Nixon White House TapesTape 88 › Conversation 088-002

Nixon, Agnew & Scott on Vietnam War and peace negotiations

Wednesday, January 26, 1972 · 7:47 AM–10:02 AM ET · Cabinet Room

ParticipantsNixon, Richard M. (President);  Agnew, Spiro T. (Vice President);  Scott, Hugh;  Griffin, Robert P.;  Cotton, Norris;  Allott, Gordon L.;  Dominick, Peter H.;  Goldwater, Barry M.;  Ford, Gerald R.;  Arends, Leslie C.;  Anderson, John B.;  Devine, Samuel L.;  Poff, Richard H.;  Conable, Barber B., Jr.;  Smith, H. Allen;  Wilson, Robert C. ("Bob");  Byrnes, John W.;  Bow, Frank T.;  Dole, Robert J.;  Shultz, George P.;  Weinberger, Caspar W. ("Cap");  Stein, Herbert;  Ehrlichman, John D.;  MacGregor, Clark;  Timmons, William E.;  Cook, Richard K.;  Korologos, Thomas C.;  Dent, Harry S.;  Ziegler, Ronald L.;  Ziegler, Ronald L.;  Harlow, Bryce N.;  Koch, Noel C.;  Gifford, William L.;  Kissinger, Henry A.;  Rogers, William P.;  Nixon, Richard M. (President);  Agnew, Spiro T. (Vice President);  Scott, Hugh;  Griffin, Robert P.;  Cotton, Norris;  Allott, Gordon L.;  Dominick, Peter H.;  Goldwater, Barry M.;  Ford, Gerald R.;  Arends, Leslie C.;  Anderson, John B.;  Devine, Samuel L.;  Poff, Richard H.;  Conable, Barber B., Jr.;  Smith, H. Allen;  Wilson, Robert C. ("Bob");  Byrnes, John W.;  Bow, Frank T.;  Dole, Robert J.;  Shultz, George P.;  Weinberger, Caspar W. ("Cap");  Stein, Herbert;  Ehrlichman, John D.;  MacGregor, Clark;  Timmons, William E.;  Cook, Richard K.;  Korologos, Thomas C.;  Dent, Harry S.;  Ziegler, Ronald L.;  Ziegler, Ronald L.;  Harlow, Bryce N.;  Koch, Noel C.;  Gifford, William L.;  Kissinger, Henry A.;  Rogers, William P.Conversation088-002 onTape 88StartWednesday, January 26, 1972 at 7:47 AMEndWednesday, January 26, 1972 at 10:02 AMRecording deviceCabinet RoomSourceNixon Library record for 088-002 ↗

President Nixon met with Vice President Agnew and Republican congressional leaders to discuss strategy regarding his recent speech on Vietnam and the administration's upcoming FY 1973 budget. The President and Henry Kissinger briefed the attendees on the Vietnam peace negotiations, emphasizing that the U.S. had made comprehensive offers while denouncing North Vietnamese intransigence and political maneuvering. Economic advisors, including George Shultz and Herbert Stein, presented the administration's fiscal plans, highlighting the importance of balancing the budget while supporting a transition to a peacetime economy through controlled spending and wage-price stabilization. Participants agreed on the necessity of maintaining a firm stance on defense and economic policy to solidify public support and improve the administration's negotiating leverage.

