Nixon's The One (2013) s01e01 Episode Script
Episode 1
Richard Nixon often explained that he had re-installed a taping system in the White House in order to preserve his place in history.
In fact, however, the taping system did the reverse.
It destroyed his place in history.
These programmes will not revisit the breakthrough to China or the political narrative that led to Watergate and the threat of an impeachment.
Instead, the tapes tell us about everyday life at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and just how the country was run from the Oval Office under Richard Nixon.
Despite his disdain for the Northeastern intellectual elite, Nixon turned to a member of that group to be his closest foreign policy adviser.
Henry Kissinger was a Harvard professor with a fondness for Hollywood actresses, as well as a fierce ambition to control the policy he'd previously been analysing.
The relationship between the two was an intricate, sly and often fraught dance of mutual respect and mutual contempt.
After they both left office, they were each competing for history to award all the credit, and none of the blame, in their individual direction, but they couldn't openly attack each other because their reputations were umbilically linked.
The result was regular barbs, just below the surface.
Nixon would say, "Henry was a great intellectual, "but, of course, like all intellectuals, he was unpredictable "and often unwilling to maintain his support for policies if they became unpopular.
" Henry, too, had his way of praising Nixon.
He would say, "President Nixon was a great president, "he was a superb delegator.
"So of course, he delegated all the important problems to me.
" The conversations you're about to see were recorded by Nixon's secret taping equipment, and these are the words actually spoken by the participants and edited only for time.
In keeping with the era in which the original tapes were recorded, this programme is presented in standard definition.
Let me say, after all the agony we've been through, you want to remember that several things have come out of it.
Uh You have to look at the .
.
that North Vietnam's capacity to wage aggressive war has been sharply reduced.
Mm.
The Russians and the Chinese have got to look upon us with, uh, certainly more fear and, therefore, with more respect.
And finally, uh, we have to bear in mind, that, uh, it has smoked out our enemies, media, the intellectual community, and Congress, there they are! Otherwise, there would've been the most sickening pressure, uh, for me to start going over to the 38 percent that voted against us, rather than the 61 who voted for us, in an attempt to govern the country.
Now, let me say, that 38 percent that were against us, they're out.
Period.
Never in this White House again.
Never, never, never.
I couldn't agree more.
That's the way you run the country.
Listen, they put it against Kennedy.
I got 49 percent of the vote, he got 49 percent of the vote.
I lost by 112,000 votes.
As a matter of fact, if you take Alabama's electors out, uh, I would've won by 112,000 votes because Alabama's electors didn't vote for Kennedy, they voted for somebody else and they gave his votes to him.
Mm.
So the country was evenly divided.
Mm.
I never saw once .
.
a column, an editorial, anything, suggesting that Kennedy or Johnson, under the circumstances, should perhaps talk with, consult, invite down, the man who had been a candidate for president, who'd been a vice president for eight years.
In eight years, I was never in the White House socially.
I should've.
Once for the Bay of Pigs.
Oh, Bay of Pigs, yeah.
I was in town at the time.
He called me because he needed somebody to - To cry to.
Oh, Christ, he damn near died! He's sitting He's rocking in that chair! I-I understood it.
Uh I saw then, it got heated.
Kennedy could never have done that - Nevertheless, the point I make is, in eight years, I was never invited to the White House.
What I think is important is, I was never invited to a social function, uh, as long as he'd been Never! My wife, myself, in eight years Mm.
Now, let me say it, though, that's over with.
We're going to do our way now.
This idea that we're going to invite John Gardner or Dean Sayre and all the rest down here to prove we're not mad at them The hell with them! Why should we? No.
And, also, the lack of compassion out of them After all, Mr President, here you've been in a decision process about the war - it must've been a painful and anguishing decision - and they owe it to their country, whatever they think about you, to ask themselves, "The man who had been elected President must've had a good reason.
"No! He's a mad man.
"He doesn't consult anybody.
"He does it because of this or that.
