Conversation 679-004

TapeTape 679StartTuesday, March 7, 1972 at 10:07 AMEndTuesday, March 7, 1972 at 10:48 AMTape start time00:16:04Tape end time00:55:51ParticipantsNixon, Richard M. (President);  Kissinger, Henry A.;  Haldeman, H. R. ("Bob")Recording deviceOval Office

On March 7, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon, Henry A. Kissinger, and H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman met in the Oval Office of the White House from 10:07 am to 10:48 am. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 679-004 of the White House Tapes.

Conversation No. 679-4

Date: March 7, 1972
Time: 10:07 am - 10:48 am
Location: Oval Office

The President met with Henry A. Kissinger.

     The People’s Republic of China [PRC]
          -Taiwan, Republic of China
               -James L. Buckley
                    -Talk with Kissinger
                          -William F. Buckley, Jr.
                          -The President’s talk with Chou En-Lai
                               -US presence in Asia
                                     -Communique
                    -William Buckley
                    -James Buckley’s view

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[Previous National Security (B) withdrawal reviewed under MDR guidelines case number
LPRN-T-MDR-2014-034. Segment declassified on 05/24/2019. Archivist: MAS]
[National Security]
[679-004-w001]
[Duration: 24s]

     The People’s Republic of China [PRC]
          -Taiwan, Republic of China [ROC]
               -James L. Buckley
                    -The President’s opinion
               -Potential action by the People’s Republic of China [PRC]

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     The People’s Republic of China [PRC]
          -Message from PRC
                -Kissinger’s view
                     -PRC acceptance of delegation
                     -Establishment of communications channel
          -State Department

     Greece
          US military aid

     PRC

      -Letter to Mao Tse-tung
      -Letter to Chou En-lai
      -Statements by non-White House personnel
            -William P. Rogers
            -Press
            -House of Representatives and Senate
            -Number of responses to statements
      -Vietnam
            -Bombing
                  -The President’s meeting with Chou En-lai
            -Postponement of meeting between the US and North Vietnam
                  -Chinese reaction
                  -North Vietnamese
                  -Significance of timing
                       -Offensive
                       -The President’s view
                             -Public opinion
                       -Kissinger’s view
                             -Le Duc Tho
                                   -Peking And Moscow
                             -Chinese
                             -Rogers
                             -Hugh Scott’s statement

US recognition of Bangladesh
     -Statement by the State Department
     -Announcement
           -Rogers
           -The President’s view
           -Timing
                 -Kissinger’s view
                      -Possible Congressional action
                      -Mujibur Rahman
                            -Communiqué with the Soviet Union
                      -PRC
           -India
     -Unknown country

PRC
      -PRC relations with the US

Vietnam

     -Postponement of meeting
     -Kissinger’s forthcoming trip to Paris
          -Timing
                -Rogers’s forthcoming trip to South America
                      -Kissinger’s talk with the Israeli ambassador
                           -Soviet negotiations

Newsweek article
    -Rogers
         -State Department
                -Morale
                      -Joseph McCarthy era
                -Kissinger’s talk with H. R. (“Bob”) Haldeman
                      -Joseph W. and Stewart J. O. Alsop
                           -The PRC trip
                           -Report in Time magazine
                                  -Chinese officials
                                       -Questions on treatment of Rogers
         -Interaction with PRC officials
                -The President’s role
                      -Chou En-lai
                -Kissinger’s role
                      -Shanghai
                      -Shanghai Communiqué
                           -Marshall Green
         -Source of recent stories
         -Replacement
                -Stewart Alsop
                -[David] Kenneth Rush
    -News summary
         -Newsweek
         -Time magazine
         -The President’s preparation for the PRC trip
         -Shanghai Communiqué
         -London Times
         -Writers
                -Kissinger’s view
                     -John F. Kennedy
                           -Television
    -John A. Scali

PRC trip

          -Presidential image
                -Toasts
                -Meetings
                -Kissinger’s previous conversation with Haldeman
                -Kissinger’s call to a television producer on the West Coast
                     -Chou En-lai
          -Rogers

     Kissinger’s schedule

     The President’s schedule
          -Forthcoming presentation of the National Advisory Committee on Child Nutrition
                Report
                -Time
          -Florida

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[Previous PRMPA Personal Returnable (G) withdrawal reviewed under deed of gift 09/20/2022.
Segment cleared for release.]
[Personal Returnable]
[679-004-w002]
[Duration: 19s]

     The President’s schedule
          -The President’s health
          -Henry A. Kissinger’s health

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     International Telephone and Telegraph [ITT] case

Haldeman entered at 10:28 am.