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29:51Hei.
29:51Hei.
30:07ok ok ok ok ok
45:21Thank you for watching!
46:38Pretty good wild card would be Barry Goldwater.
46:41But I must say, you know, Barry is very odd, and he's speaking all over the country, and fighting the good fight, and so forth, particularly in this whole area.
46:58And that's interesting.
47:01Glad to have him here.
47:04I just see how...
47:07Ha ha ha!
47:08Ha ha ha!
47:55He came in and he told us that he was in Chabut since 1986.
48:02So you want this fucking deal?
48:15That's recorded as a Harvard memoir.
48:16Everything says it's recorded.
48:16We'll have three items today in addition to our very quick story.
48:36Thank you for watching!
49:01I think first, a brief look down would be... ...the... ...the... ...the... ...the... ...the... ...the...
50:07We could not die both, although the top leaders were working from time to time.
50:18We were, of course, just very channel-centered, that the public channels, we cannot put on the most what we could, because that would have been a violation of the whole method of private policy, which we will continue to use in many areas.
50:36It is the best way to achieve the goal.
50:58Never has the administration done more work harder in all channels.
51:02And never can we expect that the government administration has gone further in trying to find the best solution for where they have no confidence in.
51:14Why don't we try to get some new political solution regarding President Trump?
51:34I've done all that.
51:36I've done months and months and months.
51:38It's almost two years ago.
51:41The fight is that I haven't done that.
51:43It's a total answer to the critics today.
51:47Why have we done that?
51:48I mean, we fight a lot.
51:52We could offer everything except total capitulation and surrender, and still be criticized.
52:00Because there are some who, as a matter of conviction, want the United States to just get out.
52:09They don't care how and why, because they believe very deeply that we should never have gotten in.
52:14They care nothing about how we get out, and that is their belief.
52:18That, for example, if you've got to respect it, or if it governs you, he says, I never supported this thing, and so therefore anything we say is not going to satisfy him.
52:25Let me say, we don't intend to satisfy people like that, because if we go that far in this country, as far as his position,
52:38and being able to be a powerful piece in the world is so challenging.
52:43Because what happens there is, after all of the sacrifice, the rest of what ends up is a total abject surrender.
52:51That we're not going to do.
52:53On the other hand, we have gone not only the extra mile, but perhaps the extra hundred miles, maybe an octave, could have been,
53:04Practically, it's an offer that nobody thought for us to do, to be able to do it, but as far as it goes, it doesn't matter in front.
53:13It's a good offer.
53:14It ought to be considered.
53:15It ought to be accepted.
53:17I'm not suggesting that you go in and do it, or that you go react.
53:21It's inevitable, but we're being honest.
53:24It's not crazy to do it, but it's not what I was going to do.
53:48I think that we should start out by saying that
54:13It's just a matter of getting rid of two.
54:18And why don't we get rid of two and get rid of the quarterback?
54:25We couldn't do that at all.
54:27But the Comets won what they tried to get, but we never clutched from one game.
55:01Korea, Japan, Philippines, Taiwan, and so forth.
55:03So if we had considered throwing this government out, letting the communists put their own government in, it would be the greatest defeat this nation has ever suffered.
55:14Now, in addition to the private discussions with the president for every last time, we had discussions with diplomats all over the world, and told them they could figure out any way to get the communists to seriously negotiate anything we could do with them.
55:27When I say all over the world, I mean...
55:29Tito, and Pax, and the Jordanians, and all over the world.
55:34The French, the French have been in contact with them all the time.
55:38We said, look, we can't do that.
55:39So that's one thing I think we should keep in mind.
55:44It's not just getting rid of the Jews.
55:47It's throwing out a government that now exists and putting it in a communist government.
55:51That's what they want.
55:53That's what we can't possibly do.
55:54The second point I'd like to make is that I think that there may be some questions
56:00They were criticizing us in public.
56:28By making these criticisms public.
56:49That's what they did during President Johnson's time, and that's what they thought they could do this time.
56:53They could keep these private discussions going, not let anybody know what we proposed, criticize publicly, and gradually their own public support for President Nixon and the government.
57:06And that's why they haven't answered us for three and a half months.
57:09They just haven't done anything.
57:12That's why they're planning probably a really comprehensive attack in the next month or so.
57:18All the investigations are going to be attacked.
57:22If we had let that in public continue to erode, or at least that's what they hope would happen, we would have gotten to the end of a very serious trouble this next year.
57:35So we felt that in view of the fact that they were not in good faith, they were using these private discussions for the very purpose of comparing the people against the government.
57:45The wisest thing to do is to make it all public.
57:49If they have any interest in negotiating, which is, I think, quite enough, you never can tell though, they can still negotiate for the state on that.
58:00We haven't lost the opportunity in any sense to negotiate, but they know now that we're on a strong foundation.
58:08The American people have encouraged the facts, they're going to support the government, they're going to support the president.
58:15So they've lost this opportunity they thought they had and turned the people away against this.
58:22And for that reason, I think that this was a very constructive step, because now that they've lost that hope, and I think they have,
58:31If they realize that they can't divide us as a nation, if the American people are going to support the president, then they may say, well, maybe that won't work.
58:41Maybe we should try to negotiate something.
58:45Now, as far as international opinions, because the president spoke about that, I think that the climate has completely changed in the last year in the rest of the world.
58:58It's something that's not discussed anymore.
59:01When I went to the NAO meeting, it never even arose.
59:05Two years before, a year and a half before, that was the main subject of discussion.
59:11I meet with foreign ministers all the way over, and something doesn't come up.
59:14Sometimes they say, oh, things are going, I say, fine, they say that.
59:18So, as far as the international climate is concerned, it's excellent.
59:20They think the president's policy is sound.
59:23They think it was done in the right way.
59:25And it doesn't present a problem anymore.
59:28And I think after last night's broadcast, it's going to be more so.
59:32I happened to, after the broadcast, want to do a deductive to see if Prime Minister Putin is going to see his president today.
59:39And we all watched the broadcast there, and I think he's going to see if he's going to talk to Prime Minister Putin.
59:48It was a good turnout from the Hill and the diplomatic corps, and they were all supposed to be complimentary at that time.
59:54It was particularly complimentary.
59:59But Mike Mansfield was there, and afterwards he said in front of all the people, well, he said, I think this is a great step.
1:00:06And he said, I think the person has gone just as far as he could possibly go.
1:00:13I don't see how he could go any farther.
1:00:16And I think that is going to be the intention that the American people have.
1:00:21How can we go any further?
1:00:22And that was really the purpose of the presence we all had, and I think we're supposed to do that.
1:00:30Thank you.
1:00:33I feel that we can make the point that, the point that was proposed along a central goal that is to make something that could be had on another center line for that political.
1:00:49Yes.
1:00:50See, Henry just came in.
1:00:51He had discussed it with us on May 31st, in which he made the proposal of a total withdrawal on a given day
1:01:02in exchange for the purpose of the war, of the speech war.
1:01:06Now, they retracted that out of panic.
1:01:09We were asked last night what was the date.
1:01:12Well, we didn't propose a date, but we wanted to know what they consider it.
1:01:17I wonder if you have a perfect mind that...
1:01:36Some of these steps are progressive, that is, CO2 is brought progressively at all at once.
1:01:43There is this response that's occurring on the other side.
1:01:47That's it.
1:01:48That's it.
1:01:50I think the point that we should keep in mind
1:02:20Yes, but the only thing they're interested in is to change the government and put their own government in.
1:02:28Everything else is just fucking around and talking about it, but they've never varied from that.
1:02:35That's what they have in mind.
1:02:36That's what they had in mind from the beginning.
1:02:38So, this is what Ernest said last night.
1:02:41We've done everything we can.
1:02:42Short of that, we're prepared to do anything that any reasonable man can think of to negotiate a settlement.
1:02:48We can't do that.
1:02:51At the one thing you can't do, when the United States couldn't stand up, it would be the greatest defeat we've ever suffered.
1:03:03Let me say, and I'd like for Henry to say a word first.
1:03:07I'll just point to you, correct me if I'm not wrong, but...
1:03:16When some suggest, why don't we offer simply a solution for basically the military side separately, and not get into this very difficult political thing, that's exactly what we did offer in May.
1:03:32We continued to get it in August, and last night...
1:03:37We've offered it as a choice.
1:03:39If they want to negotiate the military side separately and not the South Vietnamese in a later time to discuss the politics of working out, that's fine with us.
1:03:48But Bill couldn't be more right in putting his finger on the problem.
1:03:52The reason they rejected a deadline in return for prisoner of war and ceasefire...
1:03:59The reason they rejected it in May, the reason they rejected it in August, the reason they did not respond properly in October, is that it is they that have insisted always that there can be no discussion with regard to withdrawals, ceasefire.
1:04:18The goal is
1:04:44political that's why the very important one very important move was made by the last nine five and this is where Hugh gets the credit where he offered to resign the month before the election along with the vice president have a caretaker government come in run the administration side of the government and of course an entirely independent electoral commission with the communists participating in it run the election but you can't go further than that in my opinion
1:05:11Henry, it seems as though I stated it in the way that you've used that term, clown, several times.
1:05:19Secretary Clown, go ahead.
1:05:21I know that speech is by us, but is it funny that the president, or the Secretary of State, is exactly correct?
1:05:32We offer, on May 31st last year, to settle... We offer to set a day of withdrawal, but to cease fire...
1:05:44...return for exchange of prison.
1:05:46He had to be fired for a variety of reasons which I would like to mention.
1:05:52Their response was not, says this, was that point wrong that you proposed?
1:05:58They didn't negotiate that proposal.
1:06:00But they said that proposal is wrong because it deals only with military issues.
1:06:06And we will not discuss military issues alone.
1:06:09We want to discuss political and military issues together.
1:06:14So whether they were thrilled in our proposal that had complexities are really irrelevant.
1:06:21Because they wouldn't even get into the proposal.
1:06:25They said it had to include political issues.
1:06:28It was the next meeting they came back with their nine-point proposal.
1:06:32It was one that was secret.
1:06:35It was June 26th they came back with their proposal, which included political elements and put it before us.
1:06:45The president and the secretary of state have authorized me all the time to say, all right, if that is the only thing that makes the negotiation go, we'll include these political elements in the discussion.
1:06:58It was one of the few times I received high marks from them.
1:07:02They said that's a great performance.
1:07:06And that is the only thing they'd be willing to discuss.
1:07:10Every proposal we have made since then has sort of followed the outline of their proposal.
1:07:16And we have attempted to take those elements that we could really have reasonableness to go along with it.
1:07:26So, we have made two attempts to separate the political and military issue.
1:07:31One, we made a flat-out proposal.
1:07:34The second is in a more complicated way.
1:07:37It's the last proposal which the president has put before them yesterday.
1:07:42We have said, if you agree in principle to that whole package, the whole package being one, that includes those elements that they want,
1:07:52Let's start the withdrawal of prisoners.
1:07:55Exchange these key slides and let's look at the details of these negotiations.
1:08:00Now that's very important.
1:08:02What we said yesterday, and that's another thing we offered this October 11th, yesterday, what we said is, we are ready immediately.
1:08:12If we could agree in principle along the long term, we would immediately go forward on the matter of withdrawal, phase withdrawal of POWs at...
1:08:27...developed the situation with regard to the political matters in the ceasefire.
