Becoming a “Good Nixon Doctrine Country”: Political Relations between the United States and Singapore during the Nixon Presidency

The Nixon Doctrine, which devolved US troops from direct involvement in Asian conflicts but gave priority to military sales and economic assistance, was considered by some commentators to be an inefficacious foreign policy approach that did little to serve US interests in Asia during the Cold War. Using Singapore as a case study, this article demonstrates that Richard Nixon's foreign policy approach improved US‐Singapore relations significantly from 1970 onwards. After a period of flirtation with the Soviet Union during 1968–72, Singapore came to be labelled a “good Nixon Doctrine country” by the US government in 1973. Through the sale of US military equipment and economic assistance, Singapore and the US cultivated bilateral ties that endured after the withdrawal of American troops from Vietnam in 1973 and the fall of Saigon two years later.