On June 17, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon, H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman, Ronald L. Ziegler, Charles W. Colson, Clark MacGregor, Barry M. Goldwater, White House photographer, Henry A. Kissinger, Manolo Sanchez, and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House from 2:42 pm to 3:33 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 524-027 of the White House Tapes.
Transcript (AI-Generated)This transcript was generated automatically by AI and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Do not cite this transcript as authoritative. Consult the Finding Aid above for verified information.
Very well.
And we've got John on top of it.
Some good starters and constructive thinking and some people cranking all in the same direction.
I think a lot of constructive thinking has been done.
Bob, you've been thinking for four days.
But I told
That total cost is not a damn thing of sports.
Nobody knows it.
It's in the previous administration.
Nobody knows it.
He agreed on that.
He said that that's not come true in Washington.
The thing you've got to push for on that would be the device that would focus it the most and might work, as he did at the press conference.
It really would.
Because the press would bait it and he'd overreact and it would become the battle between Lyndon Johnson and the New York Times.
Has anybody asked who's in this?
Harlow.
Harlow.
He ought to have a press conference.
Harlow, Saturday there'd be more press down there at San Antonio or Austin than there were at Christian Williams.
Also, it'll help his book.
That's the other good point.
It'll help his book in Armstrong as well.
Why don't I call in and request that he have a response?
That's what I said.
Well, the stakes are high.
We can't fool around with the Rivenberg track now, you know.
We have to do it at the highest level we'll do it.
I mean, this is a hell.
Not because it's done so much hurtings, but it's the opportunity.
It's the opportunity.
We kill these people with this.
Now, I've given Colson.
Colson had a very good night.
I've given close to three lines here, which is what we haven't got about.
Nobody's got any lines.
It's like that stuff that was written for me in the dress later.
That's what's been happening here.
I just said to use the term knowingly publishing stolen goods.
That's what the Times is guilty of, knowingly publishing stolen goods.
giving aid and comfort to the enemy.
That's the way you have to play it, giving aid and comfort to the enemy.
And as far as the war thing is concerned, no cause, just a cause, breaking the law and giving comfort to the enemy.
Why haven't we had some stuff like that?
Could you hand this stuff over to Coastal?
Maybe he can get some of that out.
Okay.
I think that's the problem.
See, I'm not interested in the legal issues.
I'm not interested in denying a nice big painting plant in an 80-day program.
Not that Johnson's name sounds good.
That's a good thing.
But also, he's got time on his head.
And the other thing is, what else have you got in mind?
Of course, what would you or don't do with Rogers?
Rogers, yeah.
What, other people don't want to do it?
No, we want to.
Rogers is concerned that it's hurting him interfering with the...
judicial process over practice.
It keeps being, well, I intend to say something about it once you think my statement's about it.
See, that was, what we wanted to do is have Rogers, I mean, Buchanan's working on it now, a statement that would, that would set the same tone, the same tone as the statement, as the point you would make tomorrow on reserve.
He isn't playing on the judicial process.
He knows better than the statement by Roger, because I'm on the back of the judicial process.
I read that statement.
Good God, it was melt-coated.
We have one that's way too long.
It's an alternate statement.
Then we have...
who has done a superfluous statement, but it's all legalistic, and it has to be de-legalized and sexed up a little bit, and it really makes the points.
Well, your argument is one for me.
Well, his idea was one for you, but there's a segment of it that they would use as the Rodgers thing, and then some of what I can do has got to be done.
I can't read something.
I'm not sure I've got any time to memorize it.
No, but it'll give you the points now.
Another one you've got to use is when I said breaking the law.
No, no cause justified breaking the law.
In other words, against the Lord, breaking the law and giving aid and comfort to the enemy.
Use the words giving aid and comfort to the enemy.
And if you won't, don't try to get it this past early.
And the lawyers, the one about the stolen goods, of course, I know what it is.
I know exactly what it is.
But everything we do around here is done in such a nandy, nandy, jackass way.
We aren't getting it crossed.
And we just got to put a few bites into it.
Yeah.
You should, tell me you can if you need a few more.
I mean, get the necktieers on if you will.
Let's see, that's a good phrase.
I mean, I just gave it to Loveson.
He put it in the meeting statement.
He changed it to say, merchandise is stolen goods.
We can continue to get that.
Publishing classified documents is like making that thing so good.
Yeah, stolen goods is in this thing somewhere.
Well, okay.
Whatever its motives to publish in this particular analysis has been trafficking in stolen goods.
Trafficking in stolen goods.
Is that right?
No.
You can't.
You can't.
You can't.
Well, you see, he's right on the same line.
The Times, who knew full well these were top secret, knew they were trafficking in stolen goods.
trafficking and so on.
Now, McKenna is thinking straight.