     State Department
           -Joseph and Stewart Alsop
           -Rogers’s press conference

     The President’s schedule
          -Possible meeting with Rogers

           -Timing
                 -Congress
           -Status of Secretary of State
                 -The President’s meeting with Mao Tse-tung
                 -The President’s meeting with congressional leadership
           -Rogers
                 -Previous meeting with Haldeman
                       -Alsop
                            -State Department
                                  -Statements about the PRC trip
                                         -Shanghai Communiqué
                                         -Green
                                         -Time magazine
                                               -Chinese perception of Rogers
                                         -Articles critical of Rogers
                                               -Newsweek
Kissinger’s schedule
     -Meeting with John B. Connally

Press
        -Local press
        -News summary
              -American public opinion
        -News magazines
        -Ronald L. Ziegler
        -Writing press
        -Television
        -State Department
              -Rogers
                    -The President’s meeting with Mao Tse-tung
                          -Questions from Congress
                          -Administration strategy for negotiations
                    -Plenary sessions
                    -Chou En-lai
                    -Foreign ministers
              -White House
                    -Forthcoming US-Soviet summit
              -Statements
              -Rogers
                    -Congressional leaders
                    -Cabinet
                    -Time and Newsweek

      -Issue
            -Significance
      -Secretaries of State
            -Previous Presidential trips
                  -Dean Rusk
                        -John F. Kennedy
                             -Europe
                             -Nassau
                  -John Foster Dulles
                        -Dwight D. Eisenhower
                  -Rogers
                        -The President’s previous trips
                             -Asia
                             -Vietnam
                             -Romania
      -The President’s view
      -Meeting with the President
            -Haldeman’s participation
      -W[illiam]Stuart Symington
      -Eisenhower’s support of the President
     -Haldeman’s view
-Kissinger’s view
     -Previous Secretaries of State
-Bureaucracy
-Rogers
     -Congressional leaders meeting
            -John D. Ehrlichman’s reaction
     -Meeting with State Department officials
            -Emil (“Bus”) Mosbacher, Jr.
      -Foreign minister-level discussions
            -Forthcoming US-Soviet summit
                  -Andrei A. Gromyko
      -The President’s meeting with Mao Tse-tung
            -Chou En-lai
      -The President’s forthcoming meeting with Leonid I. Brezhnev
            -Rogers’s participation
     -The President’s meetings with foreign ministers
            -Receiving lines
            -Plenary sessions
      -Walter L. Cronkite, Jr.
      -Max Frankel
      -Press

                      -Joseph Alsop
                           -State Department statements
                                 -The President’s PRC trip
                           -Shanghai Communiqué
                           -Stewart Alsop
                      -Haldeman’s view
                      -Kissinger’s backgrounder
                      -The President’s forthcoming meeting with Rogers
                            -The President’s view
                      -Benjamin C. Bradlee
                            -Rogers’s meeting with editorial staff of the Washington Post
                      -The President’s view
                      -Kissinger’s view
                           -Rogers compared to Clark M. Clifford

     State Department
           -Cambodia
                -Kissinger’s view
                     -Settlement
                     -Sihanoukville
                           -Vietnam
           -Vietnam
           -PRC
                -The President’s meeting with Mao Tse-tung
                     -Rogers

Kissinger left at 10:47 am.

     The President’s schedule
          -Charles W. Colson
               -Unknown man
                      -Meeting
                           -Time
                      -The President’s view
                           -State dinner for Nihat Erim, March 21, 1972

Haldeman left at 10:48 am.

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.