" And the viciousness and the nastiness of these attacks They are not patriots! They are not thinking of their country.
Well, they never have.
I told you they I told you they would hate me! Look, it's one thing - Do you remember when you said, "After the election, "you'd have them in the palm of your hand because they couldn't bear to be out"? Yes, well - No! They're so full of hate, you will never have them in the palm of your hand.
But we must remember it, though.
We must remember it.
But they're out now.
You know, this has been an absolute eye-opener for me.
Quite an eye-opener, this thing There was one thing that I wanted to mention to you, Mr President, that's bothering me enormously, which is that interview by that Italian bitch, Fallaci.
I don't know whether you ever saw that, uh, but it's that, uh, that woman.
I, uh, I saw her because the Italian Ambassador that told me she was .
.
going to do an article that was a hatchet job on you, so I, as one of your close collaborators, could straighten it out, that was influential in Italy.
But she came in with a thesis that, uh, you know, the Liberals Mm-hm.
.
.
and so on and so forth, and, uh, I told her what I had said to a thousand other people, that you worked alone, and the tremendous courage it took on your part to make these decisions alone, without asking a lot of people.
Mm-hm.
And that, uh, almost all of the decisions have been taken by you alone.
And I did say that one example of your courage was that you had appointed me, even though I had not supported you in your primary campaigns, and that all you had asked was what was best for the country.
The whole purpose of my interview was to build you up, so that bitch twisted it all around to make it sound as if I were saying that Every time I mentioned something about you, she twisted it into a framework to make it sound as if I had been building myself up, and I had absolutely no intention.
For example, that cowboy quote Well, I have never been on a horse in my life! I said, "The President is going to have a big success.
" She said, "Oh? How is it possible the President, "who is not a figure like Kennedy, can have such a success?" I said, "You have to remember, "the Americans, they like many types.
"They like movie stars, "and they like the cowboy who rides alone into town, "you know, like Gary Cooper in High Noon, "and against everybody.
He, uh "He takes, uh, he does what is right.
" And, uh, I was talking about you.
Ah.
Mm-hm.
Mm-hm.
I've never been on a horse in my life! That bitch said that I see myself as a cowboy.
Well, the whole thing, Henry, is that you just can't talk to the Liberals.
I know.
But I-I've always felt that, I don't, uh, that I accept public abuse.
But no, no-one has ever heard me say anything that builds myself up at your expense.
Now, this is the point that bothers me.
I hate these little people.
Mr President, it was one of the very best and subtlest press conferences.
But, you see, on the bombing, if, uh, that comes up, if, uh, if they think, if they, uh, as a result of that, "Don't have a meeting!" then, screw 'em.
We'll bomb 'em some more.
One of Rockefeller's people, I don't know if you've met him, he's been in here, Canning Oh, yeah, I know him.
He - He's a very smart fellow.
Well, he called up.
He called me late last night and he said he just wanted me to know he often criticised your PR, but he thought that this, he thought this was a masterpiece.
Mm.
I-It just made you look so, well And another thing that was impressive, I must say, even to me, when you got into areas that I don't know anything about, I mean, the scope Hm.
.
.
that you had to handle, and you were on top of every single one of these issues.
You knew the facts and you stated a reasonable position.
Well, that's nice.
No, that fact, I think, comes through.
You do realise, Henry, that, uh, the hardest part of a press conference is the questions.
I mean, I read the entire foreign policy briefing book, I knew all the questions about Latin America, about the Azores Agreement, about the Bahrain Agreement, about the limited, uh, the, uh, the War Powers situation, uh, the Mid-East, uh, the, uh, NATO troop cuts and so forth, uh, that those-those-those were, uh, questions that I was prepared for in those areas they never asked.
Uh, now, the domestic area, you should've seen the list.
What was on that? Oh, uh, a question about the welfare form, a question about, uh, childcare development centres, a query about, a question about the OEO, and, uh, an extension of the legal services, a very long dissertation on the British pound and the Smithsonian thing, which I had to just spend half an hour getting through my head, uh, so I was prepared for all that, and that's the work, Henry.
