On April 17, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon, Henry A. Kissinger, White House operator, and William P. Rogers met in the Oval Office of the White House from 8:58 am to 9:34 am. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 709-008 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 Do not cite this transcript as authoritative.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.
Good morning, President.
We have another table from May.
It says, obviously, the fat is on the fire at Yuan.
We will need the coolest of nerve from here on.
And from my perspective, it is essential that we continue to play our hand with the utmost calm and confidence.
As you know, several occasions in the past have involved similar mistakings.
Although there has been less opportunity for events to be influenced by spasms of uncertainty in the domestic scene, on balance, the military situation here is now well under control.
As I reported yesterday, in the near term, the enemy will only suffer severe setbacks, and then the rest is all technical stuff.
And we discussed with Abrams this idea of a troop withdrawal of 20,000, of an announcement,
which would get us down to 5 July 1st, which would get us down to where we could say we've withdrawn 500,000 troops.
And he thinks it can be done, but he wants to let me know tomorrow.
And that I would recommend you now that you press conference.
Do you have one next week?
Yeah, I've got one later.
Now, last night after you had retired, the prelim came in with a Russian message
which he said since they don't want to say too much publicly, but rather tough, it doesn't have any concrete things, but after five pages of tough talk, which is standard tough talk, he said, they've transmitted our considerations to Hanoi and will give us a reply as soon as, which is amazing, because in the past they always took the position that they were
Now, my recommendation is that we say to this, there will be no answer.
They know what our policy is, and we are just going to pursue it.
But if that's going to be their attitude, I can tell them now nothing will come out of the discussion.
See if I understand.
I mean, under these circumstances, we'll go.
I think it puts us domestically, the reasons you have for deciding to go.
I don't agree that it's two for them and one for us.
It's two for us and almost nothing for them.
And what do they get out of it?
They receive me three days after we bomb Hanalei and I bomb them.
In any event, as far as the Green Game comes in, the computer is still on.
Yeah.
Oh, yeah, they didn't care.
They didn't do anything.
It's just what I think they did, Mr. President, is to send this first part to Hanoi to show, because the public has been rather mild.
The CIA has been very mild.
No, let me read you this, the CIA analysis, and the CIA is always alarmed.
Moscow is getting its population on its can, who took the U.S. airstrike on Hanoi and Haiphong.
Typically, the Soviets have not acknowledged damage to their ships at Haiphong.
How many were there, 40 in China?
Yeah, Soviet, 40.
That's good.
I think it's good.
Yeah.
The protest failed to mention the strikes on Hanoi or anywhere else in North Vietnam.
Its concentration on the Soviet ship, its failure to mention any intruding Soviet personnel, and its delivery at the low level of Deputy Foreign Minister indicates that the Soviets did not want to overstress the implications of the airstrike on U.S.-Soviet relations.
Maintaining Moscow's recent public reticence about aid commitments to North Vietnam, the past statement merely noted that the U.S. is armed with international duties.
The analysis of Cho's remarks is, Cho's remarks add little more than a compendium of cliches used by the Chinese over the past few years to describe the war.
It makes no mention of Chinese assistance of President Nixon or of damage to the Soviet ships.
Then Hanoi has made a public statement saying that their friends in the world would in time condemn the United States, in time.
And the CIA says it last appears to be yet another call for greater support from the USSR and China.
In this connection, North Vietnamese have complained the Soviet aspect of their aid, and so forth.
Now, one problem we have, I hope, around this goes, and they're determined in time.
There's just one.
I don't know what we could do.
I don't know whether you want to give him a call.
He talked to me last night, but only very briefly.
I assumed everything.
He said he'd gotten all the information.
We're about 7.30, and that you talked to him.
Yeah.
I think it'd be tough and determined.
Now, today, the North Vietnamese announced that they were prepared essentially to go back to Paris to resume plenary sessions, if we resume plenary sessions.
And, however, the requirement is that the bombing starts.
Well, that's the very thing the border
I think the only thing that I see this morning is this silly suggestion that the North Indian Green City Assembly has to go back to Paris to resume discussions.
the bombing stopped.