Well, he promised not to support his brother.
He didn't promise to support us.
He said he wouldn't make an attack on us.
He admits now Taiwan, he said they were all on.
That he says we're in good shape on.
His concern now is ridiculous.
His concern is the impressions.
that we were pulling out of Asia, I said, Jim.
He didn't read anything.
Well, I said, Jim, let me tell you something, indiscreet.
The president spent an hour and a half of his first session with Joe, explaining to him why we were going to stay in Asia and why we were not going to pull out of Asia.
I know no other American politician who would have, a political leader who would have done that.
He isn't very bright, but he...
And his brother Phil has been working on that.
Well Henry, for God's sakes, we can't do it.
On time on, he said it's fully reassured.
A little faster, perhaps.
We had him as long as we could, and he's just, he's got a problem.
But they've got a base up in the back, but they're going to be okay.
What are we going to do?
I thought that was a very useful meeting.
Oh, and as for the blast we got yesterday from Peking, actually, it was double-edged, because it really showed us how interested, really did things to them last week at last.
Yes, that A, they did it privately.
Not in writing, even.
B, that they coupled it by agreeing within 48 hours to receiving the two house people.
They agreed to the establishment of the chapel.
Yeah.
I'm trying to think of a response.
I've got to give the state something to battle about.
I see him.
There's a bait that says they're going to hit him.
He's the second one.
He's the third one.
He's the third one.
The current administration's decision to assume area increases tomorrow always.
uh...
I mean, the letter and all, I've heard it shows what the second point is.
Yes, I have heard it.
But the very fact is that we should not have just looked into the future.
I think you have to watch those things and see what the hell they want to see us run and say, look, pay no attention.
But what I did do is to tell them on Friday that there would be no further statements, which was...
But I mean, you're not that firm statement, so to say.
So if something comes, I would just immediately say something else.
I would not wait.
Because why let things build up and just say that...
And I always say to the president, you can say you tend to yourself, the president wants you to know that this statement was not authorized and he's disappointed anymore.
This statement, of course, is totally inaccurate.
This statement might remember the House of Assembly wrong, but I think it's important in terms of the relations with them to reach to an agreement.
The other side of the coin, however, is that we have to be
realistic, we can't do it three times a week or they'll figure it out.
I understand.
If it happens once a month, we can do it.
Yeah.
What I want to say is plant things and you see a building up there, you can see a building up there.
The other thing is I feel that we've got to do something or at least consider the possibility that the
And I don't know how to get this work to change.
We did cover it.
Remember, I did tell him that I'll appear as far as Bach and so forth is concerned.
We have to take the necessary steps to protect our voices, if you know what I mean, and that sort of thing.
We cannot be in that position by reason of their postponing this meeting.
But having them start to push at the right time.
Do you understand?
Absolutely not.
And I feel it's very important that we do that, and also I think it's important to do it in terms of the massive effect.
It is so they absolutely don't put it out in a massive propaganda way.
But I think Mr. President, we're in good shape.
If they start a push, we'll clobber it, and we'll say they again postponed the meeting.
They proposed it, we accepted it.
I wonder if the Chinese may be somewhat convinced that we did not tell them about the meeting.
I think, Mr. President, I'm not so sure as you are of the connection.
I'm not so sure.
Well, I'm not so sure about the connection.
You are the way that they have kept us on, but I'm not so sure of the connection.
But I know that the minority of the meetings may have decided to go strong.
Because they didn't want us to go back to China.
They said we should have gone home.
No, but they knew ahead of time that it was going to be after the Chinese IPV, Mr. President.
No, I had the reaction to the Chinese thing, etc., and all that.
No, but they asked for it the week before we went to China, and they accepted it two days after we returned from China.
I'm talking about the same house.
They generally did not like to hit us at a time.
We were supposed to be affected.
postpone the meeting and they do not like to hear us or negotiate or anything at a time when we are writing high.
They're feeling not that we're doing recently well in public opinion.
They'd rather give us a couple of bells and then, you see my point?
It isn't a good time for them to be meeting us.
Well, Mr. President, I agree.
I was astonished when they asked for the meeting.
On the other hand, they don't make that decision lightly.
Secondly, they
affirmed it last Wednesday and reaffirmed it on Saturday.
