Nixon, Haldeman & Kissinger on Vietnam War negotiations and Berlin Agreement

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 Do not cite it as authoritative — verify against the audio and the finding aid.

Download transcript (.txt) · JSON data

Click a timestamp to play from that point; the page address then links to that moment (e.g. #t=125).

My God.

What's the other day?

Same old stuff.

Keep finding more bodies in Yuba City.

That's a string of them.

Twenty-one.

My God.

Twenty-one.

That's right.

Twenty-one.

So is it.

All of it.

All between 40 and 65.

There was a guy in the park.

No, he was a Mexican.

The guy was a Mexican who was an agent for itinerant workers.

You know, he shipped them around to them.

He wasn't like workers.

Now, most of them didn't have any money.

Some of them, one guy had 32 cents in his pocket, one had $6 in his pocket.

How were they murdered?

Machete.

Ooh!

They were stabbed in half.

And they all have their hands above their heads and their shirts pulled up over their hands.

Very weird thing.

So, how can you get the hands up?

Well, you can do it after you kill them.

Yeah, but they had to drag it and pull it up.

They didn't have to kill them for you.

Yeah.

So, when you kill them...

This machete, they found the machete and they found him.

What the hell were they doing on the machete?

You've got to go ask somebody how the hell did he not, you know, take out the pipe.

It would be an interesting thing.

You know, a lot of this is a weird story.

People who steal are all whites.

They're not Mexican-Americans.

There's one guy that they think might be a black.

Did he used to have people that tend to live with him?

Is that what they did?

I don't think so.

Apparently he just hauled them around and sort of signed up, you know, if somebody needed tin workers and he'd go downtown to the tin wine houses or something.

Take a look.

What area does he live in?

Does he have any good points of sexuality?

Well, he's married and has kids.

Two kids.

He walked out in 1967 because I thought he was...

Potentially dangerous to itself and others.

But then they let him out.

You know, it's funny, something like that kind of... Comes along as no other than a trick that sort of captured the...

The attention of one of those victims in their county.

You know, I tend to remember where he was, but...

One of those bum type of people.

Yeah, poor girls.

Alcoholics.

It's the domestic news and the Soviet-Arab treaty got out.

Yes.

And international news did not.

It's not what the media speaks for.

It's just so concerning.

Maybe the truth will go out.

The reports on that are so different.

So you don't really know.

Well, rogues in the state, people feel that they are Saddam Hussein.

quite restrained when he said it.

And then the other guy, he got all excited, but said, I didn't.

And that basically was it.

They have a treaty, and it's like, so we have to fight on this thing.

I don't, I'm not silent about it, and at least about what will happen, but I didn't know this.

And he, because he's influenced by it, and I've been wrong, you go back three months ago, they said there was going to be a war, I mean, three months ago.

Three months, remember, all last summer.

And also this fall, and again this fall.

And early this year, and again early this year, we're going to have a war.

Now there are wrongs, there are wrongs.

Why this?

They were refining what the Jews were telling Henry, you know.

They were going to fight.

The other thing about this is we've got to have a deal on October 5th.

by Colonel Rogers back in the day.

He squeezed the Jews goddamn right out of us.

We can't wait until the 72 elections.

I mean, we can't wait until then, then we're gonna be in a position where the Jews will, well, this is sure a better time to squeeze them than, like, in one of the two other ones, which is government.

And the claimers that they, that they're out there, and this, of course, I didn't show to Henry.

We were the claimers, and they were really going to the elections.

Did you see that in the rain?

They're waiting.

Yeah, go ahead.

You have to send those to Rogers, and you have to show a lot of the traffic.

That's exactly what we're going to run next.

We're going to be moving over here, so you're watching.

Is there going to be a shelter in there?

I think so.

I'm trying to see.

So, is that in this way?

Oh, that's right.

I suppose it's not in this way.

Well, that's good.

That's good.

I can call him up there, I suppose.

Yes, there's everyone here.

I'll try to see.

Okay.

I saw you in here.

Me.

I'm leaving tomorrow morning.

I'm going to show myself around town today.

I'll go somewhere where people know I was here.

And I'll be back Monday afternoon, so I've left it so that...

I have no problem with the kind of electronics you know.

My ethics are...

It's divided in the fact that some of it is my KO.

Well, a curious combination of bad luck it could happen.

But this is not a North Vietnamese residence.

This is a safe house which they use only for these meetings.

The French will of course know, but they're not sure they cover it.

But, uh...

It's never in the past, not just in my meetings, but when Harriman and Bruce met privately, that's never, they've never been there.

But if it happens, I'll just say that Santini was here and called me.

I'll tell you what, by the time we were there, you know what I mean, I wouldn't say we were in the park.

No, actually, I saw Santonese.

The Air Force One was going over on a training flight.

I had a table from Rush, and we are in a ridiculous position, Mr. President, that the Berlin talks are going so well that we may not be able to slow them down enough.

I think they'll have a Berlin agreement unless there's a snag by the middle of July.

which makes it imperative that I talk to Dobrynin and tell him this is it now.

And actually the Russians are making two-thirds of the concession.

That formula we came up with, just the pragmatic things, no legal justification,

Which is actually a great help to us because any legal justification would give East Germany an enhanced status.

While if one just describes who does what.

And the Russians, that's their big concession, have agreed to assume responsibility or some responsibility for full power for the access to Berlin.

Now I don't kid myself that any time they really want a crisis they can find administrative reasons.

They can resolve the autobahn or tear up the road.

That is not affected by it.

But that they could do anything.

It's more complicated.

I understand.

The logic, the logic is so clear.

You've got to wait until you get out.

Those are the men who sent him off the wall.

That's right.

And that's the way it is.

And that is one place

Oh, yes.

— 1 min 13 s with no transcribed speech —

We have one other technical issue which is connected with Latin America.

The Brazilians have established a 200-mile limit, and they want to start enforcing it soon first.

Now, our problem is that unless we tell them that we're going to negotiate the fisheries issue with them, they will have to start enforcing it.

We've already agreed to negotiate, but we don't have a formal position yet.

And so there's some debate.

The State Department wants to negotiate now with the Defense Department once they have a showdown.

They're not so concerned about fisheries, but they're concerned about law of the seas.

I would recommend that we tell them we're willing to negotiate in the fall.

That is, because if we don't do it on fisheries, the Latin Americans will oppose us on the more important issue of navigation.

which comes up on the Law of the Seas conference later this year.

