Conversation 759-005

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 Do not cite this transcript as authoritative.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.

My children were in others, but in any event, I had to see Porter because this one was the longest meeting we've ever had.

It was the most complex.

And do you want me to run through it?

Sure.

All I have is hate.

But hate didn't have much interest.

They indicated there was a long meeting and they made some concrete proposals.

You made some concrete proposals, which I saw.

But the proposals I made, you know, they were the one impression that you worked out.

First we spent about an hour on your press conference.

I heard about that.

Which was the most acrimonious thing we've ever had.

They objected to you referring to the private meeting, so they said we had agreed that the open preference that would be made would be on the day of the meeting.

And they objected to the fact that you were using it against the Senate, so you were, I'm just giving you the account, you were using it for negotiating purposes, or for political purposes, anyway, I think it dawned on them that they lost by letting us publish them.

So they said they wouldn't publish this.

Thank you, Doctor.

Captain, I said, Mr. Chairman, you can do what you want.

We are going to publish it at 10 because the press secretary prepared it.

That's going to lie.

You want him to go out and blink and say the North Vietnamese want Mr. Jain to come and he can do that too.

So... That was a good move.

So...

It was a good move because there wasn't any question.

I think you should say the third thing about it now.

Let me say it in that connection, just so we can have a...

analysis of the 97 days left before the election.

The record that you're making on this is important.

Oh, yeah.

And therefore, I think you're setting it up in the proper way

Also, I think it's important to have in mind that to the extent you can in the next meetings, anything that you can possibly get that will bear out what we are going to have to use if the talks break down publicly.

We put the blame on the other side, the Medellin group, the Senate, and so forth and so on.

That's not the only way we can make out it.

It isn't going to serve us to be a very forthcoming arrest and that the North Vietnamese are bastards.

What we've got to do is to set it up so that, I mean, it's a very subtle thing to handle, but it'll have to get across that the aid that these clowns have been giving to these people has destroyed it.

a very, very serious effort, which we've been making at very, very high, to settle this thing.

I hope the record doesn't have to come out.

But I meant that that is, that should be our trust.

I mean, I wouldn't be too damn responsible if I were you.

But except, in your talks, except, except to appear to be, appear to be, I, because I think you've been making, like, for example, you, one point that I've mentioned before, when you said that

I told you, the only thing that concerns me is the possibility that McGovern, you know, he was the one that floated, you may remember, a year ago, that idea that the North Vietnamese would agree to imprisonment through withdrawal.

No chance.

Good.

I just want to tell you that I've cut that nail.

You got it.

Yeah, I've cut it now.

You can see what I mean.

I can hear that.

I can hear that, for example, two weeks before the election.

Not a chance.

And the North Vietnamese saying yes.

Not a chance.

At that pace.

Not a chance.

And you'll see that yourself when I go through the meeting today.

Now, my recommendation to you up here yesterday would have been, but I must admit, they've seen that strategy too, and they've made it a little tougher.

But my recommendation is still that in these talks, that we should strike these talks through September, while Congress is in session, because otherwise we'll be hit with 50 resolutions.

I have one statement.

But if on October, say on October 1st, or whenever they get out of session, we then break up the talks a few days later and say they'll resume in November 9th, the son of a bitch is making it impossible for us.

You can bet your mother probably is going to say major irresponsible things.

The guy is, he's just, he's incompetent.

Come on.

Just then, to be spent an hour on that, which is very acrimonious, I said, the president has proved that he does not have good women periods.

And then I went to the doctor, waited for two weeks to take this.

The next time you say anything about the president's intentions, motives, or anything else, I will pick up my papers and walk out of this room.

We are here to negotiate.

The fact that I'm here shows our goodwill.

I'm not going to discuss our monies.

You discuss our proposals.

We'll discuss your proposals.

I'm not sitting here to listen to one more word about the president.

If you can't take this, I'll walk out now.

I figured they were never going to let me walk out.

So he huddled right back.

He said, I'm not attacking you.

I said, I'm not saying you're attacking me.

Attack me.

That's your privilege.

I'm here.

I won't let you attack the president.

I represent the president.

So he started dancing away from the president.

