Nixon White House Tapes › Tape 222 › Conversation 222-011

Nixon phone call with Haldeman on Foreign Policy and William Rogers

Monday, October 30, 1972 · 10:44 AM–10:48 AM ET · Camp David Hard Wire · 4 min

ParticipantsNixon, Richard M. (President); Haldeman, H. R. ("Bob")Conversation222-011 on Tape 222StartMonday, October 30, 1972 at 10:44 AMEndMonday, October 30, 1972 at 10:48 AMRecording deviceCamp David Hard WireSourceNixon Library record for 222-011 ↗ · National Archives Catalog, NAID 651228792 ↗

AI Summary

President Nixon and H.R. Haldeman discuss the timing and messaging strategy surrounding pending foreign policy communications from Henry Kissinger. Fearing premature speculation or emotional reactions, Nixon mandates that Secretary of State William Rogers withhold public comment until the message is received. Haldeman is instructed to coordinate with Charles Colson to ensure the administration maintains a composed, disciplined narrative regarding the potential agreement.

Audio

Download MP3 · 4.8 MB

NARA Description

On October 30, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon and H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman met in the Aspen Lodge study at Camp David from 10:44 am to 10:48 am. The Camp David Hard Wire taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 222-011 of the White House Tapes.

Nixon Library Finding Aid

Conversation No. 222-11

Date: October 30, 1972
Time: 10:44 am - 10:48 am
Location: Camp David Hard Wire

The President talked with H.R. (“Bob”) Haldeman.

[See Conversation No. 152-7]

Transcript (AI-generated)

This transcript is incomplete. The transcription skipped stretches of speech — roughly 1 minute of this recording (about 20% of it) is represented by only a few words. Listen to the audio rather than relying on the text below; a corrected transcript is queued.

This transcript was generated automatically by AI (WhisperX) and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Names and numbers are often wrong; speakers are not identified. Do not cite it as authoritative — verify against the audio and the finding aid.

Download transcript (.txt) · JSON data

Click a timestamp to play from that point; the page address then links to that moment (e.g. #t=125).

Hello?
Hello?
Yeah.
I talked to Henry, and, uh, he said they, uh, expected a, uh, good message, uh, and, uh, and, uh, early on, I was overreacting to this question.
When you have three options, three pods, he always does, and says, very good.
See, see, generally, generally speaking, when, uh,
When the domestic people, when the domestic, the domestic things get, like, uh, Watergate and the rest, they, they can't read.
Uh, and, uh, some foreign policy have John overreacted to them.
Roger should not go out today, obviously, until after we get, we've got to see where his message is.
So, uh, I told Henry that we already talked to Roger, so that's it.
He won't go out until we get the message, of course.
Because we don't want to get on the limb until we see what the hell the message is.
The Rodgers will be out there with us already hanging out.
And we'll just jump it off.
On the other hand, I just prepared something for Egg.
Which he can do.
We don't want Rodgers getting out speculating about what their answer is going to be.
Because we don't know what it's going to be.
But I've already covered that.
You don't need to know that.
Henry was supposed to call.
Henry had already talked to Rogers and said he would call Colson as soon as I found out.
So we told him to, but just be sure he understands we've got a way, as far as Rogers is concerned, we've got a way to get the message around 3 o'clock.
As far as Daggett is concerned, he can blast the hell out of him, whatever, because he's out anyway, and he should.
He can blast him immediately, but without speculating at all.
So just go out and say this to him.
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
but we've already gotten a message from them saying that a message is going to be delivered.
Well, preemptively, we would have said something before, but... Too cute.
Too cute.
There isn't enough time.
Charge him anyway.
You see, even regardless of what they do, Bob,
We don't want to be in a position of getting jittery and jumping up and down, hysterical and emotional and all that crap.
Because the point is, as far as the people are concerned, let them feel things are going along pretty well and this is just the, you know, the earth pangs of an agreement.
That's the way to handle it.
Handle it with a little bit of poise.
That's what we need here.
That's what everybody's got to do, is have a little poise.
Not, you know, yack, yack, yack, tell Chuck, you know,
Crank them on the other things.
There are a lot of other things to get on, aren't there?
20 minutes.

Also recorded on October 30, 1972

  • 152-004 9:33 AM · 11 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Camp David operator talked on the telephone at Camp David at an unknown time between 9:33 am and 10:33 am.
  • 222-007 9:50 AM · 15 min — President Richard M. Nixon and H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman met in the Aspen Lodge study at Camp David from 9:50 am to 10:25 am.
  • 222-008 10:25 AM · 10 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Camp David operator met in the Aspen Lodge study at Camp David at an unknown time between 10:25 am and 10:33 am.
  • 152-005 10:33 AM · 9 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Henry A. Kissinger talked on the telephone at Camp David from 10:33 am to 10:43 am.
  • 222-009 10:33 AM · 6 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Henry A. Kissinger met in the Aspen Lodge study at Camp David from 10:33 am to 10:43 am.
  • 152-006 10:43 AM · 9 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Camp David operator talked on the telephone at Camp David at an unknown time between 10:43 am and 10:44 am.
  • 222-010 10:43 AM · 14 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Camp David operator met in the Aspen Lodge study at Camp David at an unknown time between 10:43 am and 10:44 am.
  • 152-007 10:44 AM · 5 min — President Richard M. Nixon and H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman talked on the telephone at Camp David from 10:44 am to 10:48 am.

All 19 conversations from October 30, 1972 →

Cite this conversation

Conversation 222-011, October 30, 1972. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives (NAID 651228792). Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/222-011 (accessed November 2, 2026).