And, but what I think is very likely to have happened is that they asked for a claim that the way Li Dazhou usually talks is via peaking in Moscow.
And of course it's possible that Moscow told them not to do it.
I'm inclined to think that in this case it would have been mortifying for Peking that within three weeks of our leaving Peking they show up in
That it's apart from whatever we said.
And that what we said added a little bit to it.
They didn't complain about what you said at all.
They put it all on the roster.
They didn't even...
They've got the means to play.
You've got to play a lot.
It's always too blurred.
Yours wasn't the headline.
Well, he jumped to the conclusion that it would be directly related to the whole thing.
But now it's gone.
Now, the thing is that I know the state can put out a statement to the effect that I would announce that, depending on what that stretch of the nation, I think it was in there.
I know.
Now, they said it would be announced or something, but I don't know.
I think I'll just wrap this up while we reaffirm it today.
I'm going to take the line.
The matter is under consideration.
I will announce the decision when I'm ready.
I think we should do it by the end of the month, Mr. President, because the heed will build up.
Congress may pass a resolution.
I'd like to keep the State Department moving.
Then I guess we can figure out on this issue.
Moody's has now signed a very forthcoming communique in Moscow, and we don't want to create the impression that we... Well, then, you prepare the answer along the lines of what you have to tell us.
Gee, I don't know the answer.
It's easy to say, yeah, we're planning to do it, but I don't think we should say it right now.
No, I think we should say it the last week in March, and we should let you know... Should we tell them now?
I think we should... Don't press that.
We should say the press... Oh, no.
No, no, no.
You have asked us...
I said he had to demand it under consideration.
Well, I... As soon as I have it later on... And as soon as you...
I think we should do it around the 27th and you should tell the Chinese around me.
Yeah.
Have the Indians withdrawn?
They will withdraw around the 25th or 28th.
Okay.
That's what he said.
He said, they're going to be the last.
Well, one thing we have to realize, Henry, is that you can't be, you can't please God or any of these Chinese and do something like what we have.
We've got such a bad, delicate game to play here.
People have got to be prepared for the fact that the Chinese are going to very strongly disagree with us on our vision.
Well, it's interesting that they're reluctant to do it publicly.
Well, at this point, yeah, they will eventually.
We end up on the different side of the issues.
But would you agree that... Yeah, but I think we're doing extremely well ahead of time as well as we've
the President is miraculous that we kept this delicate balance going as well as we have.
On this Vietnamese postponement, it is, of course, a disappointment, but it was...
I'm going to come recently.
Roger's trip, he'll be back, or he'll be in Africa, or the last few years on the weekend.
What is... Wendell is...
Why does Roberts go to South America?
Will he be there, or will he go to Paris, or will he be back?
He'll be back.
He's going to South America in a week, two weeks.
Twenty seconds, insofar as I know, but I haven't seen any feedback.
The Israeli ambassador, who I talked yesterday about, I want to get some ideas from him about the Russian negotiation.
Is...
says he's heard he's been going, because information is usually good.
If he's not going, it's up there.
I noticed the peace center in Newsweek, where they said that Rogers was downgraded, and that the State Department has lowered morale since the McCartney days.
God damn those people.
I think they ought to fire them all.
Mr. President, I don't know whether Bob has talked to you about this yesterday.
Did he mention it to you?
What?
They weren't around?
No, no, not that, but that both Joe and Stuart are somewhere, and to say that State has been going around town pissing on the trip, saying it wasn't worthwhile.
Stuart got all his information from State, some of it a total lie, that they had warned you against a high-level approach in 70, which is total nonsense.
They weren't even dreaming of a high-level approach.
And that Chinese officials, they told Time,
Chinese officials were perplexed by the treatment of Rajas and were asking Americans why you were treating Rajas, whether you had had a personal quarrel with Rajas.
Now, you know this isn't true.
You know the Chinese officials were complaining about that they were giving Rajas too much of a role.
And they would never accept it.
I mean, that is a blatant lie.
Jesus Christ.
Our real problem is begging them to see us.
Who the hell got Joe to go see him that last day?
Who arranged it on the airplane?
Hell, I did.
He didn't want it.
You arranged it on the airplane.
I arranged it in Shanghai.
I tried to get Miles O'Brien into the communicator after sessions twice.
So it's inconceivable that the Chinese did this.
As it was, when you talk about state, what do you think it is?
Do you think Russia is pissing off people?
Or do you think it's that high?
