Nixon & Haldeman on Vietnam War and Anti-war movement

Transcript (AI-generated)

This transcript is incomplete. The transcription skipped stretches of speech — roughly 4 minutes of this recording (about 10% 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 Do not cite it as authoritative — verify against the audio and the finding aid.

Download transcript (.txt) · JSON data

They do change some of the figures, but they don't change that one.

How do you do?

It's very surprising.

It must be, I think, because it's no longer in development.

It hasn't gotten anybody's common imagination after it's just been on a steady downhill.

I don't think there's even a follow-up to that.

He can't do that, you know.

He'd be like, call this line.

I'm sure he'll deal with these people when you let them in.

Even in our state.

That's why I don't want to let too many get involved.

Advice, you know, all these things.

Because when they get advice, they think they're being turned down, you know.

You ask people what they think and they'll do it.

Never asked, as he said, never asked for older politicians and others to make sure to bury the ticket.

No.

That's what the news leader thinks.

He's got an interesting point.

The LDJ was done when the elite and the media left it, but RN has never had their say with it.

So as long as he retains middle America, he'll be all right.

Well, whatever happened to the party?

Greedy commentators.

They don't like their news.

They look like they're talking to the White House too.

They should be in the newsroom.

They should look like they're in the newsstands.

They're looking like they're White House pundits.

We had a very good break, and we still have that this morning.

Their subject is Muskie and the Trotskyites, and they make a thesis that we can do on it.

It's saying the fact that Muskie endorsed such a demonstration here without even considering its domination by Trotskyite communists typifies it.

And he goes to the point that these people, he takes the history of who put this demonstration together, that it's the unsocialist alliance which has replaced the SDS as the radical organization now, that they are part of the Socialist Workers' Party, a non-defeating, prostitute alliance.

that they admit they're only using the war as a device.

In other words, the whole anti-war movement, they think they have two world capitals.

They want more than just peace in Vietnam.

Their literature describes the communist aggression in Vietnam as the Vietnamese Revolution, and he sprays on them.

I think we've got to organize the demonstrations.

The result is what was an unimaginable few years ago.

Hundreds of thousands of Americans marching into the Capitol under Trotskyist command.

This is now going to bother some people.

By the way, this point comes from somebody other than us, and I understand.

I know that many liberal columnists are issued from this source.

I think you're good.

You see, the source is so important that you're not going to laugh, you're right.

But this, they're talking about, you know, nobody, everybody's been afraid to say communists.

They're not safe.

But they quote Muskie here, there's no way for us to inquire into the ideological beliefs of anybody in this organization.

Quote, Muskie quotes, therefore he had no idea Trotskyite communists were running the NPHC, nor did he show much interest in that question.

They don't think it's a long, long journey.

They said if you had those, you would have bumped into the A.C. staff dominated by the trots.

They're called the trots.

And they're basically different, off-site individual names of the Trotskyites, who are different communists.

But he calls them here Trotskyite communists.

What I was going to say, though, is that they are really, they are more revolutionary communists who are not under the control of Russia.

Therefore, a person can be a Trotskyite without being pro-Russian.

That's the point.

A person, basically, basically the Chinese Congress are probably more Trotskyite.

And there's a lot of us that are Trotskyite, probably.

My point is that it's really, by Trotskyite, it means they're a minor revolutionary bastard.

That's really what it means.

The Trotskyite is a minor revolutionary bastard.

They point out, behind this, they're talking about the success of the takeover of the Trotskyites as a student stuff.

See, behind this success has been undeviating Trotskyist insistence on two positions, non-violence and sticks to the war.

While other left groups, including the Moscow or even Communist Party, go off on tangents concerning race and class struggle and may flirt with violence, the Trots have amassed support by concentrating on non-violent opposition to Vietnam.

But this doesn't mean they've abandoned their dream of a revolutionary takeover, rather the war opens a magnificent new avenue to an old goal.

Good.

It's time to face me perceptive.

Also, Evans.

Evans yesterday on the TV just really poured in on McCroskey.

What did he say?

Really hammered him.

McCroskey's done a lot of lines.

We've got a lot of stuff going on.

