Nixon White House Tapes › Tape 467 › Conversation 467-005

Nixon & Vogt on Lam Son 719 and Vietnam War

Friday, March 12, 1971 · 8:20 AM–8:32 AM ET · Oval Office · 7 min

ParticipantsNixon, Richard M. (President); [Unknown person(s)]; Vogt, John W., Jr.Conversation467-005 on Tape 467 (tape position 00:04:36–00:15:47)StartFriday, March 12, 1971 at 8:20 AMEndFriday, March 12, 1971 at 8:32 AMRecording deviceOval OfficeSourceNixon Library record for 467-005 ↗ · National Archives Catalog, NAID 417176103 ↗

AI Summary

President Nixon consulted with General John W. Vogt, Jr. regarding the status of the Lam Son 719 operation in Laos and the broader military situation in Southeast Asia. The discussion focused on evaluating the performance of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN), the impact of adverse weather conditions on planned air strikes, and concerns regarding North Vietnamese troop concentrations. Nixon emphasized his desire to be personally informed of any operational limitations and explicitly ordered that air strikes should proceed immediately when weather permits, asserting that budgetary or political considerations should not hinder the military effort.

Audio

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NARA Description

On March 12, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon, unknown person(s), and John W. Vogt, Jr. met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 8:20 am and 8:32 am. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 467-005 of the White House Tapes.

Nixon Library Finding Aid

Conversation No. 467-005

Date: March 12, 1971
Time: Unknown between 8:20 am and 8:32 am
Location: Oval Office

The President talked with an unknown person

[Conversation No. 467-5A]

     President’s schedule
           -A meeting in the Map Room
                -An unknown person
                      -Forthcoming call
                -Length

     General Alexander M. Haig, Jr.
          -Location

[End of telephone conversation]

An unknown person entered at an unknown time after 8:20 am

     President’s appreciation

The unknown person left at an unknown time before 8:32 am

[The President talked with General John W. Vogt, Jr. at an unknown time between 8:20 am and
8:32 am]

[Conversation No. 467-5B]

     Laotian operation (Lam Son)
           -President’s call to Admiral Thomas H. Moorer
           -Military situation

                 -Possible withdrawal
                       -North Vietnamese troop strength
                       -Moorer
                       -Henry A. Kissinger
                       -Military viewpoint
                       -Compared with World War I
                 -Washington Post coverage
                 -Duration of operation
                 -Air strikes
                       -President’s instructions
                       -Weather
                       -President’s instructions
                       -Effect
                 -Tchepone
                 -Army of the Republic of Vietnam [ARVN]
                       -Vogt’s assessment
                 -General Nguyen Van Thieu
                 -Cambodian operation
                       -Air strikes
                              -Possible limits
                                    -Budget
                              -President’s role
                              -Moorer
                 -Air strikes
                       -Budget
                       -President’s role
                       -President’s instructions

Transcript (AI-generated)

This transcript is incomplete. The transcription skipped stretches of speech — roughly 1 minute of this recording (about 12% 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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No, but as soon as he calls, I have to leave here at nine.
If he calls him, I'll leave.
Well, how long has he been in here?
All right, it's anything.
Fine, fine.
I tried to get that march on the way to Kenting.
I wondered if you could give me a little rundown on the days you're all been talking about.
I'll be in a moment.
They heard it's a knee ball discussion.
to mean about rotating him in and out.
He means, you know, and now his concern in general, the fact that he wants to get out there because he's afraid of an attack, he said,
Yeah, I remember they talked about 10 regiments and all that.
But you didn't deal with each other.
I didn't.
Admiral Moore, I don't think, was too worried about it.
Henry was worried about it.
I felt that the military guys looked at it and felt that was a mean armistice.
Of course, we all know from previous wars that
I don't think these souls are doing that.
Or do you?
I don't know.
And of course, they were playing it up.
They built the fact that they were planning to come out and claim a victory.
And this was all because they were afraid and all that sort of thing.
Of course, that would be a very bad crane.
Now, on the other hand, they're going to get whopped.
We don't want that to happen.
But the general, the general, at least the general feeling now is the sale of my locker.
Yeah.
Now the other thing I want to ask is what in the hell is happening to those airstrikes I ordered?
Or is that the only reason?
Is there any other reason?
All right, I want to know for sure.
Now what's the weather today?
Is it changing any?
Or what's the situation?
And when are we going to get those off?
They've got to go just as soon as they're open.
Good, good.
I don't want to waive the name, you know, naturally, I'm not just waiving it, but in terms of the time they hit, General, the time is to do it when we hit them in other areas, you know what I mean?
This is very important, and they, I imagine those choke points are pretty well loaded up at the moment, don't you?
Yeah, but it's weather, huh?
What about the weather in terms of our, in the support around Chapone and the rest, is that also giving us quite a bit now, or what?
I feel that plenty of our time with the wind.
Correct.
Has the plane been damaged by that fire or something?
Uh-huh, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
What's your general appraisal of the situation at the present time?
These dolls have done reasonably well, would you say?
Correct.
Going south now, it's still pretty limited, more limited than it was, I suppose.
Correct.
The 914 is surrounded.
It's still open, I don't know whether they're going to go, whether they're going to get trapped in there.
That's really probably the reason that you wanted to go back.
Or do you know?
It's hard to tell.
Are they still doing well?
Doing well.
How about California now?
Of course, I know they've lost budget because of the tree, but I guess they just sort of wander around out there in here.
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
We've got airstrikes we can lay on down there too.
We have enough to do both.
We've got shining airstrikes because of budget or any of that sort of thing at the moment.
I mean, we can't go over these two places because we're limiting ourselves because of our budget requirements.
I want to be personally informed, as you've told Adam, more personally informed by him directly than is ever limited for that reason.
I mean, if there are other reasons, I understand, but for that reason, I need to know.
There are no budget limitations as long as this operation goes on in both places.
And no budget limitations in terms of the strike in the north either.
I want to add that Northern Strike can, just as I say, just be assured that it has nothing to do with both political considerations.
I'll make those decisions.
I mean, it must be the weather, you know.
I don't want to go in on a, just for the sake of building it, but as soon as it's ready to hit, as soon as it opens up, I let them have it.
And because I don't know if the owners were, I don't know whether they were open-ended or not, but they aren't, weren't before they are now.
As soon as it's ready to hit, let them have it, because you're otherwise fine.
Don't worry about that beating pipe.
The hell with it.
Okay, bye.

Also recorded on March 12, 1971

  • 467-001 8:15 AM · 4 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator met in the Oval Office of the White House at 8:15 am.
  • 467-002 8:15 AM · 5 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House at 8:15 am.
  • 467-003 8:15 AM · 18 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 8:15 am and 8:18 am.
  • 467-004 8:19 AM · 1 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Ronald L. Ziegler met in the Oval Office of the White House from 8:19 am to 8:20 am.
  • 467-006 8:45 AM · 6 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Alexander P. Butterfield met in the Oval Office of the White House at 8:45 am.
  • 467-007 8:46 AM · 30 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Rose Mary Woods met in the Oval Office of the White House from 8:46 am to 8:47 am.
  • 467-008 8:47 AM · 5 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator met in the Oval Office of the White House at 8:47 am.
  • 467-009 8:48 AM · 25 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House at 8:48 am.

All 11 conversations from March 12, 1971 →

Cite this conversation

Conversation 467-005, March 12, 1971. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives (NAID 417176103). Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/467-005 (accessed October 31, 2026).