VATICAN II AND THE COLD WAR 47Paul VI in December 1967 to persuade the pope not to speak out
against U.S. policy in his New Year’s address.48 Paul VI seemed to
respect Johnson’s integrity, but this was not the case with Presi-
dent Richard M. Nixon. Vietnam continued to be the backdrop
for the pope’s strained relations with the United States.
In February 1970, Nixon visited Italian leaders in Rome. He
then planned to see Paul VI, but was informed that the pope was
on retreat. On March 2, 1970, while he was still in Europe, Nixon
made a special trip back to Rome to see the pope. Rumors circu-
lated that the president was about to establish some type of for-
mal relations with the Holy See. Despite assurances from a White
House aide that Nixon was not planning to establish diplomatic
relations, the president reinstituted the office of personal repre-
sentative that had existed from 1939 to 1950 and named Henry
Cabot Lodge, former ambassador to South Vietnam and his run-
ning mate against Kennedy and Johnson in 1960. Lodge present-
ed his credentials to the pope in July 1970.49
In September 1970, Nixon again paid a visit to the pope, but
this time their conversations did not seem cordial.50 Vietnam re-
mained a bone of contention. Sometimes, indeed, the pope seemed
almost friendlier to the Soviet Union than to the United States.
In November of the same year, Andrei Gromyko, the Soviet for-
eign minister, had an eighty-minute audience with the pope, the
duration of which prompted Il Tempo to chide the pope for show-
ing more warmth to Gromyko than he had to Nixon earlier in the
year. 51
It would be erroneous, however, to conclude that either
John XXIII or Paul VI was soft on communism—and therefore
anti-American. Beyond the quest for peace, both popes had to
- Joseph A. Califano, “The President and the Pope: L.B.J., Paul VI, and the
Vietnam War,” America, no. 165 (October 12, 1991): 238–39. - New York Times, July 4, 1970.
- Ibid., September 16, 1970; September 27, 1970; September 29, 1970.
- Ibid., November 13, 1970; November 16, 1970.