Nixon phone call with Brennan on Vietnam War and POWs

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Hello?

Mr. Buchanan.

Yes, sir.

Oh, I, uh, Rose was, uh, said that you had come.

given me a call last night.

I certainly had.

I thought I'd better give you a call.

Right.

I certainly did.

I thought it was a beautiful speech, and I just wanted to call you and tell you that before I went out last night.

You went out?

Yeah.

Did Shelly know?

Oh, yeah.

I took Shelly with me.

We went down to the art gallery to visit with the Russians and practice a little detente.

You're getting a hell of a soft liner, yeah.

Yes, sir.

That was... Well, I think it'll be interesting as you...

Probably, no.

This was one of those rare ones where I've been a little busy lately, but I wrote the whole damn thing myself.

Well, I knew that because the speech guys were running all over wondering if anybody was working on it, and they found out that there was nobody working on it.

Well, I had to do it myself because, you see, to say, I felt that to say what I had to say in 20 minutes, I just had to get it awful tight.

You know, one thing it did, it really put it all back in context.

It brought back to memories all those demonstrations and all the controversy and all the division and stuff like that, and people were almost starting to take for granted the fact that there's... Well, everybody's coming home, and it's because they did it.

Right, and then you went out there and laid it right on the line again, and I thought that was very good.

You know, one thing, Pat, I suppose that some of our friends, and I thought I was...

very kind at the last where I said, let's put aside the divisions of war that divide us and so forth, the difference of war.

But I didn't think that it was basically too divisive.

What did you think?

No.

But you've got to divide them up some.

My God, they only are against us.

They're against us on that.

They're against us on the budget.

They're against us on everything else.

That's just my feeling.

I don't know.

What did you think?

That was fine.

It was fine.

And you did stick it to them a little bit with that we're coming home standing rather than on our knees.

Yeah.

There was probably some gagging at the networks on that one, but it's right on the money, and it needed to be said, damn enough.

Listen, some of these pilots are doing a hell of a job on that.

Oh, aren't they, though?

Yeah, their quotes, I read those.

Well, I stuck it to them on that, and I thought, too, that it was good to stick it to them again on Amnesty, don't you think?

Right, right, right, just that one line right in there.

Just slap it to them because people have got to know.

Yeah, I mean, just a fine speech, it hit all those bases.

The other thing you see, of course, the only news out of it is, except for the warning to Hanoi, the only news that anybody picked up was the price ceiling.

But, of course, as far as the folks are concerned, while they'll be very interested in the price ceiling, a whole hell of a lot of them will be interested in these other things.

Oh, sure, sure, sure.

As a matter of fact, from what they said, I think...

A lot of them, you know, so many have been watching this POW stuff.

I haven't.

I've just got the time.

I read some of it in the news.

But the reference I made to the last, that conversation I had in the office here, that was with Reisner, incidentally.

Oh, it was.

Yeah.

But that had quite an impact on people, you know, because it made them feel how these guys are.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

I know.

You've got to bring a little of that into it.

You certainly do.

It was really excellent.

We tend sometimes to be so matter-of-fact in our...

stuff.

But I just wonder anyway that the way our liberal friends are acting, if we don't have to draw the sword on them a bit more right now.

But I don't know.

What do you think?

Well, I'm not sure.

Because, you know, we've gone back and forth.

When I say draw the sword, I don't mean in a vicious way.

But as you said, particularly on the war issue, they practically let it

Oh, yeah.

They just don't want to talk about it.

That's right.

What that speech said was, you know, all right, it's over.

The last guy's home.

Now, let's not forget how we got here, and let's not, in effect, forget who was out there raising hell and undercutting us the whole time.

But it just put it in perspective when that last guy came home, you know, what the country's been through and, frankly, what's been accomplished.

And also it put in perspective another thing.

You know, when I sit out there, I want to give credit to you, the millions that stood by us when there were others that didn't.

Right.

But that was really just... That associated him.

I felt that was important.

You know, that's allowed everybody out there, even though he might have protested at times, to think he was one of the guys that stood by.

That's right.

But I felt that was very important.