Well, of course, that's really glad it stopped the bombing.
One of the things I did want to say on the curtain is that if you would just play it in a way that will keep guessing.
Obviously, I don't know whether any of these members of the committee will have noted the very potential movement of naval ships.
having noted that they will, they might have to provide a blockade.
If they do, I would leave it variable, because it is something that we may have to move to quite soon.
And so I just say, well, I just, you know what I mean, it's a military decision, and we, we wish necessary.
So that's the one thing, and I wouldn't want, in other words, you to get in a position where we had to go, but look as if we had, you know, backed down from something you said.
Oh, well, that should be ruled out.
That has been done here, but you can say, well, as Mr. Ziegler said, and I have, too, a number of cases of nuclear weapons that are neither necessary nor advisable in this part of the world, but we will do what is necessary against military targets to stop the killing of North Vietnamese and Americans in the South or South Vietnamese in the South.
That's sort of the cliche I get made.
That's correct, that's correct.
Well, that's right, we're not going to, we're not going to reintroduce, we're not going to ask for like grounding because, and I put that very positively, let's say that the South Vietnamese now are trained to, and are undertaking the ground fighting, they're fighting very courageously, they're doing very well.
Also, I think you might point out that in that respect, if you would,
The fact that if they say, well, it's the air thing going on here.
Now, look here.
Of course, it will stop the moment we get this thing over.
But the South Vietnamese are fighting half of the tactical airport.
I'm sorry.
I sent that figure over to you.
Yeah.
We have replied.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It was clear this morning.
It was clear this morning, yeah.
I've been in here some time.
We made the answer to the Soviet protest.
Oh, yeah, that, but not even the first, obviously.
Yeah, yeah.
No, that's right.
But we've already replied.
We've already replied.
Incidentally, both the Soviet and the Chinese protests are just looking at the CIA analysis.
They're just routine stuff.
I mean, they don't say they're going to say it and send in forces and all that sort of thing.
Well, the most important thing is to have in mind the fact
uh they will ask you about summit and i think you're just you sail there well we have no we're going forward with our plan to be uh because uh i think it's a we should see you'll see i don't know there is nothing happening in my opinion because they've got another fishing product except that we might have to cancel it that's the problem but that's that's not their problem
Well, good luck.
You'll have a good one.
I think that the stronger position you can take, I mean, not the literature, but, you know, just, but in any fact, I think that's the point that's at, well, we're doing what it's, and also, I think it's, I think as I told you, I talked to, uh, uh,
Really great that I mentioned that to you.
Well, he called me yesterday, and he had talked to the chancellor of the University of North Carolina.
You know how liberal those people are.
The chancellor had said, you know, I wish you'd tell the president you're talking to him that.
We don't think we're going to have some student problems, but it's not like before, he said, because this one is not an invasion of another country.
Second, he said, and he made the two points that we made, he said,
Our students now, even those that are not for the president, really believe he's really tried.
He's withdrawn 500,000 people.
He's gone with China.
He's made an offer privately and publicly.
And then for them to offer this with stepping up the fighting, what else can we do?
That sort of thing.
Yeah.
Well, why don't you, how do you read it?
I haven't, I just saw the paper this morning.
I haven't read the ground things.
It looked like it's holding on.
Well, let me say it.
It's, I think, I'd be sure to let the boys know that it
Of course, we've got plenty of bombing stuff out there now, and Abrams is going to use it right up to the hill in the battle area from now on.
All military targets, and it is the God's truth that they're not limiting it.
Sometimes you can get that some more subtle way.
Beautiful.
If you think it's a blockade, it's got to be Tampa.
You look like a horse.
It's a blockade because, you know, that's illegal.
It's illegal.
Huh?
You understand?
Oh, yeah.
I think it's beautiful.
Mr. Bennett, I think it's quite true.
I have the idea that when I'm in a blockade, you think I'm just guessing, but I'm not.
I'm totally committed to blockade.
The end of this week.
You've done.
Well, we have to wait till I get back from Moscow.
Wait a minute.
That's the end of this week.
