The Nixon Doctrine (also known as the Guam Doctrine) was put forth in a press conference in Guam on July 25, 1969 by U.S. President Richard Nixon. He stated that the United States henceforth expected its allies to take care of their own military defense, but that the U.S. would aid in defense as requested. The Doctrine argued for the pursuit of peace through a partnership with American allies.

In Nixon's own words (Address to the Nation on the War in Vietnam November 3, 1969):

The doctrine was also applied by the Nixon administration in the Persian Gulf region, with military aid to Iran and Saudi Arabia. According to author Michael Klare, application of the Nixon Doctrine "opened the floodgates" of U.S. military aid to allies in the Persian Gulf, and helped set the stage for the Carter Doctrine and for the subsequent direct U.S. military involvement of the Gulf War and the Iraq War.

Both Nixonians and Contrarians argue that the Guam Doctrine may have masked other needs, intentions, and motives.^{[citation needed]} Nixon was president when a resolution of the Vietnam War was essentially mandatory due to growing public opinion in favor of withdrawal; A Gallup poll in May showed 56% of the public believed sending troops to Vietnam was a mistake. Of those over 50, 61% expressed that belief, compared to 49% of those between 21 and 29, even if tacit abandonment of the SEATO Treaty was ultimately required, resulting in a complete communist takeover of South Vietnam despite previous US guarantees.

Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913 – April 22, 1994) was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961.

Nixon was born in Yorba Linda, California. After completing his undergraduate work at Whittier College, he graduated from Duke University School of Law in 1937, and returned to California to practice law. He and his wife, Pat Nixon, moved to Washington to work for the federal government in 1942. He subsequently served in the United States Navy during World War II. Nixon was elected to the House of Representatives in 1946 and to the Senate in 1950. His pursuit of the Hiss Case established his reputation as a leading anti-communist, and elevated him to national prominence. He was the running mate of Dwight D. Eisenhower, the Republican Party presidential nominee in the 1952 election. Nixon served for eight years as vice president. He waged an unsuccessful presidential campaign in 1960, narrowly losing to John F. Kennedy, and lost a race for Governor of California in 1962. In 1968, he ran again for the presidency and was elected.

Christopher Eric Hitchens (13 April 1949 – 15 December 2011) was an English American author and journalist whose career spanned more than four decades. Hitchens, often referred to colloquially as "Hitch", was a columnist and literary critic for New Statesman, The Atlantic, The Nation, The Daily Mirror, The Times Literary Supplement and Vanity Fair. He was an author of twelve books and five collections of essays. As a staple of talk shows and lecture circuits, he was a prominent public intellectual, and his confrontational style of debate made him both a lauded and controversial figure.

Hitchens was known for his admiration of George Orwell, Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson, as well as for his excoriating critiques of various public figures including Mother Teresa, Bill Clinton, Henry Kissinger and Diana, Princess of Wales. Although he supported the Falklands War, his key split from the established political left began in 1989 after what he called the "tepid reaction" of the Western left to the Rushdie Affair. The September 11 attacks strengthened his internationalist embrace of an interventionist foreign policy, and his vociferous criticism of what he called "fascism with an Islamic face." His numerous editorials in support of the Iraq War caused some to label him a neoconservative, although Hitchens insisted he was not "a conservative of any kind", and his friend Ian McEwan describes him as representing the anti-totalitarian left.

Ronald Wilson Reagan ( /ˈrɒnəld ˈwɪlsən ˈreɪɡən/; February 6, 1911 – June 5, 2004) was the 40th President of the United States, serving from 1981 to 1989. Prior to that, he was the 33rd Governor of California from 1967 to 1975 and a radio, film and television actor.

Born in Tampico, Illinois and raised in Dixon, Reagan was educated at Eureka College, earning a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics and sociology. After his graduation, Reagan moved first to Iowa to work as a radio broadcaster and then in to Los Angeles in 1937 where he began a career as an actor, first in films and later television. Some of his most notable films include Knute Rockne, All American, Kings Row, and Bedtime for Bonzo. Reagan served as president of the Screen Actors Guild, and later as a spokesman for General Electric (GE); his start in politics occurred during his work for GE. Originally a member of the Democratic Party, his positions began shifting rightward in the late 1950s, and he switched to the Republican Party in 1962. After delivering a rousing speech in support of Barry Goldwater's presidential candidacy in 1964, he was persuaded to seek the California governorship, winning two years later and again in 1970. He was defeated in his run for the Republican presidential nomination in 1968 as well as 1976, but won both the nomination and general election in 1980, defeating incumbent Jimmy Carter.

George Corley Wallace (August 25, 1919 – September 13, 1998) was an American politician and the 45th governor of Alabama, having served four nonconsecutive terms: 1963–1967, 1971–1979 and 1983–1987. After four runs for U.S. president (three as a Democrat and one on the American Independent Party ticket), he earned the title, "the most influential loser" in 20th-century U.S. politics, according to biographers Dan T. Carter and Stephan Lesher.

A 1972 assassination attempt left Wallace paralyzed, and he used a wheelchair for the remainder of his life. He is remembered for his Southern populist andsegregationist attitudes during the desegregation period, convictions that he renounced later in life. Wallace said that he did not wish to meet his Maker with unforgiven sin.

The first of four children, Wallace was born in Clio in Barbour County in southeastern Alabama, to George Corley Wallace, Sr., and the former Mozell Smith. He was the third of four generations to bear the name "George Wallace," but as neither parent liked the designation "Junior", he was called "George C." to distinguish him from his father, George, and his grandfather, a physician. Wallace's father had left college to pursue a life of farming when prices were high during World War I; Mozell had to sell their farmland to pay existing mortgages when George, Sr., died in 1937. Like his parents, Wallace was a Methodist.