And then to boil it down into a form that you're comfortable with Yeah, yeah.
And I thought that the first answer was beautiful.
Um I-I mean, he I-If you had made this as a speech, you would've looked as if you were filibustering, but he set you up.
He Yeah.
He, he I-In trying to ask a tough question, he gave you a chance to give an easy answer.
Well, no! Uh, no, no, not an easy answer, but an answer that was very favourable to us.
I thought it was outstanding.
When do you leave? About 3:30 Three? .
.
this afternoon.
And listen, I want to tell you one thing about it, with your little kids Any time it would mean something to them, uh, I want them to, uh, come out and take a swim in our pool.
You know, it's a heated pool.
Well, that would be nice.
I don't know.
Uh We'd like to do that sometime.
Right.
That'd be nice.
I think it would mean a lot to the little kids to, uh, go out to California and join us.
Oh, OK.
So sometime, when you're going there, just, uh, let us know.
I'd like that, yeah.
Oh, good evening! I thought it was outstanding.
I was at the dinner and, uh, the Indian Ambassador was there and a very well-known British publisher, in fact, my publisher, Sir George Nicolson.
What paper's that? I beg your pardon? What paper's he with? Oh, no, no.
It's not a paper, it's a very large publishing Oh, the book! I understand.
Book publishing Um, and he also runs a big salon in London, very influential Right, right, right! Sorry, sorry, sorry! But, uh, the reaction was really, it was absolutely enthusiastic, outstanding, very good, and I must say, I thought you handled it with really very great delicacy.
The question of residual force, the question of withdrawal Well, we didn't give a goddamn thing away, you know! Not only did you not give anything away, but I was pretty tough.
You handled it with extraordinary delicacy.
A-And to stand up to that for an hour, I thought you handled China beautifully.
Well, we've got I know I handled that pretty well.
Mm.
We do have one minor technical problem, Mr President.
You kept mentioning November 1st, and actually, you had announced it for December 1st.
Well, that's all right! Look, if you don't mind, we would like to make it clear that the date you announced is the date that, that stands, the one you announced last week.
Uh, December, November 15th instead of October 15, right? Otherwise, we are going to have uproar in Saigon.
That's right, that's right, that's right.
It's, uh, a minor technical - I know! I-I said, uh, November 1st, I meant October, I meant December 1st and November 15, right? This is not going to create any problems.
No problem, no problem! But I thought that China was beautifully handled, and you were very wise, and, uh, it was tremendously effective that you turned that first question into a little speech on peace.
What was the first question? Oh, what you wake about What you wake up about.
Silly question! It was a silly question but therefore hard to answer.
But it was important that you had a chance to state that you - That I sleep, that I dream about peace all night.
Yeah, and all that crap! Well, it put everything else into a good framework, and you got a good hand.
I went around the table, everybody said Oh, there was another, um, a Democrat there, David, uh Oh Ginsburg! I don't know if you know him.
Dave Ginsburg? Former Head of the OPA? Uh, yeah.
Lawyer? I guess, yeah.
Oh! Tell him he was my boss.
He'll love that.
Are you going to go back? I've got to go.
Tell him he was my boss.
He recruited me.
I was top of the class at, uh, Duke Law School.
It wasn't because of me.
I was a fairly good student But he thought it was outstanding.
Huh? He thought it was outstanding.
How did Ginsburg feel? No, no.
T-That T-That's the one.
He said it was absolutely outstanding.
H-He said that.
Well, it wasn't that good.
The questions weren't that good.
T-They were a pretty stupid, some of them.
Mr President, you had a tough, tough row to hoe there.
Yeah, I had to avoid a few things, but, uh Hm.
But Ginsburg felt all right? You tell him that, uh, I remember he recruited me.
He was the man who recruited me to be .
.
to go into the OPA in 1942! He'll, he'll love it.
He'll love hearing that.
Will you tell him that? Yeah, absolutely.
