On September 9, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon, H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman, and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 3:58 pm and 5:06 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 568-009 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 Do not cite this transcript as authoritative.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.
We've got as much as the moment.
Well, there's still a hell of a lot of human in these.
Which is going to dominate all the rest of this week and next week.
Are you here?
You get back to the problem of how much visibility do we want?
In all honesty, I'm not speaking about these meetings, but I'm speaking about performance.
It may be that the country is in a state where they need more appearances.
And yet, you know, you have the problem every time you make an appearance, the president makes an appearance.
He's expected to wow, you know.
And you can't, so you can't do it too often.
I think that's, I think that's right.
I think you can't just keep, especially now, here, we have, I think John, he always, of course, when he's doing a lot more, you know, he doesn't, he ought to be on the line, say, doing something, you know, and some just think that you can't do it too much, and he said, I don't know, I have this feeling that you can't do it too much.
What do you think?
I mean, well, put it this way, I think we do a hell of a lot of that.
I mean, I don't know about a lot.
I think you've got a problem going, going, like, on national TV anymore than you do.
And the other side of it, if people like Irvin go away, is that they say, so you ought to meet with a group of students, or you ought to do, you know, talk to the plumbers or something.
But if you do,
Nobody knows that you do it.
And what's the use of doing something people don't know?
And the only thing that people know you do, really, is what you do on television.
What is reported that you've done, you know, you take some action.
Because we are absolutely right in knocking the crap out.
The crap is being done because we want to be good-hearted.
We did far too much of it, and it doesn't mean a goddamn thing.
It doesn't have anything.
I think so.
It just doesn't mean anything.
And Jesus Christ, I mean, I say go in there and people around here can drop by this meeting, do that, or the other thing.
That's not leadership.
It really isn't.
I don't think so.
I think make big plays, but I just can't be spinning around on the top of the... Let's say, see, so if you've got ten college presidents or company business leaders or something sitting in the middle of some of them, and you drop in, so those ten people...
See, the president is so eerie.
He happened to be particularly effective when they said, you see, this is great.
Or the times that we had to take down the system.
And we happened to be done.
You know, and then all of a sudden, Nelson, you go in and you're not effective.
We've had this for a while.
We've had this for many times where people said, that was great.
And then a goddamn thing that comes out of it.
Correct?
Correct, John.
They'll argue that it comes out in the ripples, and it comes out with a few people.
And there's some of that.
And there's some of just, it's got to be known that you do things.
You don't really get questionnaires or whether it's in use in presidential times.
Also, when you come to the matter of speech making,
They're just not doing the goddamn speeches that people are interested in hearing.
Sorry.
So, another thing is that I do think you could do, we could do a Q&A.
We could do the Q&A.
We could do the radio thing.
I think the radio thing, I think it's easy.
Get out of that way, sir.
I think that 12-minute radio thing the other day was worth all the shit I did for the previous week.
Questions?
Because it reached several million people.
Maybe four or five.
Probably at least five million people.
Correct.
In its totality, plus another at least ten million people in bits and pieces.
That's my point.
And there's another thing.
That line is plus a hundred million people in the news report.
Stuff afterwards not on radio.
The stuff in the newspapers and all that.
Because it was the lead story.
And the fact that you were going to do it was a start.
That's...
Just like this thing today, the announcement that you were going to do it, was it, who was the lead story?
Did he do it?
There's another one.
Yeah.
We have to work on this.
On this, as I understand it, next week we'll do the press one in here.
Get them on our back for a while.
But it'll be just to answer a few questions.
And the Q&A in Detroit will be, be effective.
You know, in another way of...
I think Q&A is good.
I think when you've got something to say, speech is good.
I think this one would have been effective as hell on TV at night, but it was exactly right not to do it.
I've done the other one at night.
That's why I didn't come up.
What do you think?
Having done an August 15th one at night, to repeat this one at night would have been effective, of course.
But that's one of the reasons why I would have preferred to do the August 15th.
But now, see, that was my young.
What the hell?
I couldn't believe the rise he got.
He did the August 15th thing and totally dominated two weeks.
I mean, that was one way to go.
Now we do this.
political reaction reading from the party people is all just the same as the other.
Yeah, terrific, great.
I like John.
How are you?
That's great.
Hello, sir.
How are you doing?
I really like John.
How are you doing?
Great.
John, I know that's to tell you that I thought it was the best speech I heard you make, and I thought it was the most forcefully and effectively delivered.
I heard it.
Well, you appeared to be quite relaxed, and you were active in here.
Yes, sir.
I'm good.
Thank you.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
Where do we go from here?
Yes, sir.
Well, we have two very basic problems or opportunities we have in the field.
One on the home front, I think by the end of the fourth month, if we can, we're going to have to move to the back.
It really comes with what follows on, and that's realistic.
We're going to have to keep this completely under wraps.
First of all, there's no consensus on what we'd recommend that you at all get in with.
We really haven't.
So these other meetings are cosmetic, but I've had a very hard time.
No, no.
I would hope that you could get something out of them.
And we're certainly having meetings with everybody.
And there's going to be a general uniformity of opinions about what needs to be done, just depending on the degree.
So I think we've talked to enough people.
We're going to please a lot of people.
Because what you're looking for, they all like to be asked.
Oh, yeah, sure.
And they all like to be asked.
And they love to give their advice.
And they call to give their advice.
And I'm so excited.
I wonder if there's going to be a great many people that will feel like they had a party.
Anyway, we will look at labor, agriculture, and business.
And you will have done it.
And that's the big one.
Mr. President, I don't really think it's important.