And after about 45 minutes of this, I presented, in effect, what you and the president had discussed, which I had talked about last night, with a few extra frills, which I have managed to use as a constitutional convention.

I made a very long speech for publications.

in which I showed that we had taken every one of their seven points into account just so that they had to shut up and we had never responded to their seven points and how we had an evidence and so on and so forth.

He asked a few questions and asked for a recess.

There was an hour and 15 minutes recess where for the first time they served us a hot meal

and offered us whiskey and wine and tea.

It never happened before.

Then he came back, asked a few more questions, then made a 15-minute violent attack on the parliament.

And what you have said about the parliament, and what did I say to that?

I was just cool about it.

We've all reviewed seats for that.

You can review about it in the self-department.

I said, it's up to you, it's not up to us.

You can start the bombing.

Then he went on again.

I said, Mr. Special Advisor, wait a second.

When I saw you present offensives under the law of war, end the war and we'll end the bombing in the next minute.

And then I offered him a ceasefire, a three-month ceasefire, a mutual de-escalation.

I said, why don't you tell us privately?

You're going to reduce the intensity of your fighting.

I promise you we'll reduce the intensity of our bombing.

I'm practically cynical.

I couldn't make it for sure.

Then he pulled out a long statement, which is the most comprehensive proposal they've ever made.

The first, I would say, negotiated proposal they've made.

In the past, they've just given us nine brief points.

This time, it's about an eight-page document.

Ten points.

And then four procedure points.

I can get them.

If you want to voice that voice, I can give you the name.

What's the heart?

The heart of the matter itself.

In the past, they had always said we must set a deadline, which we will then keep regardless of whatever happens.

In other words, December 1st or whatever.

They've given that up now.

They agree with our coordination that the deadline will be a specified period of time after the signature of the agreement.

So they accept our formulation, and they say one month, we say four months, but I'm sure we can find a point in between.

They say one month after the signature of the agreement.

Therefore, there was a tremendous change, because in the past, they've always said we must set a fixed date.

And only after that fix, and only after we've agreed with our government, which comes first.

Well, they now agree the agreement has to come first.

That's right.

That's what you're talking about.

which is exactly the same with our position.

The only thing we differ now is the length of time, but that's unimportant.

Secondly, they propose a government of national concord, but they have changed that somewhat.

But quite significantly in the past, that government of national concord was composed, as they said, of three elements.

The loving elements of the Saigon administration, neutralists and themselves,

And the people-loving elements of the Saigon administration had to change their policies, disband the army, let people out of concentration camps and so forth.

So they were paranoid.

Now they say the government of National Concord should be composed in the following way.

The Saigon government, including you, appoints people to the government of National Concord, anybody they want.

except they can't appoint you to the government of national congress, but they can appoint anybody else.

They, the PRG, will appoint another city.

And then the Saigon people, it's not acceptable, but it's a tremendous change for them.

The Saigon people and the PRG, the reader, select the other city.

So in other words, it's 50-50, that's what it really amounts to.

In the past, it was at least 2 to 1 for them, and probably completely that, because who is a people-loving element of the Saigon administration?

Again, I repeat, this is not acceptable, but it's the biggest shift they've ever made.

It's still a coalition 50-50 government.

Third, they are willing, if we agree to some of these principles,

they are willing to set up two new forums in Paris.

One, direct talks between the PRG and the Saigon government, including you, which we've never been willing to do.

Second, direct talks between themselves, the PRG, and you.

The first forum will discuss the implementation of the political program.

The second forum will discuss the military

things that do not involve America.

And then there's a lot of other causes that we can handle now.

The big, enormous change they've made is the willingness to talk to Saigon plus Pew about anything.

In the past, they've always said Pew has to resign before, and the government has to change its policies before anything happens.

That was the condition for negotiation, not the condition for settlement.

Now they say they're willing to talk to a few about a political settlement.

They still insist that it should be a coalition government, and this is why I say it's still unacceptable.

Now, I ask them, what happens in the provinces?

How are they governed?

And then there he said something that was quite interesting.

He said, in the provinces, the provinces governed by Saigon remain governed by Saigon.

The provinces governed by the PRG remain governed by the PRG.

The contested provinces get a provincial administration of national conquest.

Now, I didn't press him too hard because I didn't want to get a negative answer.