That's the kind of stuff I want.
I'm stating that the New York Times was wrong.
Wrong arrogantly to dismiss altogether the considerations of national security.
Wrong to arrogate to themselves the right to publish before the world top secret communiques and memoranda.
Wrong to unilaterally assert for themselves the right to decide what should and should not remain top secret.
Minutes.
These are excellent points about getting that just around somebody who's in the editorial or something.
If you get it printed, get it printed, Chuck, anybody, just as it is.
And then I just want to mail it over to somebody under the name.
You've got to get it.
You've got to move fast now.
You've got to get some stuff printed.
Exactly that.
That's such a... Take it to the editorial and get it printed.
The traffic is going to go to the next quarter, and it's going to happen.
And don't let that get you.
The better, the easier way to do it is to get somebody to take the candidate editorial and state it on the floor of the Senate today, get it broadly printed in a private way, and then get it back.
It won't get any play at the Senate.
You could get the mail to 100,000 people, but I want a mailer this time, a mailer with the cover letters.
Now, let's get it going on these things.
If you can get those congressmen to bounce up some of these lines this afternoon.
Yeah.
We've got some good tough speeches up there.
We don't want to see any security decisions made by Arthur Sussberg or the New York Times.
It shakes people up.
What time does a congressman go on?
All right.
Ron, I'm going to ask for it.
This is the last time.
Where is the material with regard to the last time?
The memo has just been completed.
They're going into Korea and I should have it.
How about World War II?
How many, how many, how many, how many documents?
World War II are still in my class, are still with us.
That's what I mean.
Yes, sir.
Do it, do it, do it, and I'll, it's not in, but I'll check on it one more time.
Well, at least German, that's all.
You've got an opportunity here now, a real opportunity.
This paper could take a hell of a blow.
They did this for the purpose of hurting us, of course, and hurting the nation.
Now they're going to pay.
As far as I'm concerned, I will make them personally pay a long time in this office.
So I said, Bob, I repeat again, anybody on the White House staff that I find has ever talked by phone or other ones to anybody on the New York Times,
We'll be fired instantly.
I don't care if it's the top person here.
That's the way it's going to be.
That's the way it's going to be.
They're going to have a hell of a time getting recognized in the press conference.
I don't know who they are.
That's the other thing that came out.
I really think that if there's one crappy question, you never got to recognize it in the press conference again, too.
You didn't?
Well, at least that gave me, but I want to get them on another thing.
I want to get some higher responsibility, and we've also got to put some, the fear of God and the other people in this government that are about to go out.
How's the legal side coming?
I need to know a little on that.
How's it coming?
The legal side?
Yeah, I mean earlier we were talking last night that we ought to postpone the whole thing, but they can't do that.
No, they haven't postponed the grand jury.
The judge- There's no decision yet on the grand jury.
We haven't made a decision yet.
The judge- It's gonna happen.
They're gonna go ahead and publish it on Sunday.
No, the judge has taken the arguments as far as the restraining order, the permanent objection under advisement.
And probably Saturday would render his decision,
decides to lift the restraining order, he has three options.
He can, of course, grant the permanent injunction.
The Times would appeal it.
He can lift the temporary restraining order and not grant an injunction.
The Times would try to publish on Sunday, although I would hope that we would then take an appeal directly to the Supreme Court on constitutional grounds.
Or he can continue the case under advisement and continue the temporary restraining order over the weekend.
He's a brand new judge.
He's been on the bench for three weeks.
I would suspect he, with the issues, will continue the temporary restraining order and maybe not render his judgment, his decision, until Monday.
If he decides on Saturday, we obviously will need to know immediately if we're going to take an appeal on the task.
We know we're going to take an appeal.
There's no question about that.
We're not going to accept this.
There's an argument for going the other way, which is not to take the appeal and let the rest of the papers get out, which would be desirable in that deal.
No, and then go for the criminal prosecution on the Times and Ellsberg.
If you could do that, well, there's another option, Mr. President, and that is to delay one or two days in seeking her restraining order from the Supreme Court.
The danger with that is that it might appear that you deliberately let her prosecute you.
That's the problem.
Isn't that right?
Yes, but if you have once made a case to a district court and he rolls against you and you don't exhaust your case, it looks like you didn't think you had a good case the first one, so you don't want to test it in the Supreme Court either way, which is the problem.
They're zeroing in on Ellsberg in the public, perhaps, for you.
And why doesn't the FBI pick him up and throw him in the can?
That's the next move, isn't it?
No, I have to get out of here.
They can do anything.
They think this is dangerous.
Ellsberg, what do you mean?
They've got to arrest him.
If they find him, he's guilty.
Oh, what do you mean?
If they bring him to court, can't they question him yet?
I don't know.
