On April 9, 1973, President Richard M. Nixon, James B. Stockdale, Gen. Brent G. Scowcroft, and White House photographer met in the Oval Office of the White House from 3:31 pm to 4:39 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 891-004 of the White House Tapes.
Transcript (AI-Generated)This transcript was generated automatically by AI and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Do not cite this transcript as authoritative. Consult the Finding Aid above for verified information.
Well, we're going to have, as you know, we're going to have the other thing delivered.
We did not accept the White House party until May 20th.
Yes, sir.
I was wondering, sir.
And I talked, of course, to a lot of people.
About a couple months after everybody was back, you know, everybody, I think there's very few legs again.
And your, you and your wife will come.
You'll be at a party?
Yes.
I'm presently taking on your sort of briefing program.
I don't know quite how that could be worked out.
Maybe on ships.
Never have them outside the lawn.
But, uh, that will be a, you know, it'll be a testamentary of what else can be.
And then we're going to have, Bob Hope will be the emcee, but we're going to have the Greatest Stars and all the others.
So you'll have, it'll be fun.
But I want to see all of them, all the officers and men and their wives and their, their wives and their mother and their children and what is.
And so we're looking forward to that.
The only, as a matter of fact, I have not
except for a couple who have been here on tour, the only ones I have seen who have done it for Christ's sake.
It's all in the plan.
It's a goal beyond that.
And I look at the leaders, I'm sure I think you will, and I appreciate this opportunity.
I'll tell my grandchildren about it.
You were a California Republican, a young fellow, I think a George Bond?
Sure.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, his dad and my brother were in the history.
And I know the farm.
I don't know.
I don't know what he was.
But he lived as a little boy.
It was by a farm.
Yeah, yeah.
In Illinois.
Yes.
Where was the farm?
There we are.
Oh, I know the farm.
The first airplane that ever came to Knox County was flown in there by George Bond's dad in 1917 when he was a pilot.
And we had picture postcards of my grandmother and George.
George's dad and my mother standing up on the surf.
We had a whole sea amount of people working through the whole county that converged on the farm to save us money.
So how about it?
Well, give it my best.
I, uh, still look forward to seeing you at 24th.
Make sure to see the view if you see the darkness out here.
That's the, uh, that's the, uh, the rose garden with the tulips around it.
Well, this is the very peak of the season for Toronto, Washington.
OK.
Wow.
Welcome.
Nice to see you.
How are you, too?
Yes.
Well, I'll do that.
All right.
That's great.
That's great.
I was thinking, Sean, over here, there's a picture of Ollie and then what else is there?
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
Well, we, all of us around here, of course, really, we
but also a way that you and your colleagues have survived.
And I think it surprised a lot of those that wanted to see the program be better than all the rest.
I think also that it gave the American people rather something that they hadn't had in a very small world.
Feeling pride even more, and a certain joy.
I know what you went through, and I think, of course, it's worth it.
I suppose it's worth it, too.
I'll say that you survived, but you came back.
I don't think you came back, but you went.
You really do.
Yeah, I know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
There was all of that.
All of that time.
It came down to the law.
We worked solitarily for over four years.
That's the part of it.
I stood, I talked to him.
I didn't rest with him.
They were only
Right.
Right.
It's amazing the amount of human resources those people were willing to spend to prevent fellow waiters from having contact with other people.
Yeah, they're very, very suspicious.
I was going to say, who did you ever see here?
Yes, and he was the first to have a record.
Yes, well, there's some political studies.
There's a great work on the 13th.
No, I haven't heard of it.
I mean, I think my...
They're...
What are the complications for being a monthly party?
He said they're only normal.
I think he was telling me the truth.
I don't think he was really spoiled.
I have to be 17 years old to do that.
have enough intellectual capability to understand that there is not necessarily a deviation.
You have to be selfless.
It's not the moral of life, but it's to be selfless.
But before you move on, there's a need that you have to be a man like most other people.
And they take this quality as an objective reality.
And only Americans, and I think most Westerners, don't really address that point too much.
Because in your gang out there, you've got your one man as the dog.
You know, we say they're only 10% of the population.
That's the 10% of the company.
They're the leader class.
They're the leader.
Yes, yes.
And the guys that stand out are good.
Yes, sir.
I think so.
And so they, of course, another thing that we've had to our disadvantage is the fact that
I don't know how many of them have been in prison, but I think most of them have.
