Conversation 512-004

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He hopes that when Trump comes over here, he'll give him a little tight talk about keeping his forces up.

Yes, sir.

He said it's necessary, but Schmidt is very discouraged.

His defense minister.

But I think, I agree with Mel, I think it would be helpful if he heard from you about your interests.

Because the state is talking over there about the mutual force reductions as if it is the greatest thing.

Yeah.

I think we should husband the mutual force reductions for September.

I mean, they're giving this away as if they're going to disintegrate NATO if they keep this up.

What you said is right.

Dulles had the right strategy to let himself get dragged along by them.

And we went through that in SALT.

We held back on SALT and got further that way.

Well, for Christ's sakes, the Ninja Force reduction, as we know, at this point is going to have to be much more fundamental.

And we'll get it, as long as we don't put ourselves in a position where we are the ones

We're stuck with it.

they just refuse to go into the country of Greece.

But I think, on the other hand, we're taking the line, and I told them, Robert's going to have a hard-hitting plunder.

State, go ahead.

I don't think we, I just think the Europeans, this business of, hey, it doesn't fight for our interests.

That's their problem.

They don't fight for our interests.

They are short-sighted.

They don't know how to husband our resources.

They whittle their assets away on little short-term advantages.

And they always want to please mostly foreigners.

They always want to please their clients abroad.

I told Keith.

I've seen him.

He was there last night.

When he came back, late in the middle of June, just before the foreign minister came in, and I think we'll just have him for a half hour.

I also told him that, I said, the problem here is that we just got tired.

We just got to be sure we don't get involved.

the internal conflict be pulled one way or another and so forth and so on.

He's almost fanatical on this issue.

What the hell does he think we should do about it?

Oh, he thinks we should cut off all military aid, all economic aid, and in effect help the Indians to push the Pakistanis out of...

I don't want him to come into that kind of jackass thing with me.

But Mr. President, actually...

We've got to keep Yahya, we have to keep Yahya afloat if he has public executions for the next month.

Look, even apart from the Chinese thing, I wouldn't do that to help the Indians.

It's not that good.

It's not.

Even like every ambassador who goes over there, goes over there, he gets stuck there and he now thinks the Indians... Those sons of bitches who never have lifted a finger for us, why should we get involved in the morass of East Pakistan?

All the more so.

I quite agree with...

If East Pakistan becomes independent, it's going to be a cesspool.

It's going to be 100 million people.

They have the lowest standard of living in Asia.

No resources.

They're going to become the right field for communist infiltration.

And then they're going to bring pressure on India because of West Bengal so that the Indians in their usual idiotic way are playing

For little sake, unless they have in the back of their mind that they can turn East Pakistan into a sort of protectorate that they can control from Calcutta, that they may have in the back of their mind.

Oh, what they have in the back of their mind is the destruction of Pakistan.

That's all.

That's true.

We've got this message to go back to the Chinese.

It's mostly technical.

Well, one... Well, it won't be four members.

I just want to have...

I should say up to four members.

I just intend to take one or two.

Yeah.

It won't be four.

I just wanted to have the... Well, you understand I'm just saying...

Unless you tell the better eyes.

Very accurate of what was said, Mr. President, for you.

I can't...

They'll tape it.

They can cut it down to two, that's no problem.

Really, Mr. President?

You've just got to wear it in.

I talked to Motor yesterday along the lines...

I talked to Motor yesterday along the lines of what you said.

Because bombing doesn't get the personnel.

Because something gets the artillery, for Christ's sake, they're bringing artillery down there.

Yeah.

Well, it's, uh, uh, that's one of the results of laws that they, uh, uh, this is the stuff that they couldn't send down during Lance on 719.

No, they're sending, sending it down on the range.

Sending it down on the range.

Reach out.

Recession.

They repeated their demand to have political and military issues settled together, which is what we are trying to separate in my talk.

But there couldn't be an answer yet.

They're just going through their butt there.

