The New York Times BestsellerA shocking and riveting look at one of the most dramatic and disastrous presidencies in US history, from Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award winner Tim WeinerBased largely on documents declassified only in the last few years, One Man Against the World paints a devastating portrait of a tortured yet brilliant man who led the country largely according to a deep-seated insecurity and distrust of not only his cabinet and congress, but the American population at large. In riveting, tick-tock prose, Weiner illuminates how the Vietnam War and the Watergate controversy that brought about Nixon's demise were inextricably linked. From the hail of garbage and curses that awaited Nixon upon his arrival at the White House, when he became the president of a nation as deeply divided as it had been since the end of the Civil War, to the unprecedented action Nixon took against American citizens, who he considered as traitorous as the army of North Vietnam, to the infamous break-in and the tapes that bear remarkable record of the most intimate and damning conversations between the president and his confidantes, Weiner narrates the history of Nixon's anguished presidency in fascinating and fresh detail. A crucial new look at the greatest political suicide in history, One Man Against the World leaves us not only with new insight into this tumultuous period, but also into the motivations and demons of an American president who saw enemies everywhere, and, thinking the world was against him, undermined the foundations of the country he had hoped to lead.

Author's Note 1Chapter One "A great, bad man" 5Chapter Two "This is treason" 16Chapter Three "He was surrounded by enemies" 27Chapter Four "He will let them know who is boss around here" 36Chapter Five "The center cannot hold" 43Chapter Six "Madman" 58Chapter Seven "Don't strike a king unless you intend to kill him" 73Chapter Eight "A pitiful, helpless giant" 79Chapter Nine "An unmitigated disaster" 88Chapter Ten "Only we have the power" 102Chapter Eleven "We're not going to lose this war" 113Chapter Twelve "It's a conspiracy" 124Chapter Thirteen "I can see the whole thing unravel" 134Chapter Fourteen "It is illegal, but . . ." 142Chapter Fifteen "Night and Fog" 153Chapter Sixteen "From one extreme to another" 163Chapter Seventeen "This is the supreme test" 172Chapter Eighteen "Palace intrigue" 187Chapter Nineteen "We have produced a horrible tragedy" 201Chapter Twenty "A hell of a way to end the goddamn war" 218Chapter Twenty-One "You could get a million dollars" 229Chapter Twenty-Two "Vietnam had found its successor" 246Chapter Twenty-Three "The President of the United States can never admit that" 263Chapter Twenty-Four "The same enemies" 280Chapter Twenty-Five United States v. Richard Milhous Nixon 295Epilogue 315Judgments 319Acknowledgments 321Notes 325Index 357