The Nixon Defense: What He Knew and When He Knew It (93 page)

As this conversation proceeded, Nixon brought up the Pappas situation, telling Buzhardt that, based on the March 21 conversation, he knew that I was aware that Pappas had raised money. After revealing that Pappas had raised that money for Mitchell but none of the actual facts explaining the situation, he asked: “Now that wouldn’t make him guilty of anything, would it?” “No,” Buzhardt said flatly. “Are you sure?” “Not unless he knew the money was to be used for political purposes, and he was part of the conspiracy,” Buzhardt replied, which he felt would depend primarily on Mitchell’s statement. “I will check on the Pappas thing and see what I can find out on that,” Buzhardt said. He added that he thought “Silbert is probably going to wind up under investigation,” regarding his handling of the case, along with Henry Petersen. Buzhardt believed that the special prosecutors were “methodically building a case that Silbert did not really investigate the case as thoroughly as other pending cases.” Buzhardt had little confidence that they could make the case but said, “They’ll probably smear him pretty bad.”
*

During a morning meeting with Haig, the president said he had read in his news summary that “Richardson had given Cox a broader reign. What in the world is that?”
⁵⁰
“Oh, the ITT merger,” Haig answered, and added, “Well, why the hell he did that, I don’t know.” Nixon, sounding beside himself at the prospect of digging up that old scandal, mused aloud, slowly enunciating each word: “What in the name of heaven made him do that?” He complained that Richardson had not cleared it with the White House. It was another potential scandal.
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Haig, ordered to find out what Richardson was up to and why, reported back a few hours later: “I had a good talk with Richardson, and he said that the charter that he gave Cox on the Hill included the mandate to clean up unresolved investigations.” Haig continued, “Then he said, you know, ‘I feel I can serve the president best by keeping a distance between the president and myself.’ And I said, ‘Elliot,’ I said, ‘not right now,’” and told him he could not show any lack of confidence in the president. “He’s one fast-stepping smoothie,” Haig observed, “and I’ll be God damned if we have to put up with that crap.” Nixon, still angry, agreed, and Haig reported that he and Richardson had had “a helluva shouting match.”
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The president’s morning ended with Kissinger’s complaining that Colson was continuing to drag him into the plumbers operation.
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“Fuck it, he doesn’t know,” Nixon responded and then advised Kissinger, “They don’t pay much attention to Colson, though, Henry.”

In early afternoon Fred Buzhardt arrived at the EOB office for a Watergate update.
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After reviewing the status of the Senate hearings and the order of witnesses—Stans, Magruder, Colson, Dean, Haldeman and Ehrlichman—Buzhardt explained how he was preparing for cross-examining me. Nixon surely understood, but said nothing, about the fact that Buzhardt was looking in all the wrong places: news summaries; my former deputy, Fred Fielding; documents to which I had access; and Dick Moore’s information. Nixon noted that Soviet premier Leonid Brezhnev was arriving for the summit with Russia at precisely the likely time of my testimony. The Senate Watergate committee was already concerned about having my appearance conflict with
the summit, Buzhardt said, and was waiting for the White House to request a delay. Nixon said he wanted Congress to make that decision. As this conversation was ending, Nixon, being facetious, said, “Don’t worry me with anything I’m not suppose to worry about.” “Absolutely,” Buzhardt assured him. “I think the fellow’s shooting blanks with regard to his insinuation that he had any tapes,” Nixon said about my testimony. (In his memoir, which he wrote without transcriptions of all his tapes, Nixon wrote that he did not understand why this had concerned him.
*
) “Well,” Buzhardt responded, a bit disconcerted by the situation, “I just don’t think he has any tapes, at all.” “We can live with them,” Nixon noted. “But it’s harder, isn’t it?” “Yes, it is,” Buzhardt conceded. “You get down to the point,” the president said, “if it’s his word against the president’s, we’ll kill him, right?” “I hope it never comes to that,” Buzhardt answered. “No, it’d be a terrible thing,” Nixon admitted.