And we go through our form of public possession and they go through theirs.

I'll let Cambodia in action.

What's your final decision?

In the snow months,

One is that division in Snool, the one that withdrew, is no good.

Yeah, well, you can't have that.

It wasn't as bad as the press makes out.

Oh, no, no.

The immediate action, the division is no good, but the immediate action by every account that I've been able to get in any normal press reporting would be considered a success.

They inflicted very heavy casualties on the North Vietnamese.

They were withdrawing anyway.

They weren't pushed out of Snool.

they were going to the positions in South Vietnam for the rainy season.

The South Vietnamese are under orders until October to avoid casualties.

Thieu has already told Bunker that is right after the election he's planning measures to anticipate North Vietnamese offensive.

But I think on the whole it was a very successful operation and in

in that part of the country, the North Vietnamese had been taking exorbitant casualties.

Unfortunately, if Tree hadn't been killed, those units wouldn't have been there anymore.

He was in the process of defeating them.

Certainly, I thought last night, I think that's an interesting change.

I don't know whether you've seen today's news summary, but three pages of Seoul, in that story, it's just going on and on.

But that was a group of East Asian scholars to whom I agreed to talk three months ago, really just to show the administration flag.

About 100 of them from all over the country.

There's an East Asian society or something like that.

They have banks and dry showers.

All the quick names.

Tillman Durden was there.

And the mood is really amazing.

How it has changed towards the administration.

Only one question on Vietnam and a very mild one.

And what's the last one?

All the questions had to do with China policy.

And bearded.

beatnik type got up and said, we just want you to know how great it is.

What can we do to help the president?

What can we do?

And for a group of, I'm not saying they're going to vote for it.

They saw this, they began standing on the chairs.

Well, for the, when this comes out, it doesn't have to, when the results of this come out, the fact of it doesn't have to come out.

I don't know why.

I have two, but I mean the results.

When the results come out, they're going to be climbing walls.

But the whole mood, uh,

has trashed, I don't know if you saw the Operdorfer article in the Washington Post today, that you're going to be the peace candidate of 72.

And I think I was really astonished.

And Richard Dutman, who is, as you know, is a son of a bitch,

He was there, and he commented to me afterwards.

He said, well, I guess you got the intellectuals back for the administration.

Which I tell him, he's Asian society meeting.

And this fellow was there, the pink con guy.

And they were giving him some sort of, some Quaker, who is vice chairman of this committee, said,

Mr. Stenhoven broke down the wall of China.

Stenhoven cut up.

I didn't break down the wall of China.

I didn't know what was happening.

President Nixon broke down the wall of China.

He said, I was just, he made it possible and I just followed, I just went in there.

He is a terrific guy.

But this guy could have been a total peacemaker for all we know.

But this was a group of East Asians.

He just said one sentence.

He said, President Nixon broke down the wall of China.

And apparently Tillman Durden was there.

They had talked very respectfully of you there.

I just want to raise one thing.

Just take a second.

They're doing the energy message.

This is your business, clean energy.

I think it's excellent, but I'm just not going to go over it.

Arguing for it is just to put you on with the positive story instead of the economic story.

I don't think it'll do it.

It's got three pictures in it and stuff.

So it's, we'll do the briefing.

And we'll just get somebody else.

Who's the man?

Morton Seaborg and David.

I'll make it, Bob.

It's not the kind of thing that it says in it.

And the one kind of environment thing, because it's clean energy, you know, that industry is for.

So you're not... You're for the environment, but not against... What do they got, a 52nd thing there?

Now we're at 10 pages.

No.

It's a... What do you have to have to be done?

11.

Well, leave this with me.

Look, I don't think much of the idea.

If you want to do it, you rock it.

You do it or you don't.

Who are you?

The only other urgent thing is on the format for that diplomatic discussion tonight, you've got a similar proposal to the Senator, which is that you arrive after the thing has started.

Trish and Ed go over earlier.

They start at the receiving line.

