Nixon White House Tapes › Tape 314 › Conversation 314-009
Nixon, Haig & Brennan on Henry Kissinger and Psychological state
Thursday, January 13, 1972 · 3:55 PM–4:15 PM ET · Old Executive Office Building · 15 min
AI Summary
President Nixon and Alexander Haig discuss the public perception and emotional state of Henry Kissinger, particularly regarding his recent struggles with press coverage and internal administrative pressures. The conversation touches upon the successful handling of a recent press conference by Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird and the management of a Soviet student's attempted defection in New York. Ultimately, Nixon and Haig express concern over Kissinger’s psychological stability and his capacity to withstand the intense political scrutiny expected during the upcoming 1972 campaign, emphasizing the necessity of supporting him to ensure the success of critical diplomatic negotiations with China and the Soviet Union.
Audio
NARA Description
On January 13, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon, Alexander M. Haig, Jr., and John V. Brennan met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building from 3:55 pm to 4:15 pm. The Old Executive Office Building taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 314-009 of the White House Tapes.
Nixon Library Finding Aid
Conversation No. 314-009
Date: January 13, 1972
Time: 3:55 pm - 4:15 pm
Location: Executive Office Building
The President met with Alexander M. Haig, Jr.
Melvin R. Laird's press conference
-Performance
-The President’s role
-Announcement
-US troop withdrawals from Vietnam
-Questions
-US troop withdrawals
-Laird's handling
Camp David
-Work on State of the Union message
-Draft
Henry A. Kissinger
-Forthcoming foreign policy report, February 9, 1972
-Credibility with the press
-Ronald L. Ziegler
-Statement to the press
-The Soviet Union
-Haig’s view
Russian student [Merab Kurashvili]
-Defection in New York
-Return to Soviet Union
-Tunnel
-State Department and Immigration and Naturalization Service [INS]
-Soviet view
-Yuli M. Vorontsov's call to Haig
-Aeroflot
-Haig’s call to State Department
-Interrogation
-State Department
Kissinger
-State of mind
Show the rest of the log (70 more lines)
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[Previous PRMPA Privacy (D) reviewed under deed of gift 09/25/2019. Segment cleared for
release.]
[Privacy]
[314-009-w003]
[Duration: 38s]
Henry A. Kissinger
-State of mind
-Depression
-The President’s opinion
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Henry A. Kissinger
-The President’s opinion
-Negotiations with the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China [PRC]
-Tenure in office
-Possible resignation
-Possible Administration action
-Timing
-Possible results
-Timing
-PRC and Soviet Union trips
-The President’s possible handling
-1972 campaign
-Attacks on Kissinger
-Senate
-Kissinger's possible reactions
-Haig’s view
John V. Brennan entered at 4:06 pm.
Status of First Family departure for Camp David
-Briefcase
Brennan left at 4:07 pm.
PRC and Soviet trips
-Outcome
-Détente
-Europe
-West Germany
PRC
Kissinger
-The President’s instruction to Haig
-Message
-Support
-Further attacks
-Haig’s handling
-Overreaction to attacks
-Personal life
Brennan entered at 4:08 pm.
First Family's schedule
Brennan left at 4:09 pm.
Kissinger
-Tenure in office
-Possible book
-Press coverage
Haig left at 4:15 pm.Transcript (AI-generated)
This transcript is incomplete. The transcription skipped stretches of speech — roughly 8 minutes of this recording (about 50% 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.
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Well, I think Laird did fine.
Oh, he did a superb job, sir.
Did you feel so?
Yes, sir.
I thought it was a good way to handle this.
When you've done each one a little differently, you get out there and put the first thing out and right down.
Yeah, because all I've heard is basically it was $70,000 in the three months that I released the $69,000.
This was done by the cooperative agreement of all that was concerned.
You never announced it again.
That's all that I can say.
No, I think he's done exactly that.
Because his first questions were all true for George.
Oh, I mean, the great majority of them dealt with when the next advance would be, the Adelaide War would come out.
And it wasn't until the end that they started asking, you know, what's coming?
He handled that.
He handled it very well.
Setting the way for it.
I think he did very well.
