Nixon White House Tapes ›Tape 666 › Conversation 666-006
Nixon, Woods & Sanchez on William P. Rogers and Henry A. Kissinger
Monday, February 7, 1972 · 12:42 PM–1:30 PM ET · Oval Office
AI Summary
President Nixon and Rose Mary Woods engaged in a wide-ranging discussion regarding the personal dynamics and professional tensions among his Cabinet members and close associates. The President expressed frustration over the interpersonal conflict between Secretary of State William P. Rogers and National Security Advisor Henry A. Kissinger, as well as his irritation regarding Martha Mitchell. Ultimately, the conversation highlighted Nixon's sense of professional isolation and his struggle to identify close confidants who could provide companionship without bringing political or personal drama into his inner circle.
Audio
Download MP3 (part 1) · 167.7 MB ·Download MP3 (part 2) · 168.2 MB ·Download MP3 (part 3) · 15.2 MB
This conversation has not yet been cut into its own clip, so the player above contains the full tape segment shared with neighbouring conversations. It begins about 02:43:59 into the tape and ends around 03:31:55.
Transcript (AI-generated)
This transcript was generated automatically by AI (WhisperX) and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Names and numbers are often wrong; speakers are not identified. Do not cite it as authoritative — verify against the audio and the finding aid.
Download transcript (.txt) ·JSON data · Timestamps are positions within the full tape recording.
3:15:35Commander, I ought to told you about the package.
3:16:39Bring in their own little birds and the other birdie among you.
3:16:45Which I understand.
3:16:46Well, fine it is.
3:16:49I hope I get a cat in the family.
3:16:53Oh, really?
3:16:54Bill Rocker is good, but he is so consumed with his hatred of Kissinger that he can't do anything.
3:17:00Kissinger is so consumed with his hatred of Rocker that they can't do anything.
3:17:03And both are at fault.
3:17:05Both are at fault.
3:17:06I understand it.
3:17:08I understand it.
3:17:09I don't forgive Henry one goddamn bit for his business, because he's an egomaniac and vicious and so forth.
3:17:16But Bill, on the other hand, ought to be big enough to understand it.
3:17:21And Bill is at times, but in terms of our, I no longer can have Bill come around, because he's bound to, he hasn't yet.
3:17:36He's fine, but there's Martha.
3:17:39Yes.
3:18:00So I, and I can't think of the amount I heard she should, but I, but she bugs me too, I mean.
3:18:06She should have some pretty down time.
3:18:07What do you think?
3:18:08Also.
3:18:10They're rubbing against you and everything.
3:18:13It just embarrasses me.
3:18:15Martha Mitchell's not the kind of person.
3:18:18I think a lot of people enjoy her.
3:18:20She's not the kind of person.
3:18:21She's the kind of person who irritates me.
3:18:26So who the hell else do I have in the cabin?
3:18:29There's another one that I can talk to.
3:18:31Vince, you know, is off on his own things now.
3:18:33And also Vince is so worried about
3:18:37His own problems.
3:18:38We're trying to help him.
3:18:41We're trying to help him in every way we can.
3:18:44You know, I don't know for Congress.
3:18:48I don't know what it is.
3:18:48If you're pressing him to do it or not.
3:18:53I don't think so.
3:18:54It is.
3:18:54Well, I think that's the reason I'm supposed to live.
3:18:59And that would have helped.
3:19:01Yes.
3:19:05But you don't need a guy like Glenn Hull used to be, who can always walk in and hide everything and stuff.
3:19:12Well, he made it sort of terrible.
3:19:14You see, I cannot get it, obviously, for any of the other sad people.
3:19:21No, because... Because they are not my love, and they should never try to be my love.
3:19:27No, no.
3:19:28You know, I don't have, I don't, as you know, it's a very interesting thing.
3:20:07The only other one that might be a sort of help and introspect would be Connelly.
3:20:17But Connelly, of course, he's so deeply involved in so many terrible problems that the hell I can't...
3:20:31And he isn't the best guy to relax with.
3:20:34He's a lot more fun than he is.
3:20:36He's quite an intense person.
3:20:38No, I don't mean that in anything.
3:20:40I don't keep terrific, but...
3:20:42But you see, he's not... Well, for example, it's a small thing.
3:20:48He doesn't drink.
3:20:49That's right.
3:20:50So when you go to relax...
3:20:51He doesn't never drink.
3:20:52I'm likely to drink if the other person doesn't drink.
3:20:59They ask you, why don't you see the ghosts?
3:21:01I say, you know why you see the ghosts.
3:21:05Because there are two men who absolutely never raise a study.
3:21:10They never raise a study to their own problems.
3:21:16And they try to make things delightful and easy for you and let you alone when you want to be alone.
3:21:23But here we are.
3:21:24So I had a position that is quite unique in this office, you know, the poor man had a crazy wife, but on the other hand, he had a couple of friends.
3:21:34And I'm sitting here really down with it.
3:21:39No really kind of friends that I could count on, with the possible exception, really, of, I don't know, maybe it was a campaign committee, or maybe it was Mitchell,
3:21:52Mitchell I enjoy, because he's cold.
3:21:55And he's got a good sense of humor with it, too.
3:21:58He isn't going to be raised every single day.
3:22:01You can have Mitchell without Martha.
3:22:03Now, I can get a lot of fun with Martha, because frankly, if she calls me, I have to straighten her out.
3:22:11But, um...
3:22:15Kanskje.
3:22:16Kanskje.
3:22:16Kanskje.
3:22:17Kanskje.
3:22:18Kanskje.
3:22:18Kanskje.
3:22:42It doesn't make any difference because they have to.
3:22:45It's not too bad.
3:22:46There are a few guys like Paul Keyes around just once a month or once every three months.