But if he means that, then what you really have is a standstill ceasefire, which brings this about.

Oh, and they agreed to a ceasefire.

This is my point.

That's the fourth point.

And they agreed that all prisoners would be released within one month if we agreed to withdraw within one month.

But anyway, they agreed to a total release of prisoners.

Now,

The first question is that if they mean that each administration continues and some sort of super thing is set up, that we could conceivably live with.

In other words, if we reverse the process, if we said first there's a standstill ceasefire, the standstill ceasefire de facto will produce Saigon areas and PNP areas.

That's what it's got to do.

And then you could say you have some commission overdose.

That we could live with.

If they say the Saigon government has to disappear and only a coalition government can exist, then we're in trouble.

Now, he said one other thing.

He said, you don't have to put this into an agreement.

We're willing to write the agreement in a neutral way.

provided you tell us privately you will use your influence in the negotiations that will go on between you and us to break apart that government of national concord.

Now, this gives us a number, the football gives us massive profits, because if they publish it, it is harder to turn down than their other stuff.

Harder to turn down.

It's harder to say they're imposing a communist government.

It's harder to say they're loading the trucks because they wanted to abandon its army, police, and so forth, because they've dropped all of those demands.

Secondly, you have to say that for them, they have made a tremendous step.

It's not...

In the past, we used to say they've made a step because of the mood, but this time, we used to say that when they are willing to talk to you, we are halfway home.

I think they're halfway home, I'm sure.

And third, and this I have to say only in the truth, if you told me to sell out, I could make it look brilliant.

I mean, I'm not recommending it, Mr. President, but I'm saying that if we got up against the heartless,

I do feel this, that a McGovern victory would be worse than a sellout in Vietnam.

Oh, of course, of course.

But I also think we shouldn't do it.

We shouldn't sell out in Vietnam.

Fourthly, Mr. President, I don't believe... Fourthly, this is not their last word.

It can't be their last word.

I mean, they...

When they start, they're not going to nail themselves to the flag.

What they have done in my judgment is this.

They have decided, you see, the easy thing to do is to say that they'll wait until October, and then if you're way ahead, they'll settle with you.

I've always said they can't do that, because if they, supposing they had floated this land in October, we could just, they'd never finish it.

You are ten points ahead in November.

In October, we'll accept elements of principle, and it gets to be November 7, and they have got an agreement.

So if they want to have the option of settling it early in October, they must start talking about it now.

As they talk about it now, they're helping you, because these meetings, I don't know what they do to public opinion, but I've seen when I talk to the senators, they confuse them.

They confuse McGovern.

And even with this proposal, we are in a position to say, hell, we were negotiating seriously, and this son of a bitch makes any negotiation impossible.

So I think, and certainly what they have done now, they've given us a piece of paper

which makes it impossible for these talks to break up quickly, because I can now drive them crazy.

Actually, you know, in the Middle East, our negotiations, we can claim 90% of the credit.

If we had done what they did, the Russians would still be in Egypt.

The way they conducted these negotiations created so much frustration in Egypt.

I mean, we've now got to move after the election, so that means that I'll send you a message.

I sent him a message, as I told you last week, that I'd be prepared to meet a representative of his early October.

He wanted a private contact with us.

I said, early October is the earliest.

He sent you a message saying he wants you to know, he wants you to be the elector.

It's almost unanimous that he understands why you say early October.

Well, the way I would visualize it is if we could get a deal with the Egyptians, then we can make the same deal with the Russians, and then everybody will be happy.

You have to brutalize the Israelis.

Mr. President, if we're ever going to through the Israelis, it's not even screwing them, if we're ever going to brutalize them,

I think the first half of next year is the time to do it.

Get it done.

Then by 76, there'll be a new plan.

The main thing is to do it for a reason in our interests.

Basically, the Soviet Union must overwrite everything else in the world today.

My objection to Russia wasn't that we were brutalizing the Israelis.

It said we were cementing the Russians into the Middle East and that we were likely to produce a war.

If you can pull off

If the Egyptians think that after moving to you, the thing comes fluid, while when they went to the Russians, it didn't work.

You have restored the American position among the Arabs.

The Israelis trust you enough to know that we can get them a better deal, I believe, than what Russia's offered them.

