Nixon phone call with Rogers on Yugoslavia and Soviet-Yugoslav relations

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Hello.

Mr. President.

I'm just getting a month's resignation, so that's why I had to step out for a while.

I'm sorry about that.

That's all right.

I thought you should know this in case you talked to Tito again.

Yesterday in my meeting with the foreign minister, I again pressed him on...

They were encouraged or not as a result of the Brezhnev visit, and he indicated yes, and he indicated President Tito was satisfied, as he had done in New York, and so forth.

Last night when we were up in your goal room, he took me aside, spoke in English.

He doesn't speak English very well, but he didn't want the interpreter there.

And he said, I want you to know for your own ears

in your ears only, the meeting with Brezhnev did not go well.

And then I said, I would say it again.

He said, the meeting with Brezhnev did not go well.

He said, you should know that.

And he said, you're the only one I've told it to.

And I said, well, of course I want to tell President Nixon.

He said, yes, President Tito told me to tell you so that you could tell President Nixon.

It's interesting that Tito, of course,

He's a little gingerly, but he did not indicate that much.

He said it did not go well.

Very interesting.

Now, the reason I'm sure that he did it that way, so he could say that Tito never told you, never told anybody that.

Shows you how scared they are.

Well, let me tell you an interesting sidelight to that.

After the dinner last night, I had the...

I had him...

I went over and talked to him.

Mm-hmm.

Now, the interpreter, you know, the very distinguished man, white-haired guy who was in Yugoslavia, was with him, so I think he was trying to do double talk.

But the message came through very, very clear.

He said, you know, I know I only have a few moments, and actually I spent all the time in the coffee hour with him, except for about the last three, four minutes, and I meet a few of these outsiders.

He said, a few moments, but he said, I want to tell you that

that we in Yugoslavia may face some very great problems.

He said President Tito is a very old man.

And when he goes, I mean when he retires, he said then we may be confronted with the attempts of some of our neighbors to capitalize on that.

He said what I would strongly hope is that as far as U.S. policy, and he referred to my toast about independence and all that, as far as U.S. policy is that

that you would be aware of this and could use your influence.

And I said, well, let me just say one thing.

First, you can be sure that we will never threaten your independence and so forth.

And second, that we will use our influence to see that others have, or I put it this way,

He used the word hands-off, Yugoslavia.

I said, you can be sure our hands will always be off Yugoslavia, and we will use our influence to see the others keep their hands off.

He said, you got the message.

That's what he said.

He's a very intelligent man.

This is the gray-haired fellow.

No, no, no, no, no, no.

The interpreter didn't tell me that.

The gray-haired guy.

This is the foreign minister.

Oh, the foreign minister.

Oh, yeah, I see.

But I meant, I'm telling you, he didn't speak in English to me.

Oh, I see.

So the interpreter was there, so he probably wasn't as frank with me.

I see, yes, yes.

But I could tell that what he was trying to tell me, and now I see what the picture, what he was trying to tell me was probably, it fits in with what you had said on the Russian, that they fear the Russians.

Well, very much so.

He said to me after my meeting, in which I said that we would be happy to cooperate in a military way with him, as we have been this year, on an accelerated basis, as long as it wasn't disruptive, as far as they were concerned, as long as it was consistent with our policy.

He said afterwards, when I met with Tito at lunch, Tito said to me, the foreign minister told me about his conversation with you, and we feel very much better.

Now, at that time, I didn't know what he was talking about.

But this was a very interesting thing, and he didn't even have the interpreter.

Yeah, and when he was with me, he did not speak English at all, but he did have the interpreter.

But he did, but I think now that the two conversations fit together.

Right.

When he said, we are, he says, I am, he used the word fearful of what will happen after Tito goes, and he says...

he just hopes that hands off Yugoslavia and so I see exactly and in view of what he said the meetings did not go well the point because I pressed Tito in the dinner at dinner we got into the kind of a man Brezhnev was and all that sort of thing whether or not the Brezhnev doctrine really did it mean that I said it would be very significant if

if the reports were that the Brezhnev Doctrine had been modified.

And he, of course, he has the girl interpreter there, who's probably an agent of both sides.

And he said, and he left the implication, yes, that the Brezhnev Doctrine was modified or had been modified.

But what the foreign minister tells you would indicate it certainly had not.

I gather that it had not.

And he was really...

ominous tone in his voice as i say this was not a yeah this was a very he took me aside and looked around so there's nobody there and then he said in english and then he said and he said now i want to say it again the meeting with breschner did not go well did this go well this is for your ears only but he expected you to tell me yes i told him i said that i'm going he said we have not told anyone of this and he said this is just for you

and i said well of course i'll tell president nixon he said yes president tito asked me to say this to you and of course we know you'll tell your president yeah yeah i thought you should know it it's interesting how tito probably because he figures that everything is going to be reported uh

took a took the line that he did i suppose he doesn't trust that the interpreter he just didn't trust her i think that's right he doesn't want the word to get out either publicly that's right oh god he can't he can't afford that he can't afford it it's very interesting well at least we got it but now i see the two conversations fit together like a glove yes he was trying to tell me exactly the thing hands off yugoslavia i am afraid

You know, and he always talks in an ominous way, I noticed.

I like him, though.

Well, he's tough.

He's tough and strong.

And I was so glad.

And I sought him out, actually.

I saw him in, or the aide did, you know, our assistant chief of protocol brought him over.

Good.

And so this fits in very, very well.

Well, I'm going to, no, I don't think I'll try to explore this with Tito in the morning.

Oh, I wouldn't mention, no, I think he'd.

No, no, no, no, I don't mean, I don't mean mention this conversation.

But I think that we've got the message, you know, because Tito obviously is afraid to say it.

It's afraid to say what the hell he thinks of the Russians.

Let's give them guns.

Okay.

Mr. President, Adele and I, I think I haven't had a week off for a while.

I'm going to go down over to Bermuda over the weekend.

Wonderful, wonderful.

The weather's bad in Miami.

I checked with B.B., but it's not very good.

It isn't?

It is?

Well, good.

I was hoping to go there, and then I had to have this Saturday meeting.

But Bermuda, is the weather good there?

It's supposed to be good.

Oh, great.

When are you leaving, right now?

Well, no, I've got to go to the damn reception the night after that, and I'll be back.

What reception?

Oh, the Yugoslav reception.

Oh, Jesus Christ.

Yeah.

Okay.

But I'll be back Monday.

Right.

Okay, fine.

Thanks.

Bye.

Nixon phone call with Rogers on Yugoslavia and Soviet-Yugoslav relations

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Nixon Library Finding Aid

Also recorded on October 29, 1971

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