Nixon, Patolichev & Dobrynin on US-Soviet Relations and Trade Policy

4:49to take a few lessons from an interrupt.
4:55But I learned phonetically, phonetically.
5:01Would you come over here?
5:09Perhaps meet you, she's here.
5:17And, uh, would you like to sit?
5:25You want to sit between us?
5:28Fine.
5:28Yeah, that's fine.
5:29You're with the MC.
5:31No, I can't.
5:33He is my personal interpreter.
5:37He's a good interpreter.
5:40Beautiful English.
5:42How is this Russian?
5:45We have spent a very few days in your country, Mr. President.
6:01Although it was raining, but now the weather looks fine.
6:07I have a full report on Mr. Peterson.
6:23He has my full report on him.
6:35Dr. Kissinger has also talked to, as you know, the Secretary of Russia and to Mr. Cabrini, and I'm quite aware of what he's talked about, too.
6:57Did you want to take the pictures?
7:01Oh, yeah.
7:07I know more of Germany than I understand.
7:36You got a word with me?
7:40What?
7:40Somebody hit the parking lot.
8:06I wish to ask the same question to everyone who is learning Russian.
8:40The word has us.
8:54One is one.
9:23Well,
9:56If you allow me, I would like to say a few words about our opinion about what we wanted to say.
10:16Well, with your permission, Mr. President, if you have time enough, I would like to tell you once again our opinion as to what we would like or rather what we think would be proper for us to do.
10:37...to invite me at the end of our conversation.
10:40Apparently, after this speech, I have to decide for myself how I can create our government as a result of my presence here.
10:49And since you found it possible to invite me to meet you after our talks, already by the end of our discussions, I think that the result of our conversation, I think I must be able to report to my government about the outcome of our discussions.
11:17And besides, for the same as any other statesman, I've got my government about me, who might ask me what I was doing down there in the States.
11:30And for you, Mr. President, I can tell you not only the House can ask me, but also the Central Committee.
11:38And, Mr. Speaker, I should know by now what it means, the Central Committee, to ask you.
11:47I think that the Central Committee is probably as important as our Senate.
11:59And in the course of our discussions, Mr. Peterson has referred to your opinion on a number of occasions.
12:20I would like to repeat those references so that I can start my story from that.
12:46I was told that you were quoted as being desired of a considerable attention of our economic and trade relations.
13:05And that's within the framework of the expansion and development of political relations and trade and economic relations mainly.
13:17Expanded further.
13:32and that a new era of more deep and wide relationships may appear in the relations between the Soviet Union and the United States.
13:53As a Soviet man, as a Soviet minister, I can tell you that this all is accepted by us very positively.
14:10in some of these places that we were having our discussions with my colleague Mr. Peters.
14:32And I will take one more second of your time to tell you that my meetings with Secretary Stens in Moscow were also of the most positive and constructive nature.
14:53On the instruction of my own and also on your instructions, we discussed a wide range of problems.
15:01I presume that all has been reported to you.
15:19And on a personal note, I would say, Mr. President, that I have established a very good relations, human relations with the former Secretary of State, and I think that it's on the fair and will then help our further work.
15:41It's only the same friendly way that we are having our discussions with Mr. Peterson.
15:54I have been his guest at his home.
16:00And I even had a look at his modern paintings.
16:03Unfortunately, I'm not very good in a few solutions.
16:10Now I would like to say a few words on the substance of our discussion.
16:28We are based on the assumption that our two great powers could have a most wide economic relation.
16:49And in terms of cost, I think that could be of this price, not even in hundreds of millions of dollars, but in figures of much higher order.
17:16and that for you and for us, we need to provide the elements that are necessary for this.
17:26But it seems to me that we already have some sort of a certain prospect for the future.
17:35We realize it's not an easy task, because there are many sorts of things that are layer on layer, laying on our relations, and we shall have to overcome them.
17:48But it seems to us that even now we cannot really see some shapes of the very favorable perspectives.
17:56Of course, the Soviet side is primarily interested in the Russian regime.
18:04Of course, for the Soviet side, the most tailored nation clause is of a prior interest.
18:28We were told in every detail the essence of the matter on your side, your difficulties in resolving this matter.
18:37But still, we realize it's a difficult thing for you, but we realize also that in the long run it is possible to resolve.
18:53This is the most favored nation we have in our relationship with every developed nation and we have it and it operates most successfully.