1:08:34They told me that the whole package would be completed, that the negotiation would be completed, and that the success would be completed on the 26th month while we are withdrawing.
1:08:47But that's good to hear.
1:08:48President, I'm so...
1:08:50First of all, I think the reaction is that there's only a political settlement that should offer that.
1:08:59What you just said makes me wonder whether agreement in principle means that there is no possibility of them being executed without any agreement in principle.
1:09:10I just thought it was clear that we had two things on the table.
1:09:13Either the political settlement, or simply the ceasefire withdrawal of the UNW exchange without any requirement for any political settlement, or even an agreement in principle.
1:09:25They're both wrong.
1:09:26They're both wrong.
1:09:28No agreement in principle is helpful.
1:09:31As far as the... Let me say it exactly.
1:09:33You said this exactly.
1:09:34It's what we just said.
1:09:35It's pretty sincere.
1:09:38If they want to sit down today and negotiate, and agree to negotiate for withdrawal into a WFN ceasefire, we'll do it, period.
1:09:52Let them work out the political thing in the later time.
1:09:55We have said that, but they have rejected that up to this point.
1:09:59They have said, we won't do that.
1:10:00So that's why we said, all right, all right, we'll discuss the political thing.
1:10:04What we are saying now is, all right, we won't do that.
1:10:08Let's have that.
1:10:09And we'll have a political settlement.
1:10:10We set forth a very, what we think is a comprehensive political proposal.
1:10:16And then, we even go further than that.
1:10:18We said in discussing the two together, assuming you want to discuss them together, we'll do it in a phased way.
1:10:26So, we really go off into three different ways.
1:10:29And it gives them a smart response.
1:10:31You say, one, what we would actually like to do, as a matter of fact, prefer, would be to chop off the military aspect here.
1:10:55When you read the media, they always come back and they recognize POWs, and they recognize the trolls, and they recognize these pirates, and they say, hold on, the key thing is, what are you going to do about the Nazis and their government?
1:11:10Because that is why the proposal of the Nazis to be a government is thrown in.
1:11:16for the other but if they want to go back to the original proposal, we're willing.
1:11:21And that's six months now.
1:11:23We give them back.
1:11:24There's all the people that they have proposals with.
1:11:26They want to do it.
1:11:29And within six months of total withdrawal, buses fire.
1:11:33And that's a real downside, right Henry?
1:11:36That's exactly it.
1:11:37I haven't been to residence yet today, actually, as you know.
1:11:41When I thought you were going to author a purely militant package of pistols for Christmas.
1:11:47The military package is still on the table.
1:11:51I think that, I think the
1:12:37I said, I said, we are, I said, we will do this, we will do that, and remember the words I said, the choice is theirs.
1:12:46I said, or, I said, we will negotiate a new proposal, or we will negotiate for six months.
1:12:55We are willing to negotiate a total withdrawal to cease fire in Philadelphia, period, if they wish to do that.
1:13:01So it's on the table, either way.
1:13:04Both are on the table, Mr. President.
1:13:06Mr. President, can I say, I think it's important that the discussions that we have, we don't get too involved in the public here, is that not the case?
1:13:18No.
1:13:18Mr. Vice President, Mr. President,
1:13:21Say this, it seems to me.
1:13:24First, people say, why didn't you make this offer earlier?
1:13:27Why didn't you offer to get the POWs back and change groups?
1:13:31They said, yes, we did.
1:13:33We made that offer.
1:13:36You know what I'm saying?
1:13:37We made it in May 31st.
1:13:38Secondly, ever since May 31st, they have said, the other side has said, we won't accept that.
1:13:44In fact, the New York Times sent them some questions, and they sent answers back, which were printed in the paper.
1:13:50And it says we won't consider that.
1:13:52So they made sure they won't consider that.
1:13:54Notwithstanding, last night the president said, we renew that offer.
1:13:57He said it in his speech.
1:14:01Now, we don't have to say much more than that.
1:14:03We've made the offer.
1:14:04They've rejected it every time.
1:14:05The president made the offer again last night.
1:14:08Now, that's one part of it.
1:14:09Now, the other part is a new offer, too, because they keep saying, well, we want to have a political settlement, not just a military settlement.
1:14:16The president says, fine.
1:14:16You're the president now, officer.
1:14:19On a military settlement, here's a proposal that we think is a reasonable proposal, including both.
1:14:24And that's on the table.
1:14:26Now that's all there is to it.
1:14:28And the other point that we have to keep in mind, they're not interested in any of those things.
1:14:33They're just interested in achieving their objective, which is to force us.
1:14:37to change the government, which would be the tremendous surrender.
1:14:42That's all.
1:14:43When the point of the agreement in principle comes up, that seems to indicate to me why does it require agreement in principle before executing the first one.
1:14:51Well, the answer to that is that the only reason that that comes up at all isn't again an attempt to accommodate what they want to do, but to say, look, we'll leave it there quicker.
1:15:06We want to insist that we have a complete agreement.
1:15:10If you agree to principle, we'll decide.
1:15:12That's just another way of accommodating to their point of view.
1:15:17Mr. President, all the time that Henry was going through this 30 months of...
1:15:37Negotiations.
1:15:38We were battling up on the floor of the House and the Senate the various versions of the Mansfield Amendment.
1:15:46I'm curious, Henry, to make any calculations, what impact did those battles, if any, have on your negotiations?
1:16:02They have hugely affected it.
1:16:06to American public opinion.
1:16:08And at the first few meetings, I always would get long lectures about American public opinion.
1:16:16After the first meeting, I would say, this is out of order, and I will, if you talk to me about American public opinion, I will talk to you about your public opinion, out of order.
1:16:28Nevertheless, every time one would come there, they would say that this is a criminal expression,
1:16:35And therefore, in Brits you have no real choice.
1:16:39Our concern with the Mansfield Amendment was this.
1:16:42We wanted to have this deadline in such a way that we could negotiate.
1:16:47They warned us in the position where no matter what they do, we have to withdraw.
1:16:54And they said we don't have to do anything, including the Brits.
1:16:58Men, men, men, men, men, men, men, men, men, men,
1:17:25And don't talk about bayonets, or freedom, or anything like that.
1:17:31Now, our concern with the Mansfield Amendment and the variations of it was that they would construe a congressional mandate which would meet their point for an overthrow, and of a date that we could then not change.
1:17:49Because their sophistication about the details of expression in the foreign policy field is not so good.
1:18:01At the precise moment, one of the problems we had when we proposed our major was a good proposal.
1:18:08They were watching a lot of our domestic debates, and so forth.
1:18:13So I have to say, in all candor,
1:18:17We never raised that question in answer to your question.
1:18:20My generation last 90 days has been one of critical inhibiting features to the West.
1:18:25Let's get it in terms of marketing and bailout.
1:18:30And I'm all lawyers.
1:18:32I'm a lawyer for all.
1:18:36The difficulty with the man's field and, let's not say it personally, the difficulty with...
1:19:00The whole rigmarole of the Congress setting a deadline was this.
1:19:06It completely destroyed our negotiating position.
1:19:09Let's put it this way.
1:19:13If you go to the other side and say, regardless of what you do, the Congress has said we will withdraw by a day's service, you're not letting anybody in for it.
1:19:25our position was, look, and that's what we said in May 31st, look, we will discuss the deadline, and in August we gave them one in nine months, and in October we gave them one in six months.
1:19:37But, we said, we return for, on the line, POWs inspired.
1:19:44For example...
1:19:45Let's assume that we just say, pass the resolution, the United States will get out of Vietnam within six months, forty million or nine months, whatever happens.
1:19:54And, with the idea that we will let it be discussed with the U.S. Senate and Senate.
1:20:01The difference in the men's bill resolution
1:20:21The congressional approach in our system, the congressional approach, despite all the likely that it was basically unilateral, is that we should withdraw Congress' dictates to the administration that they withdraw from Vietnam by a date of certain.
1:20:37That's a little fuzzy language about our concern about the government.
1:20:40Whereas we were saying to them in the negotiations,
1:20:43...in a very hard-headed way, but a very conciliatory way.
1:20:46Look, we're willing to withdraw and intimidate certain, but in return, we have to have certainty.
1:20:52We're making our cool about this, and we're not going to get the tails of our guys cut off while they're withdrawing.
1:20:58That's why we have to have a ceasefire, so that nobody can object to that.
1:21:01Under the President's plan, they can set the date.
1:21:05All they have to do is to agree to one of the two words of our proposal.
1:21:10If they say they want to settle military questions at all, six months afterwards, we are out.
1:21:16If they want to do the package six months after we are out, they can get a date to demoralize tomorrow by a statement of principle.
1:21:25Thank you, sir.
1:21:28And they can send it.
1:21:30But incidentally, that was true.
1:21:33That would have been true in May.
1:21:35That was true in May 1934.
1:21:36Before the Matthew women's match.
1:21:41But the critics will say that, of course, these fires have developed.
1:21:44I understand the rationale for it.
1:21:46You said you might discuss that briefly.
1:21:50But the issue, let's take the May 30th.
1:21:54Let's first take the May 5th.
1:21:55We have to despise it.
1:21:58If you combine it up with the military shoes along, ah, that is to say, bullet draw, stuff, all that kind of things and so forth, it is riskier for risk.
1:22:36And also raising the issue of why few Americans are left.
1:22:40Now, they didn't say, however, just to get the record straight, when we put this report, they didn't say, now look, of this package, we don't like disease 5.
1:22:49That wasn't their answer.
1:22:52Their answer was,
1:22:54A military proposal is in itself unacceptable, no matter what it contains.
1:22:59Any settlement must include the overthrow of Hume, so we never reach the point where it didn't break down on the issue of these fires.
1:23:09It broke down on the issue that they wouldn't even discuss it, saying it has to include the overthrow of Hume.
1:23:17And after all, as the Secretary pointed out, it...
1:23:23The New York Times sent a list of questions which were an open invitation to say we'll settle for withdrawals for prisoners.
1:23:32And it would be front page if this had been asked.
1:23:36They flatly refused.
1:23:38Monday night when these news stories were out that we were going to offer withdrawals for prisoners, and they were afraid the president would get on television with this,
1:23:48They rejected me, rejected it, and made a public statement yesterday in Paris saying absolutely not.
1:23:58The reason being that they have consistently, not ultimately maintained that it's not a negotiable deal, that it must be tuned for very well.
1:24:09What would have happened if it made, on May 31st, they had said, all right, start the withdrawals immediately after the ceasefire, so one day that we can't conduct our negotiations, you know, with newspapers.
1:24:23We are on absolutely safe ground.
1:24:25As the Secretary pointed out, if we sit off of this, then they absolutely refuse to have a separable package.
1:24:33And that's the reason we are putting a global package forward.
1:24:38It's not because we are accommodating it, but because we are trying to follow
1:24:45They are packaged as much as we can.
1:24:47In fact, in our package, we are actually picking up formulations of four of their points in order to speed the process to evade it.
1:24:59And four of their nine points and two of their seven points to evade it, just to speed up the process.
1:25:06This package is theirs.
1:25:07I mean, our approach is theirs, not ours.
1:25:10Usually, when you put something before them, they say, this is a trick, this is, this doesn't work.
1:25:28We do our demands, and that infected will figure out.
1:25:31Even in private meetings.
1:25:34Last summer for the first time, they would... Because what we would consider to go is that it's been to each of their points, and each of our points, and we try to find some action.
1:25:46And in effect, we settled seven of the nine points, more or less.
1:25:51The only outstanding point was not to cease fire, that's agreed to as coming.
1:25:58The only outstanding point last summer was how many troops will be left after our withdrawal.
1:26:04That is, how many can we have as part of the military and the trade office.
1:26:36But if the communists can win the election, it is possible that we have to add to what the president pointed out.
1:26:43It is not only his cue to resign one month before the election, but to take the agreement in time.
1:26:51All matters pertaining to the election are going to be put under an electoral commission.