Evans would tell him off the hook.

The other two guys.

Oh, yeah.

Evans was the questioner.

He would, you know, he kept...

pushing McCloskey on that, you know, do you really want to do this stuff?

McCloskey's a practical example.

He's practical.

Yes.

Sure.

He has the ability to talk down, and he has the ability, and he's very articulate, he has the ability to lie while he's looking right into the camera.

And just, you know, convincing as a devil.

And obviously the guy is totally unprincipled and

That's the thing that's surprising is because, you know, everybody told me you were so sincere.

Yeah.

In fact, I remember it was the main one.

Yeah, I thought Rico was sincere, too.

You know, they're both antithetical nuts.

I think this is... Saxby's going to take him.

Is he?

Yes, well, yeah.

Yes, Saxby's ready for you.

And since this is after your college, this is the fucking situation you're talking about.

No, not yet.

Actually, we'll probably worry about it.

Well, I don't know.

The guy that could be most effective at doing it, if he will, is Bill Sullivan.

Because McCloskey built Sullivan up.

He kept saying, well, Sullivan was ambassador.

None of this terrible stuff was done.

But as soon as Godley came in, he shifted to an intentional policy of demolishing the building.

Why don't you just give the order there to Bill Sullivan as the brigadier?

Or he's going to be on it.

That calls Roger's bluff.

All right.

He said it would be very good on the other side.

All right.

This is it now.

This is it.

I mean, if he kicks him on, this is it.

They had a big crowd in there on that one.

I see.

There's a question about who got a picture.

It looks like it's about six or eight thousand.

That plane was further ahead of 15.

Further ahead of 10.

14 to 16.

Well, whatever it was.

So I said that then I'd draw the 14.

And then rather he started at 25.

Did he?

Oh, yeah.

25,000.

The difference is zero.

But I'm going to ask rather sometime to apply the same multiple factor to our time.

Just casually say that he delivered this type of thing.

And the news part of it said a crowd of 15,000.

And rapid came on the broadcast right afterwards of this special report.

It said a crowd of 20 to 25,000 or 25,000.

How great is that?

That looks good.

That's what I'm proud of.

Releasing some of the $10 billion in impoverished funds.

I don't know.

When he arrived, he's not responsible for what he's said so far.

I see.

And he mentioned that he'll be there.

He said something about he only had the chance to.

Was he there?

Where?

Did he run it?

Yes.

I'll see him.

He's the manager of the team, and he's a personnel man at Chrysler Corporation.

Oh, I'm sure I've met him.

And he's the logical guy.

Without bringing all these hippie players, I don't think you should see him.

I don't want to talk to the team.

I saw the picture, and it's unbelievable.

Because you've got one pile of us, and you've got one hippie.

But the thing is that...

It builds up that kind of people.

I'd like to have Stainable come in to see me.

I don't know if he does.

My name is Greg.

I'm the student manager of the team.

He can give you a quick and as perfectly as you want a report.

I think you should fill that much interest in your life.

Why don't you get him in?

And they'll say, why don't you have the team?

They're scattered all over.

Just watch what happens.

They came home and they did.

Some of them did have some facility, some center.

I was so sorry.

Are you all right?

All the boxers are here.

All right.

in the papers, right?

There was a good picture posted, and they made the point that you were taking them on a tour of the house or something upstairs, and you should have them upstairs as well.

And, uh, you know, we had him up over the tall creatures of ice on one of his two rooms.

See?

Yeah.

Oh, he's fine.

It's good people.

Goddamn good people.

It was kind of ironically good time, because, uh, Clay goes to the Supreme Court today.

They're good people.

He's a good man.

He's made good statements about folks having to work and so forth.

And I quoted that.

Yeah, he said, you know, he says, let's all pull together so that we can work together and fight together and pray together.

Well, he's pretty good at that.

So he said, stop here.

I'll get out of here.

He says that, you know, life isn't easy.

He says everybody can't be a champ and everybody can't be an athlete, but everybody can do his best.

That's what you ought to do.

Well, goddammit, if I say there's too much kids, he deserves to come to the White House.

He's a fine example.

I want to keep him that way.

