Lordy, what a misreading of history
Anyway, he shouldn’t have lied, but at least he cared enough about his country to resign.
Nixon resigned because Ford agreed to pardon him. Otherwise, he was headed for prison. The misuse of the presidential power to pardon has led to a lot of miscarriages of justice. (Ford pardoning Nixon; Bush pardoning Weinberger, North, et al; Clinton pardoning Rich; etc)
At the time, the communist were threatening to take over the world, and they had to be stopped.
By the early Sixties, the Sino-Soviet split was obvious and Tito's Yugoslavia had gone its own way. The communist threat to "take over the world" was hyped, like Reagan's bloviating about the Nicaraguan Sandinistas being only two days march from our southern border.