On December 26, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon, Alexander M. Haig, Jr., and Tricia Nixon Cox met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 12:16 pm and 1:43 pm. The Old Executive Office Building taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 310-030 of the White House Tapes.
Transcript (AI-Generated)This transcript was generated automatically by AI and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Do not cite this transcript as authoritative. Consult the Finding Aid above for verified information.
I think it might be working.
Yeah.
Oh, I don't know.
I hope the water's going to be there.
Well, they got a chance.
The strike got off all right, didn't it, last night?
It did?
Yeah, also.
You mean they had to make the strike and get back with her?
Oh, I see.
It looked pretty good.
Did the first wave get something?
No, we did some damage, I hope.
Or were they, you know, a tiny part of the... Good.
We really had a break on that, you know, we've been ready to go to this damn thing for two weeks now, and they just can't get along.
Okay.
Do you think that'll harass them a little while?
That's good.
Part of the problem is if there's time running out on us, you know, and we get beyond a certain point, if we get right into the China thing, well, we can't.
Sure, I know.
Well, the main thing is, as I say, I just know it's not my last opportunity, and I just, we want to weaken them as much as we can before we have to, you know, we'll be in a position that we're just going to be there getting out, and that's not going to be very good.
It's not bad.
Well, one of you guys will be, and you respect that.
Right.
Good, I know that.
Okay, fine.
Fine.
Good morning, sir.
I apologize for what happened.
No, that's great.
I just talked to Moore.
He said that the damn weather turned bad again.
Yes, sir.
He said he had the...
So they got a couple that made me feel well and kind of go on and on.
He's certainly writing hard.
I guess we just got a lousy writing letter.
No way.
They're very, very disparate because it's been solidly softened before Christmas.
But we got the big one out there.
You see, it's always my theory that now that it's green, this is massive.
So the word massive, so they say it's extra massive if you put in 10 times as much.
We could put in 50 times as much.
We're going to get just as much glass.
That's right.
So this will have some effect even this much on it.
Even this much.
Oh, I think so.
I know we're still there.
That's right.
I know we can still do it.
Wow.
I don't know.
I think that thing is probably a blessing.
But what do you think of them?
They are beginning to look pretty fruitless, aren't they?
They are, and they're also studying us to have a little grace in our relationships, and we've got that to improve, and we've got that to puzzle with, and we're paying attention to Aiden, all right.
The whole answer on that is very simple, and something to say, well,
when we appraise the situation, we've got to see what's in it, what's out there, what it is.
In other words, agents cannot be given to a country who's engaged in aggression.
We've got to see whether they are, and what this thing holds, and the information about that, we've got to wait and see.
By the way, if you give them the aid, they lose them up, but they don't get impacted again.
Exactly right.
They have a real problem there, that thing, and we show that to support them.
The Soviet Marxists in Bangladesh and the Maoists, and Ned Schomer, I think, were the best for it.
And I could see in the world where they would welcome so kind to those kinds of things, but they were off their backs.
They were the best for it.
They're all part of Mecca.
They have a Mecca lot.
They don't have those.
There was a mosque there.
I got a message from Del, she's going to have to leave us all.
Henry's case is complete, but we've got to work on a program.
We've got to be very careful.
All the time we've been through, we've been through two big events this year.
Just this time, we've been through a long week.
We've got to concentrate our energies on making those succeed.
I think he should also stay out of the line of fire
in terms of any, what we call, backgrounders talking to the press and taking telephone calls and raising all about the state and so forth and so on.
They call it truth.
The reason for that is that there will come a time when he's going to be very vetty with the public stuff.
That is, after we have had these things succeeded.
What I think is going to happen here is that he doesn't do that.
It's got to build up within the bureaucracy and within the press.
The group of people who run over there, they will be out to destroy him because they don't understand it.
And I think that Al, at this point, Henry talks to the press.
When he does talk to them, he's not helpful.
I think that he's a little bit too emotional.
And I think he, I guess, will be raised
You know, they would be somewhat uncertain whether these tendencies would hold the shade of time.
So you want that to happen, because that's what they've been going with for a long time.
They believe.
And they didn't believe the state department before they passed.
Now, that's my view, quite your view, about the situation.
Now, I also think that you need to do it in a way that comes with an emotional stability, that if you get involved in more fights, or if you just like to wear yourself out and crack up, you know, this is going to...
But you see, there are little things like that he does on both trips.
He couldn't resist going back to the press and talking to them.
And in one case when he went back, he overstated something.
And it isn't good.
It would be fatal, but it was not good.
It wasn't necessary, you know what I mean?
Because he didn't play the right way.
Now, they, of course, played very good with us, but nevertheless, and in the long run, it hurts too much.
But he shouldn't do that.
He should stay away from them.
You see, the way we can get it so that it's equal, you know, is I'll find ways and we go to the little groups in Los Angeles
San Francisco, like Cincinnati, he loves that.
He loves going there, talking to people, but they do it on an off-the-record basis.
That doesn't hurt us.
And when he goes in, he does his background, and he's a white-off-the-press fellow.