You arrive at an appropriate point with Julie.

And they do the little introduction.

And then makes his presentation.

Julie, I mean Trisha, responds, I think, briefly, and then you respond, briefly, and then you smile and leave.

And that's what they're recommending, everybody to be involved in it, and which keeps you out of the receiving line, and there's no point in your receiving the diplomatics without our party, and then them all.

And that gets them back to where they wanted the line.

It also keeps the cops out of the line, which is an awkward situation if you get in it.

Right.

Good.

So now, just to let this go by, why don't we have Julie go by earlier, though, and we...

She comes in with us and leaves with us, too.

That's what they want.

That's great.

If they can work it out that way, Bob, that's good.

And all of them seem to be, this is what they want to do.

Yeah.

Okay.

And you walk in.

Go right through.

Well, that's great.

That's great.

On this thing, Henry, of the China trade, I've read this.

You've read it.

There's something wrong here.

But first, I would have to be a citizen.

confer with the interest groups.

I think a lead is useful in this case.

It's useful to build the story over three at a time and these people are jabbering all over it and then we come out and we get another ride.

The second thing is that I marked it on there.

With regard to the earth moving and railroad equipment, I see no reason not to include it unless you want to hold it for later.

You see what I mean?

The idea of idle defense and all that stuff doesn't mean a damn thing.

It just, it just, it would seem to me that in view of the, to the message that I think we should be aware of.

I think that's right.

What do you think?

I think that's right.

So why don't, why don't I say, refer to go immediately to the Soviet level on our Chinese exports.

The advantage of not going immediately to the Soviet level is it gives you another story whenever you need it.

All right.

And they make that.

Okay.

Now, the green thing is enormously important.

It's important politically because there's a lot of heroin.

I had it, but it could, uh...

I have an example of a fireball that would have a very, very great effect.

That's the most important part of this packet.

Yeah.

Now, the difficult part is the American bottoms.

As you know, if we go in the green, the green also means nothing unless you knock out the American bottoms.

Absolutely.

Now, if you knock out the American bottoms, you're kicking me and the Europeans off the planet.

And the long-term, I think, over the juice and over the ships, what you see with the appointment.

What I'd like for you to do, the guy that knows the most about that, don't pay a goddamn bit of attention to the labor department.

They don't know him.

They just represent their constituents.

Colson is very close to them politically, you know.

You and Peterson have a tough talk.

I talk to Peter Colson.

But what I have in mind is,

The unions aren't, and we, I just find it, and I think I include Schultz in it.

Schultz would be good, not Hobbs, he's over there.

But just put it on a cold turkey problem.

Peterson, I'd like for you, I'll put down.

You've been in it together.

You've been in it together, you see.

Pete, let Peterson take it.

You and he are doing it.

But what I mean is this is, Pete doesn't know, Peterson doesn't know about the other high strategy.

I want to go, this will be the most important single thing in the package.

Pete, Schultz, Colson.

Pete and I have no problem.

With Peterson, the thing we should do is hit the block.

And I'd say that the President would consider this only an economic recommendation and so forth, but it involved other requirements for you anyway.

You could say it doesn't involve any other considerations, so there's no problem with that.

But you all have views on Schultz and Colson.

Now, I want us to lean hard, though, in the direction of doing this.

I do not believe that you can...

I don't know what does anything...

It says...

The real question, I guess, is whether you give a general license or individual license for China without the 50% shipping.

Right.

You oppose both of those.

You just say go all the way with China and Soviet on the bottom trade.

That would be, but if it's easier to do it with individual licenses, that's...

I'm trying to think of a way we can handle it.

I see no reason why we shouldn't send a great giant hell of a train to the Soviet Union.

I mean, it's on an individual basis, you understand?

Well, on an individual basis, we can't do it because... We can't discriminate against one or... We can't discriminate against the Soviet Union.

We ought to get a facility that's very...

It's an archaic provision of law on 50% of American bottles.

