Nixon, Kissinger & Rogers on Congressional relations and Foreign aid

Well, I wondered if it would help a little the leaders to relent to this extent.
Because more, I mean, more than an hour, frankly, I might as well be able to stop for having them for, say, the evenings.
You know what I mean?
I'd have one going when the evenings are going to be that good, and the leaders
perhaps they kind of ought to be, you know what I mean?
And you could just say that the president wanted to pick one of the eight things.
For example, the version's going to be seven-inch.
That's just another piece of the term for that.
So just call that.
All right, thank you.
My account's out the window.
It's a pretty good show to be live here.
It's always open for you.
We mixed it up a little so that the heat was included to do the balance.
Or unloaded heavily with batteries.
That's right.
Or some of the distance to go to church.
That's right.
That's good.
And I think a pretty good match would have to persist.
Cancel order, regret, or something else.
Well, I'm not so sure of that.
I think if they cancel order, regret it.
But we don't have a hell of a lot.
If they're the Democrats, then don't even bother.
The only ones that the council would regret that I would bother then having are some of our good gods.
But don't bother with any of the others.
We don't give a damn if they come around to the others.
We just do it out of compassion anyway.
See?
This first Sunday, though, it was a little different, I think, because the invitations were late, and they might have had trips or something.
And you get so much credit, frankly, in the extended invitation.
That's what I mean.
To get the invitation, it just can't come.
You're not really stuck.
If a good guy gets an invitation and can't come, they put him on a list for a future thing.
That's what I mean.
But if it's just one of the guys, we're going to have to go through the motions to help with it.
Because we're really in the same divide and talk pretty strongly about it.
Well, I'm sure that's good.
It's actually getting apologized for his remarks.
Well, that's right.
We're having sex in the church now, I suppose.
Yes.
Actually, we're quickly going to have meetings.
You are?
Yes, sir.
We can cover all the Republicans' meetings and meetings.
But you thought you should include the senator's team.
I guess you're right.
Except those are the mistake dinners and we're using them for worship service.
So you're getting heavy house people teaming too, of course, yes.
Well, think about it, it went really well.
Oh, he already had a column yesterday without having seen me.
Just on the base of the Chinese coverage.
This is an unbelievable event.
No, they were just sitting there.
But first of all, all of them understood the liaison office right away.
They caught up to me.
Oh, yes.
And they all understood that the Chinese had never done this before, and that's a great event.
And then when I read the list of the prisoners, and the downing thing, the exchanges, they were just buggered and all the questions were really... Just trying to get additional stuff, we once made a deal on Taiwan.
That's where I'm from.
Yeah.
Now, on Vietnam, are there any...
On Vietnam, I really didn't.
I did the same thing on reconstruction as I did in the morning.
And I really had them on the defensive.
If there was anything to agree to, I said, you again missed the point.
You've been right and you're wrong.
For the last two weeks, that is the issue.
The issue is whether or not the United States has a relationship, whether or not we leave this war-destructing country to have a relationship only with either neutral countries virtually.
Or whether the United States .
That's what it is.
That's right.
And if we want to leave it to others, you can remind them.
But they were very attentive.
And Lizard Eat and Lizard Go around.
Really?
Oh, yeah.
You know, you can never tell what the bastards are going to write.
That's all right.
But I did them a lot.
Murray Marder had one of his super clever questions.
Did we discuss Laos and Cambodia?
So I just twisted it.
Did I discuss Laos and Cambodia?
So I said yes.
And then I explained Laos.
How did you say it?
How did you explain it?
I said, what was the issue?
We said last year we wanted to cease fire, withdraw the foreign troops.
We've got to cease the fire.
We've got to withdraw the foreign troops.
This was done by the government, not under pressure.
We were perfectly willing just to have a ceasefire.
They wanted more.
They got more.
And so they didn't look at it.
We pressured them.
They wanted more.
I mean, they wanted a political settlement.
You have, therefore, to assume that they .
Our commitment to them was only to a ceasefire and removal of foreign forces.
They, on top of it, got a political settlement.