And that, uh, one day, you'll bring him in and you have him for lunch and you bring him in and say hello to him, OK? Absolutely.
See, he was head of OPA then.
Oh, right.
But I thought the reaction was really very, very interesting, very favourable.
And I must say, I was tremendously impressed with the delicacy with which you handled those foreign policy questions, because this was a tough moment.
The main thing was not to give anything.
I mean, we didn't give any the goddamn thing away! Not a thing.
I didn't give a thing about, uh, uh Frankly, Henry, I didn't give a thing away about Vietnam, I didn't give a thing away about China.
Uh, I-I said, "Oh, I'm not going to talk about that!" Beautiful.
I said, "This is not the time to talk about it.
" Beautifully done.
The way the China thing sits now, we haven't said anything, uh, and the way, that, uh Well, it doesn't raise any expectations.
Yes! In fact, most of the expectations have been raised - And I said, uh, "In effect, uh, insofar as we're concerned, "we're ready to trade, we're ready to exchange.
" Excellent.
"But in terms of recognition, or technical problems, or these other problems, "I ain't going to talk about it.
" I thought that was good.
We going to get a hell of a blast from The Washington Post and The New York Times.
They going to say "Why don't you say we're going to recognise Red China?" Screw 'em! Don't you agree? They did not get you to this point on your China policy.
You did more in two years than they ever - Well, it drives them nuts, Henry! It drives them nuts.
That's what I feel.
But i-it, uh We, we, uh You know, you never know.
The questions determine it, but I thought we got some points across.
The questions were not good but - They were pretty stupid.
But you did - When I talk about the young people, I thought that was not bad, that, uh, I dream with them and I want them to believe in the country, that wasn't bad.
W-What did you think about the kid, the answer about the family? Wasn't that good? That was excellent.
It was very - I thought it wasn't bad.
It wasn't the best.
No, I thought - But, you know, the idea of, uh, "We're ending the war "and we're doing this and proving that the system works "Now, kids, come aboard, let's get going, huh?" "Let's focus on the things that we can do rather than on -" That's right! "Let's make this thing work.
" That's right.
I thought that - Well, Henry, have a good time.
Fine.
Thank you! Right.
There's only one thing I want, uh, and has to be done through our security people.
I want Henry's phones logged.
I want his private phone logged, I want his other logged.
Uh Can you do this discretely? Will the telephone company do this or not? I mean, the main point is, it has to be done in terms of leaks.
You mean bugged? Oh, God, no! I don't care what he said.
I just want to know who he talks to.
Like, it's very valuable for me to know that, uh, he talked to Kraft two days before Kraft's piece appeared, as you know I don't know.
I'll try to do that.
I'll find out.
Well, the White House switchboard, we can know who he calls from the White House, can we? We can know who he calls out.
We can at least know the numbers he calls.
Any call he asks the White House operator to get through, we can have all that saved.
He doesn't have to ask the operator.
He has his secretary call them for him.
Oh.
But incoming calls, the White House operator doesn't ask who's calling.
They call in and say "Doctor Kissinger" and his office asks who's calling.
But I'm sure we can do it.
Don't do anything that's going to be, uh, to look like we're spying.
If he ever found out we were spying on him - Is that? He thinks we are, anyway! He's convinced that I bug him.
Really? Oh, yeah.
He thinks it, h-he really does.
He's come in a couple times on a very serious basis.
Why the hell is his reason, then? Why does he think we bug him now? Someone told him his phone was being tapped and h-he said, "If you're tapping my phone", he said, "I can understand why you would, I just want you to "I just want you to know that I know you're doing it.
" Oh, Christ! I said, "Henry, I can't conceive of anything less interesting than tapping your phone.
" Why do you think he says that? The Jews are born spies.
And do you want to know something I've learned? They're just in it up to their necks.
Spy's a bad word.
I shouldn't have said it.
I have to dodge something.
Sullivan was the man who executed the secret taps.