1:26:58That is to say, six months before the election, under the Electoral Commission, which all parties, including the Communists, are equally represented.
1:27:07And the election itself will be run not by the government, not even by the caretaker government.
1:27:13The election will be run by the Electoral Commission, which by then will have been operating for six months, in which the Communists will get to do with the disease.
1:27:25So we've gone, we've leaned over way backwards to arrange a free trial.
1:27:34Now, they have turned this down completely.
1:27:36I'm interested to see if I know your angel.
1:27:39This morning, all they said was this is a cunning plan, which is not new.
1:27:44Well, that's true.
1:27:45I mean, it is new in the sense that they've already had it since October.
1:27:50But they haven't totally rejected it.
1:27:52Mr. President, last night...
1:27:55And one of the questions a Democrat asked interrogated Henry on the word overthrow.
1:28:02And I thought that Henry's response was very helpful.
1:28:07I hope, Jerry, we can document.
1:28:10We are on the list.
1:28:11We have this dilemma.
1:28:13We would like to keep open the house of going back to the secret zone.
1:28:18So we are revealing only documents that we submitted
1:28:23And we have not released their nine points, so we have said, if they want to, they're free to release them.
1:28:31Nor have we, up to now, released what they actually said.
1:28:36But we have a verbatim transcript of the meeting.
1:28:42And the president chose to overthrow his strange deliberations.
1:28:47It is a word which we can defend from the record.
1:28:53And if they threat us there, if they threat us to it, we will have no difficulty of receiving the opinion transcript.
1:29:00We like what they said.
1:29:02It would be nice to drive them off at that point.
1:29:05I'd like to hear them say it.
1:29:07They said two things.
1:29:08One is an indirect overthrow, and one is a direct overthrow.
1:29:12The indirect overthrow is they want us to withdraw all equipment.
1:29:18And the way they phrase it, we have to take away even the equipment that we give to the South, even if anything American has to be withdrawn, to stop all American military aid, to stop all American economic aid.
1:29:34Well, this is an indirect overthrow, although that is not what we meant.
1:29:38That's an indirect overthrow, because they are getting between 800 million and a trillion dollars worth of outside aid.
1:29:46We responded to that part of it, which is at least a proposal, by saying, we will agree to any restrictions on economic and military aid for South Vietnam that you are prepared to accept for North Vietnam.
1:30:04And we agree to a policy of neutrality for South Vietnam.
1:30:08We only want it as allies, as such.
1:30:12But beyond that proposal, which is an indirect open vote, they have flatly asked us on a number of occasions to hold a vote to resolve it in each government, and we have to have made it record to back it up.
1:30:29Henry, on your point, it hasn't been done yet.
1:30:35Practices have been made to their preparation for MFS.
1:30:42How well are they able to amount to defense?
1:30:46Well, what we've done is that, let me just say we have a course of analysis.
1:30:53We've had an analysis made by paper, by the Joint Committee, by the CIA, etc.
1:30:59And the indication is that they can amount to a rather substantial amount of defense, particularly in Newport.
1:31:09We expect them to mount a substantial offensive troop board in February and in November 1 in March.
1:31:20And we have somehow changed our estimate.
1:31:24And they seem to have changed their orders.
1:31:27Their orders meant we had to intercept them in December for a series of high points stretching throughout the year.
1:31:34The orders now seem to be to throw everything into a major military operation in February and March.
1:31:43So we expect an attack in Tukor and in Haiku.
1:31:48The unknown in this equation is how well this will lead to a fight in the face of a very sustained attack.
1:31:57Our judgment is that with American air power,
1:32:01They should be able to hold, although there will be some setbacks, we may lose this provincial city here and there, and this could be played by the Kreb into a terrible defeat.
1:32:13On the other hand, it could easily follow the test pattern, that is to say, they'll throw everything into this attack, and yet, in the hope of overturning the situation, if they have overtaken the situation,
1:32:31We will not be surprised if then they mention the negotiation, and on something like this plan, which after now they have stood here to refuse to reject, avoid the rejection.
1:33:08Well, the important thing is, don't undercut a position that we have now presented publicly in the Vietnamese Commission that goes and gives us the authority to go.
1:33:19The language must be exactly as we put it.
1:33:22That's the way I would put it.
1:33:23If the Senate goes off on a half-assed deal, without offering more than we have, then you can forget negotiations.
1:33:33Just forget it.
1:33:35This is the problem here.
1:33:36The problem with the Manningfield thing and the rest of it, and I don't say this critically to Mike, they probably best say this to Mike, but some of these other colleagues always say it.
1:33:46Well, it's Kennedy's action.
1:33:48He sent the first 16,000.
1:34:31Thank you for watching!
1:34:47At that time, there was Senator Biden, President Sanders, and Senator Harkey.
1:35:03And I did not see if I was also told that the center of government, both by and heart, saw separately, not only Hanoi group, but the NFL group of government.
1:35:15I was told at that meeting that I had seen both groups twice within a period of time.
1:35:22Specifically, how did this adventure go around?
1:35:28I don't want to ask any aspersions of any of those candidates.
1:35:33I'd be happy to go ahead.
1:35:35Let me just say, I was reading, if I could make one allusion, we had a meeting in the cabinet the other day, and the vice president and several cabinet members were saying very long speech,
1:35:56very non-partisan, arrest and so forth.
1:35:59And I said, listen, I just vote for myself, I'm not going to speak for yourself.
1:36:05Let me ask a few questions.
1:36:09All of these proposals have a long history, in which the words have very specific meanings.
1:36:18The North Vietnamese are masters at delving hundreds, which
1:36:24then enable their visitors to improve it the many way they want.
1:36:30For example, for months after they had rejected our May 32nd proposal, people were coming back for tenants.
1:36:38You remember Clifford was saying that he had inside information of the settlement.
1:36:44We knew damn well, because we had heard it directly, that it couldn't be true.
1:36:51I happened to have seen Swansweets a day after he saw McGovern, and I said, what is this?
1:37:01He said, well, what McGovern says is his problem.
1:37:05And I said, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we.
1:37:20You remember last July, there was a lot of discussion of if we only set a withdrawal date, there had never been a prisoner.
1:37:30They had never said that.
1:37:31They had said they had discussed the modality of how the prisoners are going to be released.
1:37:37Well, that's a true point, but it's not good to play it as soon as it comes to the point where it might happen.
1:37:44It goes full way back.
1:37:45So...
1:37:47One of our disadvantages has been their tendency to use American visitors, congressional and otherwise, who go in there, make a statement to them, and they then reply with an ambiguous formulation which the visitor interprets as an acquiescence, and which they then don't contradict, and which we then have to argue with.
1:38:10And the major, one of the major reasons why the president spoke yesterday is to bring before the American public and the Congress a record that everything, that any one of these visitors had brought back, we had been there before, and asked explicit questions about.
1:38:29And so we knew what the real position was.
1:38:33We have regret from putting our knowledge forward because we were hoping to bring it to a conclusion.
1:38:42So I have to tell you these visits are counterproductive because they never tell.
1:38:48I do not recall in the whole history of negotiations that they have ever told anybody who was not authorized by the government anything that they did not tell the government.
1:39:01They use outsiders for propaganda.
1:39:04They do not use them for negotiation.
1:39:09Bill, yes, you want to?
1:39:10Well, I just want to say, I agree with Henry.
1:39:13I know, I think it would be unfair, strongly and wisely, to suggest it to me, but these are, as we've been talking about, had an adverse effect, in a sense, changed his mind.
1:39:24Had an adverse effect in terms of American public opinion.
1:39:28They were just using these, they were using them, for propaganda purposes.
1:39:34That's what they had in mind.
1:39:36I mean, I don't know how anybody feels.
1:39:39I've never had a feeling up to this point that we're serious at all about working on a negotiated settlement.
1:39:43It's all been out of propaganda.
1:39:45It's what they had in mind when they went to Paris in the first instance.
1:39:50I don't think they went there with the idea of negotiating as we think of negotiating.
1:39:54They got a good deal.
1:39:55They got the bombing stopped.
1:39:58For nothing.
1:39:59For nothing.
1:39:59They went to Paris and they got the very best place in the world for a
1:40:03for a sounding board.
1:40:05They've got the French press, they've got the old Communist Party, and the Communist Party has put them up in their headquarters, that's where they live.
1:40:14So it's an ideal place for them, and they use the Paris talks as a sounding board for the propaganda, and they use our American politicians as dupes to propagate the propaganda.
1:40:28And I didn't know if they ever get to the point where they...
1:40:32I'm speaking about the government.
1:40:37So, I'm comfortable.
1:40:39Unfortunately, we haven't had any buyer people over there.
1:40:43So, I've never thought up to this point, and I think it may well be that when they realize they can't turn the thought of division around, they can't achieve any military spectacular, then maybe they will talk about whether they can recoup something or not.
1:41:18The way they work, the way they work, Senator, is the use of phrase that sounds quite recent.
1:41:27For example, you've got to replace you because he doesn't have peace, neutrality, freedom, all words that we sort of like.
1:41:37So, on one of these meetings, I tell you that you should replace you.
1:41:41Why do you say that?
1:41:44samtidig mode, while they started making one of these double talks about peace, neutrality and independence.
1:41:50So I then ran down a list of South Vietnamese politicians that we spent for peace, neutrality and independence.
1:41:57Now, I never reached anybody that they thought could vote for peace.
1:42:04I think the attraction to them as long as they had this room of big men was because
1:42:30All factions in Vietnam seem to be agreed on his encounter.
1:42:37And he seems to be the guy they thought they could overthrow.
1:42:41But even that is true.
1:42:43They never said to us...
1:42:46That they would take big men.
1:42:48They were lying there as a sort of a stalking force against you without ever committing themselves to taking big men.
1:42:58But again, in our August 16th proposal to them,
1:43:03We made proposals to them of what we were prepared to do to make those voter elections fair and free, and what we were willing to say publicly and so forth.
1:43:15And we asked them to tell us what more they wanted.
1:43:18They didn't want that.
1:43:19They didn't want an election at all.
1:43:21They wanted to guarantee governments that they had an overwhelming probability of taking office.
1:43:27Thank you.
1:43:29I'll tell you, I've never laughed at that picture.
1:43:32Barry, you have to go.
1:43:34Do you want to say a word for me?
1:43:37Well, I want to apologize for how I recognize you.
1:43:40Senator Hayden passed away last night, and I haven't been able to get on the floor.
1:43:46I want to thank the president for asking me here.
1:43:53It was last year.
1:43:54It was late, I think it was.
1:43:56I hope all of you are helping me.
1:44:00This is not the end of their efforts.
1:44:09Their total efforts is to change the Constitution to protect them.
1:44:17The man who keeps it has the war power.
1:44:21That's exactly what they're after.
1:44:24And so far, the Republicans have not fought back on this extent with Bill Rogers, and I would hope that we take this issue and really shove it down their throats and shove it up the exercises that they need.
1:44:40That's what we need to do, right?
1:44:44Another suggestion you mentioned to me is that if you and I and anyone else who wants to might introduce a resolution in support of the President's plan, if that's all you have to say.
1:45:19It's very important that the intricacies of these things be discussed by the media here, because no one who is a computer can go out and support a proposition unless he understands it.
1:45:35And we hope that this may help to make it really more understanding, and any questions you have, may I say, Paul, Henry, or Bill, both of them are totally familiar with this.
1:45:48or or or or or or or or or or
1:46:17All these interests must be understood, but it is vitally important for us to recognize what the real issue is.
1:46:25The real issue with regard to, at the moment, the North Vietnamese is not whether or not the United States is making a forthcoming negotiating alternative.
1:46:36We have, months ago, three months ago, and then the last time.
1:46:43I would not be, I would not take the pessimistic view about the go-shin.
1:46:47I would take the view, we believe they want to go-shin.
1:46:50They turn it down, we're not getting the right answer.
1:46:53I think that it's very important to keep hope, without being, of course, polyamorous about it.