As long as you have somebody like Bob Odom or maybe Arnie Weber or George Hughes or whoever, Paul, whoever is here with you just to take notes, to carry the message out so you have a messenger.
But the fact that you meet with small groups and that they talk to you,
I think it's a really important part.
And if you can just say, I'm here to listen, I want to learn from you.
And that's what we all should be doing.
And let them talk.
And one suggestion we've made is that we try to have a whole council meet with you.
And I didn't say we'd overwhelm the number of people you're going to see.
And I think the smaller the number, the more effort labor or business or agriculture, we'll see what the meeting is.
I agree.
If you had the whole costume of being counseled with the labor leaders, good God, the road would be fulfilled.
That's what I feel they're talking about.
I think they ought to be learning that.
That's right.
That's what I'm asking you.
That's what I'm asking you.
I want to stop with your time.
The only question that you're really there is the focal point.
I can't have one expert there.
Yeah, I think, as I say, whether it's our contracting, our shoes, our sign, so I'd like to bring two of them.
Sure, go ahead.
I often believe that we need to lose an enormous amount of money today.
Well, if you make it too big, it'll be like they're being talked to in order to get that to perform in front of an audience.
And if it's small enough, they'll be like, you're a person seeking their advice, and this is an enormous difference, if you will.
Yes, that's right.
Nelson, I expect, says he's expected to announce who we're going to continue to freeze.
I suppose that's, uh, that's where he's going to position himself.
I think it's, I think we're probably behind this so that we know that there are problems and what the hell might not be where I'm continuing that some people may hold products back on other things.
We also have said very strongly we're going to do something afterwards.
I don't think it's all that bad.
We keep guessing.
We started to close the call.
I did not know what you were going to ask me, but I don't think it makes that much difference one way or the other.
The other problem we have is that we really have become a problem of maneuvering and of structuring more than the matter itself is.
And that's in its whole international field.
As it comes back to the breeze, I think we should
You should have very much in mind the weapon that we stand well for in six months if we find this thing curling up.
Because you know, you have it work for three months, it'll work for three months, it'll start to break down.
They worked for three months, and then after six months they got on and went whack on it.
And I went to them right before, you know, about June, July, and I run right through the motions.
I should react to it and say, you know, some of these people have been irresponsible.
That's the time you should take on the labor leaders, which they, because they're the ones that are going to bust the Bible, and they do, and it's busted.
Or maybe they can call the business leaders you see, because they're irresponsible.
We're going to have to put that freeze back on again.
I hope we can do it by rolling back the juke.
Sure.
Roll back the tail and make it work.
We can do it.
Yeah, I'm sorry.
We're going to do that and have that in mind.
The other problem...
that I really want to ask you.
There's very little information, really, that you don't already have from... Well, things with Trump are the... You heard Paul Volcker in there the other morning say that there's less urgency as a part of the Europeans now simply because they've got their markets open in the world in the end.
And so now what's happening?
They are really moving, scurrying back and forth all over Europe to try to combine forces against us.
The Dutch and the Belgians have what we think is a plan that they call the Pivot Plan.
Where, you know, we think it's around gold.
We can't be sure.
We think they're thinking in terms of raising the price of gold from $35 to $42, $43, maybe $45 an ounce.
within the common market.
They then are trying to get agreement within the common market to reestablish fixed exchange rates within the market to cool themselves and form their block, so to speak, and then they'll float with respect to the rest of the world and the T3s, the dollar.
We think that's what's happening.
They canceled their meeting for Monday, though, because they
They couldn't get together.
Now, our problem, let me, without giving you the solution, because I don't have it, I haven't been able to think you through it, let me tell you what our problem is.
It's an illogical situation in our home town.
We have an entirely other building.
You see, for the first time, money is not a monetary problem at all.
It gets in the trade.
It gets into the mess.
So you can get commerce involved.
You can get finance involved.
You can get savings involved.
You can get treasury involved.
You can get everybody involved.
And we really can't come up with an option to do that.
On the matter of fact, we still have not even been talking about reestablishing the exchange rates.
What these countries are going to want to do, though, is drive us into that position where that's all we talk about and to where that's all we talk about.
And that's no solution ever.
There's no solution.
We've got to get the answers to these tariff problems and non-tariff problems and barriers and restrictions out of the way first.
If we don't have to fix these injuries, it's just as simple.
totally reestablish the parity between the IMF and what we have, no matter that you have a wider margin.
Now, one of these guys, Japan, they could devalue in 30 days.
Just devalue.
They're good in the latter against the dollar.
And then they said they were the advantage for a long time to come.
And the Indians didn't devalue since World War II.
They're literally undervalued.
The Dutch, the Swiss, the Israelis, everybody else.
And here we are, we're locked in again because we're the leaders.
And we can't respond to every little country, no matter how big.
Japan's not a little big, but we can't respond individually.
We're the links on which all else is tied.
We can't respond as they can.
They have to move against the law.
We can't move against the law and fight for something moving out.
Because what we do affects every person in the world.
So why don't we get back into this corral and fix this injury and we're there for some time.
Now, the thing that concerns me now,
The State is trying, and believe me, I've been critical of the State.
All I'm talking about, I'm trying to find out what I think is going to be confronted.
The State is moving to get into these negotiations.
Samuel said to me this morning about going with the G-10 meeting.
As long as it doesn't go, it's not their business.
The G-10 meeting is normally composed of the Manson, Minnesotan, and Federal Reserve Bank.
I told him not to think about it.
I wrote him notes right after lunch saying I thought we ought to.
I thought this one, I thought it might be all right, and I wouldn't know if I could have it.
Second thought, I think we'd better leave the recognition.