At least the majority have spent maybe eight or ten years in prison.
And they know the value of organization.
They know how to beat prison systems.
And they knew how damaging it was to get prisoner in cooperation with one another, the unified action against them.
And so these men were much higher than the people who were really working with us.
But their instructions to me, though,
where those are pretty widely available.
And I think we can tell it.
I say that because I read it in the first quarter.
There's a further analysis for it that's very interesting.
I read it all the time, probably in about one time.
I'm not sure about the children, but it was just one of many.
And it was that this particular one was going to be
the documentation of lectures given or talks given at a banquet for old communists.
And they were reviewing their experiences as prisoners together on the French.
And they were tingles of old suckers were.
And they were given at a banquet for old communists.
And they were reviewing their experiences as prisoners together on the French.
And they were tingles of old suckers were.
And they were .
So that was the last .
So that was the last .
It's .
His belly is your personal area.
You often find it out too.
You often find it out too.
There's a lot of people also too.
There's a lot of people also too.
And your wives, your wives.
That is a great deal.
Your wife is a great deal.
Your wife purses.
One of the really outstanding leaders, yes.
of the really outstanding leaders in the U.S. And I think you were also, of course, an outrageous person.
And I know this for a fact, the other day, the papers made a great deal out of one call I got to give back.
And I think you were also, of course, I know this for a fact, some other school, too, the other day, the papers replaced the insurer.
And I said, great deal out of one call I got to give back.
What was the average proportions of the mass?
I'm 100% sure.
So I think as far as these .
I was amazed.
But what was the average proportions?
It's just really remarkable what they have done.
I'm 103.
So I think as far as, you know, every Christmas, every Christmas, I went through four of them.
It's amazing.
I mean, I'm sure there are going to be problems.
I try to go in, you know, and share, knowing very well, you know, I knew what the facts were, and I know that we were just really reminded of what they had done and how they were almost impossible situations that they should have been in.
You know, every Christmas, every Christmas, we have two or four of them.
Yes.
I tried to put a 3-D promise in it, except that we were trying.
And we wanted to say what we were going to do.
There was something more.
By the way, you know, I shared a lot of the fact.
And knowing very well, you know, I knew the particular facts were, and I know that we were dealing with almost impossible situations.
That, uh, kind of peace group saying, well, if we don't help her, it's not the other thing.
And, you know, we did it personally.
No, I mean, we would have dated Rice, but we promised that, except that we were trying to do it for, well, someone.
And, uh, we remember, I remember having to, you know, want to say what you were going to do.
He had something more, you know, easier.
I'm a very big fan of yours.
And particularly with the peace group, saying, well, if you don't offer this and the other thing, then you wouldn't.
It of course wouldn't.
No.
We would have paid a price.
Well, so long to be remembered.
She's a very big fan of yours.
She's so proud of the picture.
She's sitting in these two chairs watching her.
The picture's taken in front of the magazine.
It's framed in her.
And she is a very...
both so happy with the way things worked out.
I did not think from the other side, you could really pull it out.
I, I, I thought that...
I was afraid, I gave 50-50 odds that we would have to dribble out in some manner through the weak P-stick operation.
This was going to really pull us through the small end of the horn.
We were going to have all sorts of problems in camp.
We and the leadership were going to have to make it to sea.
That was going to be very difficult because some people would be competing to go, others would be
It would have really been a morale problem.
Everybody thought the war was over, and so forth and so on.
I had been making it over, and so forth and so on.
I had been making it a mess.
It was Christmas, and I meant to be home, yes.
And I thought it was weird, too, like you're right, all those people, it was Christmas, and I meant to be home, yes.
And I thought it was weird, too, like you're right, all those people, it was terrible, you know, they're not much to help.
But I felt that that fight,
that we had to find out, and we tried everything else to agree and we tried everything else, and so, and, uh, early on, they not much of a help, but I felt that that fight, that we had to find out, and we tried everything else to agree and we tried everything else, and so, and, uh, the, uh, abusing the 52 was something I felt the same, because...
The, uh, abusing the 52s was a big amount to say, because... Tom Harkin and Holmes Holmes said, we're going to have some substantial losses, okay?
Because I said, what are they for?
He said, look, what in the devil are they for?
We only lost one after that.
We're going to have some substantial losses, okay?
Because I said, what are they for?
He said, look, what in the time we're lost?
I said, look, you're going to have to send them in.
I don't think they would have come.