19:00Therefore, the first thing I would like to ask, if you allow me, is if you allow me to ask the staff of our province in what form this project will be developed.
19:26And with your permission, Mr. President, I would like to ask you what can I report to my government and the Central Committee on this issue and how this problem can be and will be solved?
19:47Because I always keep in mind that my committee will ask me, of course, what did I find out on this particular piece.
19:58This is the first thing.
20:03This is the regime.
20:04Yes, it was born in Russia.
20:09Our exports are impossible practically without MFL.
20:18Consequently, we will not have means of trade.
20:21Our paying possibilities will be very limited and the means of trade will be at the same low level and we want that.
20:34Of course, we fully realize the short.
20:36Difficult problems are interconnected with others.
20:45We fully realize that.
20:56And under these existing modern circumstances in the modern world, we try to solve the problem of credit.
21:18And besides, the same as the problem of most able nation cause, the problem of crediting are all on the basis of reciprocity.
21:40Of course, we would be only pleased to sell to you a great deal of machinery and equipment on credit terms.
21:49That is, I mean, the machines in the film in which we think we are strong enough.
21:54We do have some.
21:55Yes, we do.
21:57No, in the beginning...
21:59I've seen it, I've seen it.
22:04In 1967.
22:09Well, but we'll have another step forward.
22:29Well, I believe for the initial period this problem of crediting will not be balanced and perhaps you will have to give us more credit than we give to you.
22:42And this problem of credits has also two aspects and I would like to tell you what we are interested in.
23:01We would like, you can see I'm talking most frankly, we are having some problems which are of most operational nature.
23:14Today's very problem.
23:16And in the first place, I give the priority to the Cameroonian project.
23:27One of the American companies is making a design for the foundry.
23:35And it's only natural that they have in mind American machines for the foundry.
23:42Of course they will
23:48I have a problem as a minister.
23:51This task will be completed in the next month.
24:02And myself, as Minister of Foreign Trade, I'm facing the following problem.
24:08Foreign trade in Congress.
24:11Foreign trade, yes.
24:12Only foreign trade.
24:14Oh, I see.
24:15Foreign trade.
24:17I see, I see.
24:18Only foreign trade.
24:20But everything we buy, it goes through him.
24:23I saw it.
24:24Foreign, I see.
24:25Yes, what is it?
24:26Foreign.
24:31And I kicked him out of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
24:37I used to be a protector of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
24:49So, my Minister was just saying that the Minister of Forestry is faced with the following problem.
24:55To buy machines and equipment for the Kamur River problem in the course of the current months.
25:02I will explain that to you and you will be met.
25:17We have to have signing contracts for the machinery.
25:25Well, a great part of the machinery and equipment will be made locally, but up to $200 million worth of machinery we shall import from Europe.
25:50In other countries, we do have credits.
25:56There is no problem for us in obtaining probable credits.
26:11We have credits from France, Italy, West Germany, Great Britain, Japan.
26:18Yes, in Japan, yes, but not state to state, but it's very hard to deal with the Japanese.
26:34When I started working on large projects,
26:50But when we reach the stage to discuss large projects, that state should participate.
26:57State projects.
27:00For example, oil pipelines, gas pipelines, development of the largest, biggest copper ore deposits, for example.
27:16Smaller problems, smaller contracts.
27:19We solved at the level of smaller companies.
27:31It was an association of Japanese industrialists.
27:47Yes, cash problems we solved at the level of private enterprise, private banks and companies.
27:56For example, the problem of construction of a seaport in the Far East.
28:04We signed a contract for that with private banks and companies.
28:12But for the projects which involve amounts from one to two or three billion dollars, we have to deal with them at the governmental level.
28:34Since we are having a state monopoly of foreign trade in the Soviet Union, as you know, of course, all that is going through my hands as Minister of Foreign Trade.
28:55So I have to take the decision.
28:59Where to place orders?
29:00If you make a decision, a decision, and provide us with some kind of income, you decide for yourself, a loan, we will start to place orders.
29:20If you decide, if you take a decision to give us credits for your decide on the amount yourselves, but for example if you have a million dollars credits, then we shall start placing orders here.
29:44If you will not be in a position to do that, due to this or that reason, I will have to reorient my people.
29:55You know what it means in our country not to fulfill the instruction of the government.
30:01Actually, Mr. President, the Minister is checking up on the Secretary of May because
30:13When I was in Moscow on your instructions, I told Mr. President that the principal, you were prepared to extend credits this summer and consider the end of the pension situation, which I would rather we would not have for the next year.