While if we can settle Brazil, it's not basically our style country to us.

If we dig in on the fisheries, we lose on navigation.

Well, that's my recommendation, Mr. President.

I'd like to make it a much more coarse, blunt statement.

Here's what I have in mind.

and others where you want to clear the record.

I think we have to realize in all candor that the likelihood of this record being made public or becoming an issue is about one-tenth of a thousand.

While it matters, it will be historically important, but it will not be important in terms of what we're trying to accomplish now.

I have a feeling that you ought to go in

this time, without the, only the barest of the formalities.

In other words, I think that I would like to see it start that I have come here at the express orders of the President for the purpose of making a final offense.

I would have talked about Moe, who died, or any of these others, and I would have talked about

I wouldn't go into this.

We want to be flexible.

I wouldn't put any of that in at this time.

I'd come here from the express order to the president.

Here is our file.

Here is our office.

And then I'd like to see you start just the way you talked to me at times.

But I'd like to please say we have thought this through.

It is quite apparent that as far as we're concerned,

The negotiation is drawing to a close, and you know that.

Let's be realistic and speak that I'd like to break this deadlock and separate the political issues from the military issues.

And we do it now.

That's the one thing, Mr. President, that I think we should not say.

That one sentence.

We should do it, because on this one they've already said no.

They might do it in practice.

But everything else, I think, if you don't care about what it looks like when it gets smothered, this is the better way of doing it.

This is the better way.

I've come here for the express orders, and here it is.

This is the final blood.

Strong, firm.

And then I go right down the line, we're prepared to do this, this, this, this.

Now, on the terminal date, are you prepared to, are you not going to mention a date, or are you just... That's until they accept the other port.

In terms of the infiltration, that's negotiable, as I understand it.

Right.

Yeah.

I put in a little more.

Yeah.

You see...

Except, this is not a paper from our other October 7th offer.

Oh yeah?

Well, no, except, except for the, except for the date, well, what we didn't interact with some of the data there.

That's a unilateral withdrawal, they're not asking them to pull out.

Well, to keep, therefore, as I said, they can send in...

I'll replace it later on, that sort of thing, yeah.

But that, the NATO knows nothing about it.

But also, also, Henry, you're, you know what I mean, when you talk about Laos and Cambodia and the rest, I would bother one hell of a lot about that.

I would negotiate that.

What I'm really getting down to is this.

Is that right?

I don't want you to give that at the beginning.

I think it's fine to make all these other things.

And I think you've got to get down to raw about this pretty soon.

But we're willing to do it.

What we're willing to do, as we know, is that they'll give us ceasefire, and they'll get the prisoners.

On the day, I'm sure you wouldn't get on to them.

And on the day, that's negotiable.

But the point is, it's going to go down.

And I think if you would start it that way, and I would say on the questions of, like, for example,

I would not start the way you do.

I think the way you start is exactly the right at this earlier time to say, well, you said this, and I'd like for you to explain it.

You said this, and I'd like for you to explain it.

They'll take all three or four hours to explain it.

I go directly to the author and then do that.

And then during the course of the conversation later on, say, no.

Let me tell you the reason that I think it's so effective.

When I was speaking at the crew shop, it affected the press conference.

The State Department gave me the goddamn as much crap that they wanted to raise.

You know what I mean?

18 different issues.

Well, we had a long meeting.

As it turned out, there was an attorney who came over to watch, which is named Treehawk.

And I know the State Department people, the boycotter was there, practically were going up the wall because I didn't raise the issues.

I didn't raise them.

I just went straight into the guts of what we were talking about, the power, you know, the debate, basically, which had started earlier about...

push the other around, you know, the power complex and that.

And at the very end of the conversation, I put all the crap in so that the record was made.

My point is, you put the crap in first, you'll get that very good ground and then things will finally come right to the point.

I would put it at the highest level.

I've just come directly from the president.

And I am authorized to make what is an offer which goes far beyond anything we've made before.

It is our last offer.

And here it is.

Ding, ding, ding, ding.

Now, for this to succeed, we have to have action on it immediately.

What is your answer?

I think we should do that.

I think it will, I understand, I don't do this for the record, but I do it because I feel it might have some effect on them.

And it'll let them know.

I wouldn't put in the fact that the Soviet have told us that we're willing to talk to each other.

I would drop that in later.

I'd throw that in.

I think it's a nice little thing to throw in at the end.

Well, during the course of the conversation, you know, sort of slip it in with a stiletto rather than putting it in at the beginning of, well, the reason we're here is the Soviet told us and so forth.

But you should judge them on that, that's right.

But I think that the more blunt, direct, and basically...

shocking you can be, the more you might, at least the more you may impress this fellow that this group really is.

You're not here just to talk about peace.

We're both, you know, we'll both leave with smiles on our face and so forth.

I think that's all great for the earlier ones.

is it shows that we were reasonable, we tried our interests, that record's been made.

But at this point, we're dealing with a bunch of goddamned bandits, and we've got, and I think the way, the way to go is to put it right, they don't want to play, fine, and say, and if you don't want to take it, boys, we're, we're leaving.

And I, and if you've got any time, and I think if you do that, you'll find out pretty quickly there, you're going to take it or not going to take it.

Absolutely.

So that's what I do.

I think, Mr. President, you're absolutely right.

I wrote it.

I don't know that I'm right, but I'm sure you're right.

I have a feeling that at this stage of the negotiations, not from our standpoint, but from theirs, these bandits, they need some structure.

I looked at it from the point of view of May, of Hampton.

Perhaps you wanted to surface it, but that's not clear thinking because if we surface it, you'll make a speech.

And you can make the proposal then any way you want.

Any way you want.

When we service, you don't have to do it.

At this point, the major thing is to get an impact on that.

I think that might impact me somewhat.

They may be right, but they may not be.

I think that they might take this on.

No, I didn't tell him what we were going to do.

I asked him what he thought they would settle for.

And he said, well, they'll start out.

He said what we should do rather than make another offer to them is ask them, what are you willing to settle for?

Well, there he's wrong.

And he said, well, they will start by saying prisoners for a deadline.

But a deadline for prisoners isn't good enough.

You'll lose.

Everyone in Asia will think we're just running.

therefore we have to get something else.

And he said, therefore we have to get a ceasefire.

He thinks we can get it through 72.

He said they're not children, and they will give us, and he said they'll also... Ceasefire.