The way it is to get this whole matter settled.
I said, it's the customary appearance of the Treasury Department until we get this whole matter settled.
But their movie, and the reason they're providing it, well, they want to, they say in the justification,
They say that we're not just talking about monetary matters, but we're talking about trade, and we're talking about aid, and we're talking about, yes, deeds are matters of tradition within the purview of the State Department.
Is that actually their right?
Now, it depends on what forum we use.
That's what I wish to do.
But the key thing is that I can construct a little bit different from others.
Most other countries, most of them, the finance minister,
has, in fact, a much broader portfolio in dealing with economic matters than does the Secretary of the Treasury.
Is that correct?
Yes.
Where's the chance of that?
I think what we need is... Well, we had it all except for three.
The Treasury did.
Until, I think, we relinquished economic negotiations to save it.
But that isn't the real point.
That's the fact of it.
They're going to want to go back.
They're going to want to go back to the 16 groups.
Because that's what they know.
And that's what pressure is going to get you.
The Fed is going to push hard.
The Treasury, the former Treasury people, as I told you the other day, that's basically their deal.
That's what they created.
That's what they created.
That's what they grew up with.
That's what they know.
This is what the international bankers...
They want that stability.
That's correct.
Now, they have the entree to the press.
They have this foreign policy group.
They have these, you know, these Atlantic Union groups.
They have so many ways, John, they think more of their relations with the foreign countries than they do of the United States.
I agree.
I agree.
The point is that we've got to...
We've got to structure, somehow, the defense against that.
Because, see, eventually they'll begin to eat you up.
They'll eat you first, but not get to you.
And because they'll say, he's the secretary of the church, he's a barbarian, he doesn't understand anything.
So they've had some of it.
They've had it, and there's no doubt.
And they've had it, and I don't care.
The point is that the pressure will begin to build on you.
It builds with foreign governments.
They're built at every angle on here.
Now, what do we do about it?
Well, it seems to me we do.
We do two things about it.
If indeed we won't float for a while, which I think is our only hope, the Japanese team here, I had intelligence yesterday afternoon from Williamsburg, completely outside the government, and the man who talked to the Foreign Minister and the Finance Minister,
that, in effect, you said, we are not going to be forthcoming with anything.
We are going to come tight and tough, and that's what they're doing.
And so we're going to get nothing out of these conversations.
We're going to get, we are going to get a chance to tell them how we feel, that our problem is congressional.
Now, Canada, are they aware of Canada, who we are prepared to make an election?
No, we're not going to do that.
No, sir.
Not to my knowledge, sir.
You're going to be tested now by every nation in the world, almost, to see what you really mean.
Because you've done something no president has done.
He's there to provide that.
So they're going to say, well, do they really mean it?
The Latin Americans are ganged up.
They want to present a common front and say, remove the service orders.
We're a less developed country.
We need to remove it.
Can't just impose an $80 million levy on their service to frankly give a subsidy to their businesses.
That's more than the United States.
It's just that clear.
It's a clear violation of the Gap.
So I've told all voters and all his counterparts, their license, what's happening in this mess.
We only know this.
But what y'all are looking for is a clear violation of the Gap.
We assume you're just going down the goblets to let the countervailing news get you.
We just want you to know that we damn sure are going to do it.
Exactly.
And he said, we're not threatening you because, my God, we can understand what you're all doing.
We're just asking for it.
We're not trying to get calm and pressurize you, but we just want you to know beforehand, before it goes to Parliament, that the first chance we get, we're going to make countervailing news on you.
Because that's what you're asking for.
So I think we're going to be testing it on every front, and the meaner.
As time goes on, there's going to be more of that, you see.
The Japanese have been off for about 10 days.
The Canadians are making this move into Parliament.
And then here are the British, the French, the Germans.
They all start orchestrating retaliation, right down in Turkey.
And then you get this press in this country, these internationals.
And they said, oh my God, we're going back to isolationism.
We're going back to protectionism.
The president ought to do something.
The president ought to remove the search party.
That's the big push.
He said, remove the search party.
That's what the Japanese said in the statement.
This is the first thing that ought to be done.
He in fact said, look, the United States has problems, but they can be cured by an internal action system, a monetary action.
And they don't need to be surcharged.
They ought to be removed.
Surcharged does nothing but invite retaliation from other countries and countermeasures by other countries that this would bring about deterioration of trade in 12-week-old war.
The United States ought to remove it immediately.
So this is what the Latin America is saying.
This is what Canada is saying.
This is what Mexico is saying.
So we're going to continue to get this.
It's going to be an ever-increasing crescendo.
Now, it'll be difficult.
All I'm saying is it'll be difficult for you over periods of months, no matter how hard the world looks, if you're to hold it in the face of that kind of unified opposition.
So what we did, it seems to me we did two things.
We didn't sit down and spend
out of us time talking about a common front against these countries.
But as soon as we won't vote, I'm going to get some more of this thinking out loud.
I had lunch with Henry Kissinger, outlined at the end of the broadest terms Monday.
I talked to George, he decided very briefly before lunch today.
we need to get a few people verified to who we trust who doesn't he trust and my judgment i doubt that you're going to be able to carry on the type of negotiations that we need to carry on through any
Now, I don't think you can do it in the state, simply because even though Bill Rogers would be on it, the state won't.
They cannot do it.
I don't think you can do it through trading, because I just don't think we...
I think we'd be cut up.
I think we'd be too much of a upheaval within this government, perhaps, to do it directly through trade.
You certainly can't do it through commerce for the same reason.
You can't possibly do it traditionally within the state.