30:42Mr. Brezhnev in Moscow, I have already mentioned that you, in principle, agree to give a loan to the Export-Import Bank for a certain amount and also to deal with the issue of more favorable regimes, which will obviously take some time.
31:05I told you.
31:06I told you.
31:08I told you very good.
31:12I told you very good.
31:38Well, I would like to tell my government that you will be able to solve this problem.
31:48Perhaps you can tell them now or when you come to Moscow.
31:56Now the grain problem.
31:58You devoted much time to this problem.
32:04Well, our government has told us what terms we can get for this deal, and you told us that these terms are not possible for you.
32:25Well, we are a sort of country which has periodic difficulties with grain supply due to climate conditions.
32:45You know about that.
32:46We do not try to conceal that.
32:52Well, I had devoted a lot of my time in the past to agricultural problems and I know them very well.
33:07And the major part of my life was spent on the party world, not in the foreign office or foreign trade, in the party world, in political life.
33:19At that time, I could use all sorts of objective reasons to explain and justify the shortage of brain, but now I can't do that.
33:37Now I can talk about that objectively.
33:40Luke has a very objective and unbiased look at the things.
33:45Sometimes, yes, our conditions become really cruel, severe, especially in Siberia.
34:07In Siberia they sometimes would say that in June we can still have frost and in July they would say that we can already have frost.
34:27During the war, I was working in the Europe's mountains.
34:34I know that there's Persians.
34:38Persians, yeah.
34:40Both.
34:56So, your pension is only the final one.
35:00It's a three-year loan.
35:08Some young people have mentioned what seems to be final terms, that is three year period for the credit and they enter great interest.
35:27This means that we will buy even when we will have a very good harvest and we will sell it from the market.
35:39When we say that we are prepared to conclude the long-term agreement on that,
35:47say for five years, that means that we shall buy grain even if we have good crops in our country because we sell a lot of grain ourselves.
36:01Every year we export eight or ten million tons of grain.
36:10Therefore we would ask you to have this aspect in mind as well.
36:16As we were informed, your Act 480 expires by fall of 1973.
36:28We shall report about all that to our government.
36:48We shall report to the government what all the situation, what sort of deals are possible and will be possible with the prospectus for the future.
37:16Under the pretext that in the next year we will return to the long-term agreement, we have already passed the law.
37:27As my personal opinion, I can tell you that it is quite possible that we shall conclude a contract for this year alone for one year, and in the end of the next year we shall come back to the problem on the basis of a revised Act 418.
37:50This is, I'm telling to you, my personal opinion, which I have been solid about with my friend, the president.
37:59I don't think it's safe of my, uh, uh, escort, so to say.
38:09We have a very close relationship with the president, not only with the president, but with the president himself.
38:22Well, that's how we shall report.
38:25And I said it is possible that we shall have a deal with this.
38:39Yes, I said it is possible, but when actually done, it will find it unjustifiable to have a free term of credit.
38:51Let me provide a response to what the minister has said at this point.
38:57And I will be very direct.
39:01And I think that my comments will be very reassuring.
39:18First, whatever Secretary Flats, Secretary Stans, and Secretary Peterson have discussed with the minister, as well as whatever Dr. Kissinger has discussed in his meetings with Secretary Gresham and the ambassador,
39:48It's all been done in my honor, in my approval.
39:57These are very important details.
40:15But I feel it's important that the Minister and the Ambassador, and the Ambassador knows my views and I respect, see this in a larger framework.
40:34I was reading a book last night about World War II and the alliance between our two countries, the Soviet Union and the United States, which would be different.
40:54What enabled us to succeed was that the leaders at the very top did not allow differences about details, small countries, et cetera, to keep their eye off the main goal, and that was to destroy Hitler.
41:18At the present time, the United States and the Soviet Union
41:40are the two most powerful military countries in the world and the two most productive economic countries in the world.
41:56We're at the top.
42:05We have differences about differences in philosophy.
42:09We have differences also about what may seem at the moment to be very important local problems in various parts of the world.
42:23But the main thing we must keep in mind is that if we show the understanding that we had during the Great War,
42:52those differences will not be allowed to keep us from developing a new relationship, a new relationship looking to the future, which has its purpose not just winning the war, but has as its purpose
43:14enriching both of our countries, raising our standards of living by having the two most powerful economic countries of the world with mutual respect, where either treats each, treats the others with reciprocity, develops trade and commerce, which will help us both.