1:46:59But the key thing with regard to the North Vietnamese, and this is the advice of many of our well-intentioned people here in Venice, is that their purpose is not negotiation.
1:47:09Their purpose is they want South Vietnam.
1:47:14Now, the other side of the coin is with regard to our critics.
1:47:18Some of our critics have been really concerned, and some of these I think we can take and continue to hold.
1:47:26They were concerned that the United States was being inflexible, that we hadn't answered the seven points, that we weren't considering the possibility of withdrawal, that we weren't doing anything about POWs, etc., etc., etc.
1:47:39Last night's speech totally answers the honest critics.
1:47:43who is not interested in going as far as a total surrender.
1:47:49On the other side of the coin, however, there are other critics working on the table.
1:47:55They are those, and I would say, maybe the government is one, I would raise the question about using them as an example.
1:48:02Certainly certain publications that I can name are in this category.
1:48:06But their interest is not...
1:48:09Many more than that of anarchy in the means of how they try to get the United States to increase the negotiating commission.
1:48:17Their interest is to prove their point, which is that
1:48:24The position we should take is this.
1:48:28This is a fair offer.
1:48:54It proves and demonstrates that for the past three years, on the negotiating front as well as the withdrawal front, remember, 500,000 women out of Vietnam will withdraw from May 1st, regardless of what happens on the negotiating front.
1:49:10That this offer is the fairest offer in permanent international history, basically, where a great power, which frankly had the power to do a lot more than he's done, has been very restraining the Jews because they've offered for the ending of war.
1:49:28And they think of it as an offer which...
1:49:33All reasonable questions.
1:49:34The question of having answers to things they have not.
1:49:38The question of the POF.
1:49:40The question of setting a withdrawal date.
1:49:44The question of separating the ideas that we want.
1:49:48Or negotiating an attack.
1:49:49The question of what to do about you.
1:49:52What do you do about elections?
1:49:53All right, we've got answers in all of them.
1:49:56And...
1:49:56Somebody, of course, has got to make the decision of what we offer.
1:49:59We've made it.
1:50:01It's as far as we can go.
1:50:03It's a reasonable proposition.
1:50:05I think we ought to stand up, fight for it, take on those trades.
1:50:11Not the reasonable people that are really concerned that we haven't offered enough.
1:50:15Give them a chance.
1:50:17And in an honorable way, also to support them.
1:50:21But to those, whether in Turkey or not, who are in the United States for different reasons, not because they're pro-Turkish, but because they're against what happened there, take on those people very hard for being envisaged, for not uniting behind a recent peace proposal, and for frankly not serving the cause of peace.
1:50:45disturbing the cause of peace in the present time.
1:50:49for for for for for for for for
1:51:19You might get a better deal later.
1:51:21And the war is prolonged.
1:51:23If you want to end it, the thing to do is to get the great majority of East Samaritans, Democrats and behind, and honorable with these proposals.
1:51:32And that will peace the end of the war, and give whatever chance there is for negotiation.
1:51:39But the old chance for negotiation will be destroying the league.
1:51:44There continues to be
1:51:46over all over over over over over over over over over
1:52:16Well, now, we'll have to take a break.
1:52:19We're going to have an economic report Thursday.
1:52:22So, I would like for Herb Stein, who is the preacher of that.
1:52:28Is that issue Thursday?
1:52:29Yes, it will be.
1:52:32Bill, you're here.
1:52:35You're welcome.
1:52:36Thank you.
1:53:02I can make a guilty voice in one minute.
1:53:07We're going to call it.
1:53:10Go ahead.
1:53:10This is only curves, only shots.
1:53:15Well, I'm hoping to talk about this in my last show, but...
1:53:18I thought it was probably good news that the administration of Georgia was going to put up a few points, something you might regard as rather dreary, but my main point is that the good news really depends on Georgia's news.
1:53:31We've been making progress, as you can see.
1:53:33The rate of increase of climate disparity has been very high in the fourth quarter.
1:53:37It was over about 750,000.
1:54:10We'll certainly reduce to unemployment during 1972.
1:54:12Now, in this economic report which I've handed out, which as the President says is for release tomorrow, I hope that the color doesn't disturb you with things.
1:54:21We have good color for an election year, but in many cases we have a fairly restrained
1:54:59And it implies a decline in the unemployment rate to what we call the neighborhood of 5% by the end of 1972.
1:55:10That's a fairly big neighborhood.
1:55:12We intend to avoid it.
1:55:14We can be put more precisely about that, but we do see a significant decline in the unemployment rate during 1972.
1:55:25And this forecast was well within the range of the common forecasts made by people who try to estimate these things quantitatively now.
1:55:33We are not, as we were last year, trying to push this economy off its more probable path to a target which was difficult to achieve.
1:55:40We are now looking for a continuation of these.
1:56:06The business plan, equipment investment, inventory, housing, all housing will certainly not rise.
1:56:13As long as we can live here, we expect total housing expenditures in 1972 to be higher than in 1971.
1:56:21But the point that I would like to emphasize is that this degree of recovery, which is by no means an exuberant move, but a strong, steady, non-planar recovery, depends very heavily on the increase in...
1:56:37Thank you for watching.
1:56:59Thank you.
1:57:14...in a very long time, and quite a big percentage in the earlier years, in the middle of the 1960s, but still a very big increase, and an awful lot of that comes in the first half, as we see in the first half of this year, in the first half of this calendar year, and we count on that to boost the economy in 1972, and I hope that...
1:57:43We will not be distracted by talk about some familiarly large deficit, to be timid along that path, because we believe constantly that it is a part of policy that the economy rises, that it drops down inflationary pace, but by no means
1:58:09And irresponsibly, according to the inflationary court, we expect the rate of inflation to decline during 1972.
1:58:13We expect that in part because the economy will be thriving at a moderate rate, and in part because we do expect some contributions to be made by the price-to-weight control system, and I'd like to work...
1:58:33Thank you very much.
1:59:14The standards put forward by the two boards, the pay board and the price commission, are, we believe, a system with the goal of getting inflation rate down to 2-3% at the end of the year.
1:59:24This is analyzed in our recording, chapter 2, which is, I think, the first compact account of what's been going on here.
1:59:30I know some of you will have a chance to look at it.
1:59:32The system has many hurdles to overcome.
1:59:43And by no means out of the woods, but we make it exist to a certain degree of confidence in every place that we go.
1:59:53And our feeling is basically about the economy that we have a
1:59:57A defensible program, and a necessary program, which I would use the legendary part as a final ingredient, which will give us, most statistically, an out of gear in a long, long time, a first year in a long, long time, which would make substantial financial progress on the unemployment front, the inflation front, on the international and on the position of the heavenly drive of the system, subject to very dramatic moves in Canada.
2:00:27I just have one point that is very important to make with regard to real income.
2:00:39It's not true, but it's very 1967, roughly through the 90s.
2:01:09Thank you very much.
2:02:43I will have to come back to that question.
2:02:47I just have one point that is very important to make with regard to real income.
2:02:55It is not true that in the period of 1967, roughly through the 90s,
2:03:46We just try to make the point that it's important.
2:03:49I think it's hard to get people focused on it, but it's an important point there at the last.
2:03:54That while there's all this turmoil, there's basically no reason to press about the behavior of the economy, the inflation and so on.
2:04:04If you look at what is the economy really doing for the people, that is, what level of real output per capita is being generated.
2:04:11Of course, the performance is tremendous, but 1971 was no exception.
2:04:14It was also a year in which we had by and large the highest output per capita in the world, or in our own history, and it was a split-up that by and large the economy operated in a historical and comparative sense amazingly well.
2:04:33Thank you.
2:05:06Let me tell you about...
2:05:08I'll tell you the rest of the story.
2:05:25One of the most impressive men to see on economics and on following in the search science.
2:05:32And while I've got to keep them here, you know, we're going to make things true.
2:05:38At the time that I would say that when you have a highly sophisticated economic audience, then it's very, very effective.
2:05:49I really think that's a potential area of considerable additional embarrassment.
2:06:12Unless we let this thing jerk around by the currency we want, and then by whatever concessions we're ever liable to get.
2:06:19And I suppose that's the reason August 15th came on August 15th.
2:06:24We've got a short-term accommodation there, but how long can it last?
2:06:30Well, I think maybe it's really the other way that we have more of it.
2:06:36We have a long-term accommodation and we have certain short-term troubles to get through that the main benefit of the realignment of the currencies will take some while to go into place.
2:06:52Where long-term barbers, we're saying, in our opinion, we're going to have a...
2:06:58In terms of... We basically have a monetary realignment.
2:07:02But long-term, we're saying...
2:07:05Short term, we still have problems.
2:07:08It isn't going to turn around in the next quarter, for example.
2:07:12Because it's going to take time before whatever trade decisions we get will get something to damage the Europeans.
2:07:21It's going to take time before the new monetary alignment, you know, where the yen and the rest might be valued correctly, apparently in terms of dollars, before that turns around here.
2:07:30And also, let me say, it's going to depend upon the productivity of the American workforce.
2:07:38I mean, we can't assume that.
2:07:40that the balance of payments will turn around simply by getting some trades.
2:07:45In the final analysis, we do have to be competitive, but we feel that we are moving in that direction.
2:07:55Long term, our projection is that we're moving in the right direction, and that will correct itself.
2:08:00But I think that John Collins' point, and Paul Walker's, is that we don't expect it in the first place.
2:08:08Well, I really don't remember when, but for a long time we had everything.
2:08:37I don't know what to say about it here.
2:08:40I don't know what to say about it here.
2:08:44I don't know what to say about it here.
2:10:05how much the tax cuts that we have, shall we say, at the Burns tax bill, how much of the tax cuts, how would that have changed the trade with regard to the fighters?
2:10:24I had not realized this until I was in the neighborhood 20 years ago.
2:10:32The taxes that would have been paid by the individual income tax at the rates in effect when the president took office.
2:10:41but it generated $22.4 billion more in 1973 than the tax rate is now in effect.
2:10:47So that, I think, is one of the very sharp cutting edges in this budget, or talking points, or whatever you want to call it.
2:10:58I think through this budget, the president...
2:11:03Quite a number of very distinct positions that are going to be controversial, all right, but they're clear, and this is a return of power to people.
2:11:18It's like resident hearing, except that it doesn't go to a state government or a local government.
2:11:23It goes to individuals and their families to decide how they want to spend it for themselves.
2:11:28So that is the point that we have dramatized.
2:11:32It is a tax cut to individuals of 22 billion dollars is represented in this budget.
2:11:40I'm not over 41.
2:11:40Here, they're going to do this.
2:11:43So, if we had tax at the same level, we'd have four of them.
2:11:48They're going to do this.
2:11:52That's right.
2:11:52Although, I think we have...
2:12:24Thank you for watching!
2:12:40I was pointed to the large deficit, particularly in fiscal 72, as representing a commitment.
2:12:49And he didn't call it medicine or bitter medicine.
2:12:51I guess Captain and I would feel that it's bitter medicine.
2:12:55But nevertheless, medicine has done.
2:12:58We feel we must get going and represent a commitment to an expansion.
2:13:03which, because it will automatically be accompanied by high rates of improvement and productivity, is perfectly consistent with continued success.
2:13:15And I say continued success in struggling with the problem of inflation.
2:13:20So there's that part.
2:13:22There is a tax point that the President has already brought out, that I think is a very important point.
2:13:29In practical terms, it is putting practicality behind a philosophy, and it is, as the President says in his message, as remarkable as it is unremarkable.
2:13:38You don't hear a thing about it.
2:13:41A third point that I think needs emphasis, recognizing Herb's comment about the calendar year increases and how much.