I have to go to Camp David now, and I will be totally out of touch.
It's a little better shape, at least.
We have here, which I wanted to discuss with you before you met him tonight, he's a lawyer known to the rest of the problem, and I would like to place that to you.
Basically, he has an unstable personality like many of us, which he just had at the beginning of his second year.
He sees everything now.
He doesn't have to lie to us.
He doesn't have to say no.
The rest of him, the rest of him, Henry Polizzi, he's got another one to destroy.
I'm not going to trust him.
I'm just going to leave him.
I'm going to leave him again.
He's a prostitute.
He's a real bullshit.
He's a perfect man.
I'm going to leave him.
I'm going to leave him.
I'm going to leave him.
Totally.
Totally.
They're starting to fight.
They're starting to fight.
Knowing him very deeply, I'll list the fact that he noticed that one of the major causes of his trouble was when he walked back from the Continental Air Force camp, he looked over at the Ziggler's injection without my knowledge and hopped off the end of it on the Russians and had to see the press the next day.
He started the whole thing himself.
If he hadn't said that, then it would have washed out by that time.
It was over, frankly.
I think it's not, I think you made a story of it, you know, he's not used to making mistakes.
What's that?
He's not used to making mistakes in the draft.
No, but we haven't, nobody has engaged him about it.
I told him, I said, well, if we've got it, I said, all right, we've got it.
And I said, it's never been a nice way of running his back, you know, to the house, to, you know, to Massachusetts.
on the last night, and this dam had exploded all over us on this Russian school.
Well, what did we do about it?
We did, but it turned out to be near the point where I had to call you.
The guy was in the terminal in New York.
The immigration and state people had refused to let him go until he went to the other side of the terminal.
The Russians took the position that you were sick and ill and it was a humanitarian thing to do that, and of course they were afraid you were going to be attacked.
So I finally got to Savannah and Rensselaer and called the United States and the government said, empty the plane and stay there as long as it passes you until a student gets on it.
So we got a flight with that bike.
Empty the airplane.
We each had 20 other passengers on it and took them to the hotel.
Well, I got in the plan, and I called State, and we looked at them, and we said, we don't need a major issue on this subject.
I said, well, we want to fire them.
I said, sure, we should keep them dressed and fight the Russians again.
So we interrogated them.
I told him, I told him, you had done this, and the President does not want a situation of national crime conflict.
We did it terribly.
We did everything the right way, but we didn't insist that he go across and get a throat.
We did it in a clipper lounge there.
Of course, the state's elated now, but goddamn, we couldn't have everything on the schmazzola.
And I thought you were the state's one and only.
You should take my love, Joe.
I know.
I couldn't quite understand it, except that they were talking bureaucratic stuff.
It was easier than this.
What I was going to say was this, that
We've got to take heart in our whole car.
Henry makes it psychologically more simple than we realize.
He is showing these things that I'm sure I am.
He's having these bits of depression followed by bits of elation.
And, uh, that's the, that's the sign of the material, uh, emotional condition.
Is he free or not free?
Right.
Right.
Now, in circumstances, Henry is capable of doing something for you.
What you have to rely on is that if he has such problems,
At this point, you may also have some problems.
When they get to the real crunch, you can negotiate in a line of words or some goddamn communicate with the Russian facility.
More of that matter than Chinese.
Once Russia and China are completed,
Henry himself might decide to...
I've determined that we don't allow that to happen.
I've determined that we're probably better off with Henry's present condition
We've got to examine this cold-bloodedness health.
Now rather than later, if we consider this condition that serious.
Now this poses problems.
We can take that now.
He's fatal there.
And looking at it cold-bloodedly, and I am happy to never understand Mr. Agree with it, but Al, I can handle the child care.
And I can handle the brush care.
I mean, I have all those issues.
I know.
And Henry doesn't realize how often.
but i know what the hell my own view is
I wouldn't even consider it except for the fact that we cannot have it later.
Well, we'll take it now.
We cannot take it later.
And if he's doing it now, let me tell you, Henry hasn't been through a national war.
If he thinks this is something, he should see the shell fire that's about to come out in this goddamn place four months ahead.