Will he rat on us? I don't have a single note of any of your meetings.
You know what? Fortunately, I don't either!
In fact, however, the taping system did the reverse.
It destroyed his place in history.
These programmes will not revisit the breakthrough to China or the political narrative that led to Watergate and the threat of an impeachment.
Instead, the tapes tell us about everyday life at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and just how the country was run from the Oval Office under Richard Nixon.
Despite his disdain for the Northeastern intellectual elite, Nixon turned to a member of that group to be his closest foreign policy adviser.
Henry Kissinger was a Harvard professor with a fondness for Hollywood actresses, as well as a fierce ambition to control the policy he'd previously been analysing.
The relationship between the two was an intricate, sly and often fraught dance of mutual respect and mutual contempt.
After they both left office, they were each competing for history to award all the credit, and none of the blame, in their individual direction, but they couldn't openly attack each other because their reputations were umbilically linked.
The result was regular barbs, just below the surface.
Nixon would say, "Henry was a great intellectual, "but, of course, like all intellectuals, he was unpredictable "and often unwilling to maintain his support for policies if they became unpopular.
" Henry, too, had his way of praising Nixon.
He would say, "President Nixon was a great president, "he was a superb delegator.
"So of course, he delegated all the important problems to me.
" The conversations you're about to see were recorded by Nixon's secret taping equipment, and these are the words actually spoken by the participants and edited only for time.
In keeping with the era in which the original tapes were recorded, this programme is presented in standard definition.
Let me say, after all the agony we've been through, you want to remember that several things have come out of it.
Uh You have to look at the .
.
that North Vietnam's capacity to wage aggressive war has been sharply reduced.
Mm.
The Russians and the Chinese have got to look upon us with, uh, certainly more fear and, therefore, with more respect.
And finally, uh, we have to bear in mind, that, uh, it has smoked out our enemies, media, the intellectual community, and Congress, there they are! Otherwise, there would've been the most sickening pressure, uh, for me to start going over to the 38 percent that voted against us, rather than the 61 who voted for us, in an attempt to govern the country.
Now, let me say, that 38 percent that were against us, they're out.
Period.
Never in this White House again.
Never, never, never.
I couldn't agree more.
That's the way you run the country.
Listen, they put it against Kennedy.
I got 49 percent of the vote, he got 49 percent of the vote.
I lost by 112,000 votes.
As a matter of fact, if you take Alabama's electors out, uh, I would've won by 112,000 votes because Alabama's electors didn't vote for Kennedy, they voted for somebody else and they gave his votes to him.
Mm.
So the country was evenly divided.
Mm.
I never saw once .
.
a column, an editorial, anything, suggesting that Kennedy or Johnson, under the circumstances, should perhaps talk with, consult, invite down, the man who had been a candidate for president, who'd been a vice president for eight years.
In eight years, I was never in the White House socially.
I should've.
Once for the Bay of Pigs.
Oh, Bay of Pigs, yeah.
I was in town at the time.
He called me because he needed somebody to - To cry to.
Oh, Christ, he damn near died! He's sitting He's rocking in that chair! I-I understood it.
Uh I saw then, it got heated.
Kennedy could never have done that - Nevertheless, the point I make is, in eight years, I was never invited to the White House.
What I think is important is, I was never invited to a social function, uh, as long as he'd been Never! My wife, myself, in eight years Mm.
Now, let me say it, though, that's over with.
We're going to do our way now.
This idea that we're going to invite John Gardner or Dean Sayre and all the rest down here to prove we're not mad at them The hell with them! Why should we? No.
And, also, the lack of compassion out of them After all, Mr President, here you've been in a decision process about the war - it must've been a painful and anguishing decision - and they owe it to their country, whatever they think about you, to ask themselves, "The man who had been elected President must've had a good reason.
"No! He's a mad man.
"He doesn't consult anybody.
"He does it because of this or that.
" And the viciousness and the nastiness of these attacks They are not patriots! They are not thinking of their country.
Well, they never have.