Yes, and he thinks they would stagger the letters, withdraw throughout 72, that it doesn't have to be early in 72.

I'm just giving you his views.

I'm telling you the political, well...

At the political standpoint, our major goal is not to cease fire on 272.

That is important because we don't want Southgate Mountain to fall.

Our major goal is to get our ground forces the hell out of there long before the elections.

We have to be prepared to bomb the hell out of them in the event that they break.

We can still do that.

If they break and cease fire and sell the enemies, we'll bomb them.

That's enough.

Listen, Andrews and those people with the little few goddamn things that'll do with 500,000 people there or 400,000 or 350,000 the other time allows them to crash, they're going to do with 100,000.

Oh, no, 100,000.

The only problem is to prevent a collapse in 72.

I know a collapse in 72, though.

If we have a cease fire, the American Air Force city...

But don't you think I have no political judgment if there were an agreement this summer that said we'd be out with everything by September 1st next year, that this would kill the issue, no one would talk anymore after there's an agreement that emphases fire at the war stopping.

I tell you, September 1st has the random smack dab of politics.

You can do it August, you know, I say August 1st is the latest you can do because you've got to get it so it doesn't appear as if you're doing it just as the election campaign begins, we're getting there.

Democratic convention's in July.

That's, they're not going to get what you can get.

But my point is that I'll start asking if they agree to all the other propositions that they now give us today,

I'll say January 1st, 73, because they're certainly not accepted.

And we can go back to as far as July 1st, 72.

They'll go on January 1st, 72.

Exactly.

And then for July 1st, I think that is an amendment.

That's an amendment.

With our Air Force, as I say, we're going to remember, we're going to keep.

We're going to draw that air force, air power, and tie on that, if you will.

Yeah, but the ties won't let us bomb from there anymore after that.

Through the ceasefire?

Maybe through the ceasefire.

I doubt it.

Well, that's the point.

You see, the thing is, these North Vietnamese are mean enough so that if they dare, they might want you, might want to have one hell of a blow-up to ruin the...

All right, what you could do would be to have a deal of everything but our air power.

That's fine.

Maybe that's the way to go.

In other words, get all ground forces out by July 1st and all air power out by May 31st.

I think that's a better way to say it.

But I think that, I guess my intuition tells me that if there is any chance, and I don't know if there is, there may be, if there's any chance you're going to get just a straight thing.

And I forget what they said about POWs.

Are you willing to discuss that?

No, you are not.

Absolutely.

All that is, all that is... We'll fight that out in answer to the proposition.

That has to be a point.

So again, let Bruce handle that as to what they meant when they talked about POWs and so forth and so on.

What you're getting here is to get a, if you can, is to get them to consider it a

P.O.W.

ceasefire, withdrawal of agreement, that's all, those three things.

Infiltration, I think you, look, on infiltration, sure.

Put it down, but as far as international supervision and infiltration, I never might agree to that, Henry.

Yeah, that's true.

They can agree to it, I don't think it makes sense.

But we have to drop it.

It's something that you can give.

The main thing you can't give on.

You can't give on a ceasefire.

You can't give on a veto.

That's your rock bottom.

And the rest, it ain't nothing you can get again.

But remember that you can't give on the other.

You almost know what your final deal is.

You can't give on a ceasefire.

You can't give on a veto.

That we can say about very easily.

What we have to prevent next year, one way or the other, is

If there's a ceasefire, we're going to stop bombing throughout Central China.

But we want to prevent it.

Of course, we'd like to prevent it.

The infiltration might quite as much affect the international situation when they have one.

Well, just enough so that Cambodia and Laos don't collapse on us during that period.

I just don't have much confidence in this operation.

I don't either.

See, that's my point.

It just slows it down a little bit.

Sure.

So we get through 72.

I'm being perfectly cynical about this, Mr. President.

If we can, in October 72, go around the country saying, we ended the war and the Democrats wanted to turn it over to the communists, then we are in great shape.

I know the Democrats haven't, the Congress haven't, the Senate hasn't.

Frankly, I don't think that's fine with me.

In fact, if it's got to go to the communists, it'd be better to have it happen in the first six months of the new term than have it go on and on and on.

I'm being very cold-blooded about it.

But on the other hand, if Cambodia allows and Vietnam go down the drain in September 72,

Then they'll say, you went into these, you saved these, lost so many lives, just to wind up where you could have been in the first year.

What is the situation in cases asked about Laird's comment and Laird's testimony on the budget to be affected?

All American ground combat would cease to be this summer.

He actually made that statement.

You see, I've got to be the type of man to get that in the press.

You say that

Because that's totally inconsistent with what I'm saying.

No, you can say that Secretary Layard was talking of American maneuver battalions, and that those, of course, are being sharply reduced, and it was a rough estimate.

And when the point is reached where we can announce it, you will make the announcement.

These were guesses as to when certain American maneuver battalions would be reduced to a certain point.

It was another typical layer.

Too complicated.

You do see what it does.

I think, as I said, Bill Rogers was probably protecting his own plane.

He said it to us.

He said it 15 times, and Laird said it.

Or he said it several times, and Laird 15.

But God damn it, it's just really something that they go in there and say all these things.

And in the face, I sent a directive to them every three weeks, and it was an absolutely cheap shot in January.

No one was arguing about it.

They should have let you make it then, if anyone was going to make it.

What I would say is that the progress is...

of Vietnamization is on schedule and when an announcement has to be made, you'll make it.

All the rest is speculation.

I'm just going to make this as one of those conferences.

We saw the news report this morning that they led with salt for four minutes on two networks.

I saw that.

And in a very positive way.

I didn't read it.

The main part of the news report is the news.

I can never read that anymore.

The CDS, I noticed Henrietta, desperately tries to

get the POW issue up, you know, they've got two things, CBS, which has a thing on this, I know there's a man in that network who's a communist, I know there is, who's producing this stuff, he produced the thing here, and a very, very good job, the POW thing, and they're on those three kicks, hard, tough, so you see, they're desperately trying to be a non-backup, and they're having a hell of a time.

They're having a hell of a time with that thing.

Hell of a time, well, I mean, hell of a time,

That's what I mean.

Well, Mr. President, if we get Semyonov over here to sign the headline agreement, it doesn't mean a goddamn thing.

It helps.

It helps if the Berlin thing is going to break in the next two or three weeks.

I think we've got to figure at least to get those two without Henry and the Berlin.