2:13:47That, too, in some considerability defense budget, did not become available to us until the middle of December.
2:13:55That changes the rate of spending between the first half of the fiscal year and the second half of the fiscal year quite substantially.
2:14:03But it does give us a good rough when we think Herb is 11 and a half.
2:14:10Nevertheless, the rate of increase in outlays in the last three Johnson years was 17%.
2:14:17That was the annual rate of increase in outlays.
2:14:22In the first three years of President Nixon, the annual rate of increase in outlays was 9%.
2:14:28The rate of increase in outlays is 4%.
2:14:34In other words, this has been gradually coming under control, as the President has proposed.
2:14:42absolute riches ceiling on spending to be enacted by the Congress right at the outset so that we can maintain full over output.
2:14:52So, the outlay picture is not one of wildly escalating out of control.
2:14:56It represents a very big effort to get control.
2:15:00Looking at the composition of the budget, the outstanding element in the composition of the budget is in the direction of defense.
2:15:12with a big increase, over a $6 billion increase in new obligational authority for resurgent development, for shipbuilding.
2:15:21That's a very controversial thing, but the president has his very square and strong on that point, and we will have a line fighting very hard for that strong defense president.
2:15:36Now, it is also the case that there has been a shift in priorities since the president took office, as reflected in the budget.
2:15:46This budget dollar here shows 45 cents going for human resource programs and 32 cents for national defense.
2:15:54When the president took office, those proportions were exactly reversed by chance.
2:16:00At 52 percent, that was 45 percent.
2:16:03So, there has been a shift, and that, I think, is something worth noting.
2:16:12There are a great variety of strong talking points, strong moves in the area of drug control.
2:16:18In the crime area, when you look at the chart, and you see the federal efforts in the field of crime control, or the federal efforts in terms of drug abuse prevention,
2:16:32At the time the president took office, and let's see what has happened in those areas since that time.
2:16:39And also some result, arrest, conviction, doing something about these problems.
2:16:45I think it is a very dramatic story.
2:16:49I believe there are some excellent characters here that I haven't had the time to show you.
2:16:54They're very dramatic, and they're in a card book.
2:16:58We have a bunch of copies prepared by the door.
2:17:00There's one more, but I would strongly agree.
2:17:03The characters are really pretty good.
2:17:05They come all the way through, and I think if you can spend...
2:17:10Even ten minutes just sort of leafing through and looking at some of your questions, quite rewarding, and then if you like, in your own speech.
2:17:58So then, from 1972 to 1973, the defense outlets go up about a billion dollars, a little over a billion dollars.
2:18:07What we have here is kind of a turnaround.
2:18:10When the defense spending, the colloquial authority, is lagging behind the outlets, in order to get outlets out of the defense, you have to get the colloquial authority out first, and that's boldly,
2:18:42There are quite a variety of programs we have held down and held back, and as the budget message says, people will look through this budget and find that many of their favorite programs
2:18:59...has not been funded as fully as they would like.
2:19:03They will be absolutely weak.
2:19:06You cannot hold out laid down if you don't hold things down.
2:19:12So we have sort of a crust, or... ...human problems on this paper, programs that are not... ...all together.
2:19:23All of a sudden, we are here against things like public housing...
2:19:27We of course are going to urban revenue sharing for general revenue sharing.
2:19:32That's a better way of going about it.
2:19:35And I think the evidence is just abundant.
2:20:01But nevertheless, we're sort of calling them jobs.
2:20:04I was quickly looking for some of our...
2:20:08Here's one.
2:20:09It is said that we have not paid attention to the needs of the hungry.
2:20:17Well, here's what happened to expenditures for food stamps.
2:20:21Since the beginning of the presentation, you can see what happened to food stamps.
2:20:28And even in many ways, in the sense that hungry people are getting the stance, it also represents a program that is on the verge of getting totally out of control.
2:20:40And we've been trying to see if we can't get it under control, and of course we had a role by a lot of people in the process of getting it under control.
2:20:52Every now and then, every now and then, some of my staff...
2:20:57This area, they always, you know, since we came in, the number of people getting food stamps is quite brutal.
2:21:07I think I got it.
2:21:08I think it's not because I don't want people to be fed, not because we're not sent, that it takes a day or another direction.
2:21:17I mean, I mean, you just go out and say, this has been great.
2:21:20Four times as many people in this country are living off the government.
2:21:24I'll go ahead.
2:21:24Here's another story.
2:21:25Sorry, go ahead.
2:21:27These are my first children.
2:21:29Fred made a commitment for the feeding of needy children in school.
2:21:38So, that commitment has been kept.
2:21:41Look at what's happened to that line.
2:21:44There's an issue here.
2:21:46These are the needy children.
2:21:48And the distance between these lines has grown.
2:21:53In other words, this is typical of what happens to programs where you try to do something for these people.
2:22:03They're all in there.
2:22:05It gets transformed into a program for...
2:22:07It gets so big that you can't handle it, and you destroy the original purpose.
2:22:13Now, there are many people going around saying, you know, this is a congressional mandate.
2:22:20Well, you're trying to say...
2:22:22Look, let's get a little control here so that we don't just go totally out and look at most nothing.
2:22:29And the OMV can drag and drop.
2:22:31You can say we're accustomed to that.
2:22:33But, you know, we've got to do something about these things.
2:22:35Let me just show you one other chart.
2:22:37Better and better than this.
2:22:40It's a good one.
2:22:41I'll release it here.
2:22:44Here's one on outlays that are crimes, or the treatments you might say.
2:22:53Here's one on drugs.
2:22:54Here's what the federal government was doing when the president took office, in terms of expenditures on the law enforcement side and on the rehabilitation and treatment side.
2:23:05That's all.
2:23:08And we are beginning to see some results in the form of illegal seizures and seizures of illegal narcotics and arrests for direct violation.
2:23:17So that is as though this money being poured in and nothing happening, we're beginning to get somewhere, right?
2:23:26I hope you get some of those.
2:23:27One other thing which I guess bugs me particularly because of the speech that Senator Kennedy made the other day about civil rights, which is so far away from the truth that I wish, but we'll see even.
2:23:47by sort of quiet, persistent efforts to bring quality of opportunity to people.
2:23:54It is very strong, this demonstration, and I suppose one way to test that is to say, what have you done closest to home, namely, in your home country?
2:24:07So, if you look at federal employment,
2:24:12And particularly the so-called super-graves, where these Jews are, not great ones before and so forth, you see a rather dramatic picture on the chart here.
2:24:24Here is what is a minority of boys, Spanish-speaking, black, Indian, and so on.
2:24:32Now, don't get the idea that this means the minorities have been getting all the jobs.
2:24:37What this means is that
2:24:39that how many were there in November 69?
2:24:41Some number.
2:24:45And what is the percentage increase?
2:24:47So it's a measure, really, of two things.
2:24:50Secondly, with all the rhetoric in the talk, how much had they really accomplished when we give up?
2:24:58And, well, these numbers in these bases through here are very low.
2:25:02But progress has been made.
2:25:05All through, you can find examples
2:25:09throughout this budget document of achieving, not only just in the field of civil rights, but in the field of support of civilian research and development, supportively doing something about the drug problem in people, attention to human resources, and also
2:25:30He's strong.
2:25:33He's strong.
2:25:53And you understand, as far as the amount of federal and private generally is concerned, it's been relatively level.
2:25:58But here we are in the grades, and the grades that are higher, 33% increase, 4% increase, 12% and 13%.
2:26:04In other words, they're getting the administrating jobs.
2:26:08And when I say administrating, the words are negative.
2:26:12It's a great job.
2:26:15Well, it's a...
2:26:16It may be unfair to some others, but we won't...
2:26:20Well, I think the point to be made here is...
2:27:31There is one point in preparing talks for a public address, which I'm doing now, and it's not the easiest task in the world because we've been talking the other way on that one.
2:27:54There is one point, and that is that 72% of all of these programs are uncontrolled in the sense that it lets the laws change.
2:28:02We're absolutely bound to fund them.
2:28:04They're just required programs, like interest on the national debt, welfare, and so on.
2:28:08So, you start with about three quarters of your budget, in a sense, out of your control.
2:28:13The other thing is that that makes the reduction in outlays that George spoke of all the more impressive, from 17% per year down to 4% a year.
2:28:21The reductions the Vice President asked about are coming in leveling off and actually increases in a lot of the social programs that
2:28:30We're prisoners of programs that started years ago, and we just have to fund.
2:28:35So those are some of the points that can't be changed.
2:28:38So we aren't asking dollars so much.
2:28:42Well, in dollars, somewhere in the neighborhood of 181 billion dollars.
2:28:48181 out of the 264.
2:28:49On the economy and the prospects for better development on the employment side, this chart shows how much of a drawdown there has been in military-related employment.
2:29:09So that's been a bogey, so to speak, that we had to pick up all the time before you cut into the regular increase in the labor force.
2:29:18And it's represented as our problem for us all through these years.
2:29:23Now, that's leveling off.
2:29:26We don't have that problem to fight anymore.
2:29:29They even begin to go up slightly.
2:29:32But basically it's leveling off, so we don't have the problem.
2:29:35And I think that, therefore, when we see that dignity creates an appointment that we've been getting, the courage to start fighting.
2:29:42brødhavn brødhavn brødhavn brødhavn brødhavn
2:30:06The budget presentation is complex, but it's like everything else.
2:30:10There aren't companies for republicanism, particularly for conservatives to handle.
2:30:19George and Kat make a very, very good presentation of this, and to the extent that you have a conference, or if you want to do something on the Senate side, they would be glad to
2:30:35You know, you have to give the full report, which takes about 45 minutes.
2:30:40But it's worth it.
2:30:41It really is.
2:30:42You know, it's very complicated.
2:30:45There's a lot of stuff in here that tells you the story about what we're doing, what our priorities are, and all the rest.
2:30:52So I think that's very effective.
2:30:53Yeah, I was going to say, I'm sorry to mention, it's more than a huge area, I guess, in here, so...
2:31:02They are held.
2:31:02You're right.
2:31:03You'll be there.
2:31:04I don't know if they're on the other side.
2:31:06I don't know.
2:31:06Either one can go down and take the charge and lay it out there, you know, with all the air on it.
2:31:12The other point that I would make is this, that this has come up, because I'm focused on her, this is very, very close to you, but, um,
2:31:28other than the budget.
2:31:31And in our sense, it is a story that is extremely difficult for us as conservatives.
2:31:39We all know that it has angered Republicans, and I would go further concerning the doctor, to say that the government should not spend more than the Dixon in taxes.
2:31:49On the other hand, it is a very sound government, and I think this is also concerning about it, that particularly as the transition is made for the peacetime economy, and the economy is not operating in full capacity, the government must do everything it can to take up the gas.
2:32:12Putting it in another way, and this is not related to the transition from war to peace, but the penalty that we call the year 1958.
2:32:19That was a bad year for us politically.
2:32:22I'm very frankly sitting back here, but do you remember the year that we ended up hanging around the country in that year?
2:32:311958, I remember President Eisenhower and Daniel broke his heart to have a 12-billion dollar accident.
2:32:36It would have been far better if we had had 20.
2:32:38Far better.
2:32:40Because we had 8 points on 1958.
2:32:42And the draw for the government was simply due to the fact that the economy had a downturn, and it was a decrease in revenue.
2:32:51But instead of taking strong action,
2:33:16and may take on the $40-50 billion deficits that occurred in the 67-68 period.
2:33:26Like I say, the deficits then were inflationary, and deficits under our ministry was our logic.
2:33:34We're not equating her.
2:33:37The reason, of course, is that in 1966, 1967, and 1968, the economy was operating at full capacity.
2:33:46When the economy is operating at full capacity, and the government spends more than it takes in its taxes, that inevitably creates a demand for employees.
