May 7, 1960
Washington, D.C.
It seemed all Vice President Richard Nixon had to do was sit back and watch while Kennedy and Humphrey battled it out in West Virginia for the Democratic vote. Nixon, the Republican heir apparent, got little news coverage. He was a lame-duck vice president in a lame-duck administration. No one took any interest.
To the public, Nixon appeared confident. But he was worried—not because of the Democrats. No, he was concerned Nelson Rockefeller might use the U-2 spy plane debacle to move a step closer to running for the GOP presidential nomination.
The Soviet Union had just announced that the spy plane pilot, Francis Gary Powers, was alive and uninjured. Apparently he had ejected and parachuted to safety.
In the pursuit of détente, Soviet premier Khrushchev said he’d consider releasing Powers—if Eisenhower apologized for the spy plane program. Otherwise, Powers would undergo a trial for espionage. Ike refused to issue a formal apology to the Soviet Union.
All this back-and-forth played into the hands of Rockefeller, a staunch anti-communist. Rockefeller was making speeches, blaming the Eisenhower administration for the rise of global communism—meaning the Soviet Union. He said communists were making inroads all over the world.
Rockefeller said the United States should form a Western Hemisphere economic union through the United Nations, and America should give NATO—the North Atlantic Treaty Organization—oversight of its nuclear arsenal. NATO was created after World War II, when the Soviets were installing puppet regimes in Eastern European nations that had been conquered by Germany. NATO was designed to halt the Soviet Union’s westward expansion. An attack on one of the NATO nations would be considered an attack on all of them.
Rockefeller insisted his speeches were not criticizing the administration. Journalists—and Nixon—were skeptical.
But Rockefeller had support. Some Republicans were pushing Rockefeller to jump into the race. They believed he was progressive enough, had enough charisma—and, more important, enough money—to counter a possible John F. Kennedy campaign.
Kennedy’s old man was rich, but his fortune was small change compared with the legendary Rockefeller wealth. And although Nelson’s last name had been synonymous with his grandfather John D. Rockefeller’s ruthless business tactics, later generations created major philanthropic institutions and movements, from the Rockefeller University (originally the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research) to the New York City community gardens movement.
Nelson had been an art collector and president of Rockefeller Center in New York City before he took his first federal job in 1940. He was a Republican in a Democratic administration, proof that he could work across the aisle—something the GOP could use in the 1960 presidential contest.
He was affable and poised, with a broad, international view, the popular choice of progressive Republicans. The “Let’s draft Rockefeller” rumors were for real.
One such movement had just begun in Maine. Attorney Henry Fuller, a Rockefeller classmate at Dartmouth College, placed a full-page advertisement in the Portland Evening Express calling for “Republicans anxious to draft Rockefeller” to write him letters to gauge their interest.
“I’ve had an excellent response,” Fuller said, adding, “You know as well as I do that Vice President Nixon has absolutely no appeal to the uncommitted vote…or the independent vote. No Democrat would ever vote for Nixon.”
Without support from these “swing voters,” it would be nearly impossible to win the presidency, he said. Fuller predicted that Republicans in other states would follow his lead.
Rockefeller was coy. When asked about his plans, Rockefeller said, “Dick Nixon has been a very good friend of mine for many years. He has done an absolutely superb job as vice president.”
But asked if he would support Nixon, Rockefeller simply stated he wouldn’t support any candidate before the convention.
Rockefeller was a problem, Nixon thought. But there was truth in what he said about the Soviet Union. Just look at Cuba. Fidel Castro was clasping hands with the communists. Nixon understood that was probably the only way Castro could save his regime, since the United States was on the verge of severing diplomatic relations with Havana.
But right now, the spy plane incident—and Rockefeller’s next move—concerned Nixon more than Castro or Cuba or anything else on the campaign trail.
Rockefeller and Kennedy belonged to different political parties. But both had been hammering the administration on the missile gap, saying the United States had failed to keep up with the Soviet Union.
They charged that the United States had fallen behind the Soviet Union on just about every front, including math, education, and science.
Kennedy promised a tough stance against the Soviet Union and international communism. The United States had not kept apace with the growing Soviet military. He warned of the Soviets’ growing arsenal of intercontinental ballistic missiles and pledged to revitalize American nuclear forces.
He proposed a range of programs to try to stop the spread of communism, including a buildup of conventional weaponry to give the nation’s military more flexibility.
Rockefeller was saying the same thing. Not a good sign for Nixon’s campaign. After all, he was part of the administration that was under fire from both sides.
Time and again, Eisenhower said there was no missile gap. But now he had to defend America’s spy plane program. This was a sensational development.
Ike said publicly he was upset over the Soviet reaction to the U-2 incident, insisting its mission over Russia wasn’t a “provocative act.” He said the United States needed to gather intelligence on Soviet weapons so they wouldn’t be caught by surprise. “No one wants another Pearl Harbor,” he said.
Nixon agreed with Eisenhower and defended reconnaissance flights over the Soviet Union. “The United States cannot afford any gap in its intelligence,” he said during a TV interview.
The vice president didn’t know how it would play out on the campaign trail. But he was confident that the American people would back Eisenhower.
Nixon just hoped that he could contain the fallout, and that Rockefeller would honor his promise to stay out of the presidential race.
But Nixon knew that in politics, anything could happen.