On 15 August 1971 Nixon's New Economic Policy suspended dollar–gold convertibility, added an import surcharge, and froze wages and prices. FRUS Volume III, the State Historian milestone, and the Nixon Library almanac document Camp David's deliberate package and the Smithsonian-to-1973 float sequel—managed end of Bretton Woods, not accidental gold panic.
On 15 August 1971 Richard Nixon went on television and announced a New Economic Policy package that suspended the dollar's convertibility into gold for official holders. Public framing cast the move as defending American jobs, fighting inflation, and protecting the dollar from “international money speculators.” The FRUS compilation, the State Historian milestone, and the Nixon Library almanac show something colder and more deliberate: a Camp David weekend that closed the gold window, added a temporary import surcharge, and froze wages and prices—managing the end of Bretton Woods fixed rates as bargaining leverage, not as an accidental gold panic.
The System Under Strain
Bretton Woods pegged foreign currencies to the dollar and the dollar to gold at $35 an ounce for official holders. By the late 1960s an overseas dollar overhang pressed against U.S. gold stocks. Kennedy and Johnson stopgaps had already failed; the State Historian milestone treats that brittleness as inherited, not invented in one August weekend. Convertibility was the political promise that made the peg credible. Closing the window broke the promise on purpose.
Official Posture: The Challenge of Peace
Nixon's televised address—“The Challenge of Peace”—sold domestic wage-price controls and tax measures beside the international acts. Speculators took the villain slot. Ending the postwar monetary order did not. Domestic election-year economics and Vietnam-era peace rhetoric shaped the speech. Foreign-policy principals were sidelined from the Camp David room so the monetary surprise would not leak or be softened before airtime.
FRUS 1969–1976 Volume III collects the foreign-economic and international-monetary file. The volume summary frames Camp David origins and the consultation scramble afterward. Document 168 is the editorial note on the secret Camp David meetings of 13–15 August 1971 and the NEP package: suspend gold convertibility, impose a 10 percent import surcharge, cut foreign aid, freeze wages and prices. Document 165 records an 11 August Nixon–Shultz conversation on sequencing—close the gold window and use a temporary border tax as bargaining tools toward negotiation—not as improvised panic.
Aftermath on the same milestone timeline: the G-10 Smithsonian Agreement in December 1971 tried new fixed rates around a devalued dollar; further 1973 pressures ended the fixed-rate system in favor of floating. Smithsonian did not “save” Bretton Woods permanently. The wage-price freeze was real domestic politics, but gold window and surcharge—not the freeze—were the external levers of the international story.
From Window Closure to Float
Closing the gold window was the convertibility break; it was not the last chapter. Smithsonian in December 1971 rebuilt temporary fixed rates around a cheaper dollar and a surcharge bargain. Those rates did not hold. A second devaluation in February 1973 and the March 1973 joint float ended the fixed-rate experiment in practice. Readers who stop at the television address miss the bargaining sequel FRUS and the State Historian insist on. Watergate belongs in separate captions from the 1971 monetary decision—the spine here is Camp David and the gold window, not every Nixon scandal title stacked beside it.
Why the Story Stayed Managed
Unilateral shock maximized bargaining leverage with allies. Keeping State and NSC out of the Camp David monetary room reduced dissent and leak risk. “Speculators” language reassigned blame away from U.S. policy choice. Goldbug conspiracy that Nixon secretly ended gold so bankers could print forever sits beyond FRUS's NEP and bargaining record. Single-villain “Connally destroyed the world economy” framing and overnight-hyperinflation causation claims skip the 1971–73 negotiation timeline. Nixon, Connally, Shultz, Burns, and Volcker appear by FRUS roles and document numbers.
Monetary-Order Siblings
Later Plaza and Louvre-era managed floats sit downstream of the floating-rate world this shock helped create. Archive finance neighbors—LTCM, 2008 ratings—are later leverage and crisis politics under that floating order. Shared theme: official management of systemic monetary stress. Different decades and tools.
Date discipline: Camp David 13–15 August 1971; NEP address evening of 15 August 1971; Smithsonian December 1971; second devaluation February 1973; joint float / effective end of fixed rates March 1973.
Domestic Freeze Versus External Lever
The wage-price freeze was real domestic politics and a real EO trail, but it was not the international so-what. Allies felt the gold-window closure and the import surcharge as bargaining instruments. Connally's public briefings sold toughness; FRUS Doc 165 shows the private sequencing debate days earlier. The documentary frame is managed policy shock—beside later floating-rate crisis politics, not beside every Watergate title. Camp David tension and the gold-window bargain are the spine; gold-standard primers and scandal adjacency lists without that tension are not.
Milestone Beside FRUS
The State Historian milestone is the public-history door; FRUS documents are the primary contemporaneous trail. Read them together: the milestone compresses Smithsonian and 1973 float; Doc 165 and Doc 168 show the weekend's deliberateness. The public address sold defense of the dollar; the FRUS sequence shows surprise used as a bargaining instrument toward negotiation with allies.
What the Paper Trail Settles
Settled on the documents: a deliberate Camp David NEP package; gold-window suspension as the convertibility break; FRUS sequencing debate before the weekend; Smithsonian attempt and 1973 float on the State Historian timeline. Overclaim to refuse: accidental panic folklore; permanent Smithsonian rescue; freeze-as-main-story; printing-forever conspiracy beyond the bargaining record. Officials said they were defending the dollar. The packets show they were managing the exit from Bretton Woods—and choosing surprise as the instrument.