I don't know.
Bill Brayman, Prince Brayman.
Yeah, okay.
Okay.
Is that right?
I hope to God he's not Jewish.
I'm sure he is.
I hope not.
I hope not.
I hope not.
I hope not.
I hope not.
I hope not.
I hope not.
I hope not.
I hope not.
I hope not.
Well, you can't tell whether it might just be German or something like it.
You see, the problem is that one of the things that really hurt us in the Bentley investigations, they were, we had the goods and all these people, but it was the name that's over on it.
John Act, also Victor Pearl, they were all Jews.
It was a low jury strength.
The only two non-Jews in the
and the Communist conspiracy.
The Goldberg, or Goldberg, I don't know which one, was the Adam's flag for the Jews.
The only two non-Jews were Chambers and Hiss.
Many thought that Hiss was.
He could have been a half, but, fact-wise, but he was not by religion.
The only two non-Jews, every other one was a Jew.
And it breaks all of this.
But in this case, I hope to God he's not a Jew.
Well, I suspect he is.
I don't know.
You can't tell by his name.
Ward Halpern?
Yeah, Halpern is, yeah.
Gellert is?
Gellert is.
Gellert is.
Well, then, Michael, we got to... What is, what is, what is layered?
You know, what is your observation about cleaning up their own security situations?
Well, what are we doing about getting Halpern on here?
Well, that's what I mean.
I'm just talking about the White House.
I mean, Henry's job.
Exactly.
I just don't know when one of them is going to run out and take a lot of papers.
We are in no position to criticize State of Defense on security leaks or on disloyal personnel, and that's a problem, I think.
You mean right now?
We cleared them all off.
We hope we have.
We just did.
But our track record is pretty stinking.
What did we just have one of our NSC papers this week in the New York Times?
No, that was a stinking paper.
What is it?
What was it?
State of Algeria.
Algeria was the state of the other country.
I don't know where that came from.
That could have been any, could have been state, I mean, the French state.
Bob, if you talk to Henry at the end about this, I'm going to hit him about his Florida heart.
I'm going to have to be rude with him.
We've got to be brutal in this case because, you know, he had one of his men leave.
How hard has he been left?
He's been banned.
Does he know one of his men?
He's had a number of them leave.
Well, I don't know.
It's part of the drug bank that they do a good job.
Good.
All leading with public enemy number one.
So...
You've got one thing.
One thing plus two days.
Yes, sir.
How is Jaffee on the Q&A?
Excellent.
Well, he proved himself to me this morning when he said, just very quickly, in the leadership, he said, well, what if a man shoots himself in the front?
Yeah.
Or what if he shoots himself in the eye?
He was the first one to destroy his life, avoid service.
He's great.
Get out a little of that background.
The toughness.
He's a good truth.
We picked him because he is a nonsense kind of a guy.
I expect him to knock heads together.
I told him that.
I told him that the president has told him that he's to knock heads together.
He will be back to the hills.
that this whole head of the departmental infighting is going to stop.
Instead of fighting each other, they're going to start fighting the drug traffic.
Just put it that way.
The president says that.
He says that instead of fighting each other, these nine departments are going to start fighting the drug traffic.
They're going to quit fighting each other and start fighting the drug traffic.
It's true.
It's a damn good point to make, because people think that now there's one other point, Bob.
I've got a time to pass on the verse, and I thought that's a beautiful, beautiful thing to say.
Eleanor made a good point today, and the approach stood off, so that everyone just heard what she said.
We had nine departments.
We were never going to have one in the White House.
He says, we needed so much more money to add a thousand more people here.
He says, how many are you getting rid of?
Why doesn't he have them hauled around?
Well, we don't know and so forth.
Now, I want to report, and I want to get Schultz off his ass, and that fellow Weber off his ass for a change, on this issue.
Now, there are nine departments.
You've got OEO in this, you've got GW in this, you've got all kinds, a variety of ways.
I know very well that there are a number of people in it who are spinning their wheels, who are fighting each other, and there isn't any reason not to have them.
Let's use this money, not simply for powering a lot more people over a lot of church that have done a lousy job.
They have done a lousy job, exactly, a lousy job.
And Eleanor is right.
I want to know how.
I want to report on my desk.
I want to report to Rochester.
I want to report on my desk.
How many people are they going to let go?
How many people are they going to let go out of the other departments?
Are they going to agree to get out of this?
Are you going to get a whole shelter over there and just say, that's what I expect?
Or whoever's running it.
There's no reason.
Eleanor is absolutely correct.
Isn't he?
Why do you take nine departments a week?
There's no question.
That's why I didn't like the word coordinate in that statement.
It was written for the researcher.
Coordinate means simply to take everybody that's been working in the space and tweaking them and putting some people on top of them.