43:37Right now, the main focus is not
43:42that if we show the same understanding as it was between us during the Second World War, then these difficulties will not be allowed to prevent the development of new relations between our countries.
43:58Relations that are aimed at the future, which are not aimed at winning the war, but are aimed
44:08I'm glad to hear the Minister speak of the long term and of
44:34of the bigger opportunities, rather than simply speaking of this contract and this contract.
44:43This is also my approach.
44:46We are...
44:59We are both very big countries and we should never deal with problems unless we deal in a big, big way.
45:06I believe in ministering ambassador well and
45:25To use an analogy in sports, I don't believe in little clubs.
45:30I believe in making big clubs.
45:42That means going for the score, not just for the yards.
45:52When the Secretary, I don't know,
46:10CPSU and the President of the United States meet.
46:17This is truly a meeting of the summit.
46:20because we are the two strongest military powers, the two strongest economic powers in the world.
46:30The Soviet people and the Soviet leadership, as my respect,
46:45And you can be sure that in discussions that I have and hope to have, that we will approach these problems not only with religious respect, but on my part, with the desire to reach a bigger goal than you have discussed with the ministers of our government.
47:18I respect the Soviet leadership, the Soviet people, and in our talks, which I hope we will hold,
47:28What must happen, Mr. Minister, is that if there are meetings at the summit, the mountains must not labor to produce the mouse.
47:59One of my thoughts about the meeting of the top is that the mountain should not give birth to a mouse.
48:29And I'm deeply convinced that our General Secretary, Mr. President, in discussing these matters, will be a very good partner on a large scale.
48:40What I want to say to the
48:44the minister, is this, that ex-invent credits, that is certainly possible along the lines that have been discussed.
48:58Second, with regard to nation treatment,
49:09The problem with the Congress, of course, is there, but we are prepared to move in that direction too.
49:19But what is more important than these details?
49:31is that I am prepared, provided the General Secretary is prepared, to move beyond what our ministers have discussed.
49:41I think we should make a bigger delay because our mutual interests will be served that way.
49:54but also the new relationship which we are attempting to create will be solidified by a longer range, close economic cooperation.
50:12But even more important than these details is that I am ready, if Mr. Brezhnev is ready, to go even further in the development of these issues.
50:27I am ready to play a really big game.
50:30And I am sure that this will serve our mutual interests and new
50:38What is important is that both of us keep our eyes on the main goal, the main goal, that to hear the Soviet Union and the United States at the top of the world.
50:52And we must both avoid the being
51:07is strengthened from that goal by what are important but not crucial areas where we may have disagreements in other parts of the world.
51:37What I would like to say is, without getting into the details,
51:58that I would like to set as our goal, provided other things work out, that an economic agreement that is worthy of the two most powerful nations in the world, and that means it would be the most important agreement ever made between two nations.
52:18That should be our goal.
52:20And then all of these other things fall under the table.
52:25That's the way I'm prepared to talk to the town secretary, just as I talk to the other events.
52:52See, I can do some things my ministers cannot, and I'm sure that the General Secretary can do some things his ministers cannot.
53:11Thank you, Mr. President.
53:20Thank you, Mr. President.
53:21We shall convey all that to our leaders.
53:31We shall tell all that to our leaders and, first of all, to our General Secretary.
53:35He is most carefully prepared for the meeting.
53:45And of course we would like to see this meeting yielding the maximum possible result.
53:52That does not by no means mean that we too can build our vehicles without present and our vehicles.
53:59Something we shall try to do ourselves as well.
54:03But you all made it possible.
54:05So in this, if we sit down at the PC, we will be as smart as we can be.
54:14Especially if the general commission is to be made, we shall be able to discuss specific problems.
54:25Right.
54:25He means the commission should be able to go to the business.
54:28Good.
54:29That's something we were very obvious about.
54:31And then, Mr. Peterson, perhaps we'll come to you also.
54:41What did he first say that you expected him to be in Moscow?
54:49Henry, have you ever heard of Henry?
54:58I would like to give a little souvenir to the Minister.
55:06These are some new couplings here that made the seal of the President of the United States.
55:14There it is up there.
55:15Here it is in the coffin.
55:22Thank you very much.
56:12My daughter did this.
56:17This is my daughter.
56:18Goodbye.

Nixon, Patolichev & Dobrynin on US-Soviet Relations and Trade Policy

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Also recorded on May 11, 1972

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