Can we keep Berlin from breaking if they don't agree with something?

Well, I'm going to give him an ultimatum on December the week from Monday.

We can keep it from breaking.

We have to be bastards, but we just have to...

The next time, they're going to meet on June 4th, and that's mostly technical stuff.

Then Brandt and Rausch are going to come over here.

And we see Brandt.

And before Brandt gets here, I'm going to tell Dobrynin, that's it now.

We've forced around long enough.

We have.

We have to make our basic decisions.

The only thing is, the only way we'll make it plausible is to say, if you reject it now, that's it for this year.

That's the one thing.

The submarine is in Cuba.

It's not in here.

It is nuclear.

It is a nuclear-powered submarine.

It doesn't have missiles on it.

It's one of these cheap gangster shots.

At first, I thought it wasn't nuclear.

No, that was another conversation.

No, it is nuclear.

That's what I found out yesterday.

No, that's right.

He told me it wasn't.

I told him that all of the submarines were not nuclear.

Our information was wrong.

And I corrected him.

I called him back.

We had gotten new photography and it was nuclear.

So?

Well, he says they announced it.

It's at the very edge of the understanding.

It's just at the edge of it.

And they're not in Gianfuegos.

It's a gangster thing to do.

And I think if it comes up in the press conference, as it may, because now the word will get out, I wouldn't get into the question of whether it violated the understanding, but I'd be very tough on what was...

I should say there is an understanding.

We expect it to be complied with, and the Soviets are quite aware of it.

Good.

I won't comment on every single thing.

I won't comment on it.

The Soviets are quite aware.

Good.

Much better.

The Chinese, of course, is now in the position, I think.

They're going to hit the plant.

Not because of anything we do.

Because of the polls.

I know those bastards.

They're also aware of the fact that the people who opposed it previously, you'll see people switch it with Siraju up there.

They follow these polls.

But we're in a pretty good position.

I know.

What I'm getting at is this.

because of the polls, this really does rule out what I would really prefer, and that is we'll hard on the truth.

So I think if we do that, then we not only lose the intellectuals, which I don't mind, because I'm not against our friends.

Here, if we lose the intellectuals and

We go against the majority of the country, which is no reason for us to do it.

If we're going to come out that way, then.

I see.

So what we're going to come out with, I guess, is something that you do try to like.

Well, if we connect it enough and if we make it low-key enough.

I think if we stay off the universality formula and just say majority for admission, two-thirds for expulsion, that has the practical consequence of producing two Chinas.

You see, if we say universality...

Well, no.

You see, if you say universality, you're saying Taiwan is a functioning government.

No, it will either then lead to two Chinas on the grounds, not that anyone says Taiwan is a government, but simply because there aren't two-thirds votes to kick them out.

Or it will lead more likely to the fact that the communists will not come in, and that next year or the year after, they will kick Taiwan out.

But it therefore gives us a...

So the more modest we are, the less we claim.

We just say majority for admission, two-thirds for expulsion.

Then there'll be a majority for admission and probably not a two-thirds majority for expulsion.

And that gives us an effect to China, but it doesn't make it a universal principle.

Yeah, but that they might, that the communist Chinese can live with.

What they can't live with is if we say any functioning government should be in.

Because that makes Taiwan an independent government.

I agree with you that the state people want to get out and churl around about this.

They won't agree any different on this.

I don't think there's a hell of a lot of political language.

and being an activist coming around.

State does it.

Everybody's going to know now.

We really got the initiative here.

Rockers does it.

They're going to get the credit right here.

Oh, no question.

Oh, yes.

I told him on his trip, he had to say, I'm in consultation with the President.

I want to find out what you think.

The best would be, Mr. President, it's not anything...

In fact, the best would be if Martha Green said it in a testimony before the Foreign Relations Committee, but I'm not going to make...

But this, ideally, would be the best tactical way of playing it.

Just drop it quietly.

Secondly, as far as Peking is concerned, or let George Bush do it, that would be even better.

George Bush would be the best to do it.

The next thing is, it would be best if it happened after we've established contact with the Chinese on the simple ground.

And if we can do that... Well, I've shut it down because of the June 28 meeting.

Of course.

I want some positive news after the meeting with Q.

But the Q thing is rather our position because if these guys turn us down, we make the peace offer.

And if they don't turn us down and accept it, it doesn't matter what comes after.

If you do turn us down, then let me say that on that, I would strip away all the crap about you.

All those three points, look, for the average person, he will not distinguish between two authors.

We've got to think of average people.

I just strip it all away and come down to the bare bones.

We offer this, this, and this.

And put that out.

It is a propaganda ploy.

Put out three points rather than ten points.

Oh, yeah.

There's a lot of stuff in there.

But actually, there's a big difference.

We've never said a date before.

We've never said unilateral.

So it is an enormous difference.

But we don't need the eight points for a presidential speech.

I put that on immediate basis.

If you make a public statement, you just say... Oh, yeah.

The immediate release of all prisoner of war.

The United States will withdraw all its forces and so forth.

There shall be an online communist party.

They shall also agree to a ceasefire throughout all of China.

Right.

Supervised.

That's all I have to say.

That's fine.

These are the essential points.

All the rest is baloney.

Yeah.

The rest, if you're negotiating, we have to put in, but not for... Well, I can't go crazy enough to be in there and all the rest...

But I just sort of put it right on that sort of thing, because that is very hard to argue with.

Very hard for anybody to argue with.

To say, well, you've got to have a ceasefire while we're getting out.

Some of them may say, well, we'll have a ceasefire after we get out.

That's all right.

So we'll argue about that.

That is a hell of a lot to argue about.

The problem here, though, with the Russians and the Chinese, and it really helps us, is that they have an enormous problem between each other.

and cut our balls off.

And here we are.

Well, I think they've never had a stubborn opponent in here.

As you've turned out to be.

I mean, here you've got to give Armin a call for anything.

He had the right line.

We'd agreed to quit, to give up ABF before.

We had an offensive limitation.

But it's another awkward language to communicate in.

It says together with.

Together with.

It is.

Aren't these people stupid and fickle?

We say we shall concentrate this year, but we should maybe agree ahead to it all in the next sentence.

Together with, we will agree on...

Together with this, we will agree with that.

You see, that's all we have to do.

See, look, you're all patient.

They are, but what is happening is, Mr. President, I really think that the communists are beginning to dominate some of our media.