That is not to be the case.
Throw some people out.
There are a few of those programs that, of course, we have to have more than one.
Well, I think this is a very good line to take about it.
The old man, he's, you know, the elder is wrong, isn't he?
But he's right this time.
But you'll reach out.
Yes, sir.
This drug thing is a mess.
And so, all right, let's find out where they are.
I want to know approximately how many they're getting rid of.
How are they going to do this?
Why haven't I heard more about it?
Why did the senator have to raise this point?
Why didn't we make the point?
I want to know.
Those are questions that disturb me this morning, and I agree.
Because it looks like we're doing business as usual here.
I wonder if it wouldn't be a good idea to have a Goldwater.
He's the man that would have benefited enormously.
He's been justified in history as a result of LBJ and the rest.
So he goes out and says that he makes the point.
He says, let's understand.
This is no skin off the President's eye.
You know, he could say it in a colorful way, but then if I go on, he at least says it in a colorful way, which most of us don't have the ability to do, or we don't have the right as to be able to do this.
But at least he could go out and say, he said, that is the intention.
that the point is made and how we got into the war and all that sort of thing.
He says, he said, I'm not going to judge those things.
But he said, I'm certainly not, we aren't going to give any comfort to the enemy.
It's not the way to make those points.
But he could pick up the silver goods line.
No, he never put the water out before.
Why not?
He's been out in the past.
He's been out in the past.
That's what he came down to talk about.
He says, he just steps right out there and says, I... Is that due to Johnson?
Do you want to get Johnson going?
He goes out to defend Johnson.
Well, I think he can't because he's been using it for the last three days.
Oh, has he turned Johnson apart?
Well, I didn't know that, but I can't do that.
Yeah, he said Johnson was lying.
I knew they were accelerating the war, and Johnson... Or that the attack at the time was overdoing it at the same time.
Oh, well, I think if you used him on that basis to say...
I don't know.
They were attached to the chair here on the, okay.
And then, there was a board, I'll leave it right here.
You can put it on like this if you will.
And that's how it was done.
Now, there was a board that just goes, that's the chair here.
Well, it's the beginning of the work.
I think you're not looking as mean as you were before when I wrote this song.
Huh?
I think by Christmas, maybe I'd be sitting down.
I'll eat that out of it.
I may be lying to myself.
I don't know if they're hoping we are.
I don't know.
You're like a dove.
You're pretty good at beating them.
Yeah, I say it's better every day.
But they have a secret to be safe.
They're beating us downstairs writing amendments.
They're just coming up the tube like this.
They had one who disagreed that it would require the Secretary of Defense to make regular reports on housing, on whether people need money to sign, and so forth.
It's getting complicated.
I'm convinced they're going to keep this up until July the 1st.
But I understand that they're going to try to close it.
They're going to try it on Wednesday, but I don't think they'll have any luck yet.
Well, if you know a funny thing, I never signed a motion to petition in my life until that boxman came out on the SST and I signed two of them.
That's where I'll never do it again.
I told him yesterday, if you need my signature, I'll sign it, but I don't want to.
I don't believe you.
I don't either, but in this case, you're in with the enemy.
By the way, these guys are enemies of this country, Barry.
They're trying to destroy it.
They've done an action in this war or something.
They want to destroy our position around the world.
They've done a pretty damn good job.
It's hard to run government.
I told you that report from Paris.
I haven't said anything.
Shut up.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
I mean, you got your report about the airship.
Oh, maybe a second.
If we had, you know, I was a...
I told them to try to build it with the Germans, you know.
All right.
By the way, see, will you rent that town?
No.
All right, well, if you had a clean country, if you wanted to, you know, if you wanted to do the aircraft business for all the good in this country, it'd be taking size, but...
The brand is that close to making a big buy out of Marsup's new flagship.
I mean, this is going to involve a function.
I know this.
They found it out over there.
They feel a word.
The brand is very close to buying, very close to buying Narcher's new fighter.
It's enormously important that that go to Narcher.
I want you to get over here, Brandon, as early as you can.
Let me see if that decision goes that way.
If he's going to have to pull you up.
See, it's Narcher.
It's Narcher.
It's $500 to $1,000.
I don't know.
These are the pictures we used to get from Barry and I. I just, but I want you to know that it's, you know what this is?
It's California.
And they ought to buy it here rather than from the French.
Okay.
The other thing, I don't know if you ever discussed this proposition, that you ever had a chance to in Russia, and we sort of floated around there.
In fact,
All right, would you tell him to bring it up?
I just think he ought to make a flyer question to the businessman and say, who knows?
Maybe, come on, I think just the idea that you're from the American culture is going to worry the British and the French.
Why not worry them?
They worry us.
Okay.
He has a contact.