No, I don't.
You'd still be there.
What do you think?
I think so.
You're right.
They told me to put it there.
I do recognize them.
Yes, the difference in the sound.
Yes, the bombs.
I don't think they would have come.
No, I don't think so either.
What do you think?
I think so.
You're right there.
apartment, about half of us committed that they had to be B-52s.
And then when we... Do you follow us on the phone?
Oh, yeah.
We were... We got a confirmation from other people in other parts of the country.
Did you recognize the difference in the sound?
Yes.
After the first night of our apartment, about half of us committed that they had to be B-52s.
And then when we got a confirmation from other people in other parts of the world that they'd seen them, and when they saw them, when they'd seen them in the globe, the bombs, and I think they'd seen one of them in the end.
When they'd seen them in the globe, the bombs, and I think they'd seen one of them in the end.
I think it's kind of a wonderful thing to watch.
And that is really a new dimension.
And one of the things I've been watching is the structure of the gene.
We were probably just really a new dimensionally in line from the bacteria.
So that's maybe how I talk to them now, either to improve the genetic structure.
We were probably coming out of a blame zone.
And a lot from the invasive bacteria.
So that's maybe how I talk to them now.
So they were using them.
And they said they were using a pretty new radar on us at the point that I think he indicated that those terrorist impacts were on the highway.
We felt very safe.
We couldn't be hit.
And the ground shakes.
The doors rattle.
It's just at that point that I think he indicated that those terrorist impacts were on the highway.
We felt very safe.
We couldn't be hit.
Yes, I do think so.
They were.
that the ground shakes, the doors rattle, the modeling, you know, it's just...
It must have shaken them to their ideas.
They were very...
They probably thought it was more of a con than we would probably go for civilians.
Yes.
You may have heard...
I didn't pick one, so...
They were... That's a little bit... You may have heard...
The time you ever need.
The time you ever need.
The time you ever need.
And, of course, he protested against us.
We had to do our best.
And, of course, he protested against us.
We had to do our best.
He wanted us dead.
He wanted us dead.
He wanted us dead.
He wanted us dead.
He wanted us dead.
Another thing that helped us is a curious thing that you know.
Probably here.
Another thing that helped us is a curious thing that you know.
Probably here.
History is getting wild.
You and I are kicking around for a petition.
Even our friends from the Chicago Tribune.
Nobody in this office in history is getting wild.
You and I are getting like this all the time.
And the Los Angeles Times and...
kicking around for this.
Even our friends from the Chicago Tribune came out against the 52 thing on the ground.
Yeah, they came out for it for a reason.
It's all the time.
And the Los Angeles Times and the New York Times came out against the 52 thing on the ground.
Yeah, they came out for it for a reason.
You would understand.
And they now will admit that they came out against it.
Because they'd say, why doesn't the president go on and explain why we're doing it?
Well, now, anybody that had a brain would know that the moment I had a fight going on and said, we're boxing with B-52s for the purpose of getting the enemy to negotiate, they would never negotiate on that.
You couldn't say that.
We had to say it, in fact.
At that point, we wanted to quit the resolution.
And so we had to give them that.
What we did, we privately told them.
Let me just continue.
We had to take it against the students.
You would understand.
And they now will admit that they've won.
They came out against it.
Because why doesn't the president go on and explain why we're doing it?
Anybody with half a brain would know that the moment I had a fight going on and said we're boxing with B-52s for the purpose of getting the enemy to negotiate, they would never negotiate on that trip.
You couldn't say that.
We had to say it in fact.
At that point, we wanted to put the resolution.
And so we had to give them that.
What we did, we privately told them that.
Let me just continue.
We had to take a guess at what we were doing.
Also, at the moment, we decided we were going to have to leave the market out there.
But all over the world, we were doing it.
Also, at the moment, we decided we were going to have to leave the market out there.
All over the world, I heard Dyself, I heard Dyself, I heard Dyself, I heard Dyself, I heard Dyself, I heard Dyself,
and so on and so on and so on and so on and so on and so on and so on
He believed it.
Do you agree with that?
Yes, I do.
Not that I want it.
No, but you can't be affected in the way it's done.
They've got to make their energy just a little bit for itself.
They necessarily are eating before they decide to go out and before they shut down.
Some of these game theory books are more than less.
Do you agree with that?
Yes, I do.
Now, the real strength lies not in the control of the situation, but in either the loss of control or the commitment or the appearance of it.