So state, state, state, state, state, state, state, state, state, state, state, state,
Supervision, your direct coverage, your direct... Who are the people that know?
Who are the people that take the attitudes that need to be taken?
I ain't got no...
Naturally no... comments from these people.
Except that I do notice that we are about to have a detention.
It's a tremendous step in this period.
the health of the Japanese and the Canadians and the Europeans, if that's the way you're going to play that question.
And if it raises some health in our court, all these people have to raise some for a lot.
Now, I think that is the way to start, because that's the way to get them to be reasonable.
They're going to
negotiate tough with us.
And our line with the Japanese should be cool, very cordial, and tough.
And very tough with the Europeans.
My only thing is to remember that first, with regard to what we do, we cannot
go back to any silence of the system we had before.
And I, because I think that system was set up to be a different situation, and it will change.
Second, I feel that we cannot have this handled by the State Department.
Because you're absolutely right, whatever Rogers is, whatever his armory should narrow down, there isn't any question that the State Department bureaucracy would have cut us right in pieces.
They always will speak up for the other countries.
They're the internationalists rather than the internationalists.
Now, if there's one mood in the country today,
Well, Phil, I mean, but that's me today crying.
I mean, it's a good thing I had those two paragraphs in the last about where we're going to continue to compete and all that sort of thing.
But my God, this country wants to get in the quarters, and he has to.
Correct.
That's right.
Because this time, hey, of course, that number's 10.
Well, I don't get it, but that's good.
It's a good number.
One lost to all those investors.
Yes, sir.
Because they said we were so aware of the job.
Now, what we need here is what?
Well, we need two things.
We've got this.
Well, let's talk about a candidate.
Is this Peterson?
I think it's Ross Rodman.
Is he a viable man?
Who are the people?
Who are the players that can play?
You can play.
I would think Schultz would.
I don't know.
I think he can certainly.
He doesn't think he can go back to the Old Town.
Or he.
You have to have Schultz.
You have to have .
You have to have .
You have to have the State Department .
What I'm getting at is this.
Wherever we have this, it probably comes down to what the hell we want to do.
And then this right now is a long .
I think it has to be decided and find a way to .
I don't think, in other words, it's kind of a thing where you can sit around the table
and say, well, let's discuss this thing and reach a conclusion.
I think it's the kind of thing where maybe three or four of us in advance decide what we ought to do.
Then we all sit around the table and work it that way.
I agree.
I don't know.
That doesn't work.
I'm not sure it works.
Here's what I think it will work.
There are two things we need to draw in or out.
We need a negotiating team.
Now, it always has to be headed up in questions by somebody.
And maybe if we're strong enough to do it, maybe it...
I just don't really know.
If I had reservations, I'd say so.
I just, I mean, other than that...
But you need a negotiating team.
Specifically, we need to develop a negotiating team on the whole ballpark.
We need somebody to orchestrate this.
Let me tell you a bit about it.
We ought to have somebody.
When the 21 Latin American countries meet, we ought to be down.
We ought to have somebody at every capital in South America, every country in South America.
We ought to be saying to the Lexington Resilience Department, please, now don't be all upset about this search on something.
Now, out of this, we're going to develop a whole new bilateral arrangement with you to hold it out some tariffs.
We ought to have somebody in the European community just keeping those people from getting together.
Just having somebody in every one of those capitals just every day.
Talking to people in the State Department.
All of this has to be separate from the State Department.
going to Japan, Canada, just all over this world to keep these countries all balanced until we can begin to see really what, until we can hold the pressure on them long enough.
And from solidifying, yes, of course they ever do.
But then we've got a problem.
It's not because you can't stand a gap.
It's not because security wouldn't win, but because of public relations.
You get the mad press in all over the world, and it gets to the point where your own people then start commanding institutions.
And you'll have, of course, the media business.
I mean, why don't you get the international press against you?
Inevitably, the Times, the Post, the Newsweek, Time, Life, the business magazines,
And, of course, the networks.
And that's really what's going to happen.
to start cutting it up.
Every time, though, some of the old country, there was something they said, see, we told you.
Well, listen, this is how the procedure should be set up.
He's pretty good at the procedure.
He's thought of saying so.
Well, he's, he won't think about it.
Frankly, we talk, he and I talk about getting specific individuals together to talk about a plan that I submit to you.
We talk about Tom Moore.
We talk about Dick Helms.
On the premise that Dick was longer than his organization, both of them.
We had ten men in our organization, I see.
We thought about him.
We thought about you.
We thought about McCracken.
We were about six of us.
We were, and this is where we left in that meeting, in that time.
What about Peterson?
I see, and I think Peterson was in that group.
Peterson's third daughter's name.
We thought about Bob Murphy.
Former ambassador.
I don't know what you think of him, but I'm going to check in with you.
He's fired.
The only problem is that he has policy and trade relations with the State Department.
And of course, that's the problem with getting anybody that's ever been in the State Department.
Anybody on the stage, John, he just can't help it.
He has to run all these orders.
And he has to create a need.
That's a tremendous manpower.
So that's the reason.
You've got to go buy some of that.
You have to use it.
And this, we've got to use them and we've got to try to direct them.
And this is why I mentioned transferring buildings and just saying that.
Somebody, this is the point I'm getting to.
Somebody has said, Bill, now we need a man in Brazil tomorrow.
We need one that's been away for two days from now.
You're keeping people, and I'm just supposing what we need now, but stirring all over the world.
holding out the carrot, holding out the stick, trying to keep people in other countries from solidifying against it.
I've been looking for the time that we might decide, you might decide, to form one of these new blocs of peace that I've talked to you about on the phone, that I've talked to you about on the phone.