Well, they're in pretty heavily with the French on the big Airbus, the 300D.
to 747 and Douglas 10.
Well, my idea was to have it build the SST with us.
We'll furnish the technology to us.
This to me is like, I say to you, would you build me a football field?
And then you build me 90 yards of it, and I say, I don't want to stay there.
Why don't you, I really think it ought to be pushed.
I think we ought to build it with the Germans.
I mean, why should we just sit there with that technology and undo it?
Ours is a better plan.
It's a faster plan.
And the rest of it, we ought to go ahead and build it.
I know, I know.
It really must disturb you, isn't it, to see this?
Oh, as I said, there were five countries there.
We were in fifth place.
We were?
Yeah.
Yeah, I admit that.
You know, the chalets around the people, the American people, all businesses there, French, Russian,
I didn't go in an American chalet that I wasn't asked to come in the back room.
And you talk about tears.
American businessmen with their mouths hanging on the floor.
Oh, let me see.
I mean, I love Bill Allen, but why did he have to make that awful statement about Boeing at a time when he carried the thing in the house, you know, the compass?
Well, I was sitting that day when he got the Collier Award.
It was just after he'd made the statement.
And I was sitting with a table full of Boeing vice presidents, and you, who, by the way, do you know any of them?
who almost single-handedly carried that essence deep down.
On Boeing's position, the last person said he's telling the truth.
He says $86 million won't even move it.
He said, it'll take us, if we have a half a billion, in 13 months, we can get that line moving again.
That's how badly this thing's been hurt.
And he said, all of a sudden, Bill was thoroughly right.
Three and a half billion is a billion.
Can you see what General Electric did?
They made a statement.
They will not build an engine.
The BSS people, they get paid for it.
It's great.
So that's about five American businesses.
Well, I was in, I would think, well, we were in Paris.
We went down to Toulouse to see the factory of the concrete.
And young Rockwell is along.
And he isn't over there looking for jet engines to put in his sabre liner, because the Garrett Corporation can't deliver.
That makes you sick.
You see, the French, and we've always regarded as technologically naive, building engines that we haven't even dreamed of yet,
and helicopter concepts that are so far beyond anything I can believe.
It's shameful.
There were numbers of them, but it's not from him.
I don't know if I put it in my reports, but they were asking this Russian engineer questions.
My God, he was answering everything we asked.
In fact, they said,
And he's going to make a personal report to you.
He talked for two hours with the Russians.
Of course, it got much further than I could.
Well, he talks the language.
Well, I said to this engineer, I said, do you have anybody in Russia you'd like to trade for a fellow named Fox Flaring?
And he laughed.
He said, no, the senator's the best salesman we have.
Imagine that.
Yes, I can imagine.
I can imagine that they hope to fuel him.
Now, really, if I'm not mistaken, this is the great financial event.
They love to see the United States take it to a second-class position.
That's just what they're beginning to be looking at.
Around this world, there's a story in Life magazine this week, and I don't have a lot of use for Life, but this is a pretty good story about the Pentagon.
It's called Four Star Mass in the Pentagon.
And it's not, it doesn't indict the man in uniform, but the sub-headline is, we are rapidly assuming a second position with second-rate power.
Now, if you remember, I asked you to go on the air and explain to the American people just where we sit beside the Russians.
I frankly, Mr. President, don't think that every American person cares.
speeches, and I know I know, people will say, well, what's wrong with being a secondary power?
Well, I want to...
You'd be surprised.
A lot don't.
I agree.
I agree.
They've been brainwashed.
Well, then you can't get into the gutty part of it and say, well, when we become a second-rate power, we become a second-rate economy, too.
Then they'll say, oh, you want to buy weapons just to keep things good.
Industrial complex going on.
I'd like to see.
If we could afford a depression, I sure think we could probably go through one.
I think back in my life, the best thing that ever happened in my life was a good man.
In the best times of my life, I had more good friends, and learned to solve problems.
And by God, today, nobody wants to look at a problem.
By the way, I hate to look at a problem, but this young Bill Anders, who I think is one of the smartest boys around,
I don't sleep in the day and I think he's thinking I could quit.
Same old property.
Can't get around the Buehler tracks.
He's working with Agnew.
With who?
Agnew, doesn't he?
The space thing?
He's on the...
He's chairman of the space... Well, I mean, it's...
It's under Agnew.
Well, let's get out of it.
My gunners will be using someplace else.
He's bright as a time.
He's just sharp as hell.
Put him over in that.
Put him over in that.
All right.
If you get... Get... Get... Get that fellow over there, uh...
I'd like to get a hold of Anders and let's put him in that new deal where we're trying to develop a new, for the water and all that sort of thing, the NASA approach, management approach and so forth.
Anders has got to be helped.
