On October 22, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon, Stephen B. Bull, Peter H. B. Frelinghuysen, Clark MacGregor, Alexander M. Haig, Jr., and White House photographer met in the Oval Office of the White House from 12:16 pm to 12:45 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 599-012 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 Do not cite this transcript as authoritative.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.
President.
Hi, President, how are you?
I'm just fine, thank you.
Sit down, sit down, sit down.
Well, in 19 years, I've never asked what the point is.
We are sort of in position to do it, but I really am very much aware of the fact that this is... You might as well tell everybody else that.
that situation is such that maybe the deeper issue would be
of a decade as far as serious international consequences.
And because I had a first-hand opportunity both in Pakistan and in the U.S. to take a look at it, I said I really want to talk to everyone I can.
That's all because I've never been here.
I probably wouldn't have called on him because I know him very well.
He's a member of the 68th Convention and so on.
But, and I've talked to State and I've talked to CIA and I just didn't want to do that.
I was the first member of Congress in 18 years of DACA.
And nobody knows me.
They all go and serve for the fire department.
is dangerous.
I work against restrictions.
I went to Pakistan, and all of a sudden, the police got my head.
So I was received in a friendly way.
You were right, Pakistan.
I'm quite convinced.
What a struggle we had, what we did.
I feel very strongly that the leaders of the U.S. and the Chinese, who were there, also did.
So anyway, I was received in a friendly way in Pakistan.
Yeah, yeah.
And in Calcutta, I also was received in the most cordial way.
They really talked frankly.
They offered to let me go anywhere I wanted.
But on both sides, I feel that you're an instrument that they want to use to hit the other one in the head.
And I came back and missed two things.
One, that the humanitarian problem is staggering.
And it's not ending.
I think what we've done has been magnificent, and I think your leadership in identifying the problem and doing something about it has been of crucial importance, especially in East Pakistan.
It is working so well.
Oh, yes, and I think the fact that there is a UN presence is thanks really to our initiative.
I think it may really make a difference in what develops in the next few months.
So I came back quite alarmed at the size of the problem and disappointed at the lack in it.
So far, others have done very good, especially in Pakistan, and that's really not enough.
In India, as I said at a press conference in Delhi, the Soviet Union has provided 50,000 tons of rice, plus the vaccine, about $11 million in total.
You're talking about 500 or 600 million.
The millions they're putting into this is not enough.
So as a member of Congress, I said, I'm concerned both at the size of the additional request
I hope you would be sympathetic, but Congress will want to know how much international support is there.
Is it a bottomless pit?
And is there sufficient accountability from the Indians about this event?
I think that primarily is worried about the political situation, which has led to this hemorrhaging on the part of East Pakistan and the continuing flow of refugees, and also worried about the continuing reports and the surprises
So my basic view is one of apprehension about what they develop.
I've been very much concerned that I wouldn't be able to get my thoughts down in writing before war broke out.
The reports since I came back sound to me quite alarming.
Whether they want to or not, I think the area is probably on the brink of war.
It could easily happen just by a small, small hot pursuit across borders or individual shelling at some time.
It could happen.
And if there should be a deliberate movement, a lot of times it would happen.
And the Indians are not reassuring.
They keep talking about breaking points.
I was told by one that
There was no solution but a military one.
Well, in my opinion, that's absolute ultimate folly.
Aren't you right?
I had the fact a week ago, a week ago, a month and a half, a couple of days ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half ago, a week and a half
to rally the balance.
And the Indians are the ones who worry the most, because they have the military superiority.
And the Spanish are very aware of this.
I don't know if they're going to provoke it, but they feel that the Indians have tried to provoke them into some move that would precipitate an attempt by India to impose a military solution.
And what can you do to avoid this?
Well, I would ask this out in the rice paddies, viewing the flight with 250,000 refugees in one cab.
I would say, Congressman, what is your solution to this?
Well, I don't have a solution.
All I know is that I think everybody needs to put this right on the front burner of their consideration as something that is still manageable because it hasn't fallen apart, but it's very dangerous.