Anyway, the reason we give him this is because the background rule has now been broken.
He can no longer use it.
And I just think we should say that to everybody around here.
We don't come to the press, only on the record.
I want to stay with the press company.
Don't you agree?
You do it anyhow, you don't get a guy who's got some form of trauma because they're out there, especially in Washington Post, right?
So that whole thing is not a purge for him.
That's all right.
Sure.
So therefore, don't let them have the opportunity to talk to you about this sort of thing.
You can't talk to him about this.
I think he knows that he may have made a terrible mistake in the back of his mind.
Yeah.
Well, I mean, of course, it's cool, but part of the response to this is the realization that the state doesn't wait for the amount of traffic.
Well, I think we believe in perfection.
I mean, there's many things that we're very close to it.
But nobody is perfect.
We all make mistakes, but the thing is tonight, we can't look back.
Don't feel yourself worrying about it.
But the point is, what you do is don't make that mistake again.
And that's what Henry's got to realize, that his mistake is made by overexplosion.
He's overexploded this time.
I just said he shouldn't.
We'll kill them in the city-state, we'll do this and that, but I'd rather be having more press conferences myself over these during the next year or whatever year.
I'll be there.
And I can knock them out with one little comma.
You know what I mean?
I'll kill them when they get out alive.
And they know it.
They know what to see.
So we've got that done.
We've got the youth now.
And we've just got to sit down, tend to the city,
do as well as he can working in the state, don't get these childish arguments with Sullivan and Rogers, and that's just one thing.
It's a good thing, aren't you?
But be a little bit of both.
Don't you think so?
If you have a lot of thoughts on how to handle it, I feel in my...
I think the way you've handled this is that...
I think I've been thinking, and I just put Paul on charge of...
We can do it on the ground, but the background, you know, rules and rules are not going to totally compromise the way folks, therefore we can go on with the background, therefore we can actually do something different.
We can use, you know, and another thing,
I think Scali, he used, I mean, they don't know what he was saying, because he doesn't do the judgment as good, and also, I think, he's suspicious of him.
Basically, Scali is the boy who loves Scali's problems, and if we, you know, if we don't tell him anything, he'd actually read all this bullshit, and he'd make all that kind of drama.
I mean, feel him.
I don't know.
I don't know if that's the emotion, you know, or if it's the intensity.
I don't know.
I don't know.
And secondly, I think he is supposed to be a secretary.
He's not totally on Henry's way, but that's not the point for us.
But Ziegler is.
You know what I mean?
The main thing is let's get Henry out for the press conference now.
He's got to keep talking to columnists and the rest.
Goddamn, it means hot property.
And from now on, just remember, the China trip will be so much bigger.
And all of a sudden, they said, Christ, forget this bullshit.
It doesn't bother me.
I mean, I'm worried about things like that.
What we did this, what we did that.
In one month, we forgot.
In one month, it's already there.
Can you see much of it?
I mean, I can read it.
I'm still concerned about Roger's press conference today.
Well, to be perfectly frank with you, I felt my faith in my sanity was up.
I read the total story every time.
Not even the worship portion.
The part that they emphasize, what we want to emphasize, you know, that Roger took a hard line on for Vietnam.
You know what I mean?
So he said something about, well, it's a campaign memorandum, which is not fighting it.
So it is.
It should have said it.
But you know what I mean?
The fight is that...
that Henry couldn't even see there.
Judgment was so warm that he and Roger would, whatever we would say, it was good to have Roger about taking a hard line for once about being honorable than me.
What'd they say?
I think actually timing right now is very good.
Terry is going to be in this world report.
Yes, and that's very important, and that's historically.
There's the place to make his points.
I'm going to make it in that, on the world report.
And on that, I think this time when he has the world report, he should not have a background.
I don't think he should.
Let it speak for itself.
The backgrounder will only depend.
He'll take some shit-ass thing that he'll say in the background, a little thing.
That'll be the lead.
Let the report speak for itself, Lawrence.
Don't you think so?
Henry loves the background.
He's very good at them.
But he must not do it now.
Let the world report go.
And they don't need a good report this year.
Frankly, it's a, it's a, we have, we, you know, we don't win them all.
But our report policy records, we've got to have good records.
It's, it's, we've got people who are a little bit dazzled with some of this stuff.
You know, I can't agree with you.
I can't agree with you.
India, India, Pakistan, we all know, they can say what they want, they weren't trying to knock off West Pakistan.
No.
And if we knock off, we've done a little of things that we didn't.
Right?
West Pakistan today was militarily destroyed.
Correct?
Right.
And where would we be then?
At least we kept our credibility with the Chinese.
Right.
I don't, I think maybe it was necessary for the Russians.
Just what do you think about that?
They've got their understanding of it here in our country.
They can't track it.
You know, I think it was such a memory now.
You be close to him.
You be close to Rob.
And remember, I did tell him when to keep him out.
And you talk to Rob.
You see how you get along.
You might have a little talk with him.
And just say, for Christ's sake.
