Right, that's massive propaganda by Nixon. Under Bretton Woods, the dollar was unassailable UNLESS there was massive (monetary) inflation.
And there was inflation to pay for Vietnam and the Great Society projects.
Note he said, that they were temporarily suspending convertibility into gold. There was nothing temporary about it.
That is because the FED printed more paper dollars than they had gold in order to monetize the Johnson "guns and butter" debt, and then tried to go around the world and buy stuff like they were redeemable gold certificates, and got caught out when the gold reserves were raided by currency speculators who knew what the FED was doing. The FED is basically a counterfeiting operation. It produces money without any tangible redeemability.
When the gold exchange windows was closed, that unbacked the dollar and unilaterally ended Bretton Woods.
Then you'll notice prices rose in the 70s following the end of Bretton Woods in '71 iirc, followed by recession, a period known as "stagflation", which was a phenomenon mainstream economists (but not smart ones like the Austrians) thought was inconceivable. Rising prices AND unemployment. You see, government economists and policy, are lead by the false premise that high prices are necessary to create employment. Stagflation refuted this position. But they still follow the same policies today anyway, because it is politically expedient. They know it doesn't work, but it keeps them in power, and paid by lobbyists. But I digress.
As much shit as economically ignorant liberals give Reaganomics, Reagan backed Paul Volcker and the FED when they took interest rates up around 20% to recapitalize America. This was so unpopular politically, that Congress wanted to impeach Volcker, but without that recapitalization, the 90s tech boom years and Clinton budget surpluses would never have been possible.
They could do the same thing today to bail out the dollar. But with real unemployment already around 20%, and America the world's largest debtor as opposed to when it was the largest creditor circa 1980, and currently insolvent bank balance sheets, taking rates that high would basically choke out the economy. We're talking credit card interest rates around 50% for consumer debt. Goodbye retail and service economy.
So what they are doing is running out line like when you're fishing. They're letting the dollar go long and slow, because politically, there will be riots if rates go to 20% and millions more people lose their homes, cars and businesses. It would be the right thing to do, but it is political suicide.
And the politicians know it. They are masters of self-preservation.