Nixon, Kissinger & Malik on Vietnam Peace Agreement

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Uh, one thing, Mr. White, that's what they did.

Yeah.

One thing, Mr. White, that's what they did.

They allowed us to be opposed to you going out with Travis.

It's none of my business.

They are very opposed to you going out with all the persons, returning prisoners.

It's all right, but some days you feel that there's maybe too much of a stress on the man, and it's a very uneasy about it.

Yeah, of course it is.

I understand.

So I, I, uh, I, I, you know, somebody else, somebody else, you know, I don't know, but it's, everybody's got to know it.

That's what everyone else said.

Well.

That trip of mine is a big help in that connection.

Oh, he knows he's got to do that, doesn't he?

Yeah, he knows he's got to do that.

But that helps us mentally.

It would be good, I think, to let the word out to some people.

You know what I mean?

Yeah.

Not wise, really, but wise because the congratulations are really pouring in.

Now, the Chinese put out a valuable statement.

Well, they printed practically the whole text of your speech, which is unheard of.

But they first made it enough to say you're printing a very important speech.

And then they'd add 600 words of your speech.

uh, which is, uh, I think they dropped out the D.O.W.

's, uh, of course, and the German, but they had, it was a very fair protest to send you a note saying it was one of the greatest contributions to the cause of peace.

The Polish Prime Minister, the fantastic thing is that the Romanians, the Poles, uh, didn't say this was a victory for socialism, they said this was a victory for reason, and for peace,

They don't, but that's what I find so fascinating, Mr. President.

When they read the agreement,

It's been turning and it's going to be going up ever since.

It's a hell of a trip.

That's a hell of a trip.

And you know, I said something to those YIS reporters, and it's a little bit of a stretch, but it is true.

As a reporter across the park, I said, well, I don't think so.

I said, no, it's true.

It's a great negotiation.

So we insisted that we had to have a share.

Everyone returned and treated them kindly.

You know, that's how they all heard that.

And I said, that was worth a billion people.

Mrs. Gandhi sent you a letter of drooling all over you.

Great is the treatment.

And the Indian ambassador called me and he said, and read me a report he wrote to his government at the time of the bombing.

And he said, this bombing is saddening, but not...

And Hanoi, for now, it is the war in Hanoi that it must keep the people until certainly the time.

And then... We heard it in Australia.

Yes.

You're shooting.

That's what I had to say.

Oh, okay, I see.

I was sure to say.

But what is so fascinating to me is that the communist world, which...

which one would expect to take great victory for his social and public freedom-loving people.

Now, you are coming out of it, Mr. President, in the strongest position you've ever been, because you rammed it down everybody's throat.

Uh, all the threat stories that you screwed it up in October, everyone now says you do this.

You know, all over the other day, all this, uh, isolation.

I was not, uh, I, I, uh, I don't think people, people now, I have, I noticed I just put, uh, I just smattered the wires.

Ronald said, now we understand why you didn't say anything.

It showed great restraint.

I'm getting a lot of wires which are really, uh,

They're not going to be persons of interest to the, to the policy.

And, no, I think, you see, the isolation argument is actually voted by success.

It's not worth it.

It doesn't apply, of course, to what you did with that.

But Friedman calls almost every day with some blubbering comments about it from Russia.

And it's one of those in respect to that history.

It's a, in respect to that history.

Second, we made it possible to break the crack, too, which we needed to do.

Third, we put a shock on all the spars in our fleet, and we cracked them.

And that might be cracked, but I think we've already got a plan about how we're going to do it here in the future.

Finally, I think we...

maybe in the United States and the so-called free liberal Republicans under us.

We had to go through the death sentence, in fact, in order to get what we did, because it had come easily.

they would have gotten out and they have to have some, there is no question about that, they've got to have some understanding of the plan that we did to achieve adaptability.

Okay.

What I'd only say to him is, if there's a patient in the International Commission, the Vice President of course will be visiting there.

But they've given you a long-talking paper that says you can send it because you won't have enough time.

I've made some references here.

I told them not to send it.

I know.

Because it's all economic, but you won't have time.

You won't have any time.

Very well.

Thank you.

I want to say to you, we're very appreciative of your support.

And we, of course, will seek to respond to the questions and the questions.

And so, sir, you may arise.

The other thing that I want to say is that we wish to hear about the questions and the comments.

As far as it goes, you didn't realize it, but now it's done.

You can see that you're not too sacred to yourself.

And, uh, we, uh, from now on, you know, we'll be able to, uh, as you know, I'll always have a test session with you.

It's the first station that I've ever been to.

It's my first stop.

And, uh, when you think of it, it's not as good as it used to be.

your survival, your advance, is just absolutely indispensable to the whole of this organization.

For that reason, the relationship that we've established with you is not so important.

We want to be as helpful as you can be.

And we're with you.

So you can base on that.

I'm going to ask the vice president to come by and hold it out.

We'll talk to him very soon.

We'll talk to him and we'll talk to him about how he's going to approach the rest of the year.

Yes, he was there.

Oh, wow.

Maybe you can walk up there and see the helicopter.

Maybe I have to go back to the helicopter to, uh, to, uh, make you like to walk down the, uh, sail over to the next one.

Mr. Chairman, um, before I go there, please let me ask you, Mr. Chairman, do you want me to explain to you the previous situation?

Yes, all right.

Secondly, there's always the, I guess you want to say, the strict ability to manipulate the mechanism.

How?

How does he do it?

That's your job.

That's his job.

Yeah, that's right.

I guess that is what the vice president knows, too.

What does he say to the vice president?

You see, even though the Indonesian was not correctly involved in this, what do you know?

I didn't know the United States.

Even though, to me, I've always said the question, we can't accept it.

If you go back to 1963, or way back to 1963, I don't know if I got it, but in the nation, a thousand miles of islands across that sea, and 150,000 people.

It's the big prize of Europe.

That's what the whole thing's all about, right?

Here is the great Malaysian peninsula, and the Chinese are just playing like a dagger at your heart.

And therefore, we know what it's about.

And therefore, we want to cooperate every way that we can, economically and otherwise.

We need to count on them.

These are the things that we need to count on.

How do you do it?

Well, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a,

Oh yes.

But please, create more money and power out of Heidi Hennessey.

R.I.

I don't think I need to give you any money.

Please, what do you want me to do?

Well, we hope not to carry the peace, maybe.

Yeah, not the peace.

Not the peace.

No, not the peace.

Nixon, Kissinger & Malik on Vietnam Peace Agreement

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Nixon Library Finding Aid

Also recorded on January 26, 1973

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