Nixon White House Tapes › Tape 451 › Conversation 451-005

Nixon, Haldeman & Butterfield on Public Relations and Vietnam War

Thursday, February 18, 1971 · 10:12 AM–10:30 AM ET · Oval Office · 17 min

ParticipantsNixon, Richard M. (President); Haldeman, H. R. ("Bob"); Butterfield, Alexander P.Conversation451-005 on Tape 451 (tape position 00:23:13–00:39:55)StartThursday, February 18, 1971 at 10:12 AMEndThursday, February 18, 1971 at 10:30 AMRecording deviceOval OfficeSourceNixon Library record for 451-005 ↗

AI Summary

President Nixon and H. R. Haldeman met to discuss administration messaging strategies, specifically focusing on the President’s press conferences and public relations efforts regarding the Vietnam War and foreign policy. The conversation included a review of media coverage and the performance of key cabinet members like John Connally and Henry Kissinger. Alexander P. Butterfield briefly joined the meeting to coordinate logistics for the upcoming visit of Italian Prime Minister Emilio Colombo and a White House event for Irish Prime Minister Jack Lynch, during which the President reasserted his authority over guest list approvals.

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Position in tape: 00:23:13 – 00:39:55

part A, 23:11

451a.mp3
451b.mp3
451c.mp3

NARA Description

On February 18, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon, H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman, and Alexander P. Butterfield met in the Oval Office of the White House from 10:12 am to 10:30 am. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 451-005 of the White House Tapes.

Nixon Library Finding Aid

Conversation No. 451-5

Date: February 18, 1971
Time: 10:12 am - 10:30 am
Location: Oval Office

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

[Thomas] Woodrow Wilson Foundation speech
    -Woodrow Wilson Award
         -George P. Shultz

John B. Connally
     -John D. Ehrlichman
     -Conversation concerning George W. Romney [?]
          -Event
     -Conversation with Haldeman
          -Activities

The President’s schedule

Connally’s schedule
    -Joseph W. Alsop
    -David S. Broder
    -Press briefings

Head of State visits
     -Briefing for President
           -Department of State personnel
                 -National Security Council [NSC] staff
                 -Compared to [Forename unknown] Cook

Arms control
    -Joseph C. Kraft column
          -Anatoliy F. Dobrynin
               -Antiballistic Missile [ABM] views
                     -Soviet reaction

Media coverage
    -State of the world
    -”Face the Nation” appearance
          -Henry A. Kissinger
                -William P. Rogers
                -Melvin R. Laird
                -Conversation with Haldeman
Show the rest of the log (43 more lines)
    -Kissinger’s press activities
    -Peter G. Peterson
          -Public relations skills
    -Connally

                 -Public relations efforts
           -Administration efforts
                 -Laos and Cambodia
                       -President’s role
           -Alsop article
                 -Laos decision
                       -Kissinger
           -Peregrine Worsthorne article
           -Administration efforts
                 -Peterson, Connally, Daniel P. (“Pat”) Moynihan
           -Vietnam
                 -Networks
                 -Newspapers
                       -Washington Post
           -Press appearances
                 -Lyndon B. Johnson
                 -Franklin D. Roosevelt
                 -Dwight D. Eisenhower
                 -Harry S Truman
                 -President’s previous press conference
                       -Dan Rather’s comments
                       -Robert B. Semple, Jr.’s comments
                 -Preparation

Alexander P. Butterfield entered at 10:21 am

     Emilio Colombo’s arrival

Butterfield left at 10:22 am

                 -Preparation
                      -Questions and issues

     Evening at the White House for Prime Minister John M. (“Jack”) Lynch
          -Approval by the President for reporters to attend
                -List

Haldeman left at 10:30 am

Transcript (AI-generated)

