Nixon White House Tapes — Conversation 285-008
Date: Thursday, October 7, 1971 at 8:50 AM
Participants: Nixon, Richard M. (President); Kissinger, Henry A.
Recording device: Old Executive Office Building
Source: https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/285-008

This transcript was generated automatically by AI (WhisperX) and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Do not cite it as authoritative.

[0:00] I had a command.
[0:24] Oh, I didn't ask you to take me just to see if I could get... No, no, no.
[0:26] ...get you something for yourself, right?
[0:27] Uh, no, nothing.
[0:27] I was at the Chilean embassy last night.
[0:29] I decided not to stay for dinner because I wasn't seeming very depressed about it.
[0:54] I didn't want to post on the internet.
[0:55] So I...
[0:55] But the Bremen was there.
[0:56] And, uh...
[0:56] It's really smothering to go to Bremen for three or four years without it.
[0:58] Which is helpful.
[0:58] Mansfield was there.
[0:59] I'm sure he believes that.
[1:17] Yeah, I think so.
[1:17] I think so in the beginning.
[1:19] The thing we have to guard against, Mr. President, next week, I think we should play this, just as matter-of-factly as we did the Chinese one.
[1:40] Oh, hell yes.
[1:40] We should play no great triumph.
[1:41] No?
[1:41] We should just put it out of it.
[1:42] I'm going to put it out of it in my press thing.
[1:43] I don't know how to just go deep in terms of, you know, I'm going to just give a very noncommittal answer.
[1:45] We should urge the staff to do the same, because if we grow too much, we lose bargaining positions with the Russians.
[1:49] He's learned now that there's more to go, clearly, than there is to go.
[2:10] But you don't know.
[2:10] But it's you here, the Chinese.
[2:11] You're stating it's a matter of fact, sir.
[2:12] Exactly.
[2:12] You know, it speaks for itself.
[2:13] No one, no one suspects it for me.
[2:13] The way I had it in mind, I didn't want to say it.
[2:14] I agree.
[2:15] I agree.
[2:16] Why are you going here and there?
[2:39] I know exactly quite what we have.
[2:58] I'm not concerned.
[2:59] We're not concerned.
[2:59] But if you let me talk to the White House staff, I thought we might assemble them after you announce it.
[3:01] Yeah, we're going to be careful to do that.
[3:02] We'll say this is a very important announcement.
[3:03] Well, let's put it all in the context .
[3:22] Nobody can scream about that.
[3:23] It's got to imply nothing for them.
[3:24] Because this will be a .
[3:24] The reason I'm working with all of them is because .
[3:25] Then he called me aside and he said,
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[4:02] The Egyptian foreign minister denied it, I think, rather than investigate the appeal for his flexibility.
[4:29] I don't know any of that.
[4:30] I don't get a sense.
[4:30] I don't get a sense.
[4:31] I don't get a sense.
[4:32] Oh, yeah.
[4:37] We got Reagan.
[4:38] Reagan and Rockefeller are our two biggest supporters.
[4:42] Oh, yeah.
[4:43] Oh, I don't know.
[4:47] I don't know.
[4:47] I don't know.
[4:48] I don't know.
[4:48] I don't know.
[4:49] Mr. President, Mr. President, Mr. President, we stand by.
[5:09] It's fascinating to me, Mr. President, that Nelson has asked to be
[5:11] has cut the sort of treatment on a tiny scale, you know, that you would try to take off because you would be normal.
[5:28] That wasn't even a high point.
[5:29] And it's really shaken him to his core.
[5:29] I've never seen anything like this.
[5:30] He's very experienced, by the way.
[5:31] Well, if he was just cut down, excuse me, by his voice, if he'd said, I'll do it.
[5:33] She was...
[5:34] Well, she's got it.
[5:59] She's got that V&E psychiatrist who's driving an all-terrain vehicle.
[6:00] He's a witness to an absolute, total, all-terrain vehicle.
[6:01] I met him.
[6:02] He would think that's crazy.
[6:02] They physically say, how many more girls in all the world are there?
[6:04] Wait, what, in a crisis, you say?
[6:27] Who are you talking to?
[6:28] See, he doesn't do what the mixed-mixers do out there in the school sector.
[6:29] I understand.
[6:30] He was really shaking.
[6:30] He's coming back now.
[6:31] But I'll keep it.
[6:31] In fact, he's coming down now.
[6:34] I actually think that it does help.
[6:56] Of course.
[6:58] for the same reasons you gave yesterday, which Negroes, the Negroes are switching to the Democrats anyway.
[7:17] He says that he was on the Cabot show, the second thing on the Vice President nomination, which of course I'm very sorry I didn't get.
[7:20] Now, for Christ's sake.
[7:31] That's nothing.
[7:33] I saw it this morning on television in the speech he gave last night.
[7:37] He said the president supports the powerful against the powerless.
[7:40] Ask any Cambodian mother whose children are being killed by American bombs.