The American Virgin Marine Order is a...

I don't know.

It is irrelevant, but it is very patriotic that the Union is in support of our activities and can be rough as hell.

But I'm going...

That's true.

I think perhaps then individual licenses are better.

Except that then every time we do it, we have hell to pay.

Well, the point is, we just don't get it because of the enormous surplus of grain and so forth.

We've got to do it for grain.

And we're going to fight like hell to keep the 50% American bottom for everything else.

That's what I'm told.

Right?

Right.

Is it only for grain?

Because it involves food for people and all that sort of thing.

Food for peace.

Did you discuss this with Peterson and the rest?

Did they realize the political adherence on this?

I can't be sure, Mr. President.

I'm sure they did not.

Well, it's got into the labor department, yes, but you see what I mean?

It says it follows the union, the activist union, you know.

You know these long-term, they're coming, so they won't load stuff for Vietnam.

Oh, I know, I did.

And I like that.

I like it.

The difficulty is that, and here's George Meany, now understand, he's going to be for us next time, huh?

But it would, it would certainly put some of our democratic friends in the torch, like Hubert Humphrey and others, who were sucking up to the Farm Bill, to say, look, you can't ship American grains.

The farmers want to ship those grains.

And God damn it, we ought to ship the grains.

It just doesn't fit into our strategy right now to boycott that.

No, we're not going to boycott it.

Like, why is it?

Well... And what I meant is...

We should shift the grain.

Yeah, yeah.

All we're doing, we're making a very fundamental change in our policy, and we've never done any shifting without American bottoms.

That is the point.

60% American bottoms has been the hang-up on grains.

That's one of the reasons we haven't been shifting.

It's always had a possibility to go there.

And that screwed it up.

That's why we haven't sold grains to Soviet.

50% American bottoms.

We've fought over and over and over again.

I had a...

I've been calling it that.

You see, you've got to look at it from a domestic standpoint, however.

Domestic standpoint, it cuts two ways.

One, the foreign battle will love it.

Second, the unions that have been strong for us in foreign policy will go right up the wall at the point, shilling grants to communist countries and busting their heads.

Very well.

It's the toughest part.

We don't have to do this one now.

We can wait until you announce the summit.

I know.

But I think this ought to be fit.

I think the grain...

It's a good one to fight.

It gives you a lot of...

I think it would have an enormous effect in the farm world.

Farmers, Jerry Ford.

Oh, I'd like you to...

The courtesy of placing a call on him.

If you would, actually, then he asked me about the ship and the grains.

He said if we could do something on that on the China trade, he said it would have a great effect.

I don't know.

You could get a call in and say, what do you think, Terry?

What do you think, though, about the union?

The fact that the unions and the supporters would just go right up the goddamn wall.

I'll call him right away.

And get his political judgment.

Colson will lean too much in favor of just doing what the unions want, because he's very close to J.

Love Stone.

J.

Love Stone is the guy that fights, that primarily points me in this field.

I can claim to fight.

I know Love Stone pretty well, and he's a former communist, and he understands rough strategy.

I'll tell you what I have in mind.

I could say something, could I?

Better than Folsom.

Why don't you do it this way?

All I want, sir.

Could you do that?

Sure.

And say, now look here, couldn't you sort of take him in the mountaintop and say, really, this involves China-Soviet deal, and a little of that, and that we're not, it isn't a policy for ever, but it means, you know, we could say that we do it

For grains only.

For grains only and surplus at a certain time.

In other words, if this is only for that purpose and everybody has it, and politically it's going to be put up in the Congress that we're probably going to lose on it, I'm sure we'll have to go into it.

A lot of people just are sick of the unions.

Ask Ford about fixing American bonds.

Ask Lovestone just to see what he...

If you think you can do a little convincing... Well, I could convince Lockstone if it were China only, but that would drive the Russians right up the wall.

Well, we don't have any point in telling that.

The Russian question is a move question.