And I can't help thinking of this whole plot.
Ten years down the road, we know there's going to be an Indian, and there's going to be SOBs to deal with them as they are now.
But I think there must be, my feeling basically is that we must find a way of mending our presence with India to a degree.
And this is why I'm glad that Mrs. Gandy is coming.
I think it will provide .
But not in the sense that we're going to choose between two.
They're both friends of ours.
And she may make it, like, very difficult, I suppose.
It may not be an easy discussion at all.
But it does seem to me that somehow there's got to be movement across the place, as the host expresses it so ineligibly, is in Pakistan.
how we can accelerate the process of giving East Pakistan right to its own political destiny, I don't know.
But the military in Islamabad must recognize that they've got a very tenuous hold
on that area and continue military repression for whatever reason, no matter what the provocation of India or whatever, is just to alienate the Bengali population.
And no one is going to be an Indian by having this dragged out, as the Indians say, possibly, the radicals, the Chinese, the ones who want a communist state on their border.
In other words, they talk as if they want a solution.
But I'm not sure that they're contributing to it.
I really think not.
And they're very sensitive about it.
Do you use restraint?
We don't need to use restraint.
Why don't we use it?
Well, of course they are.
They're not helping me.
But it is, I think, the basic responsibility must remain in the past if they don't.
the whole thing will blow up or disintegrate in one way or another, because I don't think they can keep the lid, militarily, on a country that big, which is bigger than West Pakistan, if the population doesn't want it.
Tommy, next, sir.
Thank you.
I think we got a little more of an arm on the back stand.
Now we can talk, you know, we really worked on the effect that we still have a, we have a very good, my personal version is very good.
And you know, he's offered to move back to the border.
He's offered to do various things.
But is that it?
Do you have a lot of artists?
What do you, if just you were sitting here, what would you do if you were not building?
I know the urgency I share with you, the urgency I share with you is I think you have a suicidal attitude in the Department of Pax.
Even though they did the hell out of it and they were willing to do it, I think as far as the Indians are concerned, they'd like to see Pakistan disintegrate.
Not because of East Pakistan, but because of Kashmir.
And they just want it to disintegrate.
So they don't want to help.
Now, it's both or false.
I can't buy the line that the Indians come in and they say, oh, it's all wrong because of Pakistan and Rubies.
It is a bandana of cooperation.
This is sophisticated innocence.
I think it's not their fault.
You've got to live with that.
They have brilliant foreign relations.
They're devious.
Very, very clever.
And the batteries are old and candid and sometimes very stupid.
What worries me is that we may end up holding a bag for something that is disintegrating.
In other words, I don't think we can, we've got to carry water on both sides.
That's kind of pertinent.
Do you think we should continue actually the humanitarian effort?
Oh my, yes.
But again, I do express some concern about getting too far out of the league with
because there is the feeling on the part of other countries, I suppose, well, the U.S. is already stepping in on such a high scale, so we won't.
So I think, and also, the feeling encompassed will be, why should we be doing it?
In other words, it may be a natural reaction against, and we won't do it unless.
So I think we've been in the forefront, and we've survived some of these months, but I don't know if we need to press all the laughing, you see, until we get international support a little more evident.
In other words, we're willing to do our share, but we have no particular reason to go home.
I'll give the others some of those themselves.
And also, the scientists, the scientists, the Indians should provide a greater degree of accountability than they so far have shown themselves willing to.
I'm not suggesting that.
One Indian reporter said, I was criticizing the way in which they've handled it, the existence they've been given.
I said, not at all.
I said, accountability is a natural thing for someone who's providing knowledge.
What do you think this is going to be?
I would certainly lend a sympathy.
It's such a presumptuous thing for me to respond.
I'd lend a sympathetic ear to what she has, and I would surely soft-suffer is what I would do.
You think that'll work?
I don't know, but I do think that they are feeling offensive for a variety of reasons, just as it is in Pakistan.
I mean, it isn't fair that they associate all these things, and they exaggerate this military appearance right there.
They are using us in a way, as a scapegoat, unfairly, I think.