No, I'll be back Sunday night.
That's the end of this week.
Oh, right.
Next week.
I mean, as soon as you get back from Moscow, if that's a hard line, Richard, and to blockade him.
Mr. President, I think you've always done what you said you would do.
And I...
have every, no, I think that's what you will do, and I think that's what you should do.
You see, if you, when you really carry out an energy error to the extreme, your analysis, that you can't have the North Vietnamese destroy two presidents, then that, it isn't really quite on all fours, because Johnson destroyed himself, and in my case, I do not feel it that way, and I would do it, frankly, if it were the country.
Nevertheless.
No, but that is for the good of the country.
That's why I'm saying it, Mr. President.
With all my loyalty, I think we cannot have these little princes destroy confidence in our government.
Well, anyway, I'm going to tell you that if I'm going to mention a country, see, let me be quite clear.
Kennedy
even leading a nation that was infinitely stronger than any potential enemy, was unable to conduct a very successful foreign policy because he lacked iron nerves and lacked good advisors.
Johnson was in the same position for whatever reason, because he didn't have any experience.
because of the, what's happening here in the rest, okay, that there is a very good chance, and it doesn't bother me one damn bit, from a personal standpoint, there's a very good chance that sitting in this chair could be somebody else.
It could be a Muskie, it could be a Humphrey, it could be a Teddy, one of those three on the Democratic side.
On the Republican side,
They won't be able to erase anybody.
Rockefeller probably didn't get the nomination.
I don't know who they would nominate.
But nevertheless, here's the point.
I know that I have to leave this office in a position as strong as I possibly can because whoever succeeds me, either because of lack of experience or because of lack of character, guts,
any weaker of the United States would surrender the whole thing.
You understand?
Now that is why, that is why what I have to do, I have to do it not only to assure that if I'm here we can conduct a successful foreign policy, I have to do it, and this is even more important, so that some quarter-weeks on the way to sitting here with the best of intentions can conduct.
It'll be hard enough to put him in his chair.
It'll be hard enough for him to conduct foreign policy in the United States as not the hell of a subject.
It'll be very hard, because he's a gibbering idiot at times.
Well-intentioned, but gibbering.
Muskie has proved that he has no character.
And Teddy is, well, an unbelievable one.
It's his up and down.
What can I tell him to do?
So you cannot leave
You just can't leave the thing.
Now, under these circumstances, as I've often said, it may be that I'm the last person in this office for some time until somebody else has developed along the same lines, I mean, who's tough and experienced, who will be able to conduct strong, responsible board calls.
So, God damn it, we're going to do it.
And that means, that means take every risk, lose every election.
That's what I'm going to do.
Now, people say, oh, well, if you .
I'm not sure.
But the main point is, we have no choice, you see.
The foreign policy of the United States will not be viable if we're to run out of Vietnam.
That's all there is to it.
Mr. President, that is exactly my point.
Selfish, short-sighted, personal point of view.
Your incentive is not to do it.
And my incentive is
I have let it say that I have all these great foreign policy initiatives.
Exactly.
And if one were concerned about public position, one would say one could remain.
Although, Mr. President, I must say one thing.
You're taking let's eat this week than you would if we waited for it.
The first week, the worst heat we took, it began to build up, was when all these little pipsqueaks were saying Vietnamization was a failure.
Excuse me.
That's what Muskie's saying.
He's saying that we've waited.
Yeah, but Muskie is always wrong.
But the fact is, South Vietnamese have healthy guys, and they couldn't have healthy guys.
I ask one question.
We should remain...
And I hope you had somebody tell our staff this.
We should not make, let me put it this way, don't set up any Verdun's out there.
That's what the goddamn French did.
The war went on too long because of Burgant, and also the Germans made a mistake, too.
The point of, you don't set up any Burgants.
And the way it's now created, the Burgant, the schloss got in here in Burgant.
It doesn't make any difference where Amlog goes.
But who would make a difference, Mr. President?
Amlog doesn't.
I know, but let's not say that the way it goes.
That was a great mistake.