Not as good as they want, but better than what they were offered two years ago.

So while the Israelis won't be happy,

This is why we shouldn't make too many moves before November, and after that we should go towards anybody.

That's why I said October and we'll just have a very preliminary talk.

Now, we have a problem of how to maneuver this next period.

But on August 14th, what I would propose, because then I can't go back for several weeks because of the convention,

Well, I want to go to Sweden first before I go to Russia.

Okay.

All right.

On the way to Russia.

Good.

When do you go to Russia?

I arrive on the 10th and I'll be back on the 13th.

Are we, are you going to send your man over to try to work something out?

He's coming this, going this, and I'm, if he can't work something out, or is it all done up?

No, no, I think we can really have him on something else.

I don't think we can work something out.

Second point, on the Russians, I noticed that Peterson had a three-yard.

Your thought that the Russian deal, or if we could make any kind of deal on the trade area, should be after your meeting with them?

I think we should finish.

I should finish the trade.

Not for me, but so that we can announce.

You can announce that.

That's what I want you to do.

I don't think we should let it be done, have it be done simply by Peterson.

I think you should break the deadlock on the land leave.

And then the credit and everything else.

And we'll get that, I think, I can get done when I'm there.

And I think, in a way, Mr. President, they're playing you a game.

You told the Breedon that you had studied, that you wanted it done in September.

You did.

I have it in my numbers.

And I think they're doing what you're asking them to do.

That's what we want.

It's much better for us.

Then you've got that under control, and you will handle everything, and you will handle this.

Right.

Good.

And I think what we can get out of it is asking questions about Japan, or why we're still here, not going.

I thought you said nothing.

Well, I would prefer nothing.

I'd prefer to make a... Well, I mean, it's...

However, I'm perfectly willing to have them come.

But you can do whatever you want.

From the Japanese side, they don't really know what to do with lives.

But us don't have lives.

Because we don't have that.

We haven't got that.

Of course, Mrs. Nixon could come with you without participating in anything else.

But then if she did, if she came and they did, it's going to look a little odd.

But if no one else is going to make it.

Yeah.

Tell me this.

Is he going to bring his board of ministers?

Yes, unfortunately.

God damn it.

It certainly screws these things up, Henry.

Well, but we can have a separate meeting.

I don't mean that we can have a separate meeting, but you know what I mean.

It's always interesting to have this.

Who is the board of ministers?

Well, he was a candidate for prime minister.

He's a pretty good guy.

You can now, but you'll find you can have very good talks with Tanaka, but you ought to do, in fact, we'll have plenty of time to talk, to make sure you have a direct channel to him, because this man is much more direct than the others.

And actually, I'm not going to have a lesson or action.

Well, we'll put it on our talks, but we'll have a little break off into this.

No, because back to the three-month thing, Mr. President, I think now for the first time we can settle it.

And I think, I'm not saying we can settle it on their plan.

This is too complex, too detailed, and then too easy.

If you say ten points ahead, I would say now the chances are two out of three that they'll settle it on your plan.

That's a different question, but I'm just telling you what I think.

I guess my question is in and of itself.

There are ten points ahead that we aren't.

And then we'll be settling on October.

The real question is whether we settle on a cost of destroying Saudi Arabia.

But we cannot accept this present proposal.

We have to have something.

I would like, frankly, I'd like to trim it.

I'd like to do it in the way that we think we should and screw up in the implementation to be quite candid about that.

That we can do, too.

We can promise something that right after the election set, too, we'll do it and just keep the pressure on.

But they can give us a lot of, they've given us a lot of options.

We could.

See, we can, but probably, I don't remember, we can't.

It's very difficult, but...

lift the mining and stop the bombing and restart it again.

We could after the election, but I will.

But, yeah.

You see, here's the advantage in trying to settle now, even if you're ten points ahead.

It's that you're sure to help on this line, and you might win the House, and you get increased training in the Senate.

And you'd have to cut that nightmare off the impact.

I mean, it's very important.

Because you know it is a nightmare.

It's a nightmare.

So therefore, I think our goal should be that.

I just don't know how far we can go with it.

I'm not saying... Conscience.

I don't see how far we can go with good conscience.