As I said, I would think they'd be worried more about what China's providing, the way of assistance, and the very small kind of assistance that we've provided since 1966.
It's a real art stuff.
It's so small that you would know.
This chamber they're talking about is three and a half million dollars.
All of it was contracted for the incident that occurred.
But I think that there probably is a team that they'd like their hands dealt with the day before that.
I don't think so.
I was just asked to do it.
But how are we going to get them to do it?
You see, they ought to be reasonable, but I wonder if the Indians want a solution.
That's the real problem.
I wonder if they'd rather just not shoot Pakistan.
Well, I think they want a solution in the sense that they don't want a real radicalization.
In other words, I don't think they... You don't think they want a radicalization?
I think they have good reason to want it.
Yeah, the bank police are going after the Indians.
Oh, the political volatility in West Montreal is important.
I mean, it's really a much more unsafe city than back.
I had my own personal bodyguard.
The house was surrounded with extra guards while I was there.
They were even afraid to let Ken Keating come into town.
Where's the town in West Montreal, though?
And you see what's happening, of course, is that you've got in a very heavily populated area with tremendous political instability anyway and food problems, a refugee population that in some areas more than doubles
the local population, and the tensions between the local and the rural, they have real interest to protect themselves to get this situation behind them.
In other words, I think they're honestly concerned that this is going to affect them.
So I think the city can stress the fact that they've got an obligation in their own self-interest to encourage, to permit conditions in East Pakistan to develop in such a way that there can be peaceful transfer of power, as Yahya has promised.
In other words, they need to resist the temptation of supplying a hookty-buckety and an adjective in ways that make it virtually impossible for the facts to penetrate themselves.
But this is, of course, a very modest scale, is what I'm struggling with in my own report.
What do I, as an individual, say?
It's nothing compared to what the president needs to worry about.
But I'm afraid that, as Bill Rogers said, that we've got to adjust to the
realities of the present, or else we're risking the future for loyalties of the past, I think we've got to recognize that this situation is time-not in favor of a solution.
And we may end up as a friend of Pakistan, but with the necessity of coping with Pakistan as a shell, and have caused a needless deterioration of our relationship with other countries.
Sir, it's all about this.
If there does break out a little conflict between Pakistan and India, it could expand into something far worse, because the Chinese, I don't think, just as a guess, would allow Pakistan to go down.
I mean, Chinese, at least, whether they would then start moving on the Indian border remains to be seen.
Something like that.
If the Indians could water anyone, then you'd have a situation.
But we want a river break on that point.
But then, you'd have a situation in which Chinese should say, we want the border, and the Indians would come to us and say, God, we need some help.
The Russians aren't going to do a damn thing for them, except in arms.
The Russians would never, the Russians aren't going to get involved in a war about that area.
Any more than they would get involved in a war about Vietnam or Korea.
On the other hand, the Chinese might be in a position where they just couldn't stand there and let their plane, Pakistan, go down in two.
Because if it, for all the impression of war, I don't see how Pakistan isn't good at anything happening.
But the first war, of course, it might have last long.
You decide it's not much to do with.
But I think Pakistan would lose quickly.
I don't think they don't seem to, except in desperation, have any feeling that there's any monetary solution.
In theory, all right, they realize, oh, they say it's fine, but their vulnerability is really incredible.
Well, not quite.
They say there's got to be a solution to this.
And they say, by the end of the year.
What is it?
What kind of a solution can there be by the end of the year?
Well, they say, easy.
And this is what they said we should be doing.
They say, you should bring pressure, public pressure, to release Mujahid and have him go back to East Pakistan.
It's got the public pressure that never works.
And I have the pressure in mind.
We are bringing him some.
But I ask the question of what, you know, what is the condition of that situation with respect to Mujahidin, how he has to be paid, charged with serious crimes, and is on trial.
No hint, of course, whether they feel that he could be useful as a form for them to educate themselves on the dilemma that these Pakistanis must represent.
Were you there before?
I've been to West Pakistan and India in January 68.
And this was on a relatively simple what is our aim of any particular value, what is it doing?