That's not, I mean, it's quite, you know, it's nice, of course, it's bad with Henry, but Henry, I must say, I second he because, I mean, not only would Roger be everybody else, but he'd treat people with some terrible contempt, and it's just terrible, you know.
Well, the problem is that it's a different realm of sophistication, or it's a problem, you know, so you think Roger's a superficial, he also thinks he's disloyal.
He is superficial, but he's not disloyal.
You know what I mean?
Yeah.
The rivalry wants to win, and they're a bit jealous, and they've got a little bit of vanity.
But what Hendrick here called it, played the game a little bigger.
It's going to come out of this very, very big.
But what he's going to do otherwise, he's going to get a whole group of press people and bureaucrats ganging up against him, and they'll chop him to pieces.
I don't respect that.
Don't let them do it right now.
Drop out of the line of fire.
Don't go back in the background.
Don't tell them anything.
Let the record keep for itself.
You know, these two, let's face it, Al, and on the other side of the pond, these meetings, these many summits that we've had, have been enormously successful already.
The Britishman did get into a good play, but I got a hell of a good play in England.
I didn't put that play.
He didn't play it.
I listened to him.
And they played it in a so ambivalent way that he put it up to kind of press the new relationship.
But it was an historic game in that case.
And I think the most important thing that he's having is that he's so young.
Because they could see him unraveling.
to get all this pulled together.
We got our friends.
That's essential.
And the economic thing, I mean, it's going to disturb everyone.
So we have to get a lot of comfort from what they're trying.
They were gloating a little, and now the damn thing has turned around 100%.
And it's good.
It's good.
It's good.
The market's up.
Everybody's feeling pretty good.
We've got to remember now,
Henry, this shows Henry at his best, Henry played a critical, resplendent role in making the deal with Pompidou.
The reason that he had to make it, normally I would have sent Rogers over to do that deal, or Pompidou.
I could have sent Pompidou because Pompidou would have had to insist.
I couldn't send Rogers because then Schumacher had to go.
So Henry had to do it.
And he did it brilliantly.
So I think that's the achievement there, you know, the story, really, the world.
You can try to keep him, but being so down-to-earth and staffed, you know the other thing.
We don't want a stacker to go walking out of here and throw a horse along.
I think getting that security officer in there is good.
I just called more, got to report on this.
I didn't even mention this other affair.
But you should have a little talk with Warren.
if you will, work together, we're on the same team.
I think it's important that you engage with him.
You agreed with him, actually, when you called me yesterday, and you mentioned this.
Well, he had a good relationship, and he thinks maybe now he's blown it.
He hasn't.
He hasn't.
My view on this is that the more of a stand-up guy, and we should try to get him to hand over the account to the final law,
I didn't know what it was.
I didn't know what it was.
I didn't know what it was.
I didn't know what it was.
I think we're doing quite well.
I think the South is good to me.
They ought to be ready to bomb us.
Couldn't they have some intensity?
probes into the monarchy of non-Saxons, isn't it?
Well, I should certainly go over there and go out and see some of the folks there and make sure.
Shouldn't they?
Yes.
They should just drop across there and make a decision.
Henry, have you had any other views on it?
Because that's the next week.
We've got to work this out, Al.
We can't let this... We can't have Henry's entrance
This next year, we heard there's going to be a bigger battle fighting, a bigger battle than we thought we were going to end.
We're going to spend a lot of time fighting.
The big real concern right now is the Soviets.
So, we're going to push through that.
They themselves believe that we were falling far with Europe.
Yeah.
Well, we rectified that.
We rectified it.
He's a wonderful guy, totally for us.
They didn't hurt us, frankly.
They didn't hurt us, frankly.
They didn't hurt us, frankly.
They didn't hurt us, frankly.
They didn't hurt us, frankly.
They didn't hurt us, frankly.
They didn't hurt us, frankly.
In your European church, for example, I think that a major impact on the recent ban on elections is the shutdown of the Christmas Eve.
You've had to do it?
I really do.
And now, for the first time, they've put it in its present.
I was supported by the Christian family, and I'm sitting on it.
So that's a key to that wire, isn't it?
Yes.
And I also felt both the...
He called me to tell me that he was going to talk to me.
And I told him to extend your personal best wishes, although you were sending a formal communication as well.
Good.
I might have.
He likes that.
Yes, sir.
But this guy is...
Now, one thing that's very important that I don't want to bother you with this stuff, but I want you working with the city, in this instance, give them the job, prepare a few of the publish points for the inspection, and that's it.
We're doing an item of package second law.
Second law, good.
When do you have that for?
We have it now, essentially, sir.
We've covered some banking, what that business is about,
I wonder if she's there or if she's going to be in the Moscow visit.
Right.
Sorry about that.
She's going to see, apparently, the ambassadors out there.
I don't know if they're going to ask for my school.
I'm a little wondering why she's going to talk to them.
I don't know what her choice is.
She's going to pay respect.
But they'll be interested in her comments.
So give her a few little, just like you do in talking points to the doctor.
Now, she should carry a letter to each pregnant.
We have the letters in our own letters that we put together.
Well, the letters I had better see, because I would like to add some personal notes on each one of them, see?