Six weeks ago, because now I saw a New Republic article in which they castigated you for the assault thing because you maintained the relationship between offensive and defensive limitations.

Here the Russians have already agreed to it.

And they are still getting away with it, which is of course what the Russians really want.

And that's what, if they babble away enough, of course the Russians will pick it up at the next Helsinki.

And that's why we should get the summit day fixed.

Because then they'll be reluctant to be true.

Well, there's no summit, however, in any circumstances, unless we do have an inner assault or even to put on the finish there.

We have to do that.

We're there without doing that.

That's not even worth our time.

I really agree to it now, because we can't be sure.

But we've got the gamble.

I think we can always sign the accidental war agreement.

We can announce some progress and so on.

If there is a deadlock in Vienna, we can break it at most.

Frankly, partly for domestic reasons and partly...

I frankly feel, Mr. President, at this point, that to keep the Democrats out of office next year is a major national necessity.

That's right.

It would be terrible, you know.

It would be terrible.

And, you know, it would really, really be a responsibility to display it in studies, I'd say, to conduct foreign policy.

What about the radicals?

Well, it would just be easier to establish.

That's where the damn radicals are.

Yeah.

And another argument for the summit is we have a better chance of getting the assault with the summit.

I agree.

They've got reasons as well as we have to have something come out of the meeting.

Well, we... Sure.

But this is the other side of the question.

We're not going to have a summit come out of the meeting, are we?

Out of the question.

That we can't do.

Never.

That we cannot do.

I don't think it's all identical.

We can have an ADM agreement and a limitation on offensive weapons.

It's an offensive weapon, so it shouldn't be so...

Even though there are, I agree, media are dominated by the communists.

Well, part of the reason here is that they have got, they have desperately, they're paranoid about it, but they've desperately got to discredit in some way what we've done.

Yeah.

They're having one hell of a time, aren't they?

Oh, absolutely.

Don't you find them running around with your social set?

They must be up the wall.

They are up the wall, and they are becoming...

I can see it.

Where did you go last night?

Last night I had dinner with Joe and Stuart outside.

That's good.

How is your temperature?

Oh, I've got Joe completely... Good.

He's all right?

Turned around.

Have you seen Harold?

Yes, yes.

Stewart is all right.

Stewart has done, well, Stewart has polled every Democratic candidate, seven candidates, on what they would do on Vietnam about air support and military and economic support.

What do they do?

Down.

Almost all of them except Jackson, down.

And he said they're the most cowardly lot he's ever seen, the most disgraceful, despicable bunch.

He's going to write an article, a column about it.

But they are solidly for you.

They know those guys just can't control them, don't they?

Oh yes, let's do it for them.

These people, Margaret Child, for example, is all out.

He thinks we are conducting a great foreign policy here.

I ran into Brinkley the night before that.

But even he, and he did a good thing yesterday.

What do you say?

No.

Are you talking about us all?

Yeah.

They all, the point McGregor made, I'm surprised that you make the point that there's more going on, that you are in charge of the foreign policy, that you have a concept of what you're building for

John Sherman Cooper was just, that was the night before, was just warbling around.

And now if Berlin is settled, which I think is practically certain, we'll have Berlin settled by the end of July.

I believe, and if you could see Rush for a few minutes when he's here, and thank him for...

His health.

Because he's been magnificent.

He's smart enough to do it.

And he's done it beautifully.

To be a totally loyal man in any position you have, he's the only guy in the Foreign Service I see now coming up that we can trust.

I think in a good way.

I don't know.

There are many we can trust on the brains.

And the ability that you get at the top of the sign.

I've never much learned.

In a new administration, he could be a superb undersecretary or higher.

Look, all you need is trust, trust, trust, trust.

That's it.

You need people that are oriented towards you.

There are for us.

That will go out and beat the other people right in the goddamn head.

And that are willing to take the lead.

That's right.

And don't shove it in here.

I mean, Connolly is the man who does it.

Connolly puts himself out front.

It turned out well.

Herbert's doing well.

He makes good speeches on morality and that sort of thing.

That's good.

People keep mentioning a possible trip to England.

I don't think that's a good thing to do at this time.

What happened is that I invited him because it's the five-year meeting with the American bar and the British bar.

And I just told, uh, when I was, I told Berger, he, Berger, he said, asked me to go.

I said, well, it worked out with the world trip, uh, with another trip I might do it.

I was thinking Moscow might come.

I don't know where I want to go.

It's all the record.

It's all, it's all the schedule.

Because if it's a special trip, it would be... We're not going.

It would create a... Well, we're not going.

I mean, actually, I don't want to go there much longer than anything here.

Right.

I think it'd be a mistake, though.

And I don't think the British really want it because...

It would look like the special relationship again while they're talking.

I was sorry to see, well, he's having to come back.

Unfortunately, he's got plenty of time.

He's got four more years.

You know, there's only 20% of the British paper in the market now.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

Because that's the only thing that's going to drag these down later.

It's like, ours would have been down this mean a lot.

Because we've done very well to hold 50% of this pie during the time.

We've got the, uh, Houston did the right thing, though, doing all these unpopular things in the first year.

But if British industry doesn't get a shot in the arm, Henry Ford was in here to see me a few weeks ago, a week or so ago, and he said to me, never buy a British car, no matter how much they cost, because the workmanship is diverse, that the British ports, he said, are 30% less good than the ones they make in Germany and France, even though they are, of course, exactly the same specifications.

The same specifications.

It's going to happen.

It is going to happen here.

Yeah, I understand.

Because we're in the same thing.

I know there's two very strange articles about Nader.

There are two of them in here.

In a sense, it's now lighting up attacks on industry, the system, etc., regardless of what they do.

It's really smacks of the McCarthyism that

Yeah, that's all right.

I think it is.

Do you agree?

Oh, and I've met him.

I've met him.

He's a lightweight.

He's a fanatical lightweight.

Yes, he is.

Oh, yeah.

I've never met him.

He's a lightweight, then.

Yes.

But a great publisher.

Great demagogue.

You've got to stop.

And power.

You know, poor Lindsey did exactly the right thing.

He supported legislation to remove the rent soon so that that son of a bitch in the city can finally get an office on him.

And Lindsey downed the option by saying we mustn't do that.

Remember, you know the problem of housing in Paris, don't you?

That's not the reason you have the problem.

Because of the feelings, of course, of course.

All right.

