Nixon White House Tapes — Conversation 014-062
Date: Thursday, November 11, 1971 at 6:30 PM
Participants: Kissinger, Henry A.; White House operator; McCloy, John J.; Kissinger, Henry A.; White House operator; McCloy, John J.
Recording device: White House Telephone
Source: https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/014-062

This transcript was generated automatically by AI (WhisperX) and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Do not cite it as authoritative.

[0:00] Hello?
[0:01] John McCloy is on the line.
[0:02] Hello?
[0:02] Hello?
[0:04] Hello?
[0:04] Yeah, hello?
[0:06] Hello?
[0:07] Hello, Jack?
[0:07] Yes, hello, Harry.
[0:08] Henry, how are you?
[0:09] Okay, Jack, you and I have been trying to reach each other and managed to miss each other for a week.
[0:16] Yeah, well, that's okay.
[0:17] But I... You've been terribly involved.
[0:19] But I'm calling you today about the following.
[0:22] The President and I have been talking about the developments in Europe.
[0:28] Yes.
[0:29] And I also told him about my meeting with you with the advisory committee.
[0:35] Yes.
[0:36] And we feel that we badly need to put our relations to Europe on a new and firm basis.
[0:43] Yes.
[0:44] and also, frankly, to get somebody to get a hold of this MPFR business before it's used as a wedge to drive our allies totally into a total lack of confidence in us.
[0:57] Yeah, the other side, yeah.
[0:59] So, as you know, the NATO ambassadorship is vacant at this moment.
[1:04] Yes.
[1:04] And the President asked me to explore with you whether knowing it would be an enormous sacrifice
[1:11] uh we uh you would agree to serve there for a year we need a towering figure there now and uh he will ask you himself but for obvious reasons he'd like me to find out first whether this is totally out of the ballpark yeah got it prestige your proposal hell of a
[1:34] You know, there's really a lot of, we have a lot of names and it's a job that people are dying to get.
[1:43] Yeah.
[1:44] But there's only one person who represents this great tradition of U.S.-European relationships, who has the statue in Europe, who can be both first