2:33:59The government does not spend more than the tax system would produce a full capacity.
2:34:20The history tells us that that does not prove to be inflationary.
2:34:25Now, having laid that doctrine out, let me say, I think we can't vouch for it totally.
2:34:30You can't say that it will always be that way, because inflation is also contributed to sometimes by a wage price inflation, as well as a demand for it.
2:34:39When we talk about the demand for inflation, and the effect of government spending,
2:34:44I think this is almost a rule that can operate in a quarrel, that when your economy is operating at less than full capacity, a deficit provided it is controlled, provided your spending does not exceed what your tax system would produce if you had relatively full employment, meaning full capacity,
2:35:07The deficit is not inflationary.
2:35:09In fact, the deficit is necessary in order to take up the flask of unemployment.
2:35:15Now, that's the argument that has to be made.
2:35:18It's a very tough one to make.
2:35:19It's one, however, which we believe is sound.
2:35:22And you're going to ask the question, well, are these bubbles giving up on balance budgets and all that?
2:35:29Are we ever going to have one in the future?
2:35:30The answer is certainly not.
2:35:34Our goal is to get the economy back to full capacity.
2:35:38When that happens, then the budget must be balanced not only in terms of full employment revenues, but it also must be balanced in terms of
2:35:58would be inflationary.
2:36:15We believe that deficits are necessary to take up the slack in the economy, and the economy does not operate in full.
2:36:42Mr. President, I think most of us understand that here, but this is a suffering call.
2:36:46Translate that in terms of the guy carrying the dinner bucket is going to raise it.
2:36:51But I would say this.
2:36:52You know, the long, the important thing here is perhaps what works.
2:36:57And if we get toward the end of the year, that guy is carrying the dinner bucket for work rather than going down to the soup kitchen to get those food sands, we'll be fine.
2:37:07We're not going to be worried about him on the other hand.
2:37:10It hasn't worked.
2:37:12And we have the worst of both worlds.
2:37:14And so we're just, we're doing, I must say we're doing what we think is right.
2:37:18Stimulating confidence.
2:37:19We're going to be very tough, however, in holding the line in this 246.
2:37:23I would say, finally, on the budget, looking at our presence, we'll post it.
2:37:28Let's just say our number, right?
2:37:30Because there are some Republicans...
2:37:34They can't talk out of both corners of their mouth.
2:37:37On the one side, they are saying, in Crete, we're not spending enough for the environment, for food stamps, for welfare, and a lot of other things.
2:37:46What is that, daycare thing that you post?
2:37:49Not going to talk for that.
2:37:51But what they ought to do is to cut the fence.
2:37:54On the other side, you have a guy like Jackson, who might have enormous respect, saying we're not spending enough for the fence.
2:38:02Now the question is, you're talking about cutting.
2:38:04What are you going to cut?
2:38:06Defense or the other?
2:38:08You made the point of it, I understand.
2:38:11You told the point you made.
2:38:12Well, I made the point again.
2:38:14It is not a single dollar.
2:38:15It's spent by the president.
2:38:18It is inappropriate by a democratic congressman.
2:38:21You don't like it, let's see your dad cut it.
2:38:23You support us in the defense, try to cut it, dad.
2:38:26You support us in the welfare program, let's see if your dad cut it.
2:38:31Let's see if you leave your dad across the board cut, which would be the only honest approach, is that you won't cut your own for that, but for their wages.
2:38:39But as a matter of fact, as a matter of fact, on defense, I can say, and I will, Mr.,
2:38:45We need this demand for two purposes.
2:38:49One, because of increased costs, the need for some new weapons and so forth and so on, modernization, et cetera, particularly in naval areas.
2:39:00We need it as a matter of fact in order for the United States to have a national defense.
2:39:05We also need it for another very important reason.
2:39:08I will be going to Moscow.
2:39:11We are going to be negotiating with regard to a limitation on arms
2:39:15And if the Congress could cut the fence unilaterally before we had a chance to negotiate, is to get through the negotiation.
2:39:24Now what we have to do, we're going to try to negotiate with them.
2:39:27We're not going to make any negotiations.
2:39:30Not yet.
2:39:31But we can't negotiate even the latest thing.
2:39:34Let me say for those of you who start your next conference, vote for the ADN.
2:39:37If you have voted for the ADN,
2:39:40The Russians wouldn't be negotiating with us to negotiate to limit their IDMs.
2:39:45What do you call them?
2:39:46SS9s.
2:39:46Because in order to get something, you've got to have something to give.
2:39:52So in this case, to hide a mess is necessary first in itself, and second, to maintain a negotiating position so that we can limit arms, which we'd like to do.
2:40:02But in order to negotiate with those guys, believe me,
2:40:07Like we said a moment ago about the deadline.
2:40:09Don't give a deadline unless they give you something for it.
2:40:12That's the difference in our proposal and the one made by the one that's in front of the Senate.
2:40:18The other thing I think is important about the domestic summit is that on the domestic summit and the rest, I mean, I know all the pressures in the water bill down here and a lot of these other things, but I will be silent.
2:40:36But the point that I have is that there, for that,
2:40:42If we go, go off, and beyond this number that we have set up, beyond the purpose that we have set up, we will never have this thing under control.
2:40:58Because basically, you're going to have a situation where you're spending...
2:41:07I'm not separating the non-defense from defense.
2:41:11The non-defense is what is growing like hell.
2:41:14It continues to grow, and some of it is inevitable.
2:41:17Social Security, as Frank knows, and the interest in the debt support, and so on, is better.
2:41:23Other social programs, great society programs, etc.
2:41:26etc.
2:41:27etc.
2:41:27That's a different company.
2:41:29That's a big added one, like the food stamp.
2:41:32My god, let's put it up and go.
2:41:34If we had a daycare in there, believe me, we'd have 250 billion dollar debt.
2:41:41That's the reason why we have to be restrained in this area, but we are being very generous.
2:41:45A point I would like to make with regard to the general approach, and I would hope you would follow it.
2:41:55Just make it real simple.
2:41:57There's so much talk about what are we doing?
2:41:59Where are we going?
2:42:01If you will read documents that I sent out to the Congress, I would advise you to take a minute to read the phrase.
2:42:12But if you will read it, believe me,
2:42:16The other thing I would say is that I would constantly hammer one point.
2:42:27This is the 93rd Congress, and the President has 93 programs that have been there.
2:42:38From one to three years that have not been acted upon.
2:42:42You folks make the record.
2:42:45The record that I will have to see through that reconciliation.
2:42:47But it's the time on your part to make the record.
2:42:51That the Congress has the programs it has not acted on.
2:42:56Now, if they don't act, they'll act on something.
2:43:01But, suppose you take 93, you, and go, you keep the court near 93, I'm sure, and maybe they give us one of the reorganization plans, and maybe they give us something on the environment, something on the health.
2:43:14So, finally, we get down that they acted on 93.
2:43:18If so, you say, what a lousy record.
2:43:21They acted on 50% of the president's programs.
2:43:26What I meant is, I wouldn't get it.
2:43:29The point is, the average person can say is, if they want to act on problems of high priority of interest to the country, then the point is, who is responsible for not acting?
2:43:42Is it the administration?
2:43:43No, it's the Congress.
2:43:47We'll have another meeting before you leave, of course.
2:43:50You'll have West Coast down straight, right after this present bill.
2:43:55Then the women's rights and H.R.
2:44:001.
2:44:00What are people's rights?
2:44:01People's rights.
2:44:06Here's last night.
2:46:43We had a high level of strike.
2:47:10We had high demand for the industry's product, and the industry was having trouble getting on the ground.
2:47:19And there was some difference between us, really, but we might talk about it several ways.
2:47:29I think that...
2:47:31What we will be doing is to have short reports about the circumstances of the industry and some of the things that this group and related groups have been doing.
2:48:12Their associations, their unions, have to work together to solve a very burdensome problem for this industry.
2:48:20And as a result, we can make some reports today that I think will give you a certain amount of satisfaction, and certainly give those of us who are here to talk with you some real pleasure.
2:48:33First I thought we would let Dr. Dunlop, who somehow or other manages to run Harvard with one hand, and involve himself in everything in the construction industry, talk to us about the construction industry, and not only the...
2:49:25I thought it best to be rather specific.
2:49:33First of all, our objectives have been both to seek to improve the performance of the collective bargaining
2:49:53and also to make it together more responsive.
2:49:58This chart shows the number of strikes in 1970 as compared to 1971.
2:50:02Most negotiations take place in the second and third quarter.
2:50:07You see a total of 424, here 232.
2:50:17In the second critical quarter of the year, in 1970, there were 309.
2:50:21In 1971, there were 174, a decline by half.
2:50:23The duration of strikes, likewise, was reduced by about...
2:50:35But third, and therefore the total impact of production costs, the use of resources and productivity in the industry was increased by a good bit by that kind of collective bargaining.
2:50:51A year ago, President, at this meeting and in the Labor Department,
2:50:57This particular chart, as shown in the exact chart that was presented here to show how badly things had reached the state of the industry, this black line shows the percentage increase
2:51:16in construction by year, thus a figure reached over approaching 15% of the average, and the red line shows the increase that was taking place, percentage increase, each year in many factors.
2:51:37Now this chart will show what has happened in the year or nine months since we met together.
2:51:44The very marked retardation that has been taking place and continues to take place in the construction as compared to that perhaps is a chart which shows the increases in percentage charts.
2:52:00These are the percentage increases in wages to take effect
2:52:04During the first year of the construction contract settlement negotiated in each year, the quarters that are important again are the second and third.
2:52:18These ran in 1970 at UC, 16 or 17% here and 0.1% there.
2:52:23The comparable figures in the second and third quarter run 10 to 12%, showing a substantial, again, retardation.
2:52:33Those are the short-run effects of our work, I believe.
2:52:39I'd like to just make two further points, if I may.
2:52:45The first is that we have had our eye throughout this year, not merely on the short term, namely 1971, but...
2:52:54We hope to continue that process during 72, that retardation process, but at the same time we pretend our eyes have worked together on what are some of the fundamentals, longer run processes in the industry, having to do with increasing productivity, having to do particularly with the perfection of the system.
2:53:16I think this has been a...
2:53:41Work and contribution as labor and management together, working with the government, have made a significant impact on a very difficult situation.
2:53:51Problems which we have called to our attention most fortunately a year ago, and this is a report on what we have been doing since.
2:54:01I think that, not as rapidly, but we have made reports...
2:54:21by week and month of the activities of this committee, and so that it is in the public domain that the activities of the committee have succeeded in bending the curve that was ever upward, downward, and doing it markedly.
2:54:37I believe that it's a success story that has been noted in a lot of quarters, but we plan to see to it that it gets more wide attention.
2:54:49Now that we have it in more graphic form like this, and I suppose that's a good reason for getting us together is to actually portray this kind of story, and we'll be talking with the press after this meeting, and through the same piece of us.
2:55:03We're going to use each other.
2:55:06Yes.
2:55:08Now, John mentioned something very interesting in his discussion.
2:55:15He's distance of a new kind of organization that marks this industry's relations.
2:55:20Last year, since the new program got underway, a series of crack boys were each scratched the industry with establishing a bipartisan, apartheid, I guess I should say, approach to the solution of labor management issues.
2:55:39ford ford ford ford ford ford ford ford
2:56:05What happens here, policy levels, is what happens actually out where the net is cut.
2:56:12And certainly the craft board concept is one that has done an amazing job in accomplishing that kind of objective.
2:56:20I'd like to have Hunter Wharton, the President of the Operating Engineers, here to my video.
2:56:27Let's speak just a bit about how this thing looks from the inside, how it makes sense.
2:56:34I think that it was a challenge to us.
2:56:38We didn't realize what we were getting into.
2:56:53but I think that we have found that the craftwork concept has been beneficial.