I told you they I told you they would hate me! Look, it's one thing - Do you remember when you said, "After the election, "you'd have them in the palm of your hand because they couldn't bear to be out"? Yes, well - No! They're so full of hate, you will never have them in the palm of your hand.
But we must remember it, though.
We must remember it.
But they're out now.
You know, this has been an absolute eye-opener for me.
Quite an eye-opener, this thing There was one thing that I wanted to mention to you, Mr President, that's bothering me enormously, which is that interview by that Italian bitch, Fallaci.
I don't know whether you ever saw that, uh, but it's that, uh, that woman.
I, uh, I saw her because the Italian Ambassador that told me she was .
.
going to do an article that was a hatchet job on you, so I, as one of your close collaborators, could straighten it out, that was influential in Italy.
But she came in with a thesis that, uh, you know, the Liberals Mm-hm.
.
.
and so on and so forth, and, uh, I told her what I had said to a thousand other people, that you worked alone, and the tremendous courage it took on your part to make these decisions alone, without asking a lot of people.
Mm-hm.
And that, uh, almost all of the decisions have been taken by you alone.
And I did say that one example of your courage was that you had appointed me, even though I had not supported you in your primary campaigns, and that all you had asked was what was best for the country.
The whole purpose of my interview was to build you up, so that bitch twisted it all around to make it sound as if I were saying that Every time I mentioned something about you, she twisted it into a framework to make it sound as if I had been building myself up, and I had absolutely no intention.
For example, that cowboy quote Well, I have never been on a horse in my life! I said, "The President is going to have a big success.
" She said, "Oh? How is it possible the President, "who is not a figure like Kennedy, can have such a success?" I said, "You have to remember, "the Americans, they like many types.
"They like movie stars, "and they like the cowboy who rides alone into town, "you know, like Gary Cooper in High Noon, "and against everybody.
He, uh "He takes, uh, he does what is right.
" And, uh, I was talking about you.
Ah.
Mm-hm.
Mm-hm.
I've never been on a horse in my life! That bitch said that I see myself as a cowboy.
Well, the whole thing, Henry, is that you just can't talk to the Liberals.
I know.
But I-I've always felt that, I don't, uh, that I accept public abuse.
But no, no-one has ever heard me say anything that builds myself up at your expense.
Now, this is the point that bothers me.
I hate these little people.
Mr President, it was one of the very best and subtlest press conferences.
But, you see, on the bombing, if, uh, that comes up, if, uh, if they think, if they, uh, as a result of that, "Don't have a meeting!" then, screw 'em.
We'll bomb 'em some more.
One of Rockefeller's people, I don't know if you've met him, he's been in here, Canning Oh, yeah, I know him.
He - He's a very smart fellow.
Well, he called up.
He called me late last night and he said he just wanted me to know he often criticised your PR, but he thought that this, he thought this was a masterpiece.
Mm.
I-It just made you look so, well And another thing that was impressive, I must say, even to me, when you got into areas that I don't know anything about, I mean, the scope Hm.
.
.
that you had to handle, and you were on top of every single one of these issues.
You knew the facts and you stated a reasonable position.
Well, that's nice.
No, that fact, I think, comes through.
You do realise, Henry, that, uh, the hardest part of a press conference is the questions.
I mean, I read the entire foreign policy briefing book, I knew all the questions about Latin America, about the Azores Agreement, about the Bahrain Agreement, about the limited, uh, the, uh, the War Powers situation, uh, the Mid-East, uh, the, uh, NATO troop cuts and so forth, uh, that those-those-those were, uh, questions that I was prepared for in those areas they never asked.
Uh, now, the domestic area, you should've seen the list.
What was on that? Oh, uh, a question about the welfare form, a question about, uh, childcare development centres, a query about, a question about the OEO, and, uh, an extension of the legal services, a very long dissertation on the British pound and the Smithsonian thing, which I had to just spend half an hour getting through my head, uh, so I was prepared for all that, and that's the work, Henry.
