the Vietnam War, and clashes over Cuba, the middle East and Eastern Europe. The author's research is based on detailed scrutiny of archives in Britain and in the United States, as well as recently published document collections. His study examines also the President's personal leadership qualities, concluding that his presidency did more significantly in the direction of superpower détente. Attention is drawn, however, to important defects of Johnson's leadership, with the author concluding that he is rightly remembered for his mistakes in Vietnam, rather than for his success as a peacemaker with Moscow. Therefore, while devoting two chapters to the Vietnam War, the book constitutes a major contribution to the growing literature on President Johnson's foreign policy 'beyond Vietnam'. The book will be of interest to students of the Cold War, the Johnson Presidency and of US foreign relations.