The Japanese held it up again this morning.
I'm not sure anybody called it.
But they, in fact, said that, you know, that they were about on an equal basis with us now.
And that they felt that our future lay in us going together, because they didn't want to indicate that they were going to play second fiddle, but that they felt that our economic and political futures were inevitably tied together, and that we had to move and come forward.
And if that can't do us tomorrow, they didn't say that, but that's what they were saying.
Now, it may need to be more second year this year to have some money saved to Tanaka or one of the other Akuta, maybe it's Akuta.
Somebody playing that hand while we're all playing another game over in Europe.
And we're calling Germany and Great Britain still to come out of the European community.
Because what's happening here?
We say it in another way, Mr. President.
We constantly—we did again this morning, this time.
We're too far down the road, I guess.
But we say that if the environment can develop and strengthen the European Union, it's greatly in our interest.
I don't believe in it, but that's what I'm talking about.
We say that we can mesmerize ourselves and believe in that.
Now, we also say that
We want to reestablish the order of the International Monetary Fund.
All right, we don't say that, and we have to say that.
But the point is, we don't want to say it so much that we get to believe it.
I agree.
And the hell of it is, all our people believe it.
That's all I'm saying to you.
That before we're through, it's going to be you and you should meet.
I see.
uh and maybe he got me and this is going to be all of it and every former state official man
They're going to do what I tell them to do.
But you've got to keep over, keep them on the level.
They like this stuff.
It just comes out because this is all they've ever done.
They're all artists.
In my view, what you find in situations, if you put a big ball like a poker in your size, I'd beat you all over the election.
And for that, we have Americans and so forth.
And Jay, Bob, and Ben, we all come up with the same answer.
That's correct.
They're all part of the same.
That's right.
They were there in Bretton Woods or their parent or their metro.
And they set up special rights and all that crap.
And so they feel that this is the way we should play the game of this.
I'm just confident that they're wrong.
But if we move early enough, maybe we can, we at least can keep some of them.
This is the point.
All I want you to do is start thinking about it.
I apologize to you because I don't have any more concrete plans, but I think we can try here.
Now, they also need, you'll keep on the program for sure, and we'll do that for sure.
What do you think I should do with Rogers at this time?
Not a thing this morning.
I just let that center.
I just let it sit.
What do you have to do with Burns this morning?
Nothing.
I don't believe he's working this morning.
I think we all heard him.
What's your wrong feeling about him?
You, I have no idea.
He's certainly talking to you guys.
He's moving.
You're awesome.
But don't.
Well, listen.
Let me just say.
Well, the point is that I want you to know that I...
First, Arthur opposed our doing what we did.
That's right.
And second, Arthur is a thug.
He's a fanatic.
I'm trying to prove that he was right and all.
He's good in his own ways.
But by the way, we cannot allow people to call him that.
He starts horsing around like that.
I've got to take him on.
All right, let me show you one other danger that we have.
And this is a classic example of the group of 10.
This is 10 foreign ministers and the 10 central bankers.
He said he wants to go and he wants to talk to every one of the Central Bankers.
Now, he wants to know what the party line is.
I said, well, Chris, you know what the party line is.
He said, no.
He said nothing.
That's right.
Basically.
We're listening.
We're listening.
Well, he said he's not going to want to just do that.
Well, the truth of the matter is, he's going to go talk to the last of the Chinese.
That's right.
I wish you could do this, could you tell them that you and I have talked, and I'm against it.
I want to be told that I'm against it, that I've thought this thing through, and I'm against that, done it for reasons that go far beyond international.
I think you could point out to others that there are great international political forces at work here.
They are more important than domestic political forces.
They're more important than
I want you to know, for those reasons that are appropriate for our discussion, under no circumstances can we even suggest we go back to the experiment.
We're done.
All right.
All right.
Yes, sir.
I'll tell you, put it on that rather than on the Capitol.
I want to negotiate about some other things.
Mr. President, on that point, we reassure you that you're the best expert I know in this field.
We're not talking about money anymore.
We're talking about international politics.
That's what we're talking about.
We're not talking about money.
It's long beyond that point.
That's why I say you can't just leave it for the trade.
Because it is trade.
It is defense.
It is politics.
It is the political decisions.
And there's no other master of opinion.
So you don't have to assume you don't know anything about what you're doing.
It's usually the strength of this nation to make alignments, political alignments, with other nations.
Put it this way.
that we're not in the tiniest past and the tail's in the way of the dog.
In my view, we have too often in the past allowed the tail of our addiction to drugs to monitor our situation, our responsibility, and our addiction also to free trade and the rest.
We've allowed that.
That's the tail.
The wag of the dog enters the interests of American home, and right, we have the interests of American diplomatic and politically abroad.
Now the dog's gone now.
That's what I do.
And I think that's, it's not a good way to question it.
I just have, I just feel that if we're one of those times, well, I think these border guards have got an issue of themselves.
I agree.
And I keep them, and you just keep loose, and I think if you talk to them, you talk my way out of it.
But I'm very reasonable.
You were the first politician to concede that, uh,
of all the damn speeches that's worked on it so far.
You know, you were, you were testifying on that.
But, I was talking on both sides of the conversation.
On one side you said we're going to be on the other side, we're going to have inflation, right?
On the one side we're going to cut down, and on the other side we're going to cut through, and we're going to have inflation.
and I'm sure you can see that, my only solicitude to the city, that was by far my final point, was to settle on a meeting with him.
Here, I went through this whole journey of all of this, and by God, we're gonna look to our own interests for 25 years, and bring out the money, and all that, and now, we're gonna look to our own interests.