Well, I think it's high enough.
I think it's high enough, but Joe and Stuart Alsop would not say it is.
And I didn't ask them.
What do they think?
What do they think we should do about it?
They don't believe it, do they?
Oh, no.
Come on.
No, Joe is totally on our side.
Well, they think, well, Stuart thinks, that Russia ought to be replaced.
I told him.
Now?
To think about it, that it cannot be done now.
I'm worried you thought about that.
I know you have thought.
I used to be for it.
I now recognize that.
Too late.
Well, it's also too late, and any new man you'd put in couldn't clean house now, before the election.
They only asked me to possibly put in at this point in Russia.
And he couldn't do a damn thing, so he'd be loyal.
Yeah, but then you may have hamstrung yourself.
I don't think Rush can go four years.
I understand.
But he would be loyal.
But on the other hand, looking at this whole thing, I was just reading a news summary out there.
I think it was reading time in our region throughout.
Oh, yes.
Yeah, and you have to remember now, I think both of them are...
There is a who won, who lost, all that bullshit.
The one thing they don't get across, neither one, of course, and I understand this, neither one get across the fact of the president's enormous preparation and discipline and his conduct in the meeting.
It's not a piece in any column that I've seen yet.
I don't know why it is, but they apparently just want to write it.
Death is not, well, they have died.
The other point is that they don't, that they're getting across, they're trying to say, well, who won, who lost, and missing the enormous importance of those sections of the convention that deal with the, uh, uh, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the,
can't relapse the Sunday Times catalog.
They don't think about foreign policy conceptually.
Secondly, you are emotionally killing them.
You've had a bigger triumph by far than any that Kennedy had, even visibly, even television-wise.
And you've behaved magnificently visibly as far as the American public is concerned.
They add on top of it
They should be had eaten better and drier, they say.
That's a part of the story of your investigation.
He got somebody who would give him a scalpel.
He had something he didn't want him to leave.
Oh no, that he should leave.
Although I'm not saying I'm a person of exceptional mission.
I know that substantively the arguments go away and people get all confused.
The main asset that we need to have conserved out of this trip is a different presidential image.
And if we can do that, I mean, we're close.
But I think it must not be just something that they'll believe and go around and tip glasses and be dignified.
But it must be that by God, in long sessions, that all of those, what the hell are they doing?
You know what I mean?
I think, Mr. President, you have that.
I do believe that you have
that the image of you is now totally different from what it was before.
Totally.
I talked to Bob yesterday, and that's his impression too.
I called a friend on the West Coast yesterday, a television producer, and he said, by God, I never thought of the President as a great man.
And he said, he's a great man.
Was he making out with you?
No, no, no.
They all commented on the dignity, humility,
And I said, all you have seen is the Nixon that I've seen for three years.
I've been trying to tell this to you.
And that is the enormous change in the situation.
This nitpicking around, Mr. President, the average American would trust your evaluation of that.
Now, let me say, as far as I'm concerned, I can pick and screw around all I want, but we're doing the right thing, and the right thing is...
You get it off in a minute, but if you've got it in the morning, or you could be not losing it.
So I'm not going to put it in a minute.
Well, I'm going to have to proceed with the treatment.
I'm just trying to make sure.
Now I, uh, you know, I feel that one thing I must say is that we've done this very good for you.
For you and I, exactly.
So I feel that, you know, I have felt it over and I've, uh, you know, I'm completely on my feet and I haven't gained any weight.
So, you know.
I'm just totally relaxed.
I'm not going to let these factors get under my skin.
I feel better than I have.
It's not about the ITT, but I want you there.
I want you there.
Jesus Christ.
Now that's beginning to turn.
That's my impression.
Thank you.
Well, we're trying to get the, uh, get the, uh, thing, uh, Andy was talking a little about his conversation with the, uh, with the office, you know.
Okay, well, there's only going to, uh, there's, uh, I guess, I guess we need to, uh, finance, uh, probably for coal and oil and other things.
Is Bill going to have a press conference today?
Yeah.
Oh, of course he'll actually have a press conference.
At least as of last night, as he called last night, he wants to see you.
Well, he said, first of all, before I said, let me see what we can work out for tomorrow.
And then I said, we do have the leaders meeting and all that.
He said, well, as a matter of fact, it's probably about me to get ready in the morning anyway.
It'd be better if I could see him in the afternoon.
He wants to see you before he goes to the Hill tomorrow.