Between a visit to his doctor’s office and attending a meeting on price controls, the president told Haig in the Oval Office, “If [Richardson’s] got any doubt about the president or whatever, then he should resign.”
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“That’s a great idea,” Haig said. “I mean, I can’t have an attorney general who doesn’t trust his boss,” Nixon said, still smarting at Richardson’s reopening of the ITT matter. While the president spent the afternoon in meetings, Haig talked to Elliot Richardson’s top aide, since he and Richardson were now at the point of shouting at each other. Haig later reported on that conversation to Nixon, saying that they understand “that Elliot just made a hell of a mistake.”
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Haig did not think there would be future problems, for they had clearly gotten the message: “I said, ‘For God’s sake, this is the last time I’m going to be surprised.’” The president invited Haig to join him for dinner on the
Sequoia,
but Haig regretted that he couldn’t, for he had invited Joe Alsop, a conservative columnist, to dinner and he explained that having postponed the meal twice, he dared not do so a third time: “[Alsop’s] writing awfully good stuff, and I’d like to keep it that way.”

Following his evening on the Potomac, which he spent with Ziegler, the president did some telephoning, speaking wih Buzhardt shortly after nine o’clock.
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Buzhardt reported that he had spent the afternoon with Fred Thompson, who was “most cooperative” and “perfectly prepared to assist in really doing a cross-examination” of me when I testified before the Senate
Watergate committee. Buzhardt also informed Nixon that Henry Petersen was “extremely upset about Cox coming in there and having such wide jurisdiction.” He added, “His animosity with Cox, that’s showing very firmly.” Petersen had told Buzhardt that “I had never given him a hard time,” but Ehrlichman had, “about subpoenaing Stans [before the grand jury] last summer.” “I didn’t know about that,” Nixon falsely claimed, adding “But that’s alright.” Buzhardt added with a chuckle, “Oh, there’s very perceptible animosity toward John Ehrlichman among the prosecutors and Cox. Comes through loud and clear. And I’d say, if they were focusing on one man, it would be John Ehrlichman. Much more so than Bob Haldeman. Or even Dean.” “Good God!” Nixon replied. “Even Dean?” “They all believe that he was doing it at Ehrlichman’s instruction,” Buzhardt explained—and with time the overwhelming evidence would establish this fact beyond any reasonable doubt. But the president still believed it was a problem Ehrlichman could handle.

After checking with Rose Woods on Pappas, whom she had still not been able to reach, the president dictated to her seven questions he wanted me asked during cross-examination.
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Six of them concerned my relationship with Henry Petersen after the arrests at the Watergate and one related to Pat Gray.
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The president then asked about the cash funds Woods had in her safe, which he had last checked on following our March 21 conversation. “I have to find a way to get that to the campaign committee,” Nixon said, but confessed, “I don’t know how it could be done.” “You’d have to report it,” Woods reminded him. Nixon did not care how she did so, but he just wanted her to get the money out of the White House.

It was a mixed morning of Watergate reports. Haig reported that the Senate was concerned about holding the Watergate hearings during the Brezhnev visit, which was encouraging, and based on his dinner the night before with Joe Alsop, Haig seemed encouraged he would continue “slicing [me] up reglarly.” Haig assured the president, “And he’s really done a hell of a job.”
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It was left to Ziegler to report the bad news: “Sirica has granted Dean immunity from prosecution, and I just talked with Buzhardt about this, and he feels Dean could possibly go on next week”—during the Brezhnev visit.
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Fortunately, though, conservative columnist Jack Kilpatrick and others were
“attacking Dean’s credibility and his immunity.” Nixon asked where they were getting material for their columns, and Ziegler said that was being done by Buzhardt. After listening to Ziegler’s summary of the coverage in the news media, Nixon complained, “I just can’t believe that the country is going to go with John Dean over the president of the United States.” “No, they won’t,” Ziegler assured him.