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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And I don't know if we can get another date.
Okay.
Well, I guess that's it.
Thank you for your time.
Well done.
Well done.
Well done.
Well done.
And so I started talking to him about it, and he said, I can't do it, I can't do it.
First of all, I can't help you from having to sit around here for one ride, and it's not going to end well, and I need you to skip this and go to the other side.
That's the end of the ride.
I'll get some around, and I'll be back.
Good.
You can sit here right now, and I'll see you in a minute.
I'll wait to see you in a minute.
I'll wait to see you in a minute.
I'll wait to see you in a minute.
And he loves to just tell you.
He loves to get in your back and go after the little things, really.
Because you can tell that he loves doing creepy stuff.
He wants that.
I don't know how I'm going to do this now.
But he's completely creepy with that.
That's what I talk to him.
And, uh...
This is great because he's getting us around.
He had some Saturday yesterday.
I hope he does here in the morning.
I'll tell you exactly.
I'll tell you exactly.
12-9-7-5-5-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-7-6-
He obviously is going to be close.
He said he's starting to work on the top three quarters.
And I don't know, he's going to help something.
You know, that was odd.
And Broder, and he's doing a good job.
Uh, that he's waiting for a bunch.
He's waiting for a bunch.
And, uh, he's got, uh, he's got to be careful not to divide himself up too thin, uh, and get caught up in the street.
You know, he's got to be careful not to get caught up in the street.
You know, he's got to be careful not to get caught up in the street.
All the fire right there, I think I ought to move up.
You know, I'm very quick on you.
I've seen influentials in the tracks.
I guess he's gonna do what he thinks he ought to do.
There must be a state department.
A state department guy.
Like, cool colors.
I'm ready to go.
Good.
The car was on the crash and then he hit me in the bum.
He was on the crash and then he hit me in the bum.
He was on the crash and then he hit me in the bum.
If you don't get involved, it's a current political crisis.
And the program I use is really, I mean, that's the example for this job, because if you think literally, I'm going to stay in college, and I do the research, and I do that grad job, and I'll get out of college, and I'll do that.
So we don't have that.
So these things get worse, and we just got to turn them off.
It gets even worse.
And, uh,
But we've got an hour, potentially an hour spent with Face Domain.
In fact, next Sunday, week, Sunday, uh, on the State of the World, Andrew wants to go on and do an hour of Face Domain and access the DGA.
All of this is not even under consideration.
What you're really worried about is that we're running a letter down the line that will be sent to State of the World.
I think he would be proud of it.
I think Tommy will be one of them to come and take me down right now.
And he has an arm for that sake or something.
I can't be going on and on.
I kind of want to go on straight to the world.
But Henry also wants to go under Tommy.
I'm not going to do this.
He doesn't surprise me.
I heard he wants to be Tommy.
That's exactly right.
I think that's the only way to do it.
First of all, I'm going to take him in as a driver.
Second, I'm going to say, well, you know, fine.
I'm going to go.
But if he's going to go at all, he just won't have me.
We won't be here that time of year.
He said, well, I can go on.
But I'm the only one who can explain the state of the book to somebody else on the show.
We did everything we could.
We did everything we could.
We did everything we could.
We did everything we could.
We did everything we could.
We did everything we could.
We did everything we could.
who, uh, he won't let me get any mustard from the staff team this morning, uh, he said, you know, I'm a little boy and I could give in to them, that you guys have been working on for two years, I'm sure, but I just think you, you, you totally faked it yourself.
The, the, what you guys put in hand, because, because that's in our business, he said, what you're doing all the time is you're selling the product, and you gotta pay for the product, because you're not selling the product, you need to be selling the right thing, which is exactly not what he's wanting.
And when it's not there, just don't sell her out on the internet.
Yeah.
He started to hear some ideas of ways to distribute the money.
And once he said to me, is it already out?
He said, stop that.
He said, I'm not going to be here for it.
I said, Dan, I'm not going to be here for it.
I'm not going to be here for it.
They want to go out and hear some chants.
They want to.
They're loyal to us, but they've never heard of us.
That's an absolute embarrassment.
I mean, I was hearing a very good song, and I heard a good song, and we were all happy.
You know, I'm crazy, but there's no offense.
You know what it feels like.
So if you're afraid to take this down, that's the way to challenge this thing.
Instead, it's actually the way to try to embody real people and families.
So we've covered everything you can do about it.
But I'm saying one thing, we've covered everything you can do about it.
It's a strong way to try to resolve this military danger, and that's what I'm talking about.
On bottles, you can do it.
The fact that, look, because all of the cities will turn down, and we will say that, well, you all stop going to Congress, or if that is not enough, it's kind of, it's kind of, I want to agree.
I want all of you, I want to have, it's, it's, it's, it works for me.
I want to have people come.
where you've got to get somebody all the time to write a column.
It cuts into some problems and some work and so on.
You've got a whole review around it.
You know, you see what I mean.
It's true.
At the end, you get a 30-year spin, and then it goes down into, you know, a pretty cold blooded sentence.
I mean, it's a thing I've done, you know.
the people who are in the sand know they are and it's hard for them just to see one of them don't have the medalists and you know, to see both themselves the people that are in the sand and look at cold blooded people and see you know, that there's a hell of a lot there to just see
Yeah, good.
Yeah, good.
10-0.
We would make a head-on line at 10-0-0, 15 minutes, 3-0.
Yeah, brah, I can go to the fighter.
You want me to pick 5?
I mean, it's quite a conference.
We said it's only a minute and a half.
I don't need to be seen.
We would expect a half on the other side of the front.
I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-
The leading story, top, Vietnam, and the other thing that I'm talking about, Vietnam, and the other thing that I'm talking about, Vietnam, and the other thing that I'm talking about, Vietnam, and the other thing that I'm talking about, Vietnam, and the other thing that I'm talking about,
I think it was good to review these in every newspaper apparently, or post them, as it was in the post, with the, you know, a warning, and then I think it was a good cop story.
And I think it tends to help a lot of cop drivers.
I think in here, it's a very fresh message.
They're not going to turn it back to the church, due to the fact that they are feeling terribly hot in here.
And it does, you know, press you off to good and perfect people.
But because they are live, frankly, even though I'm just here to stay a little bit longer, they are able to advise us here, and I probably would have to come in this way, and
I mean, I mean, Johnson and everything, you know, yeah.
Roosevelt just traded the bar to ISR and never did it at all.
He wrote a special comment.
I mean, this is a very impressive thing to think about.
Rabbit had to push very good, you know, into this ramp-up and did a very good start.
I mean, Roosevelt was in complete command at the end of that.
urgent follow-up questions or something, you know, and that there's a very relaxed kind of press conference, and I really think some of the studies are fairly relaxed.
I don't know what he said, but I haven't seen him touch it, but I think I have read it that way.
But then he said, well, it's a little kind of empty country, and rather saying, you know, fresh and complete, and urgent, you know, follow-up questions, you know,
We're going to finish this in a few seconds.
Uh, yeah.
It's a...
It's a...
It's a...
It's a...
It's a...
the exact same way.
So the brakes aren't ready to be used.
But, if Debbie required, I did it, but it doesn't count.
I didn't vote for her.
Because of her consistency, we had to wait a little bit longer, and I said, God, this is too much.
We had to keep my head up.
The fact is that I never looked at this thing since the way back before, briefly.
We thought that it went in the right
That was about an hour and ten minutes.
It took off.
And I worked for about four hours.
And then in the morning, I worked a little bit.
I broke up a little bit.
I had about five or six hours.
That's as far as it took.
That is about a minute and a half.
... ... ... ... ...
We're going out to the, uh, uh, you, uh,
I want to see the list of reporters I will see the list
I want to see the list, and I will prove that there's no audience to be invited there, and I'm going to be in the house unless I approve.
Okay.
Well, I'm going to do it the same way, and that's what you're going to do, sir.
But I also hope that you got to do the mark off the list, sir.
Yes, sir.
Uh-huh.
All right, Mr. President.
Gentlemen, please head toward your weather forces.
Ready to go.
Oh, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
We're going to speed up the camera.
We're going to speed up the camera.
We're going to speed up the camera.
We're going to speed up the camera.
We're going to speed up the camera.