And then, at the end, I brought in, on the other end, I would say, this is not an internment, we're gonna play a great role in the world, it's interesting for peace and so forth, let us be competitive in the world.
I hope that all adds up to it.
Anybody, any of those masters out there, what do you think is the very view that we've been talking about this evening?
What it adds up to is the philosophy.
By golly, we are now going to take a much broader view of
our trade monetary policies as they relate to political decisions, political forces in the world.
And that, frankly, by the easy-to-interpret either way, on the one side, those who wanted to would say, thank God he had said that we're not going to build a tariff wall around the United States.
So everybody says, gee, that's great.
On the other hand,
uh people want to get some comfort they can say thank god the president said it was a look at her that was done quite deliberately you've got to say sure that's your greatest now what i what i'm trying to convey what i'm really trying to convey is this which i would like to do is that there's some kind of delivery that the united states is going to vote we're damn welcome to vote
We are not going to build a terrible office.
All right, we're saying both.
If we are going to compete in the world, we're not going to compete.
But that allows us to move either way.
Sometimes our interests may require doing something on a temporary, and how long is temporary?
It could be a hell of a long time on a temporary basis.
We build a hell of a wall.
Sometimes our interests may be served
by playing the other way and as far as the american people are concerned of course we have to see that they are able to compete we don't want this to sit here and let the rest of the world go by but i whatever you think john this is what we have now done as you pointed out
What we've really done here in this field is to try to make it about a new ball game.
And no matter where, we've got new players now.
And let's keep it that way a while.
And I want you to, if you talk to these calls, I will play right into the hill.
Will you talk about this?
I have not.
I have no reservations about it, and I have no equivocations about it.
The only thing that worries me is that I can do it, and I'm not.
Do you think we'll get it back, Senator?
Sure.
See, and what I'm trying to do is anticipate that far enough in advance to where we'd be from.
It's an evidence, sir.
You have it in person.
A very good alibi, Mr.
Senator.
He is an experienced, a very, very experienced environment.
And he is, doesn't know a damn thing about the environment.
He is fully committed to the proposition that we've got to play a part of the game in the world.
And that's all right, but he would, he would, he would,
I mean, look at this.
All those things.
This title that disturbs our conservative friends is the most anti-communist thing you could possibly do.
Who's our big enemy in the world?
China, hell, or Russia?
It drives the Russians up the gondola.
Now, Henry, I spoke to you in a second.
You don't want to get in a lot of trouble.
We have to talk to you about this.
The Russians.
John.
Hey.
Tommy Thompson.
Chip Bowles.
All the great sign-off experts.
Sign-off Soviet experts.
After we made it to China, we said, fuck.
They've blown our relations with the Russians.
The Russians are going to be mad.
What happened?
The goddamn Doreen and Tom stuck on him.
And since we'd like to have a son, we're going to have a son.
But you think that son is why I'm here?
Now, here's my point.
My view is that in a world like this,
Sure, we'll be hard on them as much as we can.
But we will play anybody that serves our interests.
That's the way they play.
And that's the way we come.
That's right.
And we haven't been doing that ever since World War II.
We have served as a top team.
All these others in the hall, for example, the British are on their back, and the Japanese are on their back, and the Germans are on their back.
And, of course, a lot of Americans are on the back and the Americans are always being the back.
So we've got to help them all.
We've got to help them all.
We've got to take responsibility in a row.
And we've got this phobia about it that we have got to be responsible for it.
Now comes a new situation where we've got problems at home.
They're strong.
They're strong.
It doesn't mean to declare war on them, you know, but it does mean
that we're just going to be as cold and cynical in our dealings with them as they are with us.
Look how the British have us, the Rolls-Royce deal.
Now, God damn it, despite all the fine relations with Eden and all the rest, I mean, you know, they said, what the hell is it?
They did love us in their interest since that match, but don't we have to do something about it?
Now, that's really the book we were trying to talk about yesterday.
I think you understand.
Yes, you did.
I think Peterson does.
My thought on it is partly the same thing.
is the problem of this issue.
The country's ability to
and to work in a totally secure way.
Now, he was, one thing is reassuring to the establishment, it's very hard, he's been in business, and business people talk to everybody, not selling to everybody, but he hasn't secured his Japanese, his whole damn soul, or really got to where he got that suit, or something like that, close to the corner.
Peterson, on the other hand, seems to be trying.
As I read, and I had an hour of it,
thousands and so many, but he came in and gave it a little beat of what he was up to when he was a long range pitcher.
You know, he likes to start a play about these long ranges.
But, what it finally came down to, if I read it, was that the United States had a boy, a much more larger boy, probably a little bigger than that.
that the Japanese and Europeans addressed the game of change, and he was facing basically a large false line.
Of course, he was off the ground because he was writing, because he said, now, isn't there another fault that we could estimate here in this case?
Yes.
I think they must not get back to the fixed parity.
I don't know how you can do that.
What side would he be on?
Yes, I haven't talked to him.
And I'll say this.
I think Dave Kennedy is so loyal to you and so open-minded that that's no problem.
He has no problem with that.
You see, what we can't do, with the real title we've got here, we've got to make this our first time.
He wants to.
There's a movie out there about central bankers or a run-up situation.
Where are the central bankers?
Well, God damn it.
The Federal Reserve is not the central bank of the United States of America.
Is it?
Like it?
No.
Well, like the central bankers, they're different.
They're free to have them.
That's true.
If I'm wrong, I'm saying no.
You're right.
The Indian doesn't have that power that they have.
Now...
Arthur's a, as we know, he's a hell of an advocate.