On January 26, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon, Vice President Spiro T. Agnew, and Republican Congressional leaders, including Hugh Scott, Robert P. Griffin, Norris Cotton, Gordon L. Allott, Peter H. Dominick, Barry M. Goldwater, Gerald R. Ford, Leslie C. Arends, John B. Anderson, Samuel L. Devine, Richard H. Poff, Barber B. Conable, Jr., H. Allen Smith, Robert C. ("Bob") Wilson, John W. Byrnes, Frank T. Bow, Robert J. Dole, George P. Shultz, Caspar W. ("Cap") Weinberger, Herbert Stein, John D. Ehrlichman, Clark MacGregor, William E. Timmons, Richard K. Cook, Thomas C. Korologos, Harry S. Dent, Ronald L. Ziegler, Bryce N. Harlow, Noel C. Koch, William L. Gifford, Henry A. Kissinger, and William P. Rogers, met in the Cabinet Room of the White House at an unknown time between 7:47 am and 10:02 am. The Cabinet Room taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 088-002 of the White House Tapes.

Conversation No. 88-2

Date: January 26, 1972
Time: Unknown after 7:47 am until 10:02 am
Location: Cabinet Room

Vice President Spiro T. Agnew met with Hugh Scott, Robert P. Griffin, Norris Cotton, Gordon
L. Allott, Peter H. Dominick, Barry M. Goldwater, Gerald R. Ford, Leslie C. Arends, John B.
Anderson, Samuel L. Devine, Richard H. Poff, Barber B. Conable, Jr., H. Allen Smith, Robert C.
(“Bob”) Wilson, John W. Byrnes, Frank T. Bow, Robert J. Dole, George P. Shultz, Caspar W.
(“Cap”) Weinberger, Herbert Stein, John D. Ehrlichman, Clark MacGregor, William E.
Timmons, Richard K. Cook, Thomas C. Korologos, Harry S. Dent, Ronald L. Ziegler, Bryce N.
Harlow, Noel C. Koch, William L. Gifford, Henry A. Kissinger, and William P. Rogers

     Schedule

     [General conversation/Unintelligible]

The President entered at 8:03 am

     1972 campaign

     Agenda
         -Budget

     Attendees

          -Goldwater

     John F. Kennedy
          -Conversation with Goldwater about the Bay of Pigs

     Recording devices in the Cabinet Room

     Agenda

     The President’s January 25, 1972 speech on Vietnam
          -Reaction
               -J. William Fulbright
               -Michael J. (“Mike”) Mansfield
               -John C. Stennis

     Vietnam
          -Negotiations
              -Revelation of secret talks
              -Issues
              -The President’s opponents
                     -Nguyen Van Thieu
                     -Views
                     -George S. McGovern

******************************************************************************

     Vietnam peace negotiations

Goldwater left at an unknown time before 10:02 am

[To listen to the segment (59m52s) declassified on 02/28/2002, please refer to RC# E-574, E-
575.]

******************************************************************************

     Stein’s forthcoming presentation

Rogers left at an unknown time before 10:02 am

     Fiscal Year [FY] 1973 budget

National economy
     -Status
     -Prospects
           -Federal budget
     -Wage and price controls
           -Operation
                 -Pay Board, Price Commission
     -Administration’s accomplishments
     -Real income
     -Administration’s policy
     -Stein’s role
     -Balance of payments
           -Currency realignment
                 -Japanese, European action
           -US productivity
           -Views of John B. Connally and Paul A. Volcker
           -Currency realignment
           -Interest rates

Federal budget for FY 1973
     -Reduction in tax rates
     -Effect on generated revenues
     -Byrnes tax bill
     -Views of Shultz and Weinberger
     -Inflation
     -National defense
           -Procurement
     -Rate of increase in outlays
           -Compared to previous years
                -Lyndon B. Johnson
     -National defense
           -Compared to human resources
     -Crime and drugs
     -Rate of increase in outlays
     -Cities
           -Public housing
           -Revenue sharing
     -Food stamps
           -Number of recipients
     -Crime and drugs
           -Accomplishments in fight against problems

Civil rights
      -Edward M. (“Ted”) Kennedy’s speech
      -The President’s accomplishments
      -Federal employment
            -Reverse discrimination
      -Speeches by the President’s opponents

Federal budget
     -Controllability
     -Reduction in increase in outlays

National economy
     -Unemployment
           -Reductions in armed forces
                -Withdrawal of troops from Vietnam

Federal budget
     -Possible roles of Shultz and Weinberger
     -Republican doctrine
     -Role of government in the economy
     -1958 deficit
          -Harlow
          -Dwight D. Eisenhower
          -Size
     -1966-68 deficits
          -Compared with deficits during the President’s tenure in office
     -Deficits
          -Full-employment revenues
                 -Inflation
     -Liberals’ views
          -Welfare, food stamps, day care centers, the environment
                 -Spending
     -Henry M. (“Scoop”) Jackson’s views
     -Congress’ role
     -National defense
          -Strategic Arms Limitation Talks [SALT]
                 -Anti-Ballistic Missiles [ABM]
     -Water Bill
     -Social welfare programs

Congress

           -Action on the President’s programs

     National economy
          -Dock strike on the West Coast

******************************************************************************

BEGIN WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 2
[Non-historical]
[Duration: 21s ]

END WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 2

******************************************************************************

     [General conversation/Unintelligible]

Recording was cut off at 10:02 am
  • 019-090 7:47 AM · 10 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone at an unknown time between 7:47 am and 7:52 am.
  • 656-002 7:47 AM · 21 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and unknown person(s) met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 7:47 am and 7:52 am.
  • 656-003 7:47 AM · 6 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 7:47 am and 7:52 am.
  • 656-004 7:47 AM · 25 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 7:47 am and 7:52 am.
  • 656-005 7:47 AM · 18 sec — President Richard M. Nixon, White House operator, and Rose Mary Woods met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 7:47 am and 7:52 am.
  • 656-006 7:47 AM · 8 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Charles W. Colson met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 7:47 am and 7:52 am.
  • 019-091 7:52 AM · 45 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Rose Mary Woods talked on the telephone from 7:52 am to 7:53 am.
  • 656-007 7:52 AM · 5 min — President Richard M. Nixon, Charles W. Colson, Rose Mary Woods, and H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman met in the Oval Office of the White House from 7:52 am to 8:03 am.

Conversation 088-002, January 26, 1972. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives. Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/088-002 (accessed September 18, 2026).