Nick of him is a 200 heavyweight 210.

He just must be built on a brick shed house.

He's really healthy.

He's smaller than I am in physical appearance.

You know, when you see him in the play, I play towers over him.

He's a big man.

He's the only player who's only 10 pounds heavier.

But this guy is a just task.

It's hard.

I don't want Henry to be molding around me and being defensive of himself.

He always is, you know.

And since he's doing things when he isn't doing them, I don't want him to...

I think so.

I think you should.

As you know, the president's been on me every day.

I was gallantly involved in these things.

And he said what he's going to do is start reading them himself.

And Henry said, oh, well, he must do that.

That's the most impelling way to get him to dispense with that one.

And I made the point, I said, Henry, the way we ought to approach this is that before you spend any time with any other... Oh, you did?

Yeah, that's all good.

He sees the point and that doesn't mean he can leave it at that.

The other thing is Dole got such a big play in the Post.

Well, you know how he did that?

Which is very interesting.

We got two big plays in the Post by doing it this way.

Dole and Bell.

Bell got a big play.

They met the board.

No, what they did was they released on Sunday the text of what they were going to say on Monday.

So if we did the thing we keep talking about, we'll get Sunday news because there's nothing to write in the Monday papers.

See, to all the speeches this morning, to God, he put it out yesterday.

So they've got to write in the text of what he's going to say on Monday.

Because of the life we've got to live.

No, I've got a good H2 story.

I'm done.

And that was, he released that stunt.

He's going to stand on the floor today.

But he put it out as an advance tax.

And we're not going to know who's going to follow up.

We'll put that into the regular.

We've been pushing for doing that.

We've finally got two of them this weekend.

And I suggest, you know, how do we get our radio events ready?

They've got the price coming into the radio.

I am, again, pushing.

I'm trying to get the first few of those

Why not?

I think half of us in the goal, which is not a bad idea, Bob, just without trying to build them up, you know, they'll build on their own.

Don't worry whether they get first page or the line.

Just run.

Just run, you know.

And if they're good, then put out a little look at them.

See, that's what I had in mind.

I really feel it's a very good idea.

I think they should always be running on the same project, too.

The more I think about it.

Let's just do the Sunday afternoon kind of thing.

I really feel it's good.

On Sunday afternoon, it's again the same point.

If you own them and release them, you know, they'll be big Monday morning things.

Yeah.

Even though they're not new.

Even though they're not hard to do.

editor's thing, though, and the Scali deal, you know, saying we've just got to have TV because it wouldn't have been better off for you to do it my way of playing to the editors and to have the ratio to not have the goddamn cameras in there that day.

Well, you would have lost some camera coverage.

You didn't get very much.

Oh, that's fine.

But you still left the editors by putting them on TV, too.

That's a big deal to them to have the television thing.

There wasn't much else.

The big news was that China, well, China, uh, we, you know, we had spent all we did really to beat your stuff on China.

Yeah.

You beat China to a beat of these?

Yeah.

Well, that's probably where you get one.

Because we should have put it all on, on, on live.

Frasier was on TV.

We're not going to answer from the White House.

I'm going to go on and do it.

I did all the bills and said, Bill, how about this?

I really feel this.

I want to report it to you when I get back to Bill.

I think Bill ought to take an opportunity.

I'll do two of them.

So the better they can keep it at Sullivan's level at this point.

McCloskey set Sullivan up.

It wouldn't have worked very well for Sullivan to do it otherwise.

But because McCloskey can't do it like that, he's now got to.

He's in a good position to do it.

Oh, maybe Sullivan agrees to do it like that.

It's maybe possible, but I don't know.

I'll find out.

I want to know.

This is something that's another possible.

So they just nail it down.

We've got another.

It's not a break in a way that we can, if we can rank something up, because that's where Bob Wilson's in right now.

So we're going to throw him and there's a couple other guys with him.

throw them in a helicopter and run them over the area across.

He wouldn't fly over the part that we wanted to look at.

Because he knows there are villages there.

What he wanted to do was fly where he knew there were no villages.

So he could say that he had flown all over and all of a sudden couldn't find a single village standing.

That's what he did.

