205. Transcript of a Telephone Conversation Between President Nixon and his Assistant for National Security Affairs (Kissinger)1
K: Mr. President.
P: How are you?
K: Okay. I hope you had some good weather down there.2
P: It was pretty hot.
K: Actually nothing much has happened. The casualties this last week were 34 and they didn’t include the 31.
P: Did not.
K: No.
P: Why not?
K: Because they hadn’t notified the next of kin yet and they won’t release these until the next of kin has been notified.
P: Oh, I see.
K: We can spread them over the next few weeks.
P: Yeah.
K: Only 5 this week, not a bad week.
P: There were 34 without any of the 31. It is good to have 34 this week. I am planning a conference on Friday3 and I don’t want to come up with too high figures.
K: Are you planning to have it in the evening?
P: Oh, yes.
K: I have heard some conflicting—
P: Oh, it has to be at night.
K: I got some word you were reconsidering.
P: No, nobody talked to me about that.
K: Mr. President, one thing I wanted to mention to you is the meeting with Thieu.4 I have had research done on how many times the end of combat has been announced. Laird only announced it 15 times and Rogers announced it about 7 times.
[Page 646]P: Doesn’t mean much.
K: My grave concern is the minute you announce—With Vietnam now on the back pages of the newspapers, the minute you announce a meeting with Thieu you will have—
P: Think you can get out of it, not to announce to go out and—
K: By the middle of June, we will know whether the Vietnamese will accept. If they accept, they will make the announcement. If it isn’t—
P: You mean go out and make it a joint ______.
K: For the whole package.
P: Leaving out that line?
K: No, deadline and everything and let them refuse it publicly. If you see Thieu, you will have to see Thieu to keep it from blowing up, or we will be in the Mansfield position we were in a couple of weeks ago.
P: I know. Don’t think your announcing now means enough?
K: I saw Bill today, he thinks the same thing.
P: He would rather wait?
K: Yes.
P: Can say we are weighing that. In view of that, we will just wait and see. He doesn’t know about the other meeting?
K: No. By the middle of June, we will know. ______ will have signed the accidental war agreement, will have had the Chinese reply and will then know what the cards look like.
P: On Thieu—
K: We have to see him this month.
P: ______
K: Between the 20th and 30th and it would be a lot more effective. Even if we make a troop announcement then it will be closer to when the combat announcement ______. I am sending you a memo which has the whole record of what has been said.
P: I don’t know what more we can say. Don’t know if—
K: If we announced the end of combat and make the offer of withdrawal, we know it will get turned down.
P: Withdrawal of a certain time next year.
K: The way you got Thieu to agree to Midway.
P: Let me say I haven’t got a fix on it but with the debates coming up we are going to have heavy shelling from Congressional people about the drafting business and all the rest—but you don’t think this is enough?
K: I am just afraid it isn’t enough.
P: We may have to go. If it isn’t enough, there is no reason to do it.
[Page 647]K: ______ and Haig quite independently came to the same view.
P: Well, it seems to me—
K: The average American may not have heard all these things Laird and Rogers have said.
P: The average American—you know, have you checked the polls? They don’t even believe we are going to get out, we can’t repeat it too often.
K: By the end of the month—by June 25th, you will see your cards much more clearly.
P: Yeah.
[Omitted here is conversation unrelated to Vietnam.]
P: Alright. On the Thieu thing. I must say I have mixed emotions. I am inclined to think it would mean more than you think on the combat thing.
K: As soon as you announce it, Harriman5 will be on every national broadcast ______ and we will have nothing to top him with.
P: If you could come ______ when you went to see Thieu you had this plus an offer. It is awfully hard for those who have been talking deadlines to talk ceasefire. How in the hell can you talk about deadlines without talking about ceasefire?
K: I saw Sainteny today—he was in town—and he said just to do it for the prisoners is too little.
P: Yeah.
K: He mentioned exactly the package we have developed although I didn’t bring it up. If they refuse it, we can make it publicly.
P: Why don’t you have him go back, he would be good cover. Can he be back in Paris?
K: He will be in Paris tonight. He left already.
P: You can say you went over to see an old friend.
K: I will hold off talking to Thieu.
P: No, no; if he has to know—
K: [I can hold off on talking to him.]6
P: I have no strong feeling about the damn thing. Let me put it this way. Bill Rogers feels we should not have it ______ .
K: Exactly.
P: He realizes we have to have a meeting.
K: We promised it.
[Page 648]P: Promised it?
K: When Bunker was here last time.
P: Bill has no objections to meeting, just doesn’t want to have it now.
K: No.
P: Did he suggest a peace time we can open?
K: ______
P: Don’t open this to Laird—don’t tell him a damn thing! When does he go to Europe?
K: Next Tuesday.7
P: Well, under the circumstances defer the Thieu thing to the last part of June. Get the message off.
K: Right.
P: I can see the problem. June 20th.
K: I will check a date with Haldeman tomorrow morning but I think we should have an alternate date available.
P: Yeah.
K: I will check the date and send a message.
P: That’s all right, do it. Take a crack at it. Anything else new—
[Omitted here is conversation unrelated to Vietnam.]
P: Except in Vietnam. Really the problem—our enemies and press, people like Resor 8 keep hacking away. We are carrying a burden then we have to make a sale nobody will buy.
K: People will buy it.
P: Except in Vietnam. The polls are pretty rough and they have some effect on the jackasses that read them. Well, we will hope for the best. Go right ahead with the Thieu thing and get it out of the way. I don’t mind putting it off.
K: Right, Mr. President.
- Source: National Archives, Nixon Presidential Materials, Kissinger Telephone Conversations, Box 10, Chronological File. No classification marking. All omissions are in the original.↩
- Key Biscayne, Florida.↩
- May 28. The President had his news conference on June 1; see Public Papers: Nixon, 1971, pp. 688–697.↩
- Reference is to an upcoming meeting scheduled for June 15 on Midway.↩
- W. Averell Harriman.↩
- Brackets are in the original.↩
- June 1.↩
- Stanley R. Resor, Secretary of the Army.↩