New York is exactly the same situation.

I mean, that's why the east side, for example, today, I mean, the west side, the Hudson River, which has some of the best potential in the world, is gone now.

Exactly.

God damn it.

This Lindsey, I think Lindsey is a great candidate.

Okay.

Lindsey is, Lindsey is the worst kind of politician that I've ever seen.

He's a lightweight.

He wants to imitate the Kennedys, but he doesn't have that demoniac drive.

But he doesn't have that.

But he, with him, it's phony.

It isn't.

The Kennedys were tough, basically.

They were driven into a corner.

And Lindsey isn't really tough.

Lindsey is healthy.

Lindsey is a terrible stalker, this companion.

What in the name of the God is the matter with the American educational system?

Hundreds of thousands, millions of kids go to colleges and universities and take the latest science, political science, and study all the great things.

I don't think that leadership is produced by learning.

It's produced by character, by family.

The British public school system wasn't all that hot, but it put the boys through a tough training of character.

where the personality had to develop, where they put them through Spartan training, they separated them from their family, they had to stand on their own, and that produced self-reliant masses.

That's right.

The only difference...

The Israelis put them out.

They take their name coming up.

Listen, the Israelis, the Israeli leaders, when you compare, frankly, the Israelis to the American Jews...

who go to Harvard and the rest.

By God, I don't think the Israelis would have contempt for these people.

Well, the Americans do.

Oh, great.

But those Israelis are tough bastards.

You ever talk to them?

Oh, yeah.

Oh, that's good.

I don't mean for me, but I've been through those taboos and all those other places.

These three of them are great out there, and they're tough.

But the difference between the Soviet system and, say, the British and the good aristocratic system is

The Soviet system separates you out, all right, and gives you a good, tough education.

But then they create an enormous sense of personal insecurity because you're thrown into that brutal fight where you're always in danger of being knifed in the back.

While in Britain, when you were a Churchill, you could have voted to be out of government because you still were highly respected.

Right.

But you may think that Churchill, after the defeat...

I was tossing him out of the government, but then they brought him back and had him give me an issue.

It's more important for me to argue, to consult him more than to give him an issue.

I just called you to tell you that I, as one who has to read the New York Package when I know what's going on, that I'm on your side in that rent fight with your mayor, Grayson Anderson.

I just said to him, I said to him, we were going over some things, and I told him that.

And I said, I knew what happened to France, to Paris.

Did you know that, God, the reason that you've got no housing in Paris is you had ceilings too long?

Now, here in New York, I mean, you've got to, you've got to fight that bullet.

This is a total demagoguery.

It'll go the other way, in my opinion.

Or don't you, isn't that, what's the matter with this talk?

Can't you get a, why don't you get John Loeb and some of the business guys to talk to him?

Yeah.

That's kind.

Well.

Yeah.

Things are coming around, isn't it?

But you know, Nelson, you've got to turn it around in the city.

Yeah.

I didn't know the implications of that.

Well, it's really what you need is sort of a fellow that he, if he weren't already in the other canon, a guy like, uh, like Brownell or somebody to go after, but he can't do it because he's, he's not a guy.

be great, absolutely great.

You could, let me say that if you were to put him in, first, you could count on him to come up with the right answers, but second, you could also count on him to talk to you before he gave the answers to test you whether you were good with the letter.

He's the only man to do it.

As a matter of fact, I couldn't imagine more strongly giving Fred a call and saying, look here, that guy will work with us later on through this whole thing.

All these fellows on that commission, Roy Ashworth, were just direct.

But this, Capple was the man.

He's really the senior statesman in reorganization of the whole country.

No question.

Yeah?

All right.

Let me tell you, if you talk to him, only if you feel it's worthwhile, you can say we were chatting and I urged it.

Because he ought to do it.

I think that's what's needed.

You know, I feel, as you do, I mean, hell, I want Lindsay to succeed.

Good God, we don't want New York City to go down the tube.

But the way it's going to go, unless they send for some of these things, you know.

All of this, all of these problems are the result of his own, you know, well, also pandering the certain groups to, you know, to the demagoguery.

Yeah.

Yeah, he sure does.

He does a lot of big, you know, all the other shows and views are very effective.

The police, the firemen, all that.

Killings, right?

If we could... Get apart from some other things.

I see what you mean.

I'll tell you what I'll do.

I'm going to see John Irving in a few minutes.

I'll raise it with him.

I don't know what the problem is.

George Schultz is up to his farm this weekend, but I'll get right on it, and I'll have John call you back.

Fine.

I, uh...

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Even though, even though we couldn't, of course, we can't give a huge amount, but you know, if we could give you, give him money, it'd be a hell of a gesture.

It'd be very effective.

Right, right.

and that you suggested it and so forth and so on.

I suppose the problem is scattered around how much is left and all that sort of thing, but we might find a way to do it directly.

Let me see, let me see.

I thought so strongly, as I'm sure you did, when those two policemen were murdered, particularly when you had a black and a white, you know, one black and a Italian, actually.

That really stirred up people.

Yeah, and they're good people.

Most police are good people in your city.

You know, they aren't.

There's no police brutality.

Well, very little police brutality in New York City.

You know that.

That's right.

Well, anyway, I'll have John call you.

It's good to talk to you.

Yeah.

I'll talk to him first.

I said there isn't.

He said there isn't a lot.

Well anyway, I was just getting back from a university problem, an old education arrest.

Karen's verse had come up.

I mentioned this once before, but I'm not sure you remember how you were a student of World War I as well.

It's ironic that the date is the same date that was our bad date on March 1st, you know, the weekend that we had the bad date.

The general March 1st was the date that 100,000 British were lost

the great German offensive, Lutendorff's crack.

We had iron, and all kinds of things, and Mars, and I don't know, we had one Mars, we had one Mars, we had one Mars of Cotes.

It was hailed, after three or four days, as a great German victory.

It was because the Germans did move, they pounded the hell out of the British.

Afterwards, it was found

perspective of history that this was the first battle, the first battle in World War I, where the German losses and officers and men were more than very small.

It actually was the turning point of the war in 1918.

Did you remember that evidence?

Absolutely.

That March 21st, hey, it was a great German victory.

I didn't know that it was March 21st and it was the end of March.

March 21st, they call it.

He titles the chapter March 21.

And that's when it started.

And Ludengorff, and it was a mistake on his part, his whole point was, I mean, the Churchill strategy was much more clever.

