On October 14, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon and Henry A. Kissinger met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 11:01 am and 11:17 am. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 798-011 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 Do not cite this transcript as authoritative.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.
Well, let me run through the agreement.
Of course, on any public statements that I've adjourned, Mr. President, I don't see this only as an agreement.
It's necessary to present an uprising.
Oh, you've got to get rid of it.
The main thing is to make the deal.
As a matter of fact, I'm not too damn anxious to even go on with all that.
I mean, I'm not interested.
No, you must go on.
I must go on for other reasons.
But you understand.
before you get back.
It's perfectly all right.
So I'm not concerned about it.
You see my point?
I'm not concerned about it.
It won't come out from me.
It's essential that you do it.
If you have to do something to pay it, for example, it has to be a mountain cyclist, if that's what's necessary to say.
Just keep in mind the main thing.
He has to go on television about the same time.
He must not blow.
So go ahead.
Now the deal.
The deal.
Chapter 1 is garbage, you know, we recognize the independence of Vietnam.
Chapter 2 is ceasefire.
The date of the ceasefire and the hour in which it will start and that the U.S. will remove the mines it has placed.
Chapter 3 is that the South, Article 3 is the South Vietnamese
Because if you'll stop fighting in the love of God, it's how to do that.
I'm going to ask you a question.
Sullivan, as he says, is a solid agreement.
He's not having any of that.
That's why I'm taking some of this.
He doesn't realize it's a pretty good deal.
When Lear came back to the Pentagon and said the president is a great man, he's done something that none of us believed possible.
He told this to his aide.
He was practically in tears.
Laird is a piece of .
He's a .
Go ahead.
Then Article 5 is that we will withdraw our forces in 60 days.
Out of all Americans, do you accept advisers or what do you say?
No, advisers go to military and the trades can say, all civilian personnel can say, and so forth.
Six, dismantling of all our military bases.
That's just from Vietnam.
From Vietnam.
And Chapter 7, that we can continue to send replacement aid, replacement military aid.
What does it say about the North?
It's not covered in the agreement, but we handed them a unilateral statement saying that the need for replacements in the South will be interpreted by the United States in relation to the military equipment coming in in the North.
They wouldn't do equipment sophisticated.
No, I'll say this will be taken into account in determining the need for replacements.
Article 8, return of captured military personnel and prisoners within 60 days.
That's 8A.
8B is... You can't do that on Christmas, can you?
No, it doesn't make sense.
They promised me that they would release a substantial batch within one week of signing the agreement.
They may do that.
Do you want me to do it?
It doesn't look like it.
I can do this.
They just sent us information on how to get in there.
A.B.
is that they permit us to determine the location of graves and so forth, and exhumed bodies and so forth.
A.C. What is my A.C.?
Yeah, full account.
Full account.
This is the four-down paragraph.
Right.
A.C., that's the one that will blow up the agreement, which, if anything, in which they have to keep their prisoners in the jails of the South Vietnamese and
I just don't think we can get you to release 30,000 people in two weeks.
But they're not reading that yet.
What did they say?
Well, they sent me a long message which I just got saying.
It's very interesting saying the provisional government, which is our reason, are complaining bitterly about it.
What we may have to do there is to adopt a formula saying that this has to be settled within three months and give them a side deal that in those three months we'll get you to do it.
In three months, he can do it.
He can't do it all at once.
All right.
It says, immediately after the ceasefire, the two South Vietnamese parties shall hold consultations in the spirit of national reconciliation and conquer mutual respect and mutual non-elimination.
To set up an administrative structure for the National Council of National Reconciliation and conquer the three segments, the Council shall operate on the principle of unanimity.
After the Council has assumed its functions, the two South Vietnamese parties will hold further consultations
about the formation of council at lower levels.
The two South Vietnamese parties shall sign an agreement on these and other internal matters of South Vietnam as soon as possible, and do their utmost to accomplish this within three months after the ceasefire comes into effect.
That's all that's in there about coalition.
They're committed to do nothing except to talk about it.
Well, hell, it's a council.
I mean, the government, it doesn't, the point is it's not a coalition government.
Oh, no.
And then I've added the sentence, until the existing authorities will continue to exercise their current .
But it also provides that the council operates on the principle of unanimity.
Yeah.
But it just doesn't come into being, except to discuss between these two parties.
And the .
So that's Article 9.
This is not, basically, then, a three-party deal, which you've already presented before.
It's a significant change.
Before, they'd be named two, they'd be named two, they'd be named two letters.
Well, that's how it's ever emerged, if it ever emerges.
But before, the commission... How is this going to be any better with you than when you've already turned it down?
He can negotiate it.
The other one was going to be established today, the agreement is signed.
Nothing is established to date this agreement is signed.
He's got three months.
It isn't rammed down his throat.
He negotiates it.
He can make his own terms.
He's only obliged to negotiate it.
And does he want to negotiate with the NFL?
Yes, that he does, sir.
