Conversation 038-092

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Hello?

Hello, Mr. President.

Did you stay for the entertainment?

Yes, this was moving.

One of the most moving things I've heard.

You know, Frank's voice is gone, as he told me before he came.

But, by gosh, you know, the emotion in the room was just unbelievable.

I think some of the people were crying.

Unbelievable.

Did you feel that way?

Oh, yes.

And also the tremendous dignity with which he did it.

The way he spoke of you and of the presidency was really a great evening.

No, you said it very well.

It is not something that one can have such an evening.

Right.

No, but Hebert was sitting in front of me, and he was, in fact, crying at the end.

Who?

Hebert?

Hebert, yeah.

And Castori was sitting next to me, and he's just beside himself.

Wait.

Yeah.

Well, rather a hard day, wasn't it?

Well, it was hard for you.

I didn't know you had made the statement you did until the evening, when I think of the discipline with which you conducted the meeting in the morning.

And then going through the evening.

I can't look at it the attached way I really should.

Well, these people, God damn it, they're guilty.

Throw them out.

Go on.

But just the personal things are, God damn.

I think of these good men.

That's right.

Who wanted to do the right thing.

And it's going to splash a lot of them.

And anyway.

Well, I think the way you have positioned it now, it's the right way to do it.

Because Carmet, as you know, was having the idea that I should get up and announce that I'd fired Haldeman, Ehrlichman, and Dean.

And without waiting until they get up and name the real culprit is Mitchell, of course.

He's in charge of the whole goddamn thing, and John Mitchell.

We should step up like a man and say, look, I was in charge.

I take the responsibility, period.

Exactly.

All the more so is doing the opposite won't help him any.

Nope.

They're going to get him.

No, I think the fire would make him the villain.

Well, in the end, he would probably have to go, Henry.

They're going to.

Well, if that's the case, then he should get out before.

Well, but not until I have absolute evidence.

I'm not going to fire a guy on the basis of a charge made by Dean, who basically is trying to save his ass and get immunity, you see.

That's why I had that phrase in there that no immunity should be granted to a top person.

Yeah, he has no right to do that.

No, that's absolutely...

I mean, I think that is outrageous.

No, I...

I just have no way...

I have no good feel for where...

I think you would not have improved the situation if you had suddenly, without any preparation, turned on all your associates.

Yep.

And... Well, we have...

I think two or three hard months ahead.

It's going to be real rough.

Well, the major thing now, Mr. President, if I may say so, is to protect the presidency and your authority.

It's going to be hard because some of these people will even piss on the president if they think it'll help them.

Well, it's pretty hard.

I'm the only one, frankly, of the whole bunch who really did no goddamn thing

you know, about it until, until March when I finally—Dean came in and said, well, here's where it is, which he should have done months ago.

Well, they were in over their head and they tried to, instead of stepping back and assessing where they were, got in deeper and deeper.

That's right.

But I think the absolute, I mean,

Well, if we can, if we can, we will.

But if we don't, what the hell?

If we can, Mr. President, maybe we will.

I haven't even considered the possibility of, frankly, just throwing myself in the sword.

No, I think I'm going to take it.

What the hell?

That is out of the question, with all due respect, Mr. President.

That cannot be considered.

Well, the personality, what it would do to the presidency and to the historical injustice of it.

Why should you do it?

And what good would it do?

Whom would it help?

It wouldn't help the country.

It wouldn't help any individual involved.

But with all respect, I don't think a president has a right to sacrifice himself for an individual.

Well, I've had a few tough meetings, you know.

I've had dinners the night after Cambodia.

I had one after the main thing.

We had a dinner and they were tough.

But boy, I'm telling you tonight, that was a hard one for me to get through.

I don't think the audience sensed it, but no one sensed it.

No one.

In fact, I didn't know you had made a statement, so one of my dinner partners said, isn't it astonishing how the president is behaving, considering what he's done today?

I said, yes, he's had a tough meeting in the morning, but he does that all the time.

She said, no, the statement was with his guest.

So it was an astonishing performance.

But I think, Mr. President, it can be...

Well, to the extent you can, and you're talking to people, you may have to mention really very strongly these personal things, if it'll help.

I don't know.

It may not help.

No, no, it will help, Mr. President.

And if any stuff gets out, then there has to be room for surgery, or as the stuff gets out, it will help.

I hope the acts will fall.

And I'm sure that Bob wouldn't want that.

Oh, no, Bob and John both are willing to throw themselves in the sword, although when they do, they're going to fight like hell.

But one of them ought to stay.

I would hope so.

But I'm afraid it can't be all of them.

I'm afraid the only one that possibly could be saved would be Erlich Mann.

That's tough, too.

But I think you've positioned it correctly, that as evidence comes out, for you to fire them all now would look like panic.

Well, that's the Garment line.

What do you think of his line?

Well, Garment wants you to fire all the mundane.

I don't know whether they want you to fire Ehrlichman, too.

Yep.

Well, it's a possibility.

I don't know what the evidence is, but— The evidence is, at this time, charges made that have not been corroborated yet.

But there— Well, if there's a good chance that they'll have to go as a result of what

Then I don't think you should fire them.

They ought to resign on the ground.

That their usefulness is impaired.

That they have to be above sitting in like Caesar's wife.

We'll think about it to our best.

But I think it does you credit to have that understood as you have.

And in any event, today you were right to go no further.

Well, we'll do the Italian again tomorrow.

Right, Mr. President.

And this...

I'd like to move in the morning, if you will.

Rather than me reading the stuff from the Soviet, I'm going to have you read it.

I'll read it.