This is the Green Revolution.
So that is all on my end.
But this is the first thing that pains me as a friend of foreign aid, which is unusual these days.
This is a disruption to what both countries need back.
And that's a continuation of whatever progress is being made in economic development, agricultural progress, and so on.
This is a serious strain on both.
And I'm afraid it weakens our whole area.
And let me say, one of those years is very, very important.
Don't, I mean, continue to the best of your ability to see that we've regained some control of Pakistan by not being so damn foolish as to cut off all of our aid.
We can forget it.
We're going to be able to help.
Well, how about at the same, you know, it's like they talk about the Greeks, the same thing.
Well, now, I'm supposed to be able to cut off aid to Greece.
Why?
Because of Norwegians and Danes and the like.
I said, what the hell are you going to do?
You're going to trade 20 divisions for 20 Italians?
It's almost not a problem in a different way.
It's a great situation out here.
It's unbelievable.
Again, we prefer a different government than all the rest, but what is the alternative?
And they have no intentions, in my hope, to change the... No, I think they feel that...
I understand that they're between a double fire there.
The president's leader is...
one of the reveals of who's really being pushed on the right as well as down.
Is that what you're talking about?
I didn't meet Papadopoulos, but I've met him in number two land in Hanukkah.
He talked about democracy without elections.
He said the dictionary didn't require elections to have democracy.
What he's talking about is the devil and tyranny.
He's the guy.
I don't know if they feel that situation.
All I know is there's no easy, simplistic solution there.
I don't know if they feel that.
But they don't trust the democratic process.
And if they don't trust them, they're not going to go very far towards it.
But at least they're relatively healthy, I think.
At least that's not the main thing.
We have to be concerned about it.
It's not the general situation of the country, but their attitude toward us next to now.
We get that.
It wasn't something to quack.
It's something that, much as we would like to have, every country has a perfect government, just like California.
Yeah, we have a moralistic tinge.
Because what I thought of it earlier, it seemed that they'd kick on Susan once.
Oh, yeah.
Or the other day.
We don't care about this.
We've got to get more people that want to be there.
Is anybody ever going to raise a question about elections there?
They never have an election.
You've got to read the New York Times and the Washington Post and go back in the mark 25 years.
I'm curious to question about it.
Everybody says we ought to be nice to Tito.
I agree.
I'd be nice to Tito for a cold reason.
But we're nice to Chichester.
They're both dictators.
But now, dictators.
But we're nice to them because it might irritate some of the people in my house.
You know what I mean.
But this double standard that the dictatorship's on the right is wrong.
It's terrible.
It's on the left while we turn the other way.
They're both bad.
Why is something wrong with us?
How do they treat us?
That is exactly my talk.
It's why I have such real pride in talking about the way you've been handling yourself in this field.
It's not an easy operation.
It's so easy, you know what I'm saying?
Like we're talking about the port of call in Vietnam.
Well, now there, he's got a problem with democracy as it is, but they're...
You know what I mean?
After all, there is a legislature of people opposing about 40% of the Senate.
That's not bad.
Not bad.
It's only been an experience of five to ten years.
No, five years of so-called democracy.
So he was elected to go to Congress, as I had pointed out.
He started breaking relations, cutting off aid with people that don't have elections.
He cut off aid to the leaders of the countries in the world, being well-known, including most of our African-Americans.
That really irritates my ears.
I might get that when I get to the front of this.
He's landed.
If they want.
One o'clock.
First of all, why don't you call and see.
Tell them they have lunch before they come.
All right, sir.
You see, they haven't had lunch.
I didn't know what we were going to lunch.
And I would recommend two or three minutes over.
Tell them to decide when they want.
I mean, I'll see them any time because I don't have any.
the lunch thing, but I don't want them to come here and have to be stuck for that long.
They might come at 1 o'clock, available degrees, and then they can have their lunch afterwards, or if they would prefer to have lunch before they come, simply 2 o'clock, 5, 1 o'clock, 2 o'clock, either one, whichever suits their convenience.
Thank you.