Now, I deliberately wrote all that in because I knew I'd never get it from the speechwriters.

Because basically, there's always the tendency to sort of slough everything off and say, isn't everything hunky-dory?

Well, goddammit, everything isn't hunky-dory.

I mean, these people, the same people that

try to sabotage the ending of the war, not try to sabotage the peace.

They don't want us to bomb Cambodia first.

That's right.

They don't want us to bomb the trail coming down from the north.

You know, they want us... Well, on the Vietnam thing... And also, they want us to cut the budget, defense budget for 10 billion.

Well, when it comes to the Vietnam, who's more... Who does the country want to handle it?

I think the game is over as far as those guys are concerned, really.

You see, I think as long as we keep the...

ground forces out and so forth.

I think we can get away with a bombing in a while over there, don't you think so?

I do.

That's right.

I mean, I'm not referring to the north.

That won't be necessary, but we're going to hit that damn trail again in Laos, Laos and Cambodia.

Well, I think you've got to, I mean, really you've got to, I mean, tremendous confidence in the American people.

You've got a lot of tremendous amount of capital in the bank.

I mean, you said that the peace was going to come and all these guys were going to be home and the South Vietnamese were going to be standing there when we left and

And then we knew that's what was so good about it.

Last night, he laid it on the line.

He said, well, here's what we said we're going to do.

And here's what's done.

And you saw the last, and they were watching on television when those last prisoners are coming home.

And the average guy is saying, well, you know, damn it, he did it.

And so I think you got a tremendous amount of confidence.

Also, another thing, Pat, we were able to do, you know, this is the first time I've ever publicly mentioned the December 18 bombing.

That's right.

That's another one that's probably had them just crawling up the wall.

I said it was my hardest decision.

Because, you know, there, even our friends deserted as well as Chicago Tribune residents.

But it was just as well to put it out there.

That was the hard decision.

And that's what brought them back.

That's right.

Because all the pilots say that, you know.

Right.

Pilots were saying, boy, when they come back and say, yeah, we were down in those basements cheering when the bombs were hitting.

That really gets them, you know.

I think that we got a couple of other points across that I trust that the boys will, the Rudy group and you and the rest will get across.

I think I put the budget thing in a very simple way that people can understand it, you know.

That is the

stops here and so forth.

And I think we ought to start kicking that thing just a bit.

Don't you think so?

Right.

I think they've already geared up.

The other thing we ought to do is on the defense budget, which is the next big battle.

My God, let's put that second strongest country.

People don't want to be second.

Don't you agree?

I agree with that.

They may want to cut, but they don't want to be second.

But...

and that that'll torpedo the arms thing.

I think, again, you've got so much capital in the bank because the average guy is going to say, well, Nixon knows a hell of a lot better than those clowns up there what's needed in terms of defense because, after all, look at the Vietnam situation.

Look at the openings to China and the Soviet Union.

He knows what to do.

One thing, of course, we have here.

Well, none of these things would have happened.

One thing I did strike out, you know, where I said,

these things wouldn't have happened if it had not been that our strength was respected.

But I was going to say that our strength was respected by the Soviet Union.

But I struck it out because I knew that would really drive the Russians up the wall.

But they got the message.

One thing that I think is important, too, is that we've got to not get ourselves all just

burden down with Watergate.

You know, a lot of people wanted me to talk about Watergate during this speech at some time.

The point is, you know this is an embarrassing goddamn thing, but what do I get up and say that

which is the truth, that every member of the White House staff who has been named has given a sworn statement that he was not involved.

Do I get up and say that?

I don't know.

Maybe somebody else has got to say it.

But don't you agree that putting Watergate... No, no, that's why it was good.

You shouldn't have mentioned the damn Watergate mess.

It went to the whole...

I mean, you went to major foreign domestic things.

Getting bogged down in that swamp would have been... Well, that's a tough one, but we'll try to...

Okay, thank you.

Okay, sir.

Right, bye.

Nixon phone call with Brennan on Vietnam War and POWs

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Nixon Library Finding Aid

Also recorded on March 30, 1973

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