Well, he's working on a report to be submitted to you on what might be done about the aircraft, the airline industry.
And he indicated to me, and don't repeat it because we're very close friends, that he was getting frustrated
And I don't know what this is.
I'm thinking of going out and taking a crack on it outside and maybe coming back after a while.
I know how it is being on one of those councils.
It's one of the best brains I've ever run into.
Well, Clark, do you know him?
Yes, sir, I do.
He's smart.
I can't remember what part of Fred says.
I mean, yes, Fred, I'll look here.
Let's keep this very open.
Also, if he's got a report on this, let's kick it into that domestic council and get some work on it.
but it's your damn son.
You know what I'll tell you, Mr.
Person?
I'm getting awful frustrated up here, too.
I'm seriously thinking this is gonna be my last battle.
Well, we can't get them.
Here we have John Smith.
Bless his soul.
He's scared to death to get up on that floor and fight.
Now, he's like my gentleman, Scott, though.
But come the authorization where you've got to get into the money fight, and he just wants to go there before he even starts.
Our Armed Services Committee, when I was here before, had, I think, the finest subcommittee on the Hill, the fairness subcommittee.
It's become nothing now but a miniature appropriation screen.
By the way, would you be interested in some pictures of these rushing?
I don't know how they got here, but it does look pretty cool.
They do pretty well.
The French have the better airplane.
beating us in an area where we... As I told you in the report, the Europeans just can't believe that we've given up.
This is the first thing every European friend of mine, businessman, military man, would say, what in the hell has happened in the United States?
You quit.
And then they'd say, but...
We're kind of glad you have, because now we're going to move.
Because we could never move if it wasn't for you or Sarah.
Thank you.
We had a plan.
I see now.
Now, tell me, what else is in here?
Well... Not much is new, except...
We're not getting any place up there in the Congress.
And I think we're going to find a reaction coming from people about the lack of activity.
I'm hoping we won't take a recess.
I mean, this is a mistake.
What about the OE meeting there?
August 6th, September 6th.
They've already agreed by resolution, Mr. President, and then... We won't be off this draft bill until July the 1st, and my hunch is that you're going to wind up with a resolution continuing the draft, or a bill that you can't sign.
We won't finish the authorization until the middle of July.
So that means that even if we get on it, we've got about two weeks, and then a month's recess.
And we'll go through two months of debate over that again, as we've done for the last two years.
It's anything but good.
Around the country, I don't find you in any...
Great sweat.
I think if the election were held today, it would be a tight one.
But I have a hunch that some things are breaking.
I think this Vietnam thing was a very, it's not an easy thing.
It's you know and I know.
Look, yes.
unless I thought there was a chance, not a very great one, but some chance of some negotiation at this late date.
You don't think for one moment I would say, well, as of this time in the future, we will have finished Vietnamization.
But there is some chance.
I don't give a... What I say, I would say a reasonable chance, not mere 50-50, but a reasonable chance.
There are a lot of factors that bring it about.
We need to go into it.
Probably won't happen.
I've got to run out of the chance.
The second point is, if even it doesn't work, we're going to finish.
Well, it's all done.
I don't think it makes sense.
Vietnam is not going to be an issue next year.
I don't think it is now.
You think it's beginning to recede?
Oh, I think it's gone.
I think it's gone.
I think that's a terrible thing for them to do, Barry.
For this paper, for this paper, traffic and stolen goods, my victims...
makes it all better to run this office.
We're going to have all these tired people running out with papers now and selling them to the New York Times.
And how do you know they're going to be killed?
And there is nothing to talk about again.
The guy's going to get us into war.
Well, that doesn't bother me.
These papers, I think, are going to do you good.
I think it will do the Republican Party good.
Why do you think so?
Well, it's going to just bring out.
I think somebody just thinks, isn't it really of a challenge on the war, right, the war?
Well, no, but we've never had a war started by a Republican president.
That's true.
That's true.
That's everywhere.
The Republican Party has to come in before you have peace.
Now, I don't know how we go about getting that across, but I think it's going to get across.
But as far as Vietnam is concerned, I haven't spoken to a college group in four or five months where they have a question period and ask about Vietnam.
So I think as much as they'd like to think it's going to be, it's not.
Really, I think the only issue, and it's not an easy one, is this goddamn economy.
And I can't understand.
Here's the stock market going on.
My stocks are going all over the hill.
People are making money.
The only slowdown is in construction.
And in my state, it's over 200% ahead.
Same way in California.
There's not enough capital investment.
I think your idea of a little tax break there might not do it.
Well, one of the problems is this, Barry.
First of all, if you were to take out of this whole equation the number of Americans that have come out of the armed forces and out of defense industries, the number of unemployed will be about a percent lower than it is today.
You know what I mean?
That's point one.