Whoever sent this to the New York Times fellow, that was a very, very wrong mistake.
It's a great mistake to talk to the New York Times fellow.
I agree.
You tonight, incidentally, had a very rather pleasant article about you this week.
What?
In life, of how you're handling the crisis and... What's his law?
Well, that you're calm and... No reason at all.
That you...
In fact, he got something that I gave to Jerry Schecter when you had said to me
When I had said to you, it now will go one way or the other, and you had said it now, it will only go one way.
I had told this Schecter last week when I saw him in Florida.
He apparently, he didn't use it in his story, so he decided he must have read it.
What I want you to do with time, if you will, is to play Schecter.
Absolutely.
He's a nice little dog, and he's smart, and that'll teach you a lesson.
See my point?
I don't know who would play in the Times, except some people.
Maybe Frankel.
Frankel is a... Frankel, you want to remember this, too.
And it's true.
Now, God damn it.
Mrs. Mayer knows this.
I think you ought to tell her we... You've heard the President say it.
I want you to give her a meeting and say you've heard the President say it.
To the leaders, he said it a dozen times at once.
And I always start with Israel, and then I go to the deal.
But I say, if the United States fails Vietnam, if a Soviet-supported invasion succeeds there, it will inevitably be next tried in the Middle East, and the United States will not stand there either.
That's what's on the line.
And they should know that.
And I think we ought to get some of our Israeli friends to start supporting us.
I think so.
I'll call Rafi.
Now, to go through immediate tactical issues, do you agree, Mr. President, that I call in Dobrynin and say there's not going to be any reply to this?
The President is determined.
You know his course.
There's no sense engaging in rhetoric.
And we will not reply to this.
And I must tell you informally, if this is what you're going to say to Moscow, my criticism would be a waste of time.
Because we will not be able to make it.
Of course, it's just the usual thing.
We should stop bombing.
Oh, yeah.
They have to do it, Mr. President.
And just say, just say we did it.
Why don't you do it more like I talked to Joe and I?
Look, the president read this and rather smiled.
Look, he smiled and said, well, that's, he said, they have to say this.
And then he turned cold and said, there will be no reply to this.
If the Russians want to talk, because that would be fine.
If they want to talk this way, there's going to be a sign.
I'd be very happy.
Because I'd very much like to see Joanne Strauss.
I like the old part.
You understand?
Do you think that's the way to play it?
Absolutely.
I think the reason, especially to play it frankly, is... Oh, to bring him.
When he said, I'll bring you this, you'd understand we have to do this in confidential channels because we're not saying much in public channels.
Well, Bill asked me whether or not we responded.
We have responded to the Russian government.
No, he had sent over a cable for clearance.
And I held it last night because it was just too anxious and you had retired, which was true.
And that you would clear it in the morning.
And what you said was, yes.
I mean, what you said was exactly that.
You cleared it in the morning.
That's what.
Let me tell you about your trip.
I realized it's not two for them, one for us.
In terms of cosmetics, it may be two for them, one for us, in other terms.
But nevertheless, it's basically just
looking at their big game, the China game, what they want is Henry Kissinger in Moscow because he went to China.
Oh, is he?
I see.
That's what's in it for that man.
You've got to realize, you don't understand what the hell we're giving those sons of bitches.
Now, the other point I make, Henry, is, however, we're doing it for our own reasons.
Our own reasons are, you're going to go, and then we'll blow it.
And I'll blow it.
Maybe the day you come back, I might do it in the press conference.
I knew about the press conference.
I wonder if that would really take the sons of bitches right out to the women, which will open the press conference I'm announcing today with a further withdrawal of Americans and so on and so on.
In the meantime, we're going to continue this.
Make a brief, I might make a brief four or five minute statement about Vietnam and then let
and then take just a bunch and then finally turn off and say, no, look here, we're going to see this through and the American people are going to back it.
It might be a good way to handle personal protection.
What do you think?
I think, Mr. President, you may want to consider either going on television for five minutes announcing I've been there.
It will throw your Democratic opponents into a cuck hat.
They won't even know what to do with it.
And particularly if they produce a North Vietnamese in Moscow.