Also recorded on February 18, 1971

  • 451-001 9:47 AM · 5 min — President Richard M. Nixon, John D. Ehrlichman, and Alexander P. Butterfield met in the Oval Office of the White House from 9:47 am to 9:52 am.
  • 451-002 9:52 AM · 2 min — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 9:52 am and 9:56 am.
  • 451-003 9:52 AM · 2 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 9:52 am and 9:56 am.
  • 451-004 9:56 AM · 14 min — President Richard M. Nixon, Henry A. Kissinger, William L. Safire, and Ronald L. Ziegler met in the Oval Office of the White House from 9:56 am to 10:09 am.
  • 451-006 10:30 AM · 7 min — President Richard M. Nixon, Mark I. Goode, and Thelma C. ("Pat") (Ryan) Nixon met in the Oval Office of the White House from 10:30 am to 10:36 am.
  • 451-007 11:13 AM · 1 hr 18 min — President Richard M. Nixon, Emilio Colombo, Neil A. Seidenman, and A. Jose De Seabra met in the Oval Office of the White House from 11:13 am to 12:22 pm.
  • 451-025 12:22 PM · 2 min — unknown person(s) met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 12:22 pm and 1:09 pm.
  • 451-008 12:40 PM · 3 min — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 12:40 pm and 1:09 pm.

All 24 conversations from February 18, 1971 →

Cite this conversation

Conversation 451-005, February 18, 1971. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives. Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/451-005 (accessed November 2, 2026).