He's a great engineer.
But you see, if you look at the players here, the young players we've got, we've got just...
When you talk about eliciting people out of stage fright and hierarchy, I just want to see him in the present time.
What about Richard?
We thought he was smart as hell.
We thought that he's smart as two of the hell of an undersecretary of the state.
And he says, I don't know, he's...
Well, one thing he's a total loyalist.
Richardson, basically, let me say, is a literal devil.
But he does everything he's ever done.
On the bus, he marched her up there like a lion.
He took the same line.
That, Richardson, I think, will do what he was told to do.
But I don't know how you can get him into this place.
Well, what he knows about the State Department and how it operates is where the weaknesses are, maybe.
See, that's all.
That's all.
How does Flanagan get into it?
Well, Flanagan's fine, except I don't know what he brings to the party.
Yeah, that's a great idea that we already have.
See, I mean, what we need is somebody.
See, Rogers, well, even though he may have something else to do, you know, Rogers wants Flanagan.
Remember?
Yeah.
A lot of planning stuff.
He was a hell of a neighbor.
Maybe that was his most important thing.
He said, my will.
Planning on the will he told me.
He asked me if he could answer as a strong, nice person.
I'll say that.
And he did tell me.
Yes, he is.
He knows how to fight.
He's learned a lot.
I was surprised.
I guess he does.
This has been very helpful.
I've seen how much you're getting at it.
We need somebody, and I'll just name a few people, and I'm a little bit qualified, but we need somebody like Bob Murphy.
There are Bob Anderson and Ben Bobass who went through the war, I see.
We need somebody to not think of the Democrats that I wouldn't trust.
Like Tom Mann, who came out of the State Department.
He's now retired.
He's a hell of an able thought.
Get him.
Colby Oliver, who was in the State Department off and on the Bureau of Electronic Warfare during the war, an expert on Latin America.
He's always been elected by the Spanish law.
He's the guy that I know the best today.
Tom Mann.
Tom Mann.
Would you have a talk with him?
Sure.
He just moved back to Boston.
He's booked his second role.
He's part of the gang.
Or I thought of Lawrence Marston.
I thought of George Anderson.
George is all right, but he doesn't know enough about it.
He doesn't know enough about it.
And the same is true of the Murphy, Franklin Murphy.
He doesn't know enough about it.
No, he's not talking to me either.
Let's face it.
There is an establishment.
And that establishment is not ours to fight for.
Not politically.
It's not a decision of yours.
It'll be.
And that establishment is the building that they work for, that we have done, believe is the kind of movement they're for for the wrong reasons.
Because they don't realize it themselves.
The only other author that was up there, Dylan Anderson, was up here this month.
No, he's a killer.
He's a killer.
You're oppressing me in much a heavy way.
No, how about Gordon Ray?
Gordon's sick.
He's smart.
He's smart as can be.
And loyal.
But he's too old.
I mean, not too old, but too old because of his sentence.
I think that's probably right, but I'm not sure.
I'm the biggest guy in the city.
The biggest guy.
But...
And that's about it.
What do you want me to do?
What do you want me to do?
What do you want me to do?
What do you want me to do?
What do you want me to do?
What do you want me to do?
What do you want me to do?
Now there's so many other words to use, there's so many other words to use.
You know, I got a memorandum from you about discussion from the Japanese saying I couldn't mention any figure over 20%.
Well, in terms of your evaluation, I know damn well you didn't.
But if I'm going to read, and I just use this as an example, I said a memorandum on that?
Yeah, it was a memorandum set out, which you signed, saying that I could not mention any figure over 20%.
If I were going to be there, I wouldn't be satisfied.
Don't misunderstand me, I'm just saying.
Well, it was, and that's fine.
But the point is that if I were to be the negotiator in that particular case, then I should have been a consultant about what percentage was in there.
I would have earned the damn percentage, so the report came out to what they wanted.
Now, if I, we really, I would probably have said 25 years.
You know, but that's beside the point.
I would have said, oh, the day before yesterday, I guess.
But the only point I'm making is that, and that's a .
What I'm thinking, Mr. President, is if we could get a group like five or six people
And then we develop a strategy, a worldwide strategy.
Now, the first thing we need to do is analyze, as I discussed with you all along, where are our long-range enemies.
My only judgment is, just very quickly, that in the next generation, there will be three great powers in the world, Russia, China, and the United States, at the end of this century.
with Japan and Europe falling behind.
So they'll be probably a lesser power than they are today.
Now, that being true, how do we structure our own allies?
How do we begin to structure?
I'm not sure at first that we should.
As part of our objectives, as part of our...
come up with an idea right now that you would like to have a meeting with the President next to the President of Canada looking toward the removal of all barriers, including our network.
I completely agree.
Something like that would be great.
But we need to analyze first.
We don't have a mandate.
We've got to analyze product by product.
What will this do for us?
Yeah, the elements in the United States would be a thing.
Who would be hurt?
So, I mean, that's also, John, let's not overwork the deal with Japan.
I have an incident, sure.
I mean, remember, I came out at the time we had the SST thing.
People said, well, the Japanese might have my system.
Why not?
I'll make a deal, whatever happens to it.
I thought you knew what I was doing.
I thought I knew what I was doing.
I told somebody that...
I think the state of the people will drop the ball tomorrow.
But I thought it was great.
I think we might very well make a deal with Japan.
Right now, if we could make a deal with Canada, Mexico, Japan, and then start moving, as I've said to you over the whole time, to the Europeans, try to take the Arab world, like Africa, Australia, and all of South America, we have a strong position in the face of the United Nations.
And we can patent ourselves in the next one or two years.