It's his main thing.
And his concern is that
It's just unbelievable.
This whole concern is not how do we policy or anything else.
It's what am I going to do about all these articles that are appearing everywhere about the downgrading of the Secretary of State?
And how can I explain why I wasn't in the Mount meeting?
I said, well, I thought the President had already covered that at the leaders meeting along the line that you had suggested.
And he said, well, I don't know if that's going to wash it.
Maybe I could just say it was a very easily called painting or something.
I jumped on him very hard on the stuff that Alsop has still less than his model.
He took out 90% apparently of what he had from state and on the stuff in time magazine from state.
and about the slaves running down the community.
Yeah, and then saying that the president would have been in time had a big thing about the president would have been better off not to go, that the State Department saw it all.
No, that was outside of this.
Outside of that, they had a statement that the state had warned you against going.
Right.
And had lifted all the perils last year for you.
And then in effect green is saving now what we screwed up by going to the
allies.
I mean, to have these guys in the position of saving our allies is really sickening.
And time has, what does time have?
Oh, that time has that statement that the Chinese were perplexed at the downgrading of Rajah.
And then they controlled it.
We worked our tails off to get him to everything we could.
The Chinese wouldn't let him in.
They did more for him, by far, than they wanted to.
But I hit him on that and said, well, how come you see all those articles and don't see the ones that take me on?
And I said, well, I read the magazines, and that's what's in them.
There was one news release that actually counted.
Actually, Mr. President, when you read the local press, and in fact when you read the news summary, which tends to emphasize the negative...
I have the impression that the public feeling is totally for you.
There isn't anybody I talk to, including most of whom are normally...
The news magazines, that's true, there's some of that, but they're...
The news magazines, uh... Don't you think about it?
There's people in the press, he knows it as well as anybody.
There's people in the press who are against us and they've got now to cut it up, that's all.
If we had depended on the writing press, I've never been more wrong in any judgment.
Without television, they would have made it look like a setback.
I think that's right.
I don't see this enormous problem about the state and the rest.
I think it's all hell.
He's brought them out.
They haven't been treated nice.
What the hell else can I say?
The God damn meeting was a piece of the arrangement.
He doesn't raise a question.
He says that's what they'll focus in on.
Why were you downgraded?
Why wasn't the State Department...
Why don't you hit back on that?
Why don't you make the point that you never are in those meetings because you're in counterpart meetings and you and the president have a productive approach to these things the way you've never done and having a big mob of people all sitting in a room getting nothing done.
He wanted to, he couldn't.
We had two plenary sessions.
The way you can install this is to deal from strength.
That's the way it's going to be in the future.
You had two plenary sessions.
He had an hour and a half along with Joe.
He had Joe calling on him in his room.
If these guys...
But you know, sir, I'm bleeding about that.
Well, he shouldn't explain that.
He should say, I've had a hell of a lot of funny meetings with him, but that isn't the way we work.
I don't want meetings with... Well, it hasn't been the way he's intended it to be.
Well, I'm true that I was there.
That's the way he should say it.
It's not good to do that.
He should say, well, you know, of course I met with him, but that isn't the point.
The point is I spent my time working with the foreign minister and getting other things looked down.
What I don't understand is that he doesn't see that his little path that's using his humiliations
to build themselves up.
He is humiliating.
I mean, he is humiliating.
They're trying to humiliate him.
They're trying to knock down the White House and so forth.
They have no idea what we have in mind and the Russians and so on and so forth.
I mean, it's a bunch of next problems because Bill obviously is looking, he's looking to have less than he can handle.
And there's just a bloody
I mean, for the State Department, there isn't one quote in any newspaper or magazine quoting a State Department man saying, this is the most tremendous thing we've been hoping for for 20 years.
Everything is your briefing, your speech and my briefing.
Are they saying anything good to Bill?
Oh, Bill?
No.
He was very modest before the leaders on it, I must say.
He was a little better at the cabinet.
Bill hasn't said anything bad, but he isn't notable by his running around the town.
Right.
Time and Newsweek are not quoting, no newspaper is quoting any official other than the President and the Secretary of State.
Although, let's keep it in perspective now, Bob, keeping it in perspective, do you think that this is a hell of a big issue in the country?