Not because of South Vietnam, but because of the effect on other countries in the world.

Mr. President, screw it.

At least they have not possibly accepted what they were opposed to.

That is clear.

Then the question is, what... What, in any case, is true authority?

Well...

I think what we ought to do is simply to get some procedural things.

On the 14th, I ought to accept or nearly accept every point in their proposal except the political one.

Because there's no problem with that.

But that shows major progress.

Then we ought to send Hague out to Saigon or conceivably even I should go out to Saigon.

If I do it before Hawaii, I could even start on the way back in Japan and have a talk with Tanaka to make sure that that meeting is a success.

Sure.

And then...

I could tell them frankly at the next meeting, let's make as much profit as we can today.

Let's narrow the differences on the political.

We can't accept their proposal.

Then the question is, how do we get into alternatives?

And I'm really, I'd like to spend today thinking it through to see what we can do to combine.

But for the first time,

But for the first time, we have a real – I mean, they've given us so many elements to play with that, for example, we can accept the procedure immediately.

We've been trying for three years, Mr. President, to get them to talk to the Jew government.

Let me say this.

Why didn't I?

They are thinking you're going to spell out.

They are under no illusions that this offer is not open-ended.

There are no illusions that on November the 7th, there ain't no authors, believe me.

None.

Not even the ceasefire.

Well, I'm not saying it explicitly because I'm afraid.

No, I don't want to be threatening.

I don't want to be threatening.

I don't want this to be published.

That's what I mean.

You don't want to be threatening in the public.

I don't want to, but let me say that's the way it's going to be.

November the 7th, if these sons of bitches have strung us along, then you just can take them.

It's over.

But it will be murder for them, for them to have offered to us that they will talk to June, which they have said for eight years they would never do under any circumstances.

This will have a shattering effect on their guerrillas.

intelligence document we can hold firm on the proposition that you can't be talking so they have made for what is for them you know they are bastards they are they would love it best if you got defeated or shot or anything you could disappear from the scene they hate you and they hate me i mean they know who did this

But the question is now, how can we maneuver it so that we can have a process, so that it can look like a settlement by Election Day, but if the process is still open, we can get that done.

And we can screw them after Election Day, if necessary.

And we can get, and if you pull out, these sons of bitches are going to say you're not going to succeed.

I mean, that's for sure.

They're going to say you lie and you're not going to succeed.

And I think this could finish the destruction of McGovern.

Oh, yes.

And the Doves.

And I think we have two problems here.

It isn't just that you win, it is crucial.

And that you win big, but also that ideologically, if they see, if it is seen that you win,

knew all along what you were doing.

No one is tackling you anymore, Russia and China.

But you said you had a plan.

You said you'd do it with Russia and China.

You did it with Russia.

Yeah.

And even with Japan now.

You're welcome.

I don't have to say.

I think this, the, the, the, look, there's no question.

I don't know.

The real problem, which I guess you've got here in Vietnam,

Vietnam poisons our relations with the Soviet, and it poisons our relations with the Chinese.

We have suffered long and hard, and God knows how we get out of it.

All it is is a question of getting out in a way that to other countries, not the Chinese or the Russians so much, they don't put ammo on some disorder out there.

in other countries does not appear complete after four years of shutdown.

That's all we have to do.

I am not, I'm just not sure that South Vietnam can survive in any of them.

You know, I just don't know.

And the dogs should not be able to say.

Now, I said the government would not be able to say, and I'm hoping that what you did, they would have done in February of 69 and saved 20,000 lives.

So we've got to have something to show for them.

We've got to be able to prove that we have honor and a settlement.

And therefore, even if we go very far, the settlement has to look as if we haven't got a hammer for them.

Of course, what you're going to have, basically, is a secret deal.

That's not the only chance of a summit, a secret deal where we say, in fact, all right, we agree to receive spire, et cetera.

And we agree that we will then use our influence strongly on the side of kind of a political summit that we agree to.

Right?

Well, you see, I have a number of...

A number of things I've thought of I think we should do.

One is we've asked for a general ceasefire.

I think now one way of handling it, the reason they're opposed to that is that they're afraid if they break it, we have a right to come back in.