George, before she's done, I want to talk about the question of the state of Taiwan, I mean, of Saigon.
Sure, we'd prefer that everybody was elected within a contest.
It doesn't always happen, but the main thing is, of course, that they started on that long road of the process, which eventually may lead them to contested elections.
Democracy isn't easy.
Just like Mr. Marcus and the fellow he told me they're talking about now.
Well, they think that the communism industry is so great that maybe
Maybe.
They may not.
It may be America's directive constitution in a way that democracy can succeed in solving.
But I'm not sure.
And the Philippines, we believe, that's American-style democracy, trying to make it work in Asia.
Yes, I know.
We're all right.
Now, they can get it.
And our people, they couldn't hide my guess about democracy in Asia.
Our thing, in particular, is the blacks aren't any good at it.
In fact, Anglos are the only people who are as good as the blacks, the British and Americans.
And we've had it rather easy, you know, we've tried it out really two different times.
We took off a little off, and the British have come fairly off.
But you saw the thing of the blacks.
They've always screwed up every time the Italians don't have a government.
They never have a government.
They never will.
The Spanish, they are a slave, by and by.
the final left, probably, or the state of the final right.
Now, France would never have made it unless they had the accidentary Gaul, who, despite our disagreements with him, the foreign policy was a blessing to France because it gave them strong, strong anti-Constitution.
And that's kind of the other half of others.
But the Greeks basically are with our Mediterranean country.
And I remember Greece in 1947 when I was there.
I looked up and went to the Grand Hotel in the square, literally at 5 o'clock.
500s and 100s of Greeks milling around, talking and shouting and so forth and so on and so on.
I talked to one of the young State Department members who was a congressman there.
And I said, well, that's really quite a sight.
What are they talking about?
Just politics.
He said, you get five Greeks together, you have six political parties.
That's the reason.
Well, that's the sad thing about the Greeks.
They do need this kind of outlet.
At the moment, it's sort of repressed.
That's right.
The Greeks basically are combating individualism and the rest.
It is a shame that it was repressed.
They're a way to let them.
They're going to shoot us.
They need to have something like the United Nations.
We're thinking now, and that's right, it's something that means nothing, but it's a nice forum.
They can do the forums and all that sort of thing, dinners and everything, and think they're really, they would not really be doing anything.
I don't get that.
The United Nations is just a nurse who would, perhaps, you know.
Well, to get back to your basic question, President, about what I suppose I'm really saying, that I think if there's to be movement and to be meaningful movement still, the only where, the only place it really can be is the Pakistani government.
which I suppose means that we really need to keep up private pressure to persuade them of the obvious, and that is if they're to maintain any kind of hold for two wings, in fact, even to maintain reasonable integration of the West, that they need to come to some arrangement, that they must see that.
It's hard to believe, if they see it, that they can't figure out a formula to move in that direction.
In other words, maybe it is feasible.
I hesitate, just to put it in my reporting, to resurrect Mushi and send him back after all the water that's gone over the dam.
But if they don't use him, they still need to find a way to have a loosening of the relationships and a lessening of the military repression, which I honestly think is
is causing them, is weakening their own position.
Of course, on their side, they've got to quit assassinating people.
Of course.
They've got to try and create...
They make the refugee operation all the time.
But they bristle, you see.
They bristle when you say both sides use restraint.
But they need to use restraint.
And I think you just have to keep on saying what I'm planning to say in my report.
Well, I don't mean to impose on you, but I sympathize very much with your responsibility in so many areas.
I wish I could.
Oh, it's going very well, Mr. President.
Oh, thank you very much.
I didn't drink it.
I didn't drink it.
I didn't drink it.
I didn't drink it.
I didn't drink it.
I didn't drink it.
I didn't drink it.
Now what about the, how many men do you have?
Good to see you there, Peter.
Well, listen, you've got a stalwart, and I know some.
Well, I don't, I don't, I never, let's go to our table tonight, and I always say, they, they, they, they would ask me, they'd say, you and me, liberals, Republicans, are they friends of yours?
I said, yeah, pretty much.
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