No.
You mean the Rockies?
Yeah, the Rockies.
Oh, of course not.
I don't think it's a big issue.
The Secretary of State, whether he went on a trip or not, let alone whether he stopped at what meetings,
In previous administrations, they often didn't go on trips.
Russ didn't go on the President's European trip, on either of them, on President Kennedy's European trip.
He didn't go to NASA.
I'm just thinking of two or three things which I know he didn't go to NASA.
And Rogers hasn't gone with you on everything.
He dropped off on the Asian trip and didn't go to Vietnam, remember?
You remember?
He wasn't anxious to go.
He went to Romania.
He didn't want to go there.
He wished that, well, there had been actors.
You know what I mean?
He scooted on.
He wants to be.
I mean, God damn it.
It's the attitude that burns my... Why doesn't he try to say this is a good thing?
Well, when he comes in, I think you should come in with him.
And if you think so, let him off, unless here's on.
That's all.
God damn it.
He can't say that we're downgrading.
Henry isn't downgrading.
I am downgrading.
That was his complaint.
On the contrary, you read my background.
He says, you haven't built him up.
And I said, well, good Lord, Bill.
After we had that flap about the Stuart Symington and the cocktail circuit or something, you know, the president leaned over backwards to build you up.
And that backfires because that makes you look weak when he does do that.
The way to build you up is for you to deal with the strength, not for someone else to come around and follow you up.
Well, what the hell did he do?
And the leader's game just played off of that and said...
Well, he said, nobody understands this problem better than the president because he knows how Eisenhower didn't back him up.
And me and I talked about that a lot in those days.
I have the same problem now.
And I said, no, he didn't give a damn whether Eisenhower backed me up.
I can tell you that.
But I said, you know, this isn't the same kind of thing at all.
This isn't a matter of the kind of thing like Eisenhower.
The president has gone to great lengths to back you up, to include you in all those things and all that.
But you've got to
Play it as though you're in a strong position, which you are, which is that you're conducting your own meeting.
You're not just sitting along at the president's elbow at his meeting.
If they went around gloating about the communique and about the trip, they'd be part of the team.
But they always want to run a competitive enterprise and get credit for what they do rather than what the president did.
That is a losing proposition.
That's what they get into trouble about.
All the strong secretaries of state have been loyalists to their president.
They have not run competing in the crisis.
Bill tries to convince himself that that's what he is.
He says, oh, I just want help.
What does he mean by bureaucracy?
What did he say?
I said that.
I said, well, I can't control the bureaucracy.
There's a lot to do.
But if they all sit downtown, if these guys...
He said he had a session with them, told them all about what a great day it was.
But if they went around, a standing ovation at the end.
But if they went around town, were they all so...
So how strong was he?
What was the dealing with the foreign minister?
He told the leaders that, you know, I didn't have to build them up.
He built himself up with the leaders meeting.
And in the wrong, he shouldn't though.
That's what I've got a list of them, so.
Yeah, on the leaders' meeting.
Tell them about, uh, most early in this reaction, I think, because we've heard from them, so.
Yeah, that's kind of correct.
Earlier, the goddamn thing that surprised me is he had been there, and he said it was just, just, Rogers completely, everybody that was there was really shocked, was shocked.
I said, why, why did he say they were shocked?
Because of his, what was it, his weakness, really, and the lack of, of being a part of the thing.
Well, Martin Becker told me that at his meeting,
with his own people, with which Mosbacher attended.
He pulled the same speech.
And Mosbacher didn't know anything of what had come on the speech.
Well, he said it was an astonished performance.
He made it sound as if he had done everything.
And Bud Batting had foreign ministers around.
He said, what does the president of the show talk about?
You know, he really...
Uh, when I said foreign minister, they must have appeared.
It won't be that way for me, though.
We've got to deal with some.
I mean, you'll have something to talk about, but the difficulty is, Bobby, you just, you just, you can't, you can't, you can't, you can't trust Bill to make the deals.
That's all there is to it.
We've got to do it in advance.
There must be a way.
We've got to push a little, uh, screw around with the lengths and the language, and that's probably the best way, isn't it?
That doesn't bother him because there's no mileage in that.
I think if we had had him at the first Mao meeting, at that Mao meeting, that was...
But Mao wasn't about to have him there at that time.
It wasn't that he wasn't there.
It wasn't that he wasn't there.
It was the whole thing.