So we're doing it without the cost of war, but today there's no satisfaction.
The other point, though, is that we're just right at that break point where the economy begins to decline again, where inventories are low, where some companies are not going ahead with construction plants as much as they normally would because of the huge wage increases, and so on down the line.
My own view is, and I don't want to be polyamorous about it,
is that we will continue this movement.
It's moving up.
It's moving up, but it isn't moving as fast as we'd like.
But let me say, just looking at it in its coldest terms, I'd much rather take higher unemployment now and lower unemployment next October than the other way around.
But we're going to have some hard knocks here, because you see the unemployment is going to hang around 6% now for the next four or five months, no question about it.
Nobody has ever established what normal is.
That's right.
And also, they have to bear in mind, as far as unemployment among the average real wage earners, there's been really no significant shift.
It's a question of how many teenagers and others are in the market.
That's what it is.
And, let's come back to the real trouble spots are where you and I go in the winter.
California.
Last time, largely Orange County.
And the other trouble spots, San Fernando, Northwest, well, the Oregon part of it is Southern California and the Pacific Northwest.
Wherever they have aircraft industry in space, you take that, Wichita, Kansas for example, Kansas is hotter, is very good, except for Wichita.
But Wichita's down because of airframe.
Darn, it makes you sick.
Does it make you sick?
It makes you sick.
And then we crapped on this SST thing.
I think it's very important, Barry, that you continue to fight that, and also if you continue to fight this fight for the defense thing.
Let me say, I want to give you a couple of reasons.
And just remember that I said this when we talked.
I will tell you what I think is going to happen.
Don't think for one moment we're going to make any deal with the Russians if it's not a two-way deal.
There will be no agreement on ADN unless there is simultaneously an agreement on offensive buildup in the area.
They will be different types of agreements because the offensive one has got to kind of cover the whole range of offensive missiles.
The offensive next review covers airplanes, submarines, and various types of missiles, and also we can get the tactical nuclear nukes.
And because it was one system, maybe not.
But I can assure you, nobody's a bit euphoric about it.
The Russians are still trying to get ahead of us.
They're dealing tough and sorely.
Second, Berlin.
The Texas is a good group.
Berlin agrees.
They're good.
It's going to be awfully tough bargaining.
But we are bargaining as tough as we can.
I think we're going to have something good on that.
Now, the third point I want to, I think it would be awfully awful is on the Chinese side.
level with you exactly on that.
Nobody knows better than I do unless you do, unless it's you.
Nobody has that.
When you have a communist state, they're out to do us in.
I know Louie's got that.
My closest dear friends are the people of Taiwan, just as they're yours.
That friendship remains.
What we have here is an historical situation.
We've got the Chinese and the Russians like this.
That's right.
We've got 8 billion Chinese building up.
They're fighting the death of the Russians.
Now, we don't say anything about this publicly.
We don't.
You could.
I can.
We could play it the other way.
Because basically, when you have this sort of situation, you must
making moves in both directions.
Now, as far as the Chinese are concerned, we are not making moves that are to the detriment of Taiwan.
We are not.
We're doing our best.
We're going to get rolled in the U.N. on this British intern arrest on this issue problem, as you know.
But has that China passed yet?
They won't get in.
Well, they haven't even had it.
No, they don't want it.
No, but why?
We'll probably get rolled on our position due to the fact that the British and others have changed theirs.
Of course, we'll change the situation.
But our defense treaty will probably stay and so forth.
But what I'm saying to you is this.
I just want you to know, and you can hold some of the people that will come to you concerned.
I have no illusions about the Chinese.
But it serves our national interests.
to have these moves in the field of trade change.
Because as we move toward normalization with the Chinese, we're not thinking next year or for the more ten years from now.
It means that we are thinking about the future of the Pacific.
And we're also thinking about our relationships.
So let me put it this way.
If we're thinking of a safe world for our kids 15, 20 years from now, it's going to be a lot safer with
the United States having some kind of a little bit of energy with Russia.
And rather than having Russia and them together.
You get the point?
Oh, that's, I make this point to people.
By the way, let me tell you, there hasn't been any
that there are never any shipments of brave and American bottoms any place because you know that restriction, that particular restriction.
what we're really doing here or something for the American farmers.
So why should the Canadians and everybody else sell their wheat to the Russians and the Chinese without us?
It may, it may not.
I don't know.
But we just thought we ought to open up that little crack to see what would happen.
Now that's where, that's those are the things I know you can question.
I don't know if you could start that kind of
You know, you've got a lot of friends that will say, what's the matter?
You just got to go out and get the salt bar.
I had very little of that, surprisingly.
Very little.
You know what I am.
I know these people, and they know me.
They know what I get the salt for.
Well, I told them this.