Listen, if they produce anything, if I announce the movement in Moscow discussing this, what the hell are they going to do then?
That's right.
And so is... And let me tell you, I am convinced though, and we'll talk about this,
Briefly, I will go to Camp David Thursday night.
I think it'd be helpful.
And I'll be there.
And you will be at Camp David.
And nobody's going to know that you aren't there.
You understand that?
Could you stay into Monday?
I'm going to stay right through Sunday and Monday, right?
Good.
I'll stay there.
And I'll come down.
I'll come down Monday to Camp David.
You see what I mean?
Right.
But I'll either... Well, then I'll stay through Monday.
I'll stay all day Monday.
Well, one thing we could do is, Mr. President, is that when I arrive in Andrews,
I come right up to Camp David and fly back with you.
Good.
Monday?
I'll come back if there's a meeting in Paris.
I come back Monday night.
If there's no meeting in Paris, I come back Sunday night.
Fine.
Okay, good.
I'll stay through Monday if there's a meeting in Paris.
And then I'll come up and come back with you.
That's right.
And we've covered it totally.
But we may not want to cover it totally.
Well, we'll see about that.
You should be the one that closes, rather than .
The point is that we should have a meeting here Saturday.
You will not be ready until Wednesday morning to discuss what you're going to say in Moscow.
Well, I have my people, actually.
I have to meet with them now to go over it.
Wednesday morning.
Wednesday morning is fine.
No, Wednesday morning gives me a chance to redo whatever .
I'm going to go over things now.
It may be in Camp David.
It may be here.
But one slight advantage of doing it here, Mr. President, is that I'm going to be away on Thursday.
Anyway, with the argument that I'm in Camp David with you, it might be a little better.
But either way, we can do it.
Well, I'll be here.
We'll meet here.
We'll meet over at the OV and go over to them.
Now, on the other thing, I think that with the Russians,
There's one weakness in our game plan, and what's that like?
We haven't got a goddamn thing we can do this week.
Oh, no.
First of all, we are holding in the South, Mr. President.
Are you saying we are holding?
Oh, yes.
And that's the worst for us.
And that's where each other are holding.
I don't know.
I think it's...
I think it isn't temporary.
But secondly, we are bombing the southern part of North Vietnam, intensively.
Is there any bombing that you could do?
Can you even pattern this week so that it looks like it's a different kind of strike?
Because that's something that would be done if we have another B-3 type strike, just so it's a...
In the south or in the north?
In the south.
Oh, in the southeast.
Yeah.
I would like, I think what I meant is I want something that can be described as a massive different kind of a strike.
Is there any place where you think we could do it?
I'll get a massive strike.
We'll put it this way, that this week, you see what I mean?
I don't want you to go over there.
Well, I'm very frankly, people will know you're there.
I don't want the people here to get the impression.
You see what we're up against.
But next week, they'll know why you did it.
I know, but this week, they'll be right.
Because of Russian and Chinese protests, the United States is going to do it again.
See my point?
We can't be in that position.
We can ride a week of it again.
We can ride a week of it.
If they accuse your people too tough and too soft at the same time,
And then next week, I think if we can avoid, I mean, we've really put it brutally to them.
It isn't, we haven't shown any sort of, and they know, I mean, they know you now, Mr. President.
They know when I come back, without anything to show for it, we're going to blow the lid off.
Particularly having proved that we've made every effort.
Now, the last one.
You see, the deep down decision you've got to make is whether you want to conduct a Moscow talk in a way that will enable us to have a Moscow summit or in a way that will make it leave us no choice but to blockade and flush the summit.
Now, there's one point that's very important.
What I would like to suggest, Mr. President, is that I think we should conduct a summit part of the talks in a very conciliatory and forthcoming manner in such a way that they get a maximum
On the Vietnam side, on the other hand, we should be tough as nails.
Because a middle position, we will not impress these guys with conciliatoriness.
They were not passing messages while Johnson was drooling all over them.
So I think we should do both simultaneously.
On Vietnam, we should be very tough.
What I'm playing with now... What do we get out?