I mean, the Senate's going to investigate it.
They'll fire bombs at us during the campaign, and it'll be massive compared to this.
They'll go into his private life.
I mean, I understand.
It is rough.
Extremely rough.
I have a serious question whether he can make it.
I want you to
Well, this is the first time that I have had concerns.
Concerns have been...
I watched you go up and down.
You figured that it was part of the game.
It was part of the game, and it was also the symptoms of a kind of paranoid tendency which you can have.
But this time, I'm quite concerned because...
We can.
Would you check to see whether the family is ready yet?
Because I think they were having the Russians.
As soon as they're ready, I'll pop right off.
And, oh, if you will, take this space.
I will not need the other one.
Enough?
Yes, sir.
It's an awfully tough decision.
But now our stakes are too high on how the China thing is going to work.
And, incidentally, the Russian thing, I think, is going to work, too, for other reasons.
Do you agree or not?
Because I can't see the Russians...
You know, I asked you the other day, if you look at their states and what's involved in them, they can't allow a Russian, an American, a Chinese to talk.
We can blow Europe down.
We can blow Germany down.
Let alone not cooperate with the East.
They'll come along, right?
They wouldn't have gone as far as they had to go.
It's a hell of a...
I think we need to drive through both of these things.
And you're going to get less out of the Chinese than you did in the short term.
In fact, we're going to end up banging the ones that are screwed a little bit.
And that's why we've got more exchanges and so forth like that.
Henry, I just want you to examine.
I don't want you to go through.
I don't want you to indicate the fact that this is ridiculous.
Why does the president defend the defense?
The enemies suffer along here.
The idea that, Henry, you've got a shape out here.
You're just destroying yourself.
What he's doing, he's allowing his enemies to basically
We've got to input more support than we realize we would be having.
We're going to have more of this role than less.
Or how do you think ?
Well, I think it's wrong to waste this time and energy on something that is totally unjustified.
There are too many big things to do.
And it's going to add up, I think.
And he better be ready for it.
I was a combination of encouragement and slack.
And that's the way I've dealt with him all along.
So most of the time I've had success, but this time he hasn't done that.
And he has overplayed it.
He's over-focused on us.
He's taken us out.
People have told me all the hell, right?
You know what I mean?
Yeah, every night.
and he goes rushing off to some goddamn peace throw, and all that sort of thing, and he goes to the other side of the thing, and he walks back, and he goes to the other side of the thing, and he walks back, and he goes to the other side of the thing, and he walks back, and he goes to the other side of the thing, and he walks back, and he goes to the other side of the thing, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and he walks back, and
of his kind of personality, escaping by running around with a bunch of goddamn sluts, you know, who'd pamper him.
And my own feeling is that it's better than that.
But I think you should know, though, you've got to know,
But I'm prepared to do it.
And I think then we can write it through.
And it's done.
It's done.
But Henry's writing his book, he's going to carry on Hampton's mind.
And he walks out of here, he's going to be big news.
And Harry Hentworth's going to come in.
All right.
Also recorded on January 13, 1972
- 314-002 3:41 PM · 5 min — President Richard M. Nixon and John D. Ehrlichman met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 3:41 pm and 3:50 pm.
- 314-003 3:41 PM · 8 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Alexander P. Butterfield met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 3:41 pm and 3:50 pm.
- 314-010 3:45 PM · 7 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and unknown person(s) met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 3:45 pm and 4:12 pm.
- 314-011 3:45 PM · 1 min — President Richard M. Nixon and H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 3:45 pm and 4:12 pm.
- 018-085 3:50 PM · 1 min — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone from 3:50 pm to 3:52 pm.
- 314-006 3:50 PM · 1 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Julie Nixon Eisenhower met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building from 3:50 pm to 3:52 pm.
- 314-007 3:52 PM · 20 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Alexander M. Haig, Jr. met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 3:52 pm and 3:55 pm.
- 314-008 3:52 PM · 13 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Manolo Sanchez met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 3:52 pm and 3:55 pm.
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Cite this conversation
Conversation 314-009, January 13, 1972. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives (NAID 417185607). Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/314-009 (accessed November 13, 2026).