If they will analyze what you've done about Red Shatter,
The only thing that's happened is that you've opened up some trade.
And we've been trading with Great China for years.
Frankly, I thought we were going to get a lot of standing on this.
We've opened up some exchange, too.
You can't get hurt doing that.
You know what I think?
I made this statement 15 years ago that
The next war, if we ever have a third world war, it will be because the United States has given up its position of leadership, and then Russia and China are going to fight over who has it, and we'll be back in the side of Russia fighting the Chinese.
Or, to put it another way, you realize, as a buffer to the Russians, it might very well serve the interests of the United States
to have this traditional friendship with the Chinese.
We've been friends with the Chinese long before we were friends with the Russians.
And in fact, there's another thing we have to have in mind.
They're hanging over this, looming over this whole thing, the specter of a revived Japan.
The Japanese specter, what I've got to get is military.
Now the Japanese, the Japanese at the present time economically are just beating our pants off.
But on the other hand, you've got to realize what's Japan going to do
If we do not develop some sort of a relation with China, the Japanese will have no choice, as they see America sliding back and China getting stronger, but to do something themselves.
And then, if you've got Japan re-arming the nuclear wave, we then build, right?
They could even threaten, well, that's not even talking about it, right?
The Japanese have not changed.
No.
You think?
I don't think they've changed.
By the year 2000, it'll be the world's greatest economy.
Sure.
That little goddamn island is as big as Arizona.
How big will it be?
Well, it has less arable land than California.
Did you know that?
Oh, sure.
Japan, with 100 million people, has less arable land than California.
Well, they're young and they have spirits like our country has.
That's right.
Like the Germans.
That's right.
Oh, the Germans are beginning to lose some, Brackley taught me.
They taught me the Germans are beginning to get solid.
Have you heard that?
Yes, they've had trouble with their marks.
Not worth it.
But another thing about the Germans is they cut the damn socialists in.
Yep.
We all like him.
Everybody likes Willie Brown, but he's a socialist.
That's what I said about the best we can have, man.
Huh?
He's about the best we can get him on that.
I agree.
I agree.
He's all right on our side on the big issue, but basically his party still needs him.
Domestic leader.
Oh, yeah.
All right.
All right.
Why do you want me to call this National Security Council?
Go to hell.
No, I don't have any words for them.
I think they do all right.
They do.
They do.
But if you could go out and say, look, you've got to have some time.
Now, let me say this.
On Vietnam, remember what I'm saying.
We're running out the negotiating track.
A lot of things are going on, Barry, we can't talk about on the papers.
I don't know what will come of it.
But we've got to try.
We've got to try, in other words, we've got to try to get our POWs, we've got to try to get enough time for South Vietnam to survive.
If we don't finish the negotiating track, then of course we are going on the other track.
But the war will not be an issue next year.
I promise you.
Oh, it's not now.
But because we will not.
And I think one thing about our Democratic friends, you know what I mean?
I think a lot of them are trying to put these resolutions in because they want to destroy any cancer negotiations.
Also because they want to get in on the kill.
They got us into the war, so they want to pass the resolution saying they got us out.
Well, they can have it both ways.
Oh, and we're foolish enough to pass anything like that.
If I were you, I'd publicly throw it in the wastebasket because it's unconstitutional.
I've got the damnedest letter from Dean Rusk.
He's a good man.
He hand-typed it in answer to a question about it.
How, if we want to change the war policy of the president, should we do it by Roju?
Yes.
On an 8th grade letter?
What did he say?
Well, he said, no.
I haven't had a letter from B that much.
Is he right?
Oh, I got it the day before the LBJ library came.
I'm going to put this stuff together sometime because not one single lawyer
has said, should amend the Constitution to change the President's war of view.
You made an excellent speech.
The President in the Washington speech has an excellent Richard Wilson piece on the New York Times and how it serves to emphasize the fact that the Democrats got us into the board.
I'm sure you think that's not what you do, Senator, but you know David Wilson.
When you leave the office today, you open the clocks and say, you know, I just talked to the President.
And he said he didn't see me.
But you should have heard him say by and large that Wilson's got guts.
He's got guts to write about it.
And put it that way.
See, I got letters and so forth.
You know the funny thing?
I'm just saying, by God, what a lot of guts.
What a lot of guts it takes on this thing.
I'm not a bandit here, because I know it.
I know that you and I were chatting about this, and that takes a lot of guts.
And I really appreciate that.
That's a lot of guts.
He said, we'll see you next week in California.
We'll be there in 12 o'clock.
Well, we'll see you then.
Tell the damn poster I'm letting you come in.
It's three miles from your house now.
Yeah, we could always come in.
Tell him I can't even come in and shoot it.
Turn the lever.
Turn the lever off.
Turn it off.