Now, if we made a dual ceasefire in which every party makes a separate ceasefire with every other party, then if they don't break it with us or break it with the CCF, we may go back in, but we also may not.

And after January, repeat the month-and-a-half, Mr. President.

I don't think they can win against the Senate.

I agree.

No, I, from what I've read, and all the funding also, there came in also, let's face it, through the mining for fun.

That mining and that bombing has got to be heard in these banners.

That's right.

I have an eerie feeling about the bombing, Mr. President, that somebody...

He's screwing it up.

They're not bombing.

I know it's the weather.

But this is the dry season, Mr. President.

I know that.

That's my point.

I'm wondering if they're pulling some of this weather, right?

I'm wondering, would you be willing to let me bring water after some of our tech meeting is coming up?

Thank God.

You want them to go full port until there's a settlement?

No, I'm willing.

I don't.

I think they have motivated me to trick the son of a bitch after his first term was over, Mr. President, in two years.

In a year and a half, I think he's a new term.

But four years is plenty for him.

My recommendation is to find out that it would be somebody like him, who is your man, who understands how energetic, but you don't have to buy that.

Moral.

The murder is any time you give him an order, he's all right for four weeks, and Laird gets to him again.

And Laird is just...

He rocks.

And Laird is pretty disaffected.

I know he took you on yesterday on that same thing.

On the...

The spending limit.

Well, he's wrong on this, isn't he?

The spending limit does not entail any limit on defense.

There's only a limit on the other thing.

He knows that.

That's right.

Larry's doing all right.

He's going to have a lot of all these various bases to be scared of other people.

That's the kind of thing he's good at.

Oh, yeah.

Politically, he thinks that Montgomery has a sense of our government.

I think that's an excellent idea.

I should talk to him anyway.

I'll do it.

We need it in the Senate.

Mr. President, I don't include, I'm going to be at this thing, totally set it free now.

I don't exclude that you might want to consider, when I come back from Moscow, that you, that we stop bombing north of the 20th parallel for the six weeks of, if there's been major problems in Paris.

I agree.

You see, what we need is to have something at home that shows constant progress.

Now let's have them stop bombing, but also there to reduce their level of fighting too.

That will happen automatically, but my point is, if we stop on September 15th and November 8th, they can't do much.

After November 7th, if you get them, I'm afraid you get re-elected.

If we win.

After November 7th, school's out.

That's right.

We can't go through another two years.

We're going to take out the heart of them.

The heart of the installation is in Hanoi.

We're going to take out the whole goddamn dock area.

Ships, there are no ships.

Tell them to clear out of there.

We'll stay away from the Chinese border.

And frankly, Henry, we may have to take the dikes off not for the purpose of killing people, but for the people trying to get the hell out of there.

In the dry season, I would take the dikes off.

Right now, you're not in the dry season.

But in the dry season.

and then they have to move, that's all, isn't that right?

I tell them, let our prisoners go, I'll make them an offer again, and then I agree.

Because they've been better.

But, when all is said and done, Mr. Vincent, if they want to pay, assuming they have decided they're going to accept your May 8th offer, they couldn't go further than they did yesterday.

This was, in all the years of the negotiations put together,

The only thing they haven't accepted yet is the structure of the government.

But it was another thing they did, which will help us with the record,

I read them a long statement last time of really garbage, of basic principles.

I took it from some of the things you had said to Joe and I about how we think we'll exist with communist countries.

I said, I just want you to know what the president is thinking.

And they said they were very impressed by that.

It's half baloney, but the fact is they've said it, and we can talk about it.

And what they really are serious, they say from now on, after every meeting, that's right now what we should lead to.

And then that should fit into another forum.

I don't think people make the final thing before the second half.

How about getting Bunker over and letting him do the brutalizing too?

Well, that's one other way to get at it.

We can also, well,

First of all, we have to know what we want you to do, which we have decided.

If we could do two things, we could have first market come in.

I think I'm a hater.

I have to go out there at some point.

First of all, if after the next meeting...

I actually think in this next time, if you want to go, because if you go, then that will have an enormous impact here.

All it does is buy time.

You have to realize the more time we buy, the better.

If after the meeting on the 14th,

I'm looking at it probably not as PR.

Oh, it's all it is, then.

Everybody's a picket seat.