You can't be affected in the bargaining before the desired reports are under control.
This is a kind of an interesting concept to me when I read it, and it certainly applies in this case.
Before I was shot down, some of these games vary virtually from one to the other.
You can't make a credible threat if you have all your bets hedged, and they know you have paid.
Real strength lies not in the control of the situation, but in either the loss of control, or it just doesn't deter people as long as they can read you.
And the commitment, or the appearance of losing control, this is a kind of an interesting concept to me when I read it, and it certainly applies in this case.
You can't make a credible threat if you have on your bedstitch and they know you're that bitch.
It just doesn't deter people as long as they can read you and they know exactly how far you're from there to go.
You know, I know exactly how far you're from there to go.
You know, I was reading, and I've had very little time to read.
I was reading, and I've had very little time to read since I've been home, but I did take the, since I've been home, but I did take the, okay, okay, to read some of the Eric Connors comics last week.
To read some of the Eric Connors comics last week.
And I would say that even your critics, and I would say that even your critics, I read a couple of columns about you.
So who were not critical of you at all in this case?
So I just want you to know that the Friday and the Saturday, who were not critical of you?
And in both cases, he mentioned you at all.
the Vietnamese had learned that they couldn't get away with treason.
And in both cases, in the fact that he's now, the Vietnamese had learned the position that they couldn't get away with treason.
And in the fact that he's
The phrase was faint, but it was your sight, but it was seamless and unmistakable.
That he, as I suppose it would be in the war, said that we gained certain things and we had taught those things.
But it was, but it was, uh, unmistakable that he, so I think that history, uh, will treat that with regard.
Let me ask you this, uh, as I suppose a critic of the war, said that we gained, uh, what certain things, and we had talked to friends of people who had questions, and we'll, uh, I think that, you know, so I think that history will treat that with
Let me ask you this, looking at the present situation.
As you know, we're having a very rocky time.
Let's face it, the South, given the names, after what we've given them, my God, it's the biggest army in Asia now, except for the Chinese, of course.
And they can fight.
They've proven it in several places, in analog and so forth.
Sure, people say, well, our bombs haven't done it.
But on the other hand, unless you've got people on the ground that can hold it, they can't hold it.
They'll leave it wrecked.
But all the air power in the world, we've got that.
So these little guys on our side are guys, little guys too, they can fight now.
They've got the wherewithal to do it.
And I think they can.
I want to raise this to tell you that this is something that we have to be doing.
Now, the other point I want to raise,
with you is, is that I, and you've heard about the talk of the aid to the non-contentious.
And if you all, you know, the torture and all the other things, a lot of people are going to say, well, let me say that under no circumstances will I ask for it unless they comply with the agreement.
But if they do comply with the agreement, if, for example, they withdraw from the House, withdraw from Cambodia, and reduce the infiltration,
then we will go for a program, not for the purpose of rebuilding, but for the purpose mainly of having a strain on other than the threat of military to see them on the edge.
And I would hope that...
the leaders could see the necessity.
I see the necessity.
I don't, the American people are against it.
They have their very horrible things that have happened.
And I understand what you see.
There is this, in order to conduct foreign policy, you need to carry the stick now.
The stick now.
They figured it was not a white thing to be used.
They didn't know that they had to go pretty far before we would get out.
They expected that because of the American reluctance, you know, the American people in the Senate and all the rest of it.
They didn't care about that.
It's the aid.
Now, they began to guess things.
and reconstructions and so forth uh that you can say that now yes i think they just again i'm only talking to prison authorities and they're not a very representative group but i could sense that they were really quite anxious to to get that ready
In the last weeks, in the new era, America will be helping us rebuild.
And this, if I can judge maybe 25, they all seem to be quite enraptured with this idea of receiving this great American aid.
And so maybe that is a, maybe it does have a great national value,
central committee, but to the people in the country.
They just can't be thinking and continuing to fight for it.
No, I think they have to look inward.
I don't see how they can go on.
So anyway, when will it be?
When will we know?
When will we know the thing?
When will we define the circumstances?
They have to apply.
I really don't know.
I would say that we're looking at something in a matter of months.
And once this time has been established, then you will have to call on the Congress to appropriate funds for this.
That's right.
We'll go to Congress and say, we ask for appropriation of a certain amount of money.
We'll ask for a name, a basis, a court system.
The Senate, I think that's the best.