And his view was that

Ludendorff, with just a little bit of force, he could have knocked the Italians out of the war quickly after Caporetto.

Is that his name?

Caporetto.

He could have knocked them out of the war.

It could have a dramatic effect.

And, of course, the rest, but no, Ludendorff always had his eye on the main force.

And, of course, he did it.

And, of course, that was the same thing.

That was the same thing, which is the British.

Robertson.

And it obsesses Abrams with Chapone.

It's a military obsession.

And rather than thinking in terms of what can we do to win the war, they think in terms of what can we do to carry out our plan.

And what can we do?

Almost no general understands.

MacArthur understood it.

is that you've got to break the will of the opponent and not necessarily his forces.

MacArthur never tackled in World War II.

He never tackled the...

He always went around them.

He did the same thing in Korea.

He made a mistake at the Yalu, but even there...

I'm not sure that the mistake was the greatest complaint.

He made a mistake at the Yalu.

If MacArthur had his way, the moment that they came across the aisle, he would have bombed across the aisle and we'd finished off the Chinese.

That's right.

We would have killed the Chinese.

That is absolutely clear.

Absolutely clear.

I would have said at the time you would have historically never killed the Chinese.

Historically, the whole thing would have been the whole thing.

The Russians would have come in.

They were in no position to come in.

But it was the historical point.

Vietnam would never have happened.

Yeah.

All of Asia would be different today if the Chinese had a different kind of... As it was, the fact that the Chinese have been more peaceful than the Russians in the 50s and 60s is partly due to Korea because they got their brains beaten up, even with a lousy strategy.

Korea was the right... Rather than being the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time, was...

If there is any right to war, it's the right to war.

the only time we didn't choose him.

And if Atchison hadn't lost his nerve...

He lost his nerve.

He lost his nerve and we hadn't...

But that's absolutely right.

If the Germans had found their way against the Italians in 1917, they could have knocked them out.

Two divisions would have done it.

Yes, but the historical fact that is more interesting to me, even more interesting, is that what was hailed as a German victory in 21st, so then we got one of the great British generals...

The enemy recognized it was pretty good.

They fired in.

The staff was shaking up the rest.

Next, the Germans hit the French.

They did very well again, but it was not a victory.

That was another mistake.

They should have kept going against whichever enemy they had picked to begin with.

If they had hit the British again, they might have knocked them out.

Well, they had won it in Russia, and they moved over there.

That's right.

They had some renovation.

They had 55 buildings against one another.

I realize it's enormous damage, but it shows you that on Laos, who knows, it may be historically referred to as another country again.

If it worked for American television and for the undoubted public, we took in public opinion.

And whatever that may do to us, the strategic impact of laws, I have no question about it.

The casualties have not gone up in this whole year.

I don't mind how that

It wouldn't have happened if you hadn't hit the layovers.

That's the whole point.

They always have an offensive now.

And there was no offensive, Mr. President.

Do you remember?

I do.

In our briefings in December, I've seen high points and so forth.

Predictions have gotten them off.

The intelligence in Vietnam is absolutely beyond belief.

Absolutely beyond belief.

The sons of bitches are like people.

They're only trying to make themselves look good.

No high point.

You can't believe, Mr. President, that they do in order to cover their tale.

But on the other hand, our intelligence on those have been wrong.

That's what I mean.

You can't believe those predictions.

But you can't believe...

That's right.

And it made sense for them to try to knock out Cambodia and to try to score some sort of a victory.

And that they haven't been able to do.

They took heavy losses in Laos.

It is a tragedy that Abrams screwed it up so much.

What breaks my heart is

that if he, that we were within two weeks of winning the goddamn war, and today, after the agony we took, would it be the same either way?

If he, if he had done his job, if he had set up ahead in orders, if he had blocked the roads rather than dashed for Chapone, if he had stayed within the artillery fan, there are a thousand things, I have a book this thick, going through every cable and every...

Yes, within the artillery fan.

No.

He dashed for Japon.

There was nothing in Japon.

The road junctions were all to the south.

It's like the Germans.

They just cut it into their heads that they wanted it.

You know, there's a

I have this little, little bit, if I can't say it in French, although I can read French, I have parts of French.

This little three sentence summary of the Great French Battle.

You remember we're in French, and after this was, this was later in the spring of that year, very late, probably in New York, Germany, or something like that.

The Germans were fighting another offensive, this time against the Indians or Hillary, you know, and so forth.

The reason why I have this particular fact,

And then they brought in divisions.

This is when a boat took over and a tenant who was miserable, he had about 25 French divisions.

The Germans moved in.

They rescued the general.

There were so many ghosts in that war because they slaughtered so many people, 20 million people.

The horror of what it was.

It was in a much bigger shock because no one expected it and there was no issue.

So they came down to this island to...

Here came the fascinating story that came out of that.

I remember Mangan, the French child, who was a disgrace after Mangan.

They had captured, there had been a couple of captures of Mangan.

The German, the German side.

Which proved, of course, it showed a lot of guts.

But he said, there's still two minutes to go.

One of the things I don't think I'm going to believe, but it makes me feel good.

And he says that

General Bush conceived it.

General Iran made it possible.

He should have looked at it.

I did it.

And it's messed up.

Yeah.

But it's all in there.

And General Bull blocked the clue.

And I did it.

Should have paid.

Yeah.

That's a great expression to say.

It's a great rhetorical line.

It's like the way that

Well, it's French is susceptible to that sort of thing, much more than English is.

Much more than English is.

It's a very... You get it all done.

Dramatic.

Like when they go, when Jackie Kennedy, Percy the Gold, said, you know, my ancestors were all French.

The gold said, me, I would say.

I don't know.

She was waffling along to him at my house.

She said, all my ancestors were friends.

They called her, she said, my mom.

She said, let me have a seat.

Let me have a seat.

That is really good.

This is great.

I think all was able to have a perception to see through those songs.

He texted Kennedy.

He treated him...

If you wouldn't get out of that, the press will come out.

Oh, my God.

He all said it.

He all had no respect for Eisenhower.

Everybody knew that he had a great dislike for Eisenhower.

Yes, it did.

That was due to Algeria.

Yeah, period.

But on the other hand, when it came to Kennedy...

They all said that Kennedy's scintillating was a great deal for him.

They all said he was the greatest statesman of the century.

Never.

I don't think he ever said that about me.

He thought that Kennedy was a schoolboy.