[7:42] Ask any Vietnamese president who is killed by American soldiers.
[7:44] All support him.
[7:44] In fact, he said the communists are always right and those who resist are always wrong.
[7:50] Sit down for a while.
[8:15] Sit down.
[8:20] way to read the papers.
[8:34] That's right.
[8:34] And the television.
[8:35] I don't spend more than ten minutes on it.
[8:36] Any day.
[8:36] I never read the paper.
[8:36] I read the, I take the, I read the headline.
[8:37] You know, you read the first page.
[8:38] I'm very short.
[8:38] Nothing inside for today.
[8:39] I read this, but all the inside stuff is covered in country TV.
[8:40] Never watch a TV show.
[8:41] And I go, you know, that is the way for me.
[9:02] Others have got to watch.
[9:02] I don't know.
[9:03] But you know, it's not worth it.
[9:03] I read a few, now and then, a good column or something very, very important to me.
[9:05] But most people sit and read papers like he did.
[9:06] I'm going to read and read and read a whole bunch of times.
[9:07] You know, the Groove Readers, I used to do all the time.
[9:08] Nothing.
[9:08] I mean, it really won't remember nothing.
[9:09] Your brain just won't mention it.
[9:12] The important thing is to concentrate whatever we're bringing to God.
[9:19] I mean, I think that Reston has really hurt himself with his colleagues, with his interview with George Washington.
[9:41] How much?
[9:41] Everybody.
[9:41] Stuart Alsop mentioned yesterday, Roland Levinson.
[9:42] Why did he hurt himself?
[9:43] Because of his snide remarks about you, that they don't like you, and because...
[9:45] They didn't vote.
[9:45] I don't think they like that.
[9:46] Well, they will say it at a Georgetown party, but they don't like saying it's footprint in a communist country.
[9:48] I see.
[9:48] Like you pretend to be objective.
[9:49] They'd go beside her.
[10:03] Well, I thought the other heir had stolen it.
[10:10] Come back and ask for me.
[10:11] That was what cut me.
[10:11] As I say, I will never go.
[10:12] I'll never see you again, under any circumstances.
[10:14] I don't care what the cost is.
[10:15] I don't care what it does.
[10:16] We are cutting them off now.
[10:16] We don't even .
[10:17] We don't see them.
[10:18] They don't do any more damage to us.
[10:19] No, just see other people who've got to deal with some other people.
[10:39] Well, you were starting to say something.
[10:40] We're, uh...
[10:44] positions in Delaware.
[11:03] I was reading a little report on that.
[11:04] I saw that.
[11:04] I think the others messed with my driveway.
[11:05] This morning, they had McGovern, Muskie, and Lindsey on television, each a minute at some liberal function.
[11:08] And I am convinced that it's in our interest to give these guys exposure.
[11:27] I mean, they have no issue.
[11:28] Muskie said the American people are looking for a leader.
[11:29] They don't know what they're looking for, but I know they're looking for a leader.
[11:31] I think this is, what are they going to do?
[11:32] That's the current stuff in the colleges.
[11:36] Give us leadership.
[11:37] Give us leadership.
[11:38] The sheep, looking at luck, are not bad at destroying things.
[11:46] You can, my God, if anybody has done more, I've been speaking in the 50 states.
[12:01] But more than that, you have the courage to stand alone, which is real leadership.
[12:04] Anybody, any time.
[12:05] I think it's Bob who's got that.
[12:05] I think the standing alone of you, that's what you're getting to get first.
[12:08] Oh, yes, yes.
[12:10] And that's going to, I really think it's going to look better than the next year's development.
[12:30] I mean, if we compare the next summer, the summer of 68 with the summer of 69, well, we're going to try to do something like that.
[12:36] I guess the real problem I'm concerned about is the fact that I mentioned Sapphire and Berlin.
[12:38] Even he didn't realize it.
[12:38] Some way we've got to get to start getting out.
[12:59] PR for success.
[13:00] They didn't do it.
[13:00] They are playing them up.
[13:00] They're not there.
[13:01] Everything from sea beds.
[13:02] I mean, we can play that out, too.
[13:12] That's right.
[13:12] These things, you know, people that he mentions, chemical and biological warfare.
[13:18] Chemical, biological warfare.
[13:19] I mean, they'll get our way.
[13:21] Good God, what are we talking about?
[13:22] All the dumb ones.
[13:23] You realize that?
[13:23] We ought to consider some foreign policy television program.
[13:24] Well, you, would we, would you, sir, put down the administration crimes, please?
[13:28] for the possibility of, we'll start getting some columns on them.
[13:46] And if I got one day on a television show, we'll simply say, you might do the show.
[13:47] All right, here it is now.
[13:50] And then give everybody credit, Steve, did this, all the other things.
[13:53] Oh, damn cheeky, huh?
[13:53] If I can check on that again, I'll get you a report by noon.
[14:04] Come on.