Now we'll run over Wilson with a camera crew.

And drop her over where all the villages are and take pictures of them.

Let Bob Wilson come back and say, well, it's a matter of which son of a bitch they tried to get her to take.

and it will be interesting to see what it will be.

You will give me advice on those people.

Unless we get to know this, we'll put him on the front page.

It's amazing how little attention they gave Wachowski yesterday.

Why do you think they got so little?

I don't know.

BEEP

on, and apparently wanted to, on a general basis.

And I saw, I mean, I know this is, I guess this was a good strategy, but I just, well, I wonder about it.

You know, they had me proclaiming this first meeting thing.

I saw that, too.

I didn't know that didn't happen.

Well, the reason they did was that Congress was going to pass it, and they said, well, I had better proclaim it.

I don't want to be associated with such people.

Now, doesn't John realize that?

I mean, I know John knows that this is a... And he knows, really, he knows, John, he knows that this is a... Of course, we don't want them to have the environmental issue of the people that are on Earth.

They are bad people.

But don't get me going any harder today, please.

Well, please, don't get me in the earthquake.

Now, this is Earth Week, and you're not doing anything on Earth.

Thursday.

Oh, it's Earth Week.

It's Thursday.

I'm bugging out of that one.

Yes, Thursday.

I'm bugging out of that one.

I'm getting past it.

I'm bugging out of Earth Week.

I feel your reaction when so many, I mean look this way, when so many thought no, who normally thought yes, that was the kind of thing that convinced me.

You know, I mean, Dick Morris was referred for going on.

I think probably the overall strategy was better not to.

You see, it was just being taken back from the other one.

That was one of the things we were after, was a Q&A thing with a pause for the answers.

That was the war.

Whatever we want to say, the war is the issue anyway.

The war in China.

People don't give a shit about China.

It's part of the war.

China's part of the war.

Well, when I say the war, China and Cali, I meant to say Cali.

Cali's the war.

Sure, Cali is the war.

China is the war.

I know that there are a lot of Russians out there.

Who does the war?

Who does the war to?

Yeah, to essential security.

It's fine.

All that sort of thing.

If that's the case, you just go on.

Don't get played out.

This week, they're going to give the demonstrators a big thing, and that's the one.

That's right.

This week, and then next week, we'll die out, and then the week after, we'll go looking at it.

Next week, we go on.

TV, right?

Now, do you agree that we should not do anything now?

They'll take care of it.

They've got a department here for sure.

I represent the Greek government.

I run here at Williamsburg.

I was going to suggest that you do have some of that story with me on my podcast.

That's why I wanted to talk to you.

That's the only chapter called that.

Well, you see, I can get word for you on the way.

You'll understand that.

He can't talk on helicopter anymore.

He's going down the street.

He's on this afternoon and he asked for a ride down a car.

You know, it's my friend who appraises us on our China.

He shows you that we are at that level.

At least we do something, but we are getting a little credit there.

China.

Absolutely.

Would you agree?

Across the board, we are.

Absolutely.

No, I didn't try to play it too much.

No, I mean, in the right way.

No.

You know what I mean?

The real question is, who did it, though?

That's my question.

There's been no quibble on that at all.

You did pretty well.

We're just in time.

The ping pong game is universally viewed as a result, not a cause.

And you really are not infringing on that type of person who wants to see the movie.

God damn it, the people who listen, there are people who want to see the news.

They're screwing the networks.

They say, well, we don't want you to preempt the news.

Sure, they want me to preempt, uh, uh, Ben Raddick, right?

See, I think we're doing a great job of preempting those things.

I mean, we'll do it next week, sadly.

How about that?

I don't have the news.

I don't have the office.

Oh.

You preempt them, but you screw yourself.

I'll show you the office.

That's the second one that bothers me.

Okay.

All right.

But wouldn't this prevent them, or we didn't want the crime not to, of losing them?

For me.

Yeah.

This is done.

That's that.

There's only half the effect.

If it was effective with the people that were there,

can be far more important than even the immediate television effect.

Oh, sure.

But all the editors, the producers, sure, they go home, they talk to people, they talk to their...

They run every day.

They've got editorials.