Why does he want to?
He's always offered to do that.
I understand.
Why?
Why?
I believe in money.
Well, his trouble is going to be to, we call them the provisional revolutionary government, so we have to make clear that we recognize him as the government.
Now, one thing we may have to do, I thought about your idea of meeting him, and while it will irritate the Shiddas and North Vietnamese, I think we all do agree to meet, say, on Midway or Hawaii,
within a month of the election, if he agrees to this.
I think it's a priceless thing.
Yeah.
I'll go there later.
Oh, I think you should go to the end of your second term.
I think you should tell him about it.
That's really why... President, after this thing, we have a year's peace.
That's really the reason why I have to go to Hanoi.
Now, the other thing is, I do think the idea of it was, I don't want to go there.
I just can't go to Saigon.
I don't want to go to Italy or Hawaii.
As a matter of fact, I need to have a sanguine, which might have a hell of some use.
You'll see him within a month of the attack.
I'll see him.
Will you be in San Clemente in November?
Well, I'm coming for this year.
Well, not the month of the agreement.
It's December, early December.
Why don't we say yes, yes, early December?
I feel needed, because there'll be terrific turmoil.
That's right.
And then we can announce that we're going to go forward.
In fact, if you do it, my advice would be to do it as fast as possible as you can recover from the election.
I can do it any time.
Because?
It will irritate the North less if you do it fast.
All right.
Well, let me say, within a month, what we can say when we get closer to that is, right after you can say that, as soon after the election, as we can get you to work out.
But certainly no longer than a month.
It will not be longer than 30 days and months.
Well, I think it's easier for me.
I'll receive it with my own.
It's my own.
Give the little fellow a real turn.
Then chapter five, how the unification of South and North, remember the achievement of total belonging.
Negotiations established.
Chapter six, endless garbage about international commission.
I won't bother you with it, but the softheads will love it.
I mean, it's certainly...
But I've put in another book that there'll be an international guarantee conference within 30 days of the signing of this agreement.
It's just for them to keep quiet for 30 days.
Why are you arguing that he's doing this?
I think they're on the verge of collapse.
I think they are too.
I think they are coming and I think they have to do something.
Remember when we talked about earlier, we said by the end of the year they'll really be hurting.
And the time has come.
I think they're hurting.
I think they're bleeding to death.
And they know they can't survive.
And also I didn't hear quite about the Chinese.
Do you think the Chinese did send a courier plane back and forth?
About that I know.
Every day.
And the Chinese.
Chinese have handled these supplies diabolically.
They're giving them just enough to keep the war going, not enough to start another offensive.
Now, of course, if you wanted to play for all the models, you'd kick this over.
But then the sons of bitches might begin to unleash their whole propaganda apparatus again.
Well, the Chinese might.
And the Chinese might.
That's why you are opening this picket box.
I'm not sure.
I'm not sure.
I think the Chinese have more fish to fry than this thing.
care about the China-Russia deal.
That's why we're doing this.
That's right.
And, Mr. President, you've got essentially the maximum terms you can get on paper.
The only thing that might change in six months is you get the same terms, but there'll be fewer North Vietnamese troops in the South.
The minority of Vietnamese do not agree to withdraw.
We do.
What else?
No, but let me explain that to you.
I had a long talk with the doctor.
First, Haig went there as a total skeptic and came back a believer.
Haig formed a view, and here you're talking about a tough guy.
When I talked to him about the North Vietnamese, he said, you have to look at it from their point of view.
They are screwing their southern allies as it is.
They are getting
There's one guy who's, one group that's getting drafted by the...
It's the NLR.
It's the NLR.
Now... Well, yes and no.
They're separate enough to be drafted by this.
Now, Lidochko said what he's willing to do when he gets his right into the agreement, that there should be some demobilization in equal numbers, and the demobilized soldiers should return to the place of their birth.
That's in the agreement.
Now, the South has a million and a half.
The North has 120,000 down there.
They've demobilized 50,000 in the South.
That will create an obligation to send 50,000 up north.
Secondly, it is inconceivable to me, if we think about it...
In equal numbers?
Yes.
If we think of... No, no, but who are they going to demobilize?
The North does it.
Now, secondly...
You have to remember the political realities.
These peasants in the north will not tolerate having their sons in the south once there's peace.
I mean, it sure is a police state, but there's a limit to what a police state can do.
So I think on this one we have to be realistic.
The nitpickers are going to tell us they keep their army in the south.
I don't believe that that's true.
I believe and they believe that they are ending the war.
They sent me another message today saying, this is not an armistice for us, this is a permanent peace.
Now, who sent this?
We got told before he left.
Now, this could be, Mr. President, it might be a mask.
He left today.
No, he left.
They called him in and said it's a message from we got told before.
I think maybe he sent it from Moscow.
You want me to get it?
I thought I wouldn't sit in on it.
Oh, I should be this man again.
What do I have to do?
Well, you know, that's interesting.