which was made by the non-communist, neutralist prime minister.
Jesus, you know, that really devastates the, and I'll tell you the guy that really led the press in this, first-stage press didn't at all plan it that way, but it was this Sankovic.
Arbuckle.
Arbuckle.
They all, in fact, you read the stories of Martin Press this morning, and Henry, it just sounds as if they all repeat Arbuckle word for word.
But is he that big?
It just hurts that we've done it.
I mean, after all, when we said, when we announced the peace, when we said there'd be a ceasefire in Laos, soon everyone was making smart alecky remarks about that.
Now there's not only a ceasefire, but a political session.
I think that Suvarna panicked a little bit, and he could have gotten a few better terms.
Those are the margins.
They don't affect the fundamental thing.
It's like... ...the terms, as we know, that make only a big difference, provided there is some incentive for the parties to keep it.
And that's why the deal with the North is so important.
If the North gets its ass out of there, he'll survive.
If they don't, he won't survive.
And that really is where... And after all, let's look at me.
That's the other thing.
I said to Lee, as we start to fight on that cable, these congressmen and senators, they know very well that if the North continues to ravage its neighbors, they're going to get a .
How the hell would it move?
You know, it's a hell of an incentive for the .
How about you, what would you like to see Bill Rogers?
I've been working on it for a long time.
I've been working on it for a long time.
I, incidentally, changed the event for tomorrow.
If you want to go to the camp, David, we'll meet here.
Oh, just a second.
I'm George, I'll just go to the camp.
I'd like to have a meeting for 2.30 at the EOB.
I won't be over there until about 5.30 when Joe can read the triage.
And then I'll do the television.
No use for you to have to go up there and back.
Just go up to me, and then I will just can't do the radio.
So you're all set.
And if you agree, then I'll do the television.
That way you can do your television while you get back at 5.30, and then you can relax a little.
You won't have to be right on time.
It's up to you.
I wouldn't do it just before 11 because then you're not going to do it.
Is there anybody that's going with me?
I would like to have him order salt.
Order salt.
Order salt, right.
Right.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I just want to have a discussion with you.
Good.
Good.
And also that I'm going to put a little bit of information so that we don't have to make you do all the goodness to that.
This is what we're going to do.
But their views, what you said, that this is fire, that it might not be aiding it because it's a running battle.
But you know, we've got to win that battle.
We've just got to win it.
It's unbelievable that these people would not want to win the battle.
Well, I don't know what they are.
The President, when we go on the offensive, you haven't lost one of these yet.
And, well, if you lose it and the contact thing then blows up, we're going to crucify it.
But they've got to be warned that I think if you would tell Joe all something, and let me write that, I mean, on his own.
And I just want to say, Joe, this is, I think Joe should know how to do it.
Because I know, because I know.
Joe started me at the time.
I was not him, but I was on him.
And Joe knows very well that you should hold him in that way.
But he knows I came right away.
And I believe the Republicans were the isolationists.
And they were isolating on exactly the same ground that the liberal internationalists, who got us into this goddamn war, are now opposing.
And therefore, I mean, it's a patient a decision that the French was arguing.
Because basically, if you say that, why should we help a nation abroad when we can't help the Brooklyn school and the ghetto at home?
It's irrelevant.
If you don't help the nation abroad, you may not have any school at all.
That's what it's about.
That's the argument I made.
In the end, I got the district disappointed.
Totally.
Absolutely.
What these guys say is that the polls show people are against aid.
Of course they did.
They did in 1947.
The polls all told us aid.
But the responsible congressmen and senators are not supposed to follow the polls.
They are supposed to make the polls.
That's disgusting.
The President was wondering whether you, Bill, and Bill Porter, and Southerland, and I might have breakfast with them tomorrow morning to discuss the international conference, and that we have a picture together.
That'll give us about 45 minutes.
I think it went pretty well.
You know, it was easy.
I made many of the same points I'd made in the briefing.
There's a little less of the, uh...
I didn't make too much of the... of the chemistry, a bit much of the color.