That would be the Chinese the only ones that would probably be interested in getting grants.

The Russians have every other source of grants.

Well, frankly, I don't think the Chinese would buy it either.

But it would be quite a gesture.

Because the Chinese had said they wouldn't buy directly from us at the time for this.

But they said this publicly four weeks ago.

But after this, they will probably, yeah.

It could change very, very significantly.

That is a hell of a fact.

Look, if we get a ship of a few thousand tons of grain over to China, that on the China issue would have the most, that would just really give us a plus that you can't imagine how much it would be.

I talked to Dobrynin last night to set a date for next week.

I thought I'd invite him to dinner, where we can talk leisurely.

So I asked him for Tuesday night.

I thought maybe I could get the boat or something, or get the chief of naval operations to get him away from here.

But at any rate, he said on that occasion that we have to talk about the next few months.

But before I get Schultz and Peterson and Colesman, I'm going to talk to Lutztone.

Call Jerry Ford to get the...

I'll call Jerry Ford to get the congressional reaction on the farm side and also what kind of reaction there would be among the labor, pro-labor, and then get Lutztone in and say, all right, I'm out of this.

There we go.

I can't do one other thing.

One thing that I can do is talk to you about something.

We need... We need something positive.

I don't know what the hell we can do, but I...

Remember, I wanted that, that's the reason I was opting for that to be earlier because I thought it would be positive and it won't be now.

I think we'll still put that, it's still something.

The point is that we really need something positive now.

On the board.

I don't know what the hell to do or say or anything, but we've got to stretch our mind.

Because I talked to Dole yesterday, and I was checking the Senate, the Grand Senate, and we, the only issue is the war, basically.

The only issue is the only thing.

No matter how much we try to reassure ourselves about, you know, what's going to happen, we do think that there's diplomatic things that may follow up.

As far as the public is concerned, the war thing is pretty rough.

It's just, I mean, a lack of hope, a lack of belief, and so forth and so on.

And we, you see, the only, the problem with our whole scenario at the start of the time, it doesn't do anything on the war on the West.

I don't know if you had a break.

We both had a break.

I think during the summer we can do it.

We will certainly know.

For me, what I'm getting at is even if you get it in the summer, the month of June is a tough month.

It's a tough month for the Hill Library, and it's a tough month.

What I'm asking is, I don't, even if there's anything cosmetic that we can think of in this field, that's why we come back, you know, we talk about layers and draftees.

The, uh, whether that's built, that's, that's out of my understanding now.

I just, we've looked at it and looked at it and just, uh, I'll look at it again.

We have as a time in the future always, uh, the compact will only have to wait for two.

The announcement of the two is, uh,

Maybe there's got to be a way.

I need to have some thought given to the prisoner thing.

The old horses you know are very helpful.

We are building that into an albatross around that fence.

He's holding it too.

My point is it is an albatross, but we've got to find some way of... How do you get the albatross from around?

But what he's afraid of, of course, is people who start marching around out there.

B-W-I.

That would be a son of a bitch.

I am convinced they're not going to march until July.

And I think these senators, if Joe doesn't have any nerves, and... Why understand that?

Because we're dealing with people that don't have any nerves.

That's the problem.

Out of there.

But we have to wait.

I'll give it some thought, Mr. Dressler, what cosmetic... Any cosmetic way that we can do or say to keep some...

In this case, we've just got to even... We've got to leave some hope, that's all.

There's got to be something that is hopeful in this situation.

But we've got in the bank now the fact that we offered a deadline which we can drink if... That's later.

See, that's not this one.

I know, but...

Because from the way it looks to me, I may be wrong.

I think Vietnam is moving to the back pages again, which is the best place for it to be.

And, uh...

Senators are always frantic on petty little moves.

It is moving to the back pages, except for the fact that, uh... New summaries on terms of the television.

They desperately gave up every damn little thing, like dollars.

You give us the lead one night, a few of your wife will give you the lead the next night, and so forth.