That's right.
You know, it had to do with this, and they said no, it has to be very, very good, so no aid at any certain time.
They said no aid unless it's approved by the Constitution.
Of course, we're not going to approve the Constitution, but we're going to approve the Constitution.
But the U.S.A. is extremely important to the event, if they're not in a good position.
We'll wait.
We'll wait.
We'll wait.
We'll wait.
We hope that, just hope that God, now for your information too, we're working on other channels so we can admit this.
We're breaking our views and all of that, but our views belong to both the Russians and the Chinese to the extent that either or both of them want better relations with us.
It's going to depend a great deal on whether they are restrained in their resistance to one of the actions.
Well, you certainly may.
We have tried.
We have made.
And they have indicated that they're willing to be of assistance.
But in all this, it's hard to know us.
But aren't we of the means?
There are quite a few kinds, yes, such as we all knew.
They're the most primitive, the most vicious, ruthless.
And they're self-centered.
I really believe that this propaganda lab, they're doing it.
They're making the decisions.
I really believe they're a proud group of people.
And I don't believe they, I know they would accept by rushing technical, by using the science and so forth.
But we saw no evidence.
You know, one thing that might be interesting, you know, one of the things that I've trained with that person that was of the highest value, I thought, thank God they never, you know, put two and two together.
In the Gulf of Texas in the fall of 1964, there were three major air operations.
One was the PT boat in the daytime.
One was the PT boat in the night.
And one I would call the major raid on the B&I water refinery on the 5th.
There was also a raid on the 9th.
But I led all three of those raids, particularly the one of the night actions on the 4th, which was the justification for the raid on the 5th.
I might admit that there was press on that.
And if they had known that I had been on those flights, they could have really made a whole lot.
I had a thing on it for the United States.
Because I know what they can do with me and what they can't do with me.
You see, whether or not there were boats out there tonight, the fourth is up for grabs.
There were three airplanes overhead.
And two of them were flown by myself, who was my leader, and my classmate, Wesley Donald, who was found, and I had both of them flushed back.
And basically, and after we got back to the ship that night, we had a little chat, and we couldn't say for sure we'd seen any roadways out there.
There had been a destroyer.
We'd seen their wakes, and we'd fired our gun and dropped our, or that's where they said dropped it, and they claimed it happened.
Boats attacking here and there.
We spent, I think, two hours out there on a rainy night.
Couldn't say for sure.
And we were degraded from that flight.
And there were a couple of things that were really shocking.
One is that before I went to bed, my wing commander came up and he said, look at this.
And it was a message from the destroyer.
He had enjoyed that.
He said, I don't remember where the flight was.
And so it was in plain language.
And there were these messages that were sent out about every minute or two minutes.
It just went back and forth.
And I'm going to ask the guy, the guy said, I'm not sure there are any boats out here at all.
And this was plain language.
I don't think the Vietnamese ever got that or they would have never had that on display.
Two days later, Weston asked my captain, and the captain called, and he said, we've got guest support.
We were at sea.
And he said, go up to my import cabin, and I want you and Weston to talk to .
And we walked in, and we were .
And they pulled out to try to find out .
In the meantime, we .
Well, I understand how all these things work.
The next morning when they told me to sign off and go get a bed after I'd just gone to bed, I'm very doubtful that there's been any place there.
It was kind of a moment of sober consideration, but I never shared it with anybody.
And I certainly didn't want to share it with the Vietnamese.
If they had known, particularly if they knew there were no folks there,
And they didn't know I was there.
They didn't know my name.
They would have been murdered.
I did everything.
And they kept saying, we know a lot about you.
And I had, my name had been in life.
My excuse was a prisoner.
And the New York Times has been a participant in this flight.
Any one of these Coral Weiser or Leperberg could have pursued to the other side of the postcard.
And I guess this talking about thing has gone over again.
Congress and the press and so forth, so it sort of died out.
But right in 1966, if they could have put out a headline that we have here, the pilot that led the flight, you know, the Maddox on the plane of the 4th of August, and he said there were no boats out there, I think I could have really done the United States a damage, and I just pray that they would never, never, never know that, because it wouldn't have, they could have gotten that story.
Yeah, of course.
How much is it that you follow the system in turn and have the opportunity to go to catch up on what happened?
I mean, I knew it was going to happen, but I knew it was going to happen.
personal events here in the end.
Like, for example, you talk about Cora Weiss and so forth.
