Nixon phone call with Haig on Vietnam War and Cambodia

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General Haig.

Hello.

Yes, sir.

Hope I didn't interrupt you at lunch.

No, no, no.

Oh, no, fine.

I was just, as you know, I'm leaving for California soon.

I just read a very ominous memorandum from Henry about his concern about the North Vietnamese buildup and all that sort of thing and so on.

Right, sir.

And what's happening in Cambodia.

Now, you may recall when we made the decision last week not to do the trail, Henry at that time was sort of pushing for it, but then he backed off some when they had that 23rd deal in Laos.

I still think it was wise that we probably didn't do that.

I don't know that we had the public provocation set up, obviously, but I don't know.

What do you think?

I think...

that last week's timing was not... Wasn't the right time.

Wasn't right.

It was an awfully tough one and a tightly balanced one.

Everything is that.

It doesn't mean you can't do it, but what is your present evaluation now as to yourself as you look at the whole situation?

I'm getting increasingly concerned about Cambodia.

Cambodia, but what about the thing, you see these intelligence reports, you know, the thing you talked about.

Now, they seem to be going almost overboard in the direction of indicating that everything's going to hell in a hat.

I'm not, I don't know that it, you know, they've

It's just hard.

You know, you've been analyzing them.

I don't know.

What do you see in the thing?

And incidentally, what the hell is the South doing?

Good God, they've got a hell of a big army.

Aren't they doing a little fighting themselves?

Yes, they are.

The number of incidents is actually down some, is it not, or not much?

No, the incident rate has been slowly and very mildly decreasing.

But only mildly, right.

I noticed that's what I meant, some, but just very slowly, yeah.

But I think the danger is that there are a combination of reasons for it in Cambodia.

There have been a series of violations across the board in Laos, South Vietnam, and, of course, no action at all in Cambodia, although we didn't expect that initially.

The areas that worry me the most are the broad applications of the overall agreement in Laos and in South Vietnam.

refusal to investigate.

And when you combine that with what could be happening in Cambodia, it is reason for some concern.

I think it is.

But I don't think it's an immediate thing in the sense of we've got a crisis.

I think we have an obligation to take a look at every kind of leverage we can

You see, the problem we've got, Al, here, that we mustn't get into is sort of the crisis mentality that, like in Cambodia, that, well, we'll start bombing.

Well, we're bombing the hell out of it already, you know.

That's right.

Good God, I don't know.

Are they hitting anything?

What is the situation?

There are indications that they're hitting it so hard that they're driving a lot of the North Vietnamese...

in South Vietnam.

That's not good.

Well, no, that's good.

It's good to get them out of there.

It disrupts them and it keeps them under pressure.

And it takes some of the heat off.

To what extent would you feel right now that we ought to start hitting the, well, I don't mean like today, but maybe next week start hitting the panhandle again?

Uh,

I wouldn't discount that.

No, I wouldn't.

I think the thing that I'm not aware of is what we've said to our customer up there in Hanoi.

If we've given him good, strong warning, I think if we do anything, it's got to be, we've got to make a lot of things evident to him that we're nearing the breaking point.

Yeah.

Well, of course, I put a very strong warning in that speech last night.

That's right.

And they can't just ignore that.

I think strong warnings have gone, I can assure you.

Private warnings.

Goddamn strong.

Well, I think we should take a very careful look at all the possible leverage we can.

It shouldn't be done in a crisis atmosphere.

but in a very stealing way.

See, we've got this problem.

You have to face it.

We've got it growing, building up with the goddamn Congress now.

They don't want to stop us doing anything in Cambodia.

We can't do this justifying on the Cambodian situation.

The only way we'll ever get away with anything is if there's a decision to do it.

in the context of a sacred agreement.

Well, I think we've got to do it, not for safe Cambodia, but because they broke an agreement.

Exactly right.

Exactly.

And that we are keeping an agreement and that they violated an agreement and we're therefore continuing it.

I think as long as it's air operations, that people will generally support it, too.

Yes, I do, too.

I don't think there would be a problem with, you know, if we decided that earlier, that we're hitting the house or something.

No, that's not going to be much of a start.

Except that before the POWs were out, the one problem, rather symbolically, that would have been very bad was that before they were out, that you'd lose some planes and have some more.

I think a lot of people would say, well, you're dumb.

That's right.

But now, again, at this point, we can just have to take a damn hard look.