The lady could have stopped and said, just a minute, we have to get the second case.
I said, no, because Joe came into the house and they were gone in a matter of minutes.
No.
I said, well, we shouldn't have dealt with it then.
Yeah, we should have had pressure.
It should have happened with pressure the first day, just to shut that out.
That would be easy.
That would be easy, but... No, I don't think the Secretary should have stayed the first day here, except in a receiving mind.
But the President said the goddamn thing.
You know that, my niece?
I never said anything except in a plenary session at the end.
But the trouble is, he didn't even do that.
His own people saw an opportunity there, while we were all gone, defeated.
It wasn't his own people, because he said it was Comte, Max Frankl, and those people that were, you know, probably when they were out there.
But I know it's a problem.
Bill, apparently, oh, he doesn't disagree with God damn it.
He's on the best of it.
He doesn't agree with the whole thing.
He hasn't read the outside problems.
He's standing on his spiritual path.
And his people, I'm not saying he wouldn't do that.
I mean, I remember that.
But his people clearly, Joe Alsop was in yesterday, and he said this most astonishing thing happened.
And it seemed to say about him, and called on it, and told him the whole trip wasn't any good.
And, uh,
The president didn't have to go.
Now they're building me up.
They should have had it all done already.
That's fine.
It was all worth having at the time.
There was no point.
There was no point in your going.
Now that, actually, I told Joe.
Tell him if you were going.
Well, I said, Joe, first of all, the president did something that no one but the president could have done by convincing the Chinese that we knew what we were doing and setting the parallel course.
And secondly, just for the record, on the communique, every concession was made by the Chinese
while the president was there and and therefore it is also factually even on the communique which is not the most important thing wrong well he sees it stewart needed a little explaining well hell rogers is so damn stupid to to let him play that line when the line he's put up
clearly establishes him in a major role in putting the thing together by it being done when you were over there.
And also if you see my... And if you see my background, I said every day I would receive instructions from the Secretary of State, the President.
I put myself in a totally subordinate role to him.
Of course you are, sir.
Bradley thinks that he's gone.
That was before the trip.
He said he invited the whole editorial board
of the Washington Post over there, and they decided that he had emotionally disintegrated, that there wasn't...
He was saying there is no problem.
He personally had solved all problems.
It was a monologue of eyes, and it was so trite that they were embarrassed.
The difficulty line was built.
Mr. President, if he sounded impressive, he would be the Clifford of this administration.
The one thing that has saved it from happening is that no one takes him seriously.
He's tried to posture himself as a good guy in every issue.
Well, is it going to help him to...
I'll let you know.
Is it going to help him to, to, uh, to create a position of dissent on the China thing?
He won't dissent.
Oh, no, he won't.
But if the state is, is it going to help him?
No.
It isn't.
That's my point.
I'm just arguing.
That's the point.
He doesn't want to be arguing for it.
And they ought to do it with enthusiasm.
It's like camp audio.
They sort of let the word out that they don't like it, then they say some formal things.
That's supported.
They ought to be out there every day.
Can't believe the message.
Yes.
What did you say to them?
I said that the only way we can get a decent settlement is for all of us to stick together and not to have separate negotiations.
We have included them in all of our negotiations.
But you got to the point that a separate settlement by Cambodia, which was old enough, could sink Vietnam.
Don't you think that point?
Oh, yes.
And that they're all safe.
It depends on that.
Also, our aim is not Cambodia.
We could lose Cambodia, it doesn't make any difference.
But if Vietnam is lost now, we're screwed.
That's what they don't understand.
But that is another example where the State Department, by back-channeling, has started a negotiation without ever telling us in it.
But...
Sorry, I had... God, how many times do I have to tell you this?
this situation.
Basically, I'm convinced it didn't want him at the Mount Eden because of his physical condition at the Mount Eden.
That's why I put out he was well.
I put out a lot of stuff that we were there.
Do you want to post for a second?
It's available on half hour notice if you want it.
I'll bring it in about 11.15 when I'm there if you want to see it.
On second thought, I think not.
I thought it was last night that he mentioned it.
You know, but he is bringing the Turkish dead.
And I bet they're going to bring him in.
You know what I'm laughing at?
I'm trying to suppose.
I'm trying to make sure.
In my mind, I'm just saying that, look, I got tied up, and I'll sit in the dinner, and I'll make an appointment to get a chance to talk to you about it.