Do you know about the people like Jane Bond?
Well, of course, this was heavy in the propaganda.
The way they selected it out, it sounded like they were the normal Americans and the rest of you were the oddities.
And so we, of course, were allowed for that.
That would be not surprising that they would do that.
But anybody that was really odd and why, we probably heard about it.
Because they heard about it.
Yes.
I thought of theater sometimes.
that even the bubbles that were gone, that you don't see.
Only because it shows how strong your life is.
That's had to be.
What works is there is a respectable intellectual stand on this.
I was talking to Senator Johnson about this.
He's all right.
No, I know he's all right.
But I had dinner with him the other night in San Diego, and we were talking about what should be done about improving our national standards.
And I asked an honest question.
It seems to me, as I'm in Stanford University, when I went back there to graduate school,
It's a liberal institution.
It's a great university.
Right.
And there are probably a lot of crackpots on campus.
But they've got a lot of very respectable men there who are not crackpots, who aren't crackpots.
Yeah.
And I signed a few names up.
Phil Freilander in philosophy.
Yeah.
Thomas Bailey in history.
He did a lot of standing by places and knew these people.
I hope to reestablish associations with those people.
And somehow, it seems, I think that if we lose contact with...
the elected community to go together that's not good and it is not a screwball community there are plenty of brilliant scholars who are not political leftists i guess they don't get into the argument just out of the sheer
degradation of meeting those people and confronting them.
I don't know.
But I do know that there are, in every college in this country, good, solid scholars with conservative conscience, understandings of these things.
What happened there?
Maybe I can summarize it this way and speak of the election.
Well, the college had taken their so-called elite schools at Stanford, so they had the I.A.
as a little, I suppose, law school.
Anyway, it just became unimpactional for anybody to be on any other total
I met all the IEP presidents right out of the Capitol here and they came in here to a man in Sweden, Ray Scallon, and not coming in and saying, well, how can we help?
But they said, James, do something.
Calm the campus down.
And they, when I did that, I'm not even wrong in saying that, but every one of them, they unanimously met me.
They used to be at the IEP schools and met and connected.
They did very well.
We were doing apparently a four-year track.
But anyway.
And then of course there are soul mates and the medias, we'll call them, the television, the radio, and more television, and the elite press.
You've got Coppi, you've got Hearst, you've got Scripps Howard, you've got a few individual papers like in Dallas, Columbus, Ohio, where they did have some in the South, where they did write a reasonable
without thinking we're conservative or liberal, at least responsible about it.
There is in this country, and this is the language that your view holds, can help on radio, there is in this country, among our leader class, what I call the S-class, the problem, I can assure you, it's a theory that I think is very important for us to understand.
The problem in America is not the common people, so-called.
And that's the history of nations, as I see it.
When great civilizations passed, have gone down, it has not been because their common people became corrupt and weak and so forth.
It's mainly been because their leader class failed.
Now here, if you look at Europe today, the leader class in Britain and France is always all shy.
And the leader class, as a result, the British don't have any more.
determinants, but they don't have it for a number of reasons.
But they remain in terms of climate.
As far as the United States is concerned, there is a very, very disturbing sense of isolationism developing, not among the hard rock isolationists, you know, the America First report, which I understood.
They were basically very patriotic people who said, let's build up America first.
These are people who say, disarm.
don't build private or ABM, et cetera, et cetera, withdraw three or four divisions from Europe, regardless of what the Russians do, or even what countries do, who say, get out of Asia, et cetera, and dismantle water, and so forth, and so on, and turn to water problems, and so on.
There is, in other words, there's a sort of a, there's a, and this is among,
The responsible class.
In other words, let's face it, it was the responsible class, the leader class, that supported America getting into World War II.
Which we had to do, yes.
I mean, when I say we had to do it, of course, when Japan attacked.
It was inevitable that we would go in.
But of course, a lot was done before that to get prepared for attack.
They had to get America prepared.
But it was the...
Korea is another topic.
But yet, in Korea, I would say at least half of the leader class recognize that we have to stop the North Korean invasion of the South, the UN was on, and not Vietnam.
In this case, what has happened is that as a result of
that the United States sector carry for many Americans and is a very great burden in World War I and World War II and in Korea and Vietnam.
And to get all of that together probably doesn't equal what the British lost in World War I in about a week, in the month of March 1918.
I don't know how those things turned out, but I know that in one day's battle there they lost 75,000 in, you know, Hague and Toronto.