Something has to be going on.

My own view is you really probably ought to go to Saigon after the meeting on the 14th.

I would wait.

In fact, I'd like to see you go there.

And then you don't have to be back to go to the convention until the 21st.

You could go right on.

That's what I think.

There is a time.

Get it out of the way.

There's shit all over you.

And then you...

You'll know pretty well what we have to do.

And I could even go from there.

Well, I was going to go from there and go right on around.

It's my 160th wedding anniversary, and then in Switzerland, I'd like to stop one night in Switzerland.

What you do is you stop there and go right on over to, I think actually there is a beautiful place you could go on, the Saigon, and sit around, too, for a couple days.

That would be just...

It'll visit the city.

The Confederate campaign will have just begun at that certain date.

And if you're over there in Paris, down that sideline, it is going to drive these people up the wall.

You see, the difficulty right now, which you have to realize in terms of your meetings in Paris, while it does affect solicitors, they are no longer having quite as much of an effect in that country because it isn't a surprise for the first time that

And now it's still important news.

If you go to Saigon, then you're eight columns ahead.

That's the point.

And I'd like to meet eight columns just before our convention.

Just before our convention.

Why don't you then go to Saigon and then up to Japan?

Oh, yeah.

See, it's the perfect way.

I think that's personalized.

Now, Mr. President, one other question.

They are objecting to announcing these meetings.

Now, on the other hand, I just can't get away with it.

And I think we should just tell them.

Well, like you say, this next meeting.

We have to.

This is what's going on inside.

No, I think you could get away with that and go to your parents' wedding anniversary.

You could recover.

Yeah, but isn't it better for us to announce it?

It's better if you have a meeting, if you can.

But as I said, it's more important to succeed.

But then I'm going to not make peace because we are announcing the meeting.

Then just say it.

Just say it under the circumstances.

at the present time.

You're following so closely, it's impossible.

It's better to announce it, but then we will make nothing out of it.

We'll say nothing about it.

You will say nothing in any French country?

No, no.

I've covered it now.

We have to give.

But we've done that now.

Some hold to people that something is not good.

We've covered it.

We've also got to put the Democrats on the spot.

But they, for a few, had chance.

They've got to be on the spot.

They ought to be getting away with this.

Mr. President, I, one other thing.

If you agree, I will tell Bill nothing about the content of this meeting, because if Marshall Green gives up his new proposal, he'll have to accept it.

Marshall Green was for a coalition government three years ago.

This is at least a conceivable coalition government.

I don't want to say that you had a very long conversation, but there's some of the values you see, sir, but they just aren't given yet on that political side.

Oh, I'll say eventually.

I think I know if I could go if we don't announce the trip to Saigon

until after my meeting on the 14th, and then on the 15th, after I leave Switzerland, we announced, you have ordered me to go to Saigon.

Yes.

That it's going to be the damnedest bombshell ever.

I'll knock those sons' bitches, and well, I'll see if it can be a bombshell, and then I'll see what happens.

Like that, right?

I'm sorry.

No, because then on the 7th or 8th, I'm going to meet them again.

No, we'll say this is just part of the process.

And then I go to Russia.

And by that time, they'll be ready to settle.

I think we have...

They may be ready to settle, I think you're right.

They may be, and we are still doing well.

If we are doing well, we are going to... Now that they've opened a stand to ceasefire, I know they're going to try to take advantage.

I mean, they're going to try to grab the priest.

We have to prepare that we may agree to a stand to ceasefire.

But I must say, I think...

The argument may be doing a little better on the ground than they have.

They seem to be having a hell of a lot of spoiling operations.

And I say that not because of the casualties they claim they're inflicting, but because of the ones they're taking themselves.

In other words, whenever I see low argument casualties, I know they're sitting in their foxholes.

So when I see them high, they must be outfilling somebody.

They're taking almost as many as the nodes they've been making.

They are?

Yes.

Well, they should, because they're on the offensive.

Now, those boiling operations, Henry, are pretty hard in these bath years.

Oh, and then they pick up, yesterday they picked up six tons of wood.

I saw that one place.

I also saw that in one area, in another province, where they came into an area of training, they found 180 dead bodies, just dead bodies from bombing them.

