Biography:Another biography of Richard Nixon - and this time by Conrad Black, who one might have thought would have been so preoccupied with his upcoming trial that producing a work of this dimension could not have been contemplated.
But Lord Black of Crossharbour is nothing if not dogged and he reportedly wrote up to 200 pages a week of this tome in the run-up to the trial. Perhaps it helped him compartmentalise the legal proceedings and carry on as if nothing much had changed.
Whatever his reasons, this is a monumental piece of work. Black has for years been a historian of some merit, particularly on military matters. He recently turned his attention to US politics and he makes it abundantly clear that he has read widely. Four years ago, he produced a biography of Franklin Delano Roosevelt which was thoroughly researched, eminently readable and well written. This book is just as good.
At more than 1,000 pages, it is the culmination of exhaustive research. It displays a wide-ranging knowledge of US politics. It is quite superior to the wholly negative Arrogance of Power, by Anthony Summers, which came out three years ago. The author does, though, like to demonstrate his wordsmith credentials and often cannot resist using three words where one would have sufficed. And some of his adjectives are simply showing off: "Jackie Kennedy created a brobdingnagianly serene myth" of the JFK presidency. Dean Swift would not approve. But the book's principal failing (and not everyone would see it as such) is that it is unashamedly partisan. Richard Nixon, according to Black, was much more sinned against than sinner.
While the book is a commendable one-volume biography of, perhaps, America's most controversial president, it acknowledges that Vietnam and Watergate are the issues for which Nixon is chiefly remembered. Vietnam turned many of the American people and much of their media against Nixon, just as it had done to Lyndon Johnson. Nixon genuinely thought he could end the war within a year of being re-elected in 1972 but did virtually nothing for the first year and then wondered why it had worsened. He eventually pulled out the troops, much too late, and it was in this weakened standing that Watergate did for him, hounding him out of office. But in the eyes of the author, Watergate was no big deal. Nobody, he says, "got hurt or got rich" because of Watergate and most of what has been written about it "is self-serving claptrap".
This is disingenuousness on a grand scale. As Black himself reminds us, the Watergate burglary owed its origins to Nixon's determination to put together a team of rogue employees who would use whatever means necessary to investigate leaks - hence the "plumbers" tag. This team would carry out tasks that the law- abiding FBI refused to do and it moved swiftly from being a defensive arm of the White House tracking down leaks to being an offensive weapon authorised to instigate any dirty trick against opponents that occurred to its members. It gave rise to the Howard Hunt/Gordon outfit which burgled Watergate to put taps on the telephone of the chairman of the Democratic Party. There is absolutely nothing in Black's re-telling which suggests that the burglary was contrary to Nixon's wishes and why would there be? Nixon himself, as the tapes demonstrate, ordered dirty tricks on political opponents as a matter of course.
ON VIETNAM, ACCORDING to Black, Nixon inherited "an utterly hopeless war" but got peace with honour rather than the peace on any terms that the Democrats were prepared to settle for. Certainly George McGovern, Nixon's hapless and inadequate opponent in 1972, campaigned for unconditional withdrawal, but Lyndon Johnson, whom Nixon succeeded in 1968, would have driven a hard bargain. Had Johnson succeeded in ending the war, it would, of course, have been a boost for Nixon's opponent, Hubert Humphrey. So Anna Chennault, co- chairwoman of Republican Women for Nixon, persuaded her close friend, South Vietnam's President Thieu, to stay away from Johnson's peace conference. Consequently Vietnam suffered more years of bloodshed, devastation and death.
Nixon does deserve credit for the skilful way he, finally, pulled the US out of Vietnam. His foreign policy was sure-footed and imaginative, although Americans were left waiting for a long time to see any real benefits from the opening up of China which captured so many headlines. He was also committed to civil rights from very early on and worked to end desegregation. Black however offers the opinion that "he, more than anyone, engineered the downfall of Joe McCarthy". That is not supported by the facts. If any one man deserved credit more than others it might be Ed Murrow who, in his CBS documentary attacking McCarthy (and Eisenhower, who wouldn't take him on), said "we cannot defend freedom abroad by deserting it at home", or perhaps Senator William Fulbright, the only senator with the courage to vote against funding for a McCarthy subcommittee.
Nixon, the author says, "got where he did by climbing, falling, climbing again, never ceasing to struggle". No argument there. But Black either ignores or considers inconsequential the fundamental flaws in Nixon's character which manifested themselves from his very entry into politics and persisted right through his career. He was by no means on his own but he cheapened politics and dishonoured the presidency. Black argues that his subject "achieved as much as any US president since Lincoln except perhaps for Roosevelt and Eisenhower". That's really stretching it but the reality is that Nixon had the intelligence, the skills and the instincts to actually be one of the best and he blew it.
There are interesting Nixon assessments of his rivals, some of which owe their origin to conversation with the author. Nixon considered JFK a mediocre president and something of a con artist but got on well with him. Bobby Kennedy he thought of as a "vindictive hypocrite and fanatic". Teddy was "a weak character of no particular talent". He could not understand why all the Kennedys betrayed their admirable wives and behaved "like oversexed pigs". He liked Gerald Ford but disliked his undignified insistence, post- presidency, on taking large speaking fees; Nixon never took a fee. Carter was a decent man but Nixon found his sanctimony insufferable. Reagan was hag-ridden and naive but he envied his charmed political life. Bill Clinton was a "waffler", Hillary a "subversive robot".
And what of Conrad Black? The book's dust cover informs us that he "divides his time between London and Toronto". Not any more he doesn't; passport confiscated, he is not allowed budge from Chicago until November 30th when Judge Amy St Eve will hand down his custodial sentence. Then, presumably, he will start working on his appeal. He will, no doubt, dwell on that great Eisenhower quote about D-Day: "the cost of victory may be high but the price of defeat is everything".
A LOVER OF journalism, if not of journalists, and a generally benign proprietor, who arguably saved the Daily Telegraph from closure. Innocent of the charge of racketeering (ie perpetrating a succession of frauds) and of tax evasion but guilty of fraudulently receiving $3 million in person and, much worse in the eyes of the law, of obstruction of justice. An intelligent, learned man and a practising Catholic, who was very rich by most people's standards but who suddenly wanted more, much more.
And a man who believes he was entitled to take what he did. A man who still believes in his innocence and who believes that his fate is a travesty. Some similarities with his subject? In a recent article in the Guardian publicising this book, Black wrote: "It's not clear that Nixon had any criminal intent. He had gone, the hate would fade away and the subject of the hate would become a matter first of forgetful indifference, then mystery, then guilt . . . He would torment the national conscience that had tormented him and that had been roused to an Old Testament destruction of his career". In his book, Black comments that Nixon, when writing about other leaders, was often, actually, writing about himself. He's not the only one.
If Black gets the 10-year sentence that is being talked about, he might distract himself again with a further political biography. If it's as good as this one, it will be worth waiting for.
Eoin McVey is a managing editor of The Irish Times
Richard Milhous Nixon: The Invincible Quest By Conrad Black Quercus, 1,152pp. £30