What do we get out?
What do we...
Sorry.
Well, what I think, if we are... We certainly are going to have a ceasefire while we're in Moscow.
That's my point.
Oh, one outcome, Mr. President, that I think we might get is to say, to offer to the Russians, we'll go back to the conditions of May, of March 29th.
That is to say, the North Vietnamese withdraw the three divisions they put across the DMZ, north of the DMZ.
Uh...
They scaled down their military actions to the levels they were on March 29.
This is guaranteed by the Soviets.
We, in turn, stopped the bombing of the North, and we resumed plenary sessions in Paris.
That's a good deal.
That would be a damn good deal, Mr. President.
That would be such a defeat for the North Vietnamese if they had to stop their offensive.
And it makes us look damn good in domestic opinion.
Draw across the DMZ.
Those horses across the DMZ, they probably can't get out of everything.
And we'll stop the bombing of the North.
Because we will have had to deal with the lack of the North at that time.
I hope, I trust, though, that means that Cambridge has got a shellac bed north right now.
It's rigged over out there now.
You've done that, haven't you?
You've got enough horses there.
Is there any more horses we can send out there?
Is there anything left?
We've got horses left.
We've got no airfields to put them on.
But, Mr. President, it is the question.
We are now...
When this thing started, their maximum number of soldiers, I keep saying the same thing, was 367.
Now it's 900.
Good.
When this thing started, B-52 soldiers were 36 a day.
They are now at 78.
When this thing started, there were four destroyers out there.
By the end of this week, there'll be 38.
38?
How many cruisers?
Four.
And there were what?
How many were there before?
None.
There was a cruiser in the Pacific.
Let me give you some of the farm damage.
It's really unbelievable.
Let me just run through it quickly because I found P.O.L.
I've already given you the one last secondary explosion.
They were seen 110 miles away.
Eight large P.O.L.
tanks destroyed, and I've seen the pictures.
You said they were all destroyed.
Yeah, from you.
Eight large P.O.L.
tanks destroyed, six large P.O.L.
tanks burning.
They showed me pictures taken in High Farm yesterday where there was so much smoke you couldn't see anything.
Six P.O.L.
tanks, five-kilinder-shaped tanks burning, eight buildings destroyed, three rail cuts, each 15 feet long.
Five railroad P.O.L.
cars derailed.
Four railroad P.O.L.
tank cars destroyed.
Ten railroad P.O.L.
tank cars burning.
This is in Haiphong.
In the Haiphong open storage area, two large sustained fires.
In the Hanoi P.O.L., target 75% destroyed.
Base of column, smoke column 1.4 miles wide.
Railroad tracks north of target completely cut.
flames up to 10,000 feet.
Haiphong warehouse, six large secondary explosions, six large buildings completely destroyed, five large buildings heavily damaged, one barge sunk.
Haiphong warehouse number four, 14 buildings completely destroyed, 15 severely damaged, five burning, extensive cratering.
Haiphong naval base, four buildings damaged, one building burning,
One, something rather destroyed.
Haiphong Shipyard, ten very large secondary explosions.
Haiphong Warehouse Northeast, eight large buildings completely destroyed, six damaged.
This goes on and on and on.
Disagreement.
They have to photograph today with an XR-71.
I'll go to my meeting, Mr. President.
The resignation of that doctor.
Good.
Do you really feel it's going well in Antioch or better?
What's why?
21 tanks that attack your health.
President, sir, there must be some... As they have cleared the whole town now, there's no more reason for me to sit down.
And now they're trying to slip around on both sides.
They're going to launch another big attack.
But each succeeding attack is going to be a little weaker than the previous one.
What about the Kuwaitis?
In the Kuwait area, there is no major attack.
In the Kuwait area, they're probing.
Kuwait is like D3.
They're trying to get an attack south, but can never get over that.
In the Kwantri area, the South Vietnamese are moving out.
But frankly, they're no good on the offensive.
All those tanks we sent were useless.
Oh, no, that's not true.
They're tanks.
They did knock out a lot of tanks out there.
With our tanks, yeah.