I don't really want to go, you know, you can say now, we've been in communication and here's what's happened and God damn it, we've done.

And if these people start to whine around, I'm going to be very tough.

I'm going to say, fine.

I said, now here's what you're going to do.

There'll be no Soviet summit.

There'll be no arms control.

There'll be no...

I mean, this great initiative will be destroyed.

And if the Jewish community wants to take that responsibility, I am going to take them on.

Believe me, there's just one time I'll do it, Henry.

I think you should.

But they won't come in until Thursday, Mr. President.

Tomorrow is the Senate people.

Tomorrow is still a Jewish holiday, so they won't come in until Thursday, the Jewish group.

Be very strong and say,

It's like getting out in Downey.

It's like all these other things that I got.

We can do it working within.

If they don't want to work within, the door will slam bang down.

And Henry, nobody's going to get out, believe me.

No question.

And they've got to understand that.

Not a question.

And not only that, when they don't get out, this will be the key point.

The Russians are tough.

They've gone further than they would ever want to go.

for their backing down.

And if I were they, I wouldn't come to the goddamn summit.

No.

Not if they know it's going to fail.

Not if they know the MSN is going to fail.

Yep.

Tomorrow, perhaps, with the senators, I would give them a chance to think about it.

Well, don't you get discouraged.

Mr. President, I'm not discouraged.

You do your job.

of us have got to stick around, try to hold the goddamn fort.

You have saved this country, Mr. President.

The history books will show that when they don't—when no one will know what Watergate means.

And maybe although our enemies, you know, will say, well, this proves that we were obstructed just as we—oh, well.

Oh, and in six months, no one will know it anymore.

It's a human tragedy for Haldeman and Dean and a few of those fellows.

Haldeman is a big man, Mr. President, and he'll... Dean is the real... Oh, that's really got to be the loose cannon because he's trying to save his ass.

That's why I had in that little phrase that no immunity should be granted to any top person.

And that's going to burn his ass because then he'll thrash out about everything you can imagine.

Although Ziegler made an interesting point.

He has goddamn little credibility.

After all, he was making the report.

He was the one that said there was no involvement.

That's what we relied on.

February or March of this year before he finally came in and said, well, here it is.

That's right.

It's a little damn late, isn't it?

I just fired him as soon as it comes out and let him scream from the outside.

I guess so.

We will when the time comes.

Well, you know, nobody really will know that

what they put a president through on a thing like this.

Well, it's inhuman, Mr. President.

These bastards know damn well that you couldn't have known about it, that if one considers all the things you had to go through, you couldn't be a police judge, too.

You're running the government.

You're doing all the negotiating.

You're carrying a bigger load than any president has.

top of it they want you to record we were going to russia and china and ending the war and negotiating i was even thinking about the goddamn campaign you know i had nothing to do with the damn campaign as you know of course that's the problem that's the tragedy i wish to christ maybe that i had but if i'd been spending time in the campaign maybe i wouldn't pull it off if you can't rely on your own people to tell you the facts then it's then it's not

If you hadn't done—exactly, if you hadn't done that, we might still be in the war.

I made a note to you that Stennis told the hospital that he approved the bombing of Cambodia and Laos, but he could not approve renewing the bombing of North Vietnam.

And I want you, if you will, to take a quick trip out to the hospital and say, Senator, you know, brief him and say, we've got to hit the—in South Vietnam, just say that for a brief period, we've got to hit it in order to avoid a complete tobacco.

I'm seeing him Friday morning at 10, Mr. President.

We've got it scheduled already.

You're going out there?

Yep.

And I'll talk to him then.

That's only three days from now.

I don't think he'll speak before then.

No.

But I'll call him tomorrow.

Call him and tell him, Senator, don't make up your mind on bombing or anything else until I talk to you and you tell him what the hell the facts are.

Right.

And in the meantime, put your arm around Holloman and Ehrlichman.

You can count on it, Mr. Brandt.

I've been standing by all of them, and I didn't know Ehrlichman was in trouble, too.

Now, you can count on the fact that I'll stand by them.

But the major person to stand by now is you.

We shall see.

But at least the old Sinatra gave him a lift and I thought the dinner was rather nice, you know.

The whole evening was beautiful.

The PM was nice and, you know, it was light and yet fun for everybody.

The whole evening was beautiful.

Well, sleep on it.

We'll all try to get some ideas.

I don't think Carmen's judgment is very good.

I don't, you know, I mean,

He panicked so easily.

He panicked on Cambodia and everything else earlier.

That's right.

That's been my experience.

I just feel that we may have to...

So far, you haven't got the evidence.

If you get some evidence that makes it look that the fellows can't be held...

If it's hard evidence, though, God damn it, I'm not going to...

If you get hard evidence...

It's got to be corroborated.

I'm going to let them do it on the basis of... Then you ought to fire the people...

against you, you have evidence, and the others ought to consider resigning.

Yep.

Well, it'll be a great day on the other side for all of our enemies on it.

Time, suppose, the rest should... That's right, Mr. Pratt.

Pull it together, the wagons, and pull it through, as you've done so often.

Well,

What's really disturbing is that comparing this goddamn thing with Teapot Dome, for Christ's sakes, which was thievery on a massive basis, isn't what this is all about.

That's right, Mr. President.

In a year, that will be clear.

It'll take that long, I'm afraid.

Maybe less.

I think if the major thing now is to

Let it be squeezed out a little at a time.

That's right.

And I think once you have all the facts, I think you should consider then at least cleaning at least that part of the house that must be cleaned.

Right.

However, right?

Right.

Okay, all right.

Right, Mr. President.

Thank you.