Now, that must not be an accident.

Well, we think we've killed about 70,000 people.

That's not even counting E-52s.

And that's true.

That makes me wonder another 70,000.

I talked to Thompson, who's going around the world for us, around South Dakota for us, and he thinks we've...

He thinks they're through till 75.

Well, that's armament.

Armament can survive that.

I think, Mr. President, we have a...

I can be certainly proved.

I mean, we've never yet accepted the first offer anybody made to us.

No.

But I will make specific recommendations to you before the end of the meeting.

Of course, you know that you have a very tough partner to you here.

He may not be willing even to go along with this, that he won't run again.

That is not longer an issue, actually.

Their proposal is easier for him to handle, because it requires a direct negotiation with him.

Strangely enough, their proposal is better due to Ilhani's psychology than ours is.

Their proposal requires that he can participate in the negotiations.

Then he's supposed not to participate in the

what that government of national concord is, whether that's a super sort of structure, and Saigon continues, you see, or whether Saigon disappears.

But he's always said when there is permanent peace, he won't run.

So he has to face everything.

He will resign.

So he could put it into that context.

But the government of national concord, it could just be a temporary government.

It's only the elections that are going on.

Oh, but that's what it may be.

And to do elections to determine the government.

Yes.

Sure.

Well, how can that be proposed?

In other words, this is really, this is the election commission.

The way we ought to state it is rather than government in action, it's basically an electoral government.

A government, an interim government or something like that.

Mr. President, if we want to be cynical enough, first of all, it's in our interest.

What do we call it, sir?

It's in our interest.

I think the South Vietnamese would win that election.

This is an economic country, Mr. President.

You can't tell.

Whoever is the province chief, he's going to determine the outcome.

I wish we could run our elections as well.

Your bureau has to come to us to tell you about it.

Oh, yeah, Frankie Fitzgerald, I know her.

Well, actually, Frankie is very bright, but she used to be a girlfriend of Ellsberg's, so that gives you a feeling.

He brought her to Vietnam as his mistress.

In fact, I've never met her.

But she is bright.

She's exceptional.

Marietta Tree was a close friend of that.

That's very close.

Very close.

I know Marietta Tree.

She hangs around the Georgetown crowd.

She comes up every once in a while.

God is going to punish me someday for the same thing.

There's no time.

You know, the sport's deadly.

I had a reason he isn't going to watch that.

I don't care if that's a subject on the calendar, but he's just avoided having a name being named as a correspondent.

But I understand that Carter Bird had said that he'd bring a, that he'd name Teddy as coach.

Yeah, yeah.

And I've heard...

If that ever happens, I've met a coach for an American politician.

I mean, I've heard that from George.

I thought that Carter Bird, you know, I don't know if you know, he's a pretty boy.

And, you know, a real mean little lightweight.

You see?

Yeah, I know both of them.

They're close friends of John Gray.

Yeah.

And...

He's the hero for you.

Yeah, he's the hero for me.

Oh, sure.

Medium, very thin.

I don't happen to like that.

I mean, like a model.

Very thin.

Yeah, the model.

Very machiated looking, but quite pretty.

You know, it's the booze.

You can't just drink.

Well, at least you can't have a first-board drink.

No, no, no.

Bobby and Teddy, Bobby and Jack, everybody knows that people don't have their own way.

Because they wear it all up on the street.

But I've had to be seen and told, for example, that Teddy is unbelievable.

He invited her to the opening of the Kennedy Center, to his house.

He had two tables, one upstairs and one downstairs.

He took it up all during the dinner.

She had to fight him off because under the table he was grabbing her by the legs.

Oh, Christ.

And, you know, Christina... And they never left an equal presence.

...at his own house with his wife heading the table downstairs.

And, you know, Christina's past, she's not exactly an innocent.

I didn't think so.

It doesn't look like it.

I don't know.

And then she said...

She followed her to New York, and they have an apartment there in the Carmel Hotel.

He rented one ten floors down, walked up the stairs, practically beat her door down.

And she said she's been pursued by many men in her life, but Teddy just, it's impossible.

She finally told him, what if the newspapers get this?

He said, no newspapers are going to print anything about me.

I've got that covered.

Jesus Christ.

That's for sure.

And...