They also affect their writers.

They talk to the big chums in their town.

I saw the president.

You look all right.

Well, I mean, that's about as potent a ripple effect through the best week as it is.

If you follow that theory of talking to the people that talk to other people, they have an opportunity to talk to more other people with more authority, and then they're going to try to get together.

Yeah.

The D.A.R.

will have a ripple effect.

You get those old ladies that are leaders back, well, it's a mass on the chamber of commerce and stuff.

That's the next step, yeah.

All right.

I want to be directed toward that audience primarily, not toward another audience.

These are people who go back and talk.

I want to try to get some enthusiasm out of them.

I want to talk about, and you personally should do this as well, I want to, like the, like the additive part of mine, and again, like the, like the,

out of the, uh, beginning of the system, out of all the, uh, not mentioning the necessity, the need for the United States to be productive, I mean, to explore the window, to remain a great nation, to, uh, the greatest advantage the United States has,

But you see, upbeat.

I had that feeling, Bob, and I saw that.

I really did.

A little class in Rio Grande High School, they had little Mexican kids who refused to go out and beg the merchants for the money.

You have the truth of the story?

Yeah.

And it was just crazy.

They went out and sold salons, and they washed cars, and they picked fiends, and they did all the lousy, mean little tasks.

He's got that whole barber thing.

He said they're proud, these little Mexican kids, that they had earned their way to Washington.

I felt the same way.

They were good with details.

Wonderful, nicely dressed, strong and nice.

They looked like a lot of others.

Then I saw that choir, Texas A&M.

David pointed out, well, you're saying that was working on the students.

That's more than a hundred.

The eight-year-old president and the three veterans of the little Ivy League schools put together.

I saw those guys.

All of them with their hair cut.

All of them.

The teachers, they all showed their hands at first.

Half of them were trickling in.

A third of them, a fourth of them had been to Vietnam.

and a lot of religious types, you know, God bless you and that sort of thing.

I'm really not trying to go into the hands of the enemy.

I didn't try.

We were right to go to Kansas State.

We were right to go to Nebraska.

We've got to work hard.

So if you go in, in any private session, you'd have to get into an in-picking, you know, why aren't you doing this, and who's doing that.

Right.

All this kind of crap.

Go ahead and talk over there, so I can play around about that.

Okay.

He's got a picture.

He just thought you should do the Republican government, but he should sure as hell not get into political.

What is your, what is the, uh, what is your feeling on that?

That's why I want Ziggler to stay out of it.

I think Sullivan is better than Rogers.

I really feel he is at the time.

In the House, anybody can pick him up.

That's perfectly all right.

The people out there should pick him up.

Reagan should pick him around.

The White House should soar along the globe.

As a matter of fact, no disagreement.

That's why I didn't get in with the editors when they asked me the Agnew question.

I didn't mind the...

I think everybody else should.

But what the hell is this?

I didn't kiss their ass.

I didn't say anything.

But I did not take them on.

And you can tell if I'm going to jail you.

You said that these brass editors, you have a responsibility.

But don't you agree that we ought to stay in the White House and wait for big issues like this?

This is a big deal.

We want to pop it off in the House.

And all of a sudden they realized they didn't have

So you get the bug, you start losing your attention.

You start listening to all the people that are in all the ways of their lives.

The privacy checks go all the way to Vietnam, because they know it's there, they know it's better, you know, than everybody else.

So, it's not an issue for long.

And do you think I should get the skeleton probably tomorrow?

Hold an hour, you know, I guess.

I'm going to have Henry in for five minutes.

I'm not going to mention Scallion.

Do you understand?

Okay.

You told him, right?

Yeah.

See, and we talked about it.

If you go to sleep tomorrow, Scallion, I'm not going to tell you.

I'm not going to tell you.

Is there anywhere I can start looking?

There is.

A lot of people.

They're funny and they're smart.

Even though I have a very different perspective on cinema and reading.

Nixon & Haldeman on Vietnam War and Anti-war movement

AI Summary

Audio

Transcript (AI-generated)

NARA Description

Nixon Library Finding Aid

Also recorded on April 19, 1971

Cite this conversation