3:22:51He doesn't believe in raising anything.
3:22:57He's very good.
3:22:59But if we had several people like that, you know...
3:25:28May I say something?
3:25:29I know.
3:25:30Well, I wish there were a few people in town, or around somewhere, like for instance, that Duke Rose, to, well, you don't play golf anymore, but if you were near someplace to play golf, because I don't think he ever brought that stuff either.
3:25:51But there just aren't any.
3:25:53I'm not really getting back to
3:31:17I think you had, you did make, you did make one very, very safe point there.
3:31:26I take one more cocktail, and then we go over to the other side.
3:31:29But this, I don't see if Ziegler has seen three yet.
NARA Description
On February 7, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon, Rose Mary Woods, Manolo Sanchez, Stephen B. Bull, and Ronald L. Ziegler met in the Oval Office of the White House from 12:42 pm to 1:30 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 666-006 of the White House Tapes.
Nixon Library Finding Aid
Conversation No. 666-6
Date: February 7, 1972
Time: 12:42 pm - 1:30 pm
Location: Oval Office
The President met with Rose Mary Woods.
******************************************************************************
BEGIN WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 1
[Personal Returnable]
[Duration: 29m 25s ]
END WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 1
******************************************************************************
Cabinet
-Meetings
-Congressional leaders
-White House staff
-William P. Rogers
-Henry A. Kissinger
-Relationship with Rogers
-John N. Mitchell
-Martha (Beall) Mitchell
-Remarks made
-Robert H. Finch
-Possible Congressional run
-Elliot L. Richardson
-Rogers
-Unknown man
-Staff
******************************************************************************
BEGIN WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 2
[Personal Returnable]
[Duration: 33s ]
END WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 2
******************************************************************************
The President’s schedule
-Cabinet
-John B. Connally
-Schedule
-Idanell (Brill) (“Nellie”) Connally
Charles G. (“Bebe”) Rebozo and Robert H. Abplanalp
-Relationship with the President
-Abraham Lincoln
-[Mary Todd Lincoln]
-Friends
-Mitchell
-Campaign committee
-Martha Mitchell
-Relationship with Woods
-Hobart D. (“Hobe”) Lewis
-Issues
-Paul W. Keyes
******************************************************************************
BEGIN WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 3
[Personal Returnable]
[Duration: 1m 57s ]
END WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 3
******************************************************************************
The President’s schedule
-Cabinet
-Departments
-Melvin R. Laird
-Rogers
-“Duke” Rose [?]
-Golf
-Possible location
******************************************************************************
BEGIN WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 4
[Personal Returnable]
[Duration: 5m 18s ]
END WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 4
******************************************************************************
Manolo Sanchez and Stephen B. Bull entered at an unknown time after 12:42 pm.
Refreshments
Ronald L. Ziegler
-Meeting with the President
Sanchez and Bull left at an unknown time before 1:29 pm.
******************************************************************************
BEGIN WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 5
[Personal Returnable]
[Duration: 1m 4s ]
END WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 5
******************************************************************************
The President left at an unknown time before 1:29 pm.
Ziegler entered at 1:29 pm
The President’s schedule
-Ziegler’s action
-The President’s reaction
-Kissinger
-Woods’s schedule
-The President’s schedule
-The President and Woods
Woods and Ziegler left at 1:30 pm.Also recorded on February 7, 1972
- 090-001 11:54 AM — President Richard M. Nixon, United States Attorneys, Treasury Department officials, and Justice Department officials, including Whitney N. Seymour, Jr., William D. Keller, James R. Thompson, Jr., Harold H. Titus, Jr., Louis C. Bechtle, Ralph Guy, Jr., Joseph L. Tauro, James L. Browning, Jr., Richard L. Thornburgh, George Beall, Herbert J. Stein, Anthony J. P. Farris, Eldon B. Mahon, Stan Pitkin, John W. Stokes, Jr., Donald O'Connor, Harry D. Steward, Robert W. Rust, James L. Treece, Gerald J. Gallinghouse, Daniel Bartlett, Frederick Coleman, Sidney I. Lezak, William Smitherman, William W. Milligan, David J. Cannon, John L. Briggs, Wayman G. Sherrer, James M. Sullivan, Jr., F. L. Peter Stone, Richard G. Kleindeinst, Myles J. Ambrose, Henry E. Petersen, Jerris Leonard, John E. ("Jack") Ingersoll, Harlington Wood, Jr., Eugene T. Rossides, John F. Hanlon, Egil ("Bud") Krogh, Jr., Geoffrey C. Shepard, the White House photographer, and members of the press, met in the Cabinet Room of the White House from 11:54 am to 12:18 pm.
- 666-003 11:54 AM · 2 min — Stephen B. Bull and unknown person(s) met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 11:54 am and 12:23 pm.
- 666-004 11:54 AM · 2 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 11:54 am and 12:23 pm.
- 666-005 11:54 AM · 1 min — Manolo Sanchez and unknown person(s) met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 11:54 am and 12:23 pm.
- 090-004 12:18 PM — Unknown person(s) met in the Cabinet Room of the White House on an unknown date, sometime between 12:18 pm on February 7, 1972 and 11:22 am on February 9, 1972.
- 666-009 12:18 PM · 1 min — Stephen B. Bull and unknown person(s) met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 12:18 pm and 12:23 pm.
- 666-010 12:18 PM · 46 sec — Stephen B. Bull and Manolo Sanchez met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 12:18 pm and 12:23 pm.
- 666-007 1:31 PM · 32 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Ronald L. Ziegler met in the Oval Office of the White House from 1:31 pm to 2:03 pm.
Cite this conversation
Conversation 666-006, February 7, 1972. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives. Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/666-006 (accessed September 18, 2026).