Nixon White House Tapes — Conversation 336-037
Date: Monday, May 8, 1972 at 5:23 PM
Participants: Nixon, Richard M. (President); Kissinger, Henry A.
Recording device: Old Executive Office Building
Source: https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/336-037

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 Do not cite it as authoritative.

[2:08:39] We now have a clear-hearted choice of our three forces of action.
[2:08:43] We need to withdraw all of our forces to commence a negotiation or precise a military action to end the war.
[2:08:47] I know that many Americans think of the first force of action.
[2:08:51] They believe that the way to end the war is for the United States to get out and remove the threat of war, meaning through a present-day withdrawal.
[2:09:00] From a political standpoint, this would be a means of choice that we need to send.
[2:09:06] I did not send a reply to that.
[2:09:07] I did not send a reply to that.
[2:09:11] But abandoning our commitment to Vietnam, here in Vietnam, to remain in Germany's 17th League, is not the only thing we will accomplish there in Germany.
[2:09:16] It would risk the lives of 60,000 Americans who are still living in Vietnam.
[2:09:18] It would mean leaving hundreds of American prisoners in communist camps with no bargaining power to keep them from leaving.
[2:09:32] The American League Vietnam will encourage this kind of aggression all over the world.
[2:09:37] Aggression from small nations, armed with energy and arms, will be attempted.
[2:09:41] The attack will take place as well.
[2:09:43] World peace will be a great challenge.
[2:09:45] The second course of action is to keep on trying to push itself.
[2:09:48] This is the course that we prefer to begin.
[2:09:51] We should continue to pursue it.
[2:09:58] We have every reason to go on, try every possible path, to pretend it's war, but we're not the same.
[2:10:01] The problem is that it leads to a coercion.
[2:10:03] And now, in the past four years, we've partly and inherently refused to negotiate, negotiate any, but an imposition by the United States of a communist regime with 17 million people in South Vietnam who do not want to compromise.
[2:10:10] It is plain that what appears to be a choice among three forces of action in the United States is really not a choice at all.