And then to boil it down into a form that you're comfortable with Yeah, yeah.
And I thought that the first answer was beautiful.
Um I-I mean, he I-If you had made this as a speech, you would've looked as if you were filibustering, but he set you up.
He Yeah.
He, he I-In trying to ask a tough question, he gave you a chance to give an easy answer.
Well, no! Uh, no, no, not an easy answer, but an answer that was very favourable to us.
I thought it was outstanding.
When do you leave? About 3:30 Three? .
.
this afternoon.
And listen, I want to tell you one thing about it, with your little kids Any time it would mean something to them, uh, I want them to, uh, come out and take a swim in our pool.
You know, it's a heated pool.
Well, that would be nice.
I don't know.
Uh We'd like to do that sometime.
Right.
That'd be nice.
I think it would mean a lot to the little kids to, uh, go out to California and join us.
Oh, OK.
So sometime, when you're going there, just, uh, let us know.
I'd like that, yeah.
Oh, good evening! I thought it was outstanding.
I was at the dinner and, uh, the Indian Ambassador was there and a very well-known British publisher, in fact, my publisher, Sir George Nicolson.
What paper's that? I beg your pardon? What paper's he with? Oh, no, no.
It's not a paper, it's a very large publishing Oh, the book! I understand.
Book publishing Um, and he also runs a big salon in London, very influential Right, right, right! Sorry, sorry, sorry! But, uh, the reaction was really, it was absolutely enthusiastic, outstanding, very good, and I must say, I thought you handled it with really very great delicacy.
The question of residual force, the question of withdrawal Well, we didn't give a goddamn thing away, you know! Not only did you not give anything away, but I was pretty tough.
You handled it with extraordinary delicacy.
A-And to stand up to that for an hour, I thought you handled China beautifully.
Well, we've got I know I handled that pretty well.
Mm.
We do have one minor technical problem, Mr President.
You kept mentioning November 1st, and actually, you had announced it for December 1st.
Well, that's all right! Look, if you don't mind, we would like to make it clear that the date you announced is the date that, that stands, the one you announced last week.
Uh, December, November 15th instead of October 15, right? Otherwise, we are going to have uproar in Saigon.
That's right, that's right, that's right.
It's, uh, a minor technical - I know! I-I said, uh, November 1st, I meant October, I meant December 1st and November 15, right? This is not going to create any problems.
No problem, no problem! But I thought that China was beautifully handled, and you were very wise, and, uh, it was tremendously effective that you turned that first question into a little speech on peace.
What was the first question? Oh, what you wake about What you wake up about.
Silly question! It was a silly question but therefore hard to answer.
But it was important that you had a chance to state that you - That I sleep, that I dream about peace all night.
Yeah, and all that crap! Well, it put everything else into a good framework, and you got a good hand.
I went around the table, everybody said Oh, there was another, um, a Democrat there, David, uh Oh Ginsburg! I don't know if you know him.
Dave Ginsburg? Former Head of the OPA? Uh, yeah.
Lawyer? I guess, yeah.
Oh! Tell him he was my boss.
He'll love that.
Are you going to go back? I've got to go.
Tell him he was my boss.
He recruited me.
I was top of the class at, uh, Duke Law School.
It wasn't because of me.
I was a fairly good student But he thought it was outstanding.
Huh? He thought it was outstanding.
How did Ginsburg feel? No, no.
T-That T-That's the one.
He said it was absolutely outstanding.
H-He said that.
Well, it wasn't that good.
The questions weren't that good.
T-They were a pretty stupid, some of them.
Mr President, you had a tough, tough row to hoe there.
Yeah, I had to avoid a few things, but, uh Hm.
But Ginsburg felt all right? You tell him that, uh, I remember he recruited me.
He was the man who recruited me to be .
.
to go into the OPA in 1942! He'll, he'll love it.
He'll love hearing that.
Will you tell him that? Yeah, absolutely.