Anyway, what I'm getting at is this, that in America today, we have a situation where people, where the leader class, the intellectuals in the universities, in the clergy, which you're expected, in the business community, and in the
Obviously, the press say, withdraw.
They're cutting all the time.
They say, don't do anything.
Don't put more on defense.
Cut the defense budget and put it into the canals, et cetera, et cetera.
You'll hear this all the time.
Now, the whole problem with this argument, of course, is this.
If there were some other nation,
carry this load.
If we dropped it, God knows, anybody sitting in this office would say, do it, John.
Because who doesn't want to be popular at all?
Those nice people out there don't want that federal bill, John.
The point is, the world, as I said on Sunday, if you took the United States out of the world today, the rest of the free world would be living in utter terror.
It was going to carry the load.
The Japanese, the
And beyond that, there's nobody.
And none of them have the strength.
And so what do you have left?
You've got the Soviet Union, a superpower today with aggressive attention still, and China, a superpower 20 years from now, with the manpower to conquer the world.
So therefore, the United States has got to play this role.
Or we're not going to.
Or we're not going to be able to have a peaceful world.
We play this role.
correct me, we could perhaps turn the Soviet and the Chinese toward a, what I call, a negotiation or a confrontation stance, always having in mind the fact that they're out to do us and we're out to do the enemy.
In other words, that they know it and we know it, but there's a live and let live attitude, there's strength.
But what we have to understand is that that's why it was so important that we understand that this war would not be ended in
if we use a cliche, in a dishonorable way, that the United States had bugged out on a small ally in Vietnam, and that the North Vietnamese had humiliated the United States in Vietnam, then you can be sure that the United States would never play a role in the war in Vietnam.
Now, at the present time,
It's the moment of truth.
Will we continue to play a part because of our frustration about Vietnam, Korea, and so forth?
Is the United States going to turn its back on the world's problems and become a second-class power?
It's this one that I'm going to have to spend, and we'll spend a lot of time in this office in the next three and a half years, trying to keep that from happening.
But it's going to be a hard fight.
It's going to be hard.
And the main one that you've got to believe last is it.
It is they, it is they that need the education.
You go out and talk to your labor union guys.
You talk to your farmers.
You talk to the main street businessman, as distinguished from the Wall Street elite businessman.
And there's a lot of guns out in this country that we would never have been able to survive this last four years.
We wouldn't have won the election had it not been for the fact that the leader class did not speak for America.
The leader class, for the most part, basically was for
even though we got most of the newspaper endorsement, but deep down the leader class was for what Barrett stood for, you see, isolationist, you know, get out of Vietnam regardless, and that sort of thing.
Now, they couldn't take him due to the fact that he had a few mistakes, you know, and they kind of said, well, you know, that's not going to make it next time.
Barrett is probably quite active, but deep down, when you come to the things he stood for, they were for it.
And the American people and the majority were not for it.
But you couldn't be more right.
That if the leader class continues to advocate for responsibility and action, that will destroy the AOL and the lower classes.
It'll destroy the AOL and the lower classes.
You see, their kids, their kids, you know, the leader class were here.
They go to the better schools than the rest and they come out.
So that's the first time.
And eventually the guy out there, you know, is a bricklayer in the rest of the school.
They hear it every night on the television.
If they read the newspapers, most of them don't.
They don't read it there.
If they read an editorial, they hear it there.
They hear it on the radio.
They hear it in and out of political speakers.
And their kids, when they go to high school, and certainly if they go on to college, they're going to hear it day after day after day.
It'll come out.
That's right.
If you're for peace, I'm for peace.
I'm born that way.
You and I know that the only way we can have any kind of peace in this world is for the United States, which is the only strong nation that believes in peace.
The Russians aren't for peace.
The Chinese aren't.
They're only for peace if war is too dangerous.
We're for peace as an end to self.
Right?
And so...
Therefore we stay.
But I don't mean to tell you that it's hopeless.
I simply mean to tell you that it is a difficult thing.
Now out there at these college and university, there are some strong people who, but they are very small.
They are minority.
But maybe now some of them will begin speaking out, but they need to.
Well, I think they do, and I think they need to take...
not be so docile in the hands of these liberals.
The liberals shut them down and make it unpopular and so forth and so on.
You see, that's the point.
The liberal law is basically, we call it liberal.
They have a...
He's more of a...