And I didn't make any speculation on the audience.
And, um, I made things with me, and I gave about the same answer.
That's what I think, because the liberals in that will do too much, can't do too much.
I think so.
At least we have been told to guard everything about his pleading about the poor people there.
Yes, that's right.
That we should be known as the people doing construction rather than as the bombers.
Now he has his chance and he does not.
Okay.
Clearly.
You see, the fight is to build something up.
Build something up.
Well, you've got to go.
Yeah, I've got to go.
But we're going to have, you know, the rest of the team.
Show me.
I've got to go.
But I was just going to say, you know, the rest of the team, I think, probably better do it without us.
Six or seven people.
You know, it's just like that.
I'll have to take the breathing out of the can, David, for a few weeks.
Yes.
You can talk about it.
It's better to have some people in the service, but since I've worked back in the day, getting my people back from the outliers, they're very positive about it.
They work out of date, you see.
But, you know, you're going to have to come to that.
And that gives us one to manage that.
That puts the end of the year to get you to therapy and all that.
Well, with Joe, I think you could take that from Joe.
And he then was basically a liberal himself.
He was all over the state.
I supported him.
I was one of the best supporters of hate that this country's ever seen, including Vietnam.
Now they have liberal Democrats.
He's the one trying to scum it.
This is not a caution about that.
In particular, when we didn't get back over, when we didn't start it, when they were pleading for years of how we should be known as the humanitarian as well,
You can also find this, I make the link right to him, which I think is very interesting.
That, you know, as I said this morning, what the hell, I hated the Japanese and a lot of people hated the Germans, just as they hated us, I'm sure.
And yet here, now, we find our liberal intellectuals who apparently love the North Vietnamese and are crying.
Bob had some tears over them, saying, oh, no, we'll help the Germans and the Japanese, but we won't help an army in the east.
I'd say it's all on average.
I told Bob, I told you this morning to these leaders was really very effective.
They have to do it sometimes.
But I can go there and do it towards you.
Now, there, there's nothing to take you on.
I think the transformation of your position, I think it's going to grow.
Well, they must rather have an endless energy situation when they go home.
We've taken the kids last.
I was going to mention this.
I was with Billy Graham talking last night.
He's got a kid, 21 years old, in college.
And, of course, his kid actually follows his line.
Oh, great.
I hear everybody else was worried about the father.
His father-in-law was great.
The lay, one of the great ministers of the church.
who's always been a hardliner.
He called really around Christmas and said he's always smart about this.
He just had very tough, but he would never say anything about it.
His father-in-law called him a few days ago.
He said, I went wrong.
The president was right.
That's what he was always saying.
His kid, though, this is the last thing I'm going to do.
His boy said that his school, at least probably the conservative school, that his school, they were taking one of the kids and saying,
My God, what they're doing is work.
That's the thing that impresses the kids.
That's right.
They can do something that happened harder.
It may not have happened harder, but it happened in his school anyway.
I get letters from high school, from elementary school children.
Really?
And some of them are really nice.
One of them said, thank the President for ending the war.
I hope there'll be another war soon so that we can end that too.
It is the best thing that happened since the dropping of the atomic bomb was waiting for me.
Oh, my God.
Well, this is not a race, Willie, if you want.
Sir, this is not a...
This is not a country that likes to lose.
I would hate to say, Mr. President, what any president would be if he paid.
If we had dug down and we had not done it, what would it be, Senator?
What, what, what?
I believe in very personal terms.
What would those people, brothers, have looked like down on that ramp?
If we had trained just to get them off their heads, we had low control.
Huh?
They would feel responsible for having gone.
I'll go ahead and give you all my best.
Right, Mr. President.
I don't even think I know who you are, partner.

Nixon, Kissinger & Rogers on Congressional relations and Foreign aid

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Nixon Library Finding Aid

Also recorded on February 22, 1973

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