He should put on a show for him in Versailles.

Nobody wanted to forget.

Sure, because he was the President of the United States.

You didn't have to think that it was a good show.

In that, he had enormous respect for you.

Everybody has been.

That's been well documented at a time when there was absolutely nothing in it for him.

And from 63 on, he said that you were marked for great sex.

And, uh, but he despised Kennedy.

And Kennedy hated him because the goal was what Kennedy would have liked to have been.

But Kennedy doesn't have the credit for that.

That's the conclusion, and this is very important.

as he was speaking, Germans, pirates, nothing that can save them.

There's no policy, no man, nothing can save them.

And the great problem in the United States is we rapidly are nearing that point.

We're rapidly nearing that point.

We're nearing it economically.

We're nearing it also very much in the geopolitical field.

And to do that, I mean, after all, it is a historical accident that you're president.

I mean, you're not the type that at this time would normally have become president.

And any possible alternatives at this period that the political process would normally have produced would have cut and run out of our commitments in the world.

This is a fact.

Humphrey would have been a total disaster, but also any other Republican.

You know how 80% of the press in the time after the 1968-1966 elections, 80% of these little bastards out here were having a chance.

Nobody thought I had a chance in 1966.

A big loser in the 66th election for the next president.

His affection for Rockefeller is a close friend of his.

He could not have succeeded.

He would have fucked out of Vietnam.

He would have been hurt.

He might have hit them.

The one thing he might have done is made an all-out blow.

But finally, probably the psychiatrist and happy would have kept him from that, too.

Uh, sure.

Uh, I'll be honest with you.

The point is, the Democrats...

But also no Republican would have done it, Reagan.

Would it be...

The trouble with Barack Obama, and he did it, is that he would have lost establishments areas, beaten down his door all the time, you know.

He was going to make John Cotton Secretary of State, so, uh... Who?

John Cotton.

Secretary of State?

Yeah.

Reagan would have been very strong internationally.

He would have stayed with the commitments but he would have done it in such a way that he would have lost the country in about a week.

Reagan would have lost Europe.

But after all, you've performed this enormous balancing act of having a very strong standing in Europe.

which is still the keystone of our foreign policy.

There's no visitor that comes, that travels through Europe that doesn't... That seems to be getting across a number of people, but it certainly doesn't with the average journalist, does it?

But there's no foreign leader who doesn't consider you the most reliable man in the world from their point of view today.

Now this, to put this across to the American people is, it's easy.

But Reagan would have been considered a menace by every leader in the world.

And justifiable.

Because he would have been a menace.

Because he is totally simplistic.

And he couldn't have learned because he's a congenital lightweight.

He doesn't learn.

Reagan memorizes, but he doesn't learn.

I talked to him in Palm Springs and...

really all he's looking for, which is some catchphrase.

And then, all right, I've understood that now.

So he can go out and say this is the answer, these other simplistic answers.

Unfortunately, the Lutheran surveys are that way.

They have to be all over simplicity.

Well, there's an answer here, and the answer is very simple.

Why do we have all these complex problems?

Boy, that was what Reagan just beat back on the desk and screamed and everything else.

He said, God damn it, don't talk about it.

complex.

That's how you cover up all these things.

There are simple answers, and we've got to get to the simple answers.

No.

The simple answers may solve the short-term question sometimes, but boy, they sure do.

President, for us to get the list solved, China...

sum it all into one time frame, and to keep any of these countries, to keep Europe happy, to keep Vietnam from collapsing.

That takes great subtlety and intricacy.

Forget this Berlin thing, as I now consider practically certain.

We've got that where we had sawed them out.

How about you both?

I probably ought to get into that after some time.

Well then, yeah, still... Give me a little credit.

But from this here, you might be able to do something, won't you?

I'll see.

Well, I heard our friends in Germany will buy gear into that son of a bitch.

Well, that's the thing.

I think we can leap far with the ego to lead our death story.

Yeah.

The weak is one thing, but the other thing is the demagogic.

You've just got to remember every little thing that is all plus.

But you see, I talked to Harriman the other day, and all he's got left now is Vietnam, but he's hacking around in Berlin.

He says if you couldn't settle Berlin, he figures it's a hopeless town.

I said, what a great achievement.

He said, but you are so against Trump that you're not going to be able to do that.

So I said, all right, I have no way.

I didn't tell him anything.

So with that bunch, it will compound their confusion, because we are not supposed to be able to settle further.

I mean, the difficulty with all these things... How to get it across?

The difficulty with all these things, it has great effect on that bunch, and I don't want to vote for it.

That's right.

The thing we have to remember is that we have to, that's why I say we have to down-copy and do things, to embarrass businesses and solve them.

basically for me not to make the announcement.

So I think we'll get a little credit for it.

And the same with the government.

You have to realize that we're in all these areas now.

All that matters is the political consequences.

The trouble with Berlin is it's technically a four-collar thing, so you can't do it alone.

We have a congress up.

We have one over there, and we announced it.

Exactly.

Big deal about being there.

Well, we could have a western summit or something.

That could be done.

Western summit?

Yeah.

The thing is, it is a poor power.

We can't do it alone.

I want to stay here for a while.

I've been here.

I've never been to Steve's.

No, no, no, no.

We ought to move now to get Ballou in as undersecretary and give it a deal.

Laird is going to fight that.

All right.

I think you put it cold in.

Senators all want the loot, which is true.

Senators all want the loot.

And now the president's given you one.

He's insisting on this one.

Just put it that way.

The president has given him this one, but he has to insist on this one.

And I think he's going to raise it with him.

I think he's taking a lot of heat on the other.

If we do that, we can keep the loot in there.

Because the other guy is not going to have any strength on the hills.

And the Army's going to have a problem with the other guys.

And, uh, oh, may I take your comment to, uh, that's all I understand.

That's the whole point.

That's all I do.

But I'll take it.

That's all I want.

Nixon, Haldeman & Kissinger on Vietnam War negotiations and Berlin Agreement

AI Summary

Audio

NARA Description

Nixon Library Finding Aid

Transcript (AI-generated)

Also recorded on May 29, 1971

Cite this conversation

Nixon, Haldeman & Kissinger on Vietnam War negotiations and Berlin Agreement

AI Summary

Audio

NARA Description

Nixon Library Finding Aid

Transcript (AI-generated)

Also recorded on May 29, 1971

Related conversations

Cite this conversation