And that, uh, one day, you'll bring him in and you have him for lunch and you bring him in and say hello to him, OK? Absolutely.
See, he was head of OPA then.
Oh, right.
But I thought the reaction was really very, very interesting, very favourable.
And I must say, I was tremendously impressed with the delicacy with which you handled those foreign policy questions, because this was a tough moment.
The main thing was not to give anything.
I mean, we didn't give any the goddamn thing away! Not a thing.
I didn't give a thing about, uh, uh Frankly, Henry, I didn't give a thing away about Vietnam, I didn't give a thing away about China.
Uh, I-I said, "Oh, I'm not going to talk about that!" Beautiful.
I said, "This is not the time to talk about it.
" Beautifully done.
The way the China thing sits now, we haven't said anything, uh, and the way, that, uh Well, it doesn't raise any expectations.
Yes! In fact, most of the expectations have been raised - And I said, uh, "In effect, uh, insofar as we're concerned, "we're ready to trade, we're ready to exchange.
" Excellent.
"But in terms of recognition, or technical problems, or these other problems, "I ain't going to talk about it.
" I thought that was good.
We going to get a hell of a blast from The Washington Post and The New York Times.
They going to say "Why don't you say we're going to recognise Red China?" Screw 'em! Don't you agree? They did not get you to this point on your China policy.
You did more in two years than they ever - Well, it drives them nuts, Henry! It drives them nuts.
That's what I feel.
But i-it, uh We, we, uh You know, you never know.
The questions determine it, but I thought we got some points across.
The questions were not good but - They were pretty stupid.
But you did - When I talk about the young people, I thought that was not bad, that, uh, I dream with them and I want them to believe in the country, that wasn't bad.
W-What did you think about the kid, the answer about the family? Wasn't that good? That was excellent.
It was very - I thought it wasn't bad.
It wasn't the best.
No, I thought - But, you know, the idea of, uh, "We're ending the war "and we're doing this and proving that the system works "Now, kids, come aboard, let's get going, huh?" "Let's focus on the things that we can do rather than on -" That's right! "Let's make this thing work.
" That's right.
I thought that - Well, Henry, have a good time.
Fine.
Thank you! Right.
There's only one thing I want, uh, and has to be done through our security people.
I want Henry's phones logged.
I want his private phone logged, I want his other logged.
Uh Can you do this discretely? Will the telephone company do this or not? I mean, the main point is, it has to be done in terms of leaks.
You mean bugged? Oh, God, no! I don't care what he said.
I just want to know who he talks to.
Like, it's very valuable for me to know that, uh, he talked to Kraft two days before Kraft's piece appeared, as you know I don't know.
I'll try to do that.
I'll find out.
Well, the White House switchboard, we can know who he calls from the White House, can we? We can know who he calls out.
We can at least know the numbers he calls.
Any call he asks the White House operator to get through, we can have all that saved.
He doesn't have to ask the operator.
He has his secretary call them for him.
Oh.
But incoming calls, the White House operator doesn't ask who's calling.
They call in and say "Doctor Kissinger" and his office asks who's calling.
But I'm sure we can do it.
Don't do anything that's going to be, uh, to look like we're spying.
If he ever found out we were spying on him - Is that? He thinks we are, anyway! He's convinced that I bug him.
Really? Oh, yeah.
He thinks it, h-he really does.
He's come in a couple times on a very serious basis.
Why the hell is his reason, then? Why does he think we bug him now? Someone told him his phone was being tapped and h-he said, "If you're tapping my phone", he said, "I can understand why you would, I just want you to "I just want you to know that I know you're doing it.
" Oh, Christ! I said, "Henry, I can't conceive of anything less interesting than tapping your phone.
" Why do you think he says that? The Jews are born spies.
And do you want to know something I've learned? They're just in it up to their necks.
Spy's a bad word.
I shouldn't have said it.
I have to dodge something.
Sullivan was the man who executed the secret taps.
Will he rat on us? I don't have a single note of any of your meetings.
You know what? Fortunately, I don't either!