Nixon phone call with Kissinger on Vietnam War and General Creighton Abrams

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Yeah, Mr. President.

Yeah, hello, Henry?

Yes, Mr. President.

Any further developments today?

Well, I've talked to Mora and to... Got everything inquired?

I think there have been no press inquiries.

Yeah.

Well, it's just one of those damned...

He was in two dishes, but I think this is going to blow over.

Yeah.

Well, particularly if nothing happens, but we must not continue to let it be stirred up.

I mean, but the South Vietnamese, on the other hand, they should move right through that valley and clean them up.

That's right.

And that's really, there are only 2,500 men involved.

This is a...

This is a relatively minor operation, which is to put an offensive later on.

You see, that's the whole point.

And they try to blow it up as if there's going to be a major U.S. attack on Laos again, you know.

And the problem is that

and you get senators will squeal what are we going to do and they try to get a resolution passed and you see we want to avoid the situation where they pass a resolution saying we cannot participate in another attack on laos see i find henry it's no longer relevant because they will pass such a resolution they're just as sure as hell i'm i i was absolutely outraged mr president and really uh

You know, if it were, Abrams, I think, has outlived his usefulness out there, to be quite candid.

He just hasn't been aware of our problems at any stage of this operation.

Right.

Well, the point is, right now...

It's probably not worthwhile recalling... No, no, we can't do it.

No, no, no, we won't do it.

But my point is, right now, we just want to tell them all to shut up.

Well... Now, the war is being wound down, and just shut up about what they're going to be doing.

Exactly.

We'll make all...

Well, the worst thing is this wasn't even a press conference, Mr. President.

He was on a reviewing stand.

He walked off it.

He was already past the newsmen.

Then he decided to go back and start bantering with them.

Yeah, I know.

He was there for the celebration that the South Vietnamese put on to celebrate their victory.

Yeah.

Well.

And if that had been all that had happened, it would have been on page 32.

That's right.

But I think it's a one-day story.

Yeah, true, true, true.

Well, if the Senators all call and say, well, we're going to pass a resolution, say, look, it's like Cambodia.

It's moot, boys.

We're not going to... You see, I don't want to be... Look, as if the Senate forced us to do something that we were going to do anyway.

That's what I'm concerned about, see?

But I think if nothing more happens now, we have it under control.

And at any rate, it hasn't made any waves yet.

Fine, fine.

And otherwise, there's a curious thing going on in Europe, and we haven't figured it out yet.

There are 320 Soviet helicopters that have moved from East Germany into Poland.

And we think it's an exercise, but still it's a funny exercise.

that they should be moving east and into Poland.

We don't know of any evils that are going on there that would justify it.

I'll tell you one thing.

I think all of Eastern Europe is seething.

I really think it is.

I think it's more than meets the eye and that I think everybody is sitting on a powder keg.

Just good God, that reception we had in Romania, we proved it.

That's why I think, Mr. President, that we are going to...

The Soviets have to break out forward or into a conciliatory stance.

They can't do...

They cannot stand pat.

And my guess would be that they are not going to go into a tough one with Russia.

You see, I interpret also the Chinese moves.

They must have read the President's speech the way we do.

And they must have read it as a beginning of a thaw in U.S.-Soviet relations.

And they want not to be

The victims of that.

In other words, they're afraid of a condominium.

Exactly.

And so they want to get in on that before.

Yeah.

Because otherwise they could have waited a few months.

Yeah.

I think their reading of depression of speech is like ours.

Yeah, in that world they read all those things and read things into them.

Oh God, they read them in a way that we don't even know how to begin.

Right, anyway, we had an interesting...

singing group today that's singing cadets from Texas A&M, 60 of them, you know, because they're traveling troops.

And I shook hands with them afterwards, and boy, it's rather heartening.

These boys, some of them, several of them, of course, a few of them had served in Vietnam, but boy, I'd say about half of them said, boy, we're behind you in your policy.

We're all with you, and all that sort of thing.

And then David made an interesting observation.

He said, you know, Texas A&M has a

student body of 14,000, which is bigger than Harvard, Yale, and the three Ivy League smaller schools combined.

That's right.

And he says, and they're a hell of a bunch of guys, and we've got to remember that just as the East spews out these revolutionaries and radicals and bastards, that some of those people in the West are spewing out bright guys that are pretty good.

I think those bastards are also impressed by a man who's willing to stand alone.

Well, sure, and also they spew out some good ones, too.

We know there's an awful lot of good kids in the Eastern schools, but...

You go out to places like A&M, by golly, there's a lot of guts in those places.

Oh, that's it.

Those schools in the southwest are really marvelous.

Right, right.

But we need them.

We need to keep that sort of thing alive in this country.

We must not disappoint them.

Absolutely, and that's what your policy has been all about.

Well, sure.

I try to have it.

Well, this Abrams thing, of course, it isn't all that serious, except that I can always see what

goes through the minds of these doves and they will they always try to seize on this and you watch they'll have a speech tomorrow about it now the administration is doing this or that and are we doing this and that and how laird's going to cool it with some sort of a statement that's the best thing so that ziegler doesn't i think the best thing is for ziegler to say nothing

Really, it's really, I don't care whether Ziegler or Warren say nothing, just simply refer it to defense.

Why don't we do it that way?

Let's keep it out of the White House, Henry.

Okay.

I think that's better.

Because I tell you, if we do it at the White House level, you'd have it much bigger.

Just refer it, well, I'll have to refer you to the Defense Department.

Then have Heimkin say...

Whatever it was you were going to have Ziegler say.

How does that sound to you?

That's even better.

I think it's really good.

Because that way we should just act as if this isn't important for White House attention.

That's right.

Well, this is not important enough.

Just say this is a purely tactical move.

And you'll have to go to the Defense Department for any statement.

Fair enough?

Good.

I'll get that done immediately, Mr. President.

How did the casualties look this week?

I think they're again around what they were last week.

Even with the 10, huh?

Yeah.

We don't get the good count until Sunday night.

Well, if with the 10 we can keep them in that ballpark, that's pretty good.

Because they'll drop next week, in my opinion.

Oh, yes.

I think they'll be down around 30 within two weeks.

Yeah, they may drop.

You remember, we got down to 16 once, didn't we?

That's right.

These people are going to have trouble keeping them up.

All right, thanks.

Good night, Mr. President.

Nixon phone call with Kissinger on Vietnam War and General Creighton Abrams

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Nixon Library Finding Aid

Also recorded on April 18, 1971

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