The Watergate Scandal - Essay Example

Soon things got worse forcing President Nixon to step down from office as President of the United States. Apart from resignation of President Nixon on August 1972, the scandal also led to the indictment, trial and imprisonment of 43 accomplices most of whom were administration official of President Nixon2. This paper will explore the Watergate Scandal from the buildup, the scandal, the end, and the aftermath. The Watergate scandal is said to have originated from the hostile political environment of the 1960s general elections3.

This is attributed to the fact that by 1972 when President Richard Nixon was seeking for his reelection as president of the United States as republican candidate, the country was already deeply divided internally as a result of the Vietnam War of 1955to 1975. Because of the harsh political environment, Nixon and his henchmen found it prudent to employ forceful campaign tactics in order to be able to sabotage his opponent, particularly his challenger Gerald Ford, the then democratic candidate4.

The aggressive campaign strategies used by Nixon and his advisers included what later emerged as an illegal spying. This is after the evidence gathered at the scene revealed that some member of Nixon’s re-election committee (CREEP) broke into Watergate building, the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee on May 1972 stealing copies of confidential documents and then bugged the phones in the office. Mark Feldstein reveals that despite having stolen the DNC’s top-secret document, the wiretaps stolen could not work properly forcing the burglars to return to Watergate headquarters on 17 June of the same year.

5 However, this time round the burglars came with new microphone, but before they could break in, one of the security guard called Frank Willis saw a piece of tape wrapped on the locker of the door leading into the stairwell. Willis quickly removed the tape oblivious of water was happening. However, since he suspected that something was a mess, he rushed to the telephone and called the Metropolitan Police who came to Watergate few minutes later and began conducting a thorough search in the building6.

It is then that the police realized that all the doors leading to stairwell of the sixth floor had been taped in a similar manner7. Investigation also revealed that the Democratic National Committee had rented the entire sixth floor. The police officers then began moving from one office to the next in the entire sixth floor with arsenals drawn8. No soon had they entered the offices Stanley Grieg, of Deputy Party Chairman than a man came out from his hiding place and surrendered to the officers pleading not to be shot.

Subsequent searches led to the arrest of five men in the offices all wearing surgical gloves and business suits. A team of investigators learnt that the main purpose for the break-in by the burglars was to bug Lawrence O’Brien, the DNC chairman’s offices and get files related to their campaign strategy that might help republicans in the forthcoming presidential elections9. Investigators also found out that the burglars had all booked suits fictitiously at the Watergate Hotel. The police officers also conducted a search in their rooms and in DNC offices in which $5,000 numbered as $100 bills was found plus