He's more interested.
Yes, he is.
He's a conservative.
He's a dull person.
Yes.
Little charisma.
But we... Well, it was just...
But I think I've heard it.
I guess that's part of the battle that we were born to fight.
We were born to fight.
We're part of the leader class, too, to speak.
Yes.
Somebody's here the other day talking about it.
Look, I could be calling you.
I had a call from Mr. Van Garner the other time.
He said he wanted to be a writer.
And I...
Great.
And I didn't use God, and I didn't use country in that article, but I said that we were committed in that camp to the military ending, and that we were committed to a belief that life should be based on rules and the total rules should put unity over self, and that it should include self-indulgence.
All of these things I think are valid, and I sort of try to direct this to this leader class.
Right.
I see some problems, and as a matter of fact, some of the advertisements, I think that's the first label.
I got home from picking up my kids, and the man on the phone was the editor of the Stanford University London Magazine.
And he wanted permission to reprint that in their magazine.
So maybe that's the sort of thing he's thinking about.
And he set up in the Stanford London Magazine, now, an article supporting .
Those are the ones you want to retool.
Those are the ones.
Not the popular masses.
a popular message.
When I went up to a baseball game here in Friday and gave the first ball to a small, orange ice who threw it at me.
I was kidding.
But anyway, the whole crowd cheered, 28,000 or so, this time.
But most of those people are, but the leader class has got to get back on it again.
And I don't care what it is, some of them may need religion, but those of them that have religion have got to have philosophy.
Most of all, they've got to understand the realities of the world situation.
cannot leave a bathroom of leadership in our world.
And if the United States does not leave, the Soviets will.
And that isn't going to be a very safe world.
And it isn't going to be a very pleasant world.
Because I've seen a vocal voice decide, I like Russians and I like Chinese.
But as far as the communist system is concerned, it is a desperately vicious system.
And it destroys everything that we believe in.
And particularly that our leader class believes in.
We used to say when we were studying standard post graduate school, my friend Monroe was not at home and so we were taking a course in law and things were there too.
And the liberal professors would go on and on about the, in the informal conversations.
And Monroe said to him one day, he said, you know, if the Russians came over here, do you know where you'd be?
You'd be in jail in six months.
Do you know who'd be running this county?
I would.
He said, they know that guys like myself, those are the ones who can run a railroad down here.
And I'm the man that makes out the rest of society, and you'll be in jail.
They can't tolerate you.
And I think that's so, because these very people that are so liberal about this thing, and they're the one group of people that those people could not tolerate.
They can't tolerate.
You know, it's great if you produce a bunch of them out of the university, but that's where I don't feel like you would have any of that.
And perhaps, at least I would have.
Where did he go to school?
Ohio.
And he was a young, he was a young priest in his class.
And I was just a priest.
He was in the midst of this turmoil, and he had to take a choice between being disloyal to me or being considered a freak by his peers.
He hung in.
He did well.
I don't think he's polarizing in either direction.
That's good.
But I find him a very, very good advisor and close friend.
Good.
Isn't that great?
He was 15 when he went away.
He was a freshman in high school.
and graduated college when I got home.
And he does a lot of good for me out there in San Diego.
He stayed in Taiwan.
He's working at a steel mill in New Haven.
And many of the leaders have made us, you know, to make money to travel.
He's going to travel in Europe and the direction Africa for a year or so, and then enter the next world war.
So, I find that he's taking time off from this to be with me in my request.
And he follows me out of the hospital.
He has all of the health calls down here that I say, you know, you say that.
Yeah.
He's 35 years old, man.
They're just not bringing some of them, right?
And they're being offered all this wonderful opportunity to follow in the towing favor, you know, and they're being run right into it.
Yes, because he did either talk to one fellow, I think Raymond was, Jim came back and said, I just had to talk to him.
They respect Jim, even though he's just a very young kid.
He talked to this one officer and he just accepted it.
And there were going to be two lads on the campus.
One was going to be James Bond and the other was going to be him.
And Jim, he said, listen, you don't know what those campuses are like.
That's like standing in the ring with Joe.
And he talked him out of it, I think.
That would have been terrible.
Yes.
To put it this way.
Incredible.
So I don't think there were to be an open debate.
I don't know.
She would have come over to the debate.
Yes, she would have.
Well, this young mind that I have following me around has done not only even the most good, because he is upon these things.
You have to get back to that point of the whole world.