But it's this time, I don't know if that's wise, but this is the type of strategy that we've got to think of.
And whatever comes out, then we've got to start sending people into these countries.
But we ought to be in Latin America right now, so from Mexico to Brazil, Argentina, and probably Colombia, I know, and trying to slip them away from the Perus and Bolivias and other cities.
Yeah, yeah.
And maybe we don't need to try to make such a deal with Venezuela, but on a five-hour basis, on a five-hour basis, they have to.
Because we've got the harm of it, we'll make it work.
It takes a whole new approach.
I don't think we can sit and dread it.
Because if I were one of the European countries, if they do get together, I think I mentioned to you over the phone, you see, we have both the affirmative and the negative reasons for trying to tie it closer to the Arab world.
If Europeans are smart, they'll go in and try to disrupt the governance of every other nation.
It's because the United States companies control the hydrocarbon resources of those countries.
With the exception of British Petroleum, every other company that has seen substantial strains, whether it's Kuwait, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Libya.
Pardon me.
They're American companies.
except British economy.
But after Britain looks there, and the economy looks there, for a fair oil and gas, that's what's fueling it.
Now, they're going to see us doing more and more of that Middle East oil.
But they're smart.
They'll say, the first thing we've got to do is disrupt these American alliances.
We've got to run these damn American companies out of here.
So they'll start fomenting a revolution or a coup or whatever they can on the theory that they can't be worse off than they are.
That's what I'd do.
I'd run every American company out of there.
We need to move, in my judgment, on a number of fronts, but we can't do it, in my judgment, for the first time, under the established structures that we have.
So I just turned over to my mind how to put together a small group that could develop some plans for you that would make sense.
And then we use all the resources of the CIA, the state, the military, you know, the military.
Let me go into South America and promote some of these movements.
Let Tom Ford send the Army, the Air Force, and the military down there and get a little help with these, uh, uh, samosas.
Well, that's one of the reasons it's an ugly lie.
The other day we had another, one of the favorites came in.
It's a small matter.
The state was against it.
The defense was for it.
I said, hell yes.
And the reason I said it was solely because I just want to come in there.
We need a stroke.
We don't have to get out of any class.
Absolutely.
Right.
Absolutely.
That's the danger that we have as a person in this whole international monetary picture.
What do you want me to do?
I've got to, next week, I'm going to have to have some of these press lectures and continue questions.
I'm not going to do it in public.
I would by all means do it in a televised thing, but just in an office conference.
Uh, I think what I'll do is to have, uh, if you can, just, uh, if you might.
I'll have you look over your testimony very carefully, all the Q&A you have.
I'll get everything else.
On this international, I'll just keep loose as a goose.
I was just saying that I don't think you'd be anything wrong if you said, well, here we are.
Things are uncertain.
And frankly, we're looking at, perhaps, an assessment from new alliances or new arrangements.
As far as I'm concerned, that's a matter of consideration.
But it's part of the discussion of this Congress.
don't get tied down, but keep everything loose.
That's the best thing to do.
Well, that's the thing.
Eschinger's got no thoughts yet.
Well, he, as I've talked to him, I've sworn this on him a lot.
So what I think is, what I think Eschinger, it's very important for the group to be small enough, first to be small, absolutely trustworthy, and secondly,
It's got to be damn secure.
That's correct.
We can't have anybody in there who's going to go running back to the department and have it do the job.
That's for sure.
In other words, we must all agree against the first instance, and this is going to be unlawful.
And then I think the next 30 days, we ought to look at the next 30, not more than 45 days, if we need to develop a formula for you that would be acceptable to you.
They will start to use them, sir.
I sent one to Chile and Mexico.
I sent one to Trudeau.
You take it out of them.
You hack it in them.
You leak it out of them.
Outside gifts, you've got to be able to tell where they are.
No.
If you had a man, a man would be a great guy to send around a lot of America.
He sure would.
He'd be great.
He'd be great to go to Canada, because he knows.
And if you should see whether he would be a good guy, it's not special, I'm sorry.
I have her total confidence in him.
Always have him.
I'll tell you another thought that you could use to speak on the truth, I think, and you can judge it better than I can.
Hoyt Avedon would just as well.
Oh, sure.
Hoyt wants me.
He could go on some special deal.
He would extend it.
He wants the medal of freedom.
I've got the rights.
I don't know what he's going to justify it, but he wants that one.
That's right, he did.
But, uh, good.
Well, I was thinking of some more names, and I'm very busy on that.
Aren't you?
We're going to have to go to that fair tonight.
Yes, sir.
I think, well, I frankly don't know.
I think we're going to jail.
I'm not sure.
Or you're partying or something.
I'm not sure.
Yeah, I think you're dead right here.
I don't know.
But I will find out.
Otherwise, everything that's walking along, I think, is in great shape.
I just really don't think they had any problems except these two.
One, the consultation leading up to the follow-up plan with the Waitress-Price Group, and secondly, protecting ourselves against what I think is inevitably going to come in the way of a, pretty much, of a massive opinion against the continued float.
And I'm in doubt.
But I'm with you on Price-Price.
You've just got to get a system out there and pick off the people.
The big thing is to deal with fire in the tunnel and not be afraid to take these guys on through.
We haven't hit any of those.
The best thing that you did was when we took on the governor of Texas.
You did a really good job.
We did it in a nice way.
No words, but it was done.
And I still did it.
But it isn't the time.
Not now.
No time.
We have to cooperate.
We have to have their help.
And frankly, I think they wouldn't know that.
I think they wouldn't.
They've got too far out.
They may be even more cooperative with you now.