These guys are willing to...

I think so.

I think that if it were over time...

to really seriously erode, the price would be incalculable.

It just would be very serious.

And we've always played for enough time for other events to overrun it from our obligations worldwide.

And that's what we've got to have.

We've just got to have it.

You can't have it collapse like immediately.

That's the point.

And you sure as hell can't have it collapse.

Well, as you know, we've been very tough with the Russians, and they claim they're

pulling the string, but I don't know.

I doubt it.

It sure isn't an awful much sign of any... Well, it may be they're pulling the string at the pipeline, but the pipeline is so full, it has not any effect yet.

Yeah, yeah.

Well, I think we should do a very thorough job.

Actually, Henry's kicked one off in the West Ag.

I'm not confident it'll be the best thing in the world,

You mean a study?

Yeah.

Yeah, I know.

That won't come out.

That won't do much.

But anyway, we've got to get something, and we've got to line up our forces within the government on this.

God damn it.

This is right.

We can't have any flinching once we...

Now, one thing that's been mentioned is probably, and we've talked to you, I might want you to go out there to Cambodia and take a look.

I don't know what the hell you're going to find out.

I mean, what can we do?

They've got to get La Nola the hell out of there somewhere or other, but you can't overthrow them.

I don't think we should rush on it in the context of the recent flurry on the hill.

It'll just look like a... Yeah.

And it will...

I get your point.

...increase that syndrome that we're doing for Cambodia.

We don't want that.

You could go out and look at both.

That's right.

That's what you might just visit all the areas.

That's why I think if you took a trip, I think you should visit all.

That's right.

So it's just an overall assessment.

That's right.

All right.

Well, certainly if the DRV continues this kind of asshole stuff, Jack, we're off the hook on the aid thing.

That's for damn sure.

Oh, yeah.

And that's, I don't know if they want it or not, but if they do want it, good God, they aren't going to get it, not as long as they're doing this.

And another thing, too, is that these POWs are now going to be talking about how they've been lacerated.

Well, you see, that's right, and that's going to build up a hell of a, you know, among the average American.

Yesterday's television and this morning is going to raise a hell of a lot of heckles with you.

patient with they're now violating these agreements if they're in violation no way no way that's why we have to that's the thing we have to use and we have to start drawing attention to it where it's happening we did that last week you gave a good shot last night we're looking at every possible military preparatory signal character

That's what we're doing over here right now.

Right, right, right.

That's Abrams' evaluation, or is he about the same as yours?

I think so.

He's concerned about it.

He knows we can't have the thing happen quickly, but he's also, he doesn't panic and doesn't... You also know, I guess what we've got to also realize now is that if Vietnamization meant anything, good God, to

The South Vietnamese, looking at their situation, ought to be able to do something here.

I don't know.

They could.

There's no question about that.

And they're going to get upset here in the six-month period.

It just couldn't happen.

Yeah, Henry was saying that he's, as a member this morning, I think he's gone a little bit overboard here.

He says that he thinks that there might be even a big communist offensive in April.

Hell, that's three weeks, two weeks away.

Well, the intelligence community.

What CIA came in with.

They said there could be an offensive in April.

Jesus, I just, I don't... Q will probably make that point to you.

Yeah, so?

So what does he want us to do, send our forces back in?

No, I don't think so.

No?

No, I don't think so.

He wants to do bombs?

I'm not sure that he wants anything other than maybe understanding if he takes the name.

I don't think we'll get any panic from him.

Well, as a matter of fact, I don't give a damn if he takes some action.

I mean, as far as the ceasefire is concerned now, and if they're breaking it, he can break it.

I mean, and he could take some rather effective action, couldn't he?

Oh, yes.

He could take those missiles out of the case on, and he could put a... With his own air, couldn't he?

With his own air, he could put some heavy strikes in around that MR-3 and contain them.

They've been constantly taking on this little

of a unit there and pounding the hell out of them and won't let any investigators in you know but it's not none of this is major it's the compounding of the whole yeah the whole picture cambodia the real problem there basically is getting a government out good god we're putting money in and we don't have any advisors there that's that's right i don't know the same

considerations that drove us in 70 or could appear if that country went communist.

Of course.

Well, okay.

I'll thank you.

Yes, sir.

Bye.

Nixon phone call with Haig on Vietnam War and Cambodia

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Nixon Library Finding Aid

Also recorded on March 30, 1973

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