That's the problem.

Now, that's better than it was, because usually it's seven nights a week.

Now it's only three nights a week that it leads.

But what I've understood is we need something simply for holding action.

Maybe, maybe what is needed here is just trying to think.

Maybe, you know, maybe it's...

So, the more we talk about the worst, you, you, uh... Chris, this is no time for any back-runners on the goddamn thing.

No.

Uh, they just go over the same titles.

What about the... What about a deadline?

The press is pretty good right now.

I ran into Sokrat last night, and he says we're doing fine.

He said it on television after your press conference, so it isn't just fluttering me up.

Haight notices the same thing.

The press has not been, since we're here, so respectful of you, and while they still mumble about Vietnam, they've got too much of a vested interest.

They are just terribly uneasy that something is going on there, too.

It hasn't quite penetrated to the television guys yet, but...

It has penetrated to people, yeah.

But, uh...

The masses.

Yeah, but there's always a... Lag.

There's always a lag.

And I think with half a break, we're going to have such a spectacular summit.

I think we are.

I think we could well have two.

I just don't want to have something happen in this month before we get to see, we're going to be in June or the 6th of July, and have something happen that might destroy that break.

You understand?

Well, then we have to send it to Harvard.

And they should still go crazy.

I know this bunch is...

They're scared now, though.

But I'll...

Let me see whether I can figure something out.

No, I understand the situation.

It's always bad news.

I just talked to him to shut up for two months on Vietnam.

Let me see what they have that would show progress or something of the kind.

You understand what I'm saying?

I understand it completely.

I'm trying, but my name, I'm not going to change at all.

I mean, they can all stand here like a rock.

I don't want something public to be done in the United States that will destroy a negotiating machine and hurt us as the Chinese and hurt us as the Russians.

You understand?

This is what it's going to do.

They've got to believe we're going to last.

I think we've got the intention.

And I have the impression that at least as long as this negotiation is going on, the Chinese are not going to make you look, try to, they can't afford it.

You're no good to them.

I certainly want you to let them, the Russians, know.

I'd be damned, I'm tough on Cuba.

And you know, they aren't going to be able, they can't, on the one hand, say, look, we want to talk about assault and then screw us every place else.

And Berlin, I'm shot down anyway.

They want to play a tough game.

They don't get it.

Well, they have... Oh, yeah.

I'll play with the Russians.

I fear, it's almost a ridiculous fear, it's going to be the opposite.

I don't think...

I've believed ever since the Polish uprising, and even more so since the Party Congress, they're not going to play a rough game.

Not this year.

The great danger is that they're going to play such a soft game

Who's off the game before we get that Chinese one on the ground?

Okay, well, get this involved.

I'll give you two points.

First, keep Kate busy with Hughes on the first view of WI.

That's going to work on you.

And frankly, reach your leaders and have a main blowout or some bad thing.

That fight, for example, was very hard to get through.

I have to show you how little the Senators know.

Gold was a student of this.

He said, uh,

That was a terrible setback.

And Mitchell was here, too, and he didn't even know about that view of W. How did we budge that up?

I said, what do you mean, budge it up?

He said, well, it was how do we budge it up so that these calls wouldn't go bad?

I said, my God, we budged up the interaction right across the interview.

And that's it.

It rose the interaction a lot.

And Mitchell said, well, that wasn't in the papers.

It was, of course, but he never saw it.

And those haven't seen it.

Can you imagine?

The International River Cross point, that's the total answer there.

And the point is that whether it's the Korean prisoners or the Vietnamese prisoners, they won't know.

That's what I know.

That's the great bus that people ought to travel on.

Exactly.

Take it to them.

Exactly.

Now that, but I think this, I think this, that Bruce has got to get this across the International Red Cross more effectively than he has apparently.

He hasn't made that point in a loud way, but get, get the people up on the hill with the International Red Cross, International Red Cross.

Good job, Mr. President.

And I hope we'll get him on the board here.