The president called Buzhardt at 11:44
A.M.
for a confirmation of Sirica’s decision.
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Buzhardt did not know whether Cox would appeal the judge’s ruling and seek a stay, although Buzhardt explained that the judge really had no discretion in the matter, for when the Senate requested immunity, it was automatic. They discussed matters related to the publicity from the Senate hearings, and Buzhardt said they were debating readying Fred Thompson for my closed-door session with the Senate Watergate committee, which would precede my public testimony. Nixon agreed with Buzhardt that they best not prepare Thompson lest I get any indication in the closed session how they planned to impeach my testimony. Nixon told Buzhardt that he would be available on Thursday morning [June 14] to provide him with his recollection of our conversations.

A conversation with Haig later that morning included another assessment of the president’s vulnerabilities.
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Nixon expressed his doubts about Ehrlichman, but though he did not believe Ehrlichman would turn against him, he noted, “I feel for John [Ehrlichman], because I think that Dean may have reported more to him, and he may have implied more to him, than he’s told me.” This was a correct assessment. As for Mitchell, while he was fond of him personally, he was unconcerned, because he “had no contact with him whatever,” which according to his official diary, was not really correct. Mitchell had joined him with others for a weekend get-together, and then on another occasion, a reunion at their former New York law firm. But saying he had no private time with Mitchell was true. As for Haldeman and Colson, they would both be “like a rock.” Haig noted that the problems with the economy and the Brezhnev visit would help deflect from my testimony, and Nixon wanted to “play it up like hell” that the Senate was having me testify while Brezhnev was in the country. Both Haig and Nixon noted that Haldeman would follow me and challenge my testimony as it related to the president. Nixon instructed Haig to make certain they had a strong denial of whatever leaked out of the Senate Watergate committee from my closed-door visit with the committee on Saturday, June 16. “A good, tough
statement,” Nixon affirmed and suggested Pat Buchanan might draft it. Nixon began to propose cross-examination questions for me regarding my dealings with Petersen, and suggested they might start with these on Friday. The president said that he did not want the White House to deny specific charges I made but rather merely to respond with a flat-out denial of everything I said.

In the early afternoon of June 12 the president telephoned Buzhardt to see if he had received the cross-examination questions that the president had prepared for me; Buzhardt had and thought them an excellent line to pursue.
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Nixon said that I would claim I could not report to the president because “he has a wall around him,” so I reported to Haldeman and Ehrlichman instead. That, in essence, was true; it was not a good defense with respect to Pat Gray and Henry Petersen—hence Nixon’s proposed questions about what I had told them. What Nixon did not understand, of course, is that I did not inform Gray and Petersen about the White House cover-up because I was then helping support it as best I could. Buzhardt encouraged the president’s less than thoughtful questions, telling Nixon they “should be a very difficult line of questions for him.”

Although Buzhardt did not have any further information regarding whether Cox might appeal the grant of immunity to me by the Senate, he was very anxious to get me under oath, so they did not have to guess about what I actually knew. Buzhardt said that while he had not reviewed all the material he planned to go through in preparing for my testimony, he was making good progress, including reconstructing the payments to the Watergate defendants. Nixon then began what was clearly a test of Buzhardt’s knowledge: He said that when I had spoken with him on March 21, I had mentioned Tom Pappas, and the president now asked Buzhardt what that was all about. Buzhardt did not know, and instead mistakenly reported that all payments to the Watergate defendants had taken place long before I met with Nixon on March 21, in January 1972 or earlier. Nonetheless, Buzhardt insisted, “this is a very important factor.”

Nixon asked if Buzhardt would be ready to meet to discuss the president’s recollection of our meetings on Thursday [June 14], and Buzhardt said he would. “All I have are fragmentary notes,” the president reported. “It turns out I have more than I realized,” referring to notes that he in fact had created only eight days earlier, after listening to a number of our conversations. Buzhardt agreed that going over them together would be helpful, for the
more precise their knowledge, the more effective their cross-examination of me would be. Nixon suggested that Buzhardt also consult with Ziegler about other questions I should be asked on cross-examination. Nixon then recapped his reconstructed version of the March 21 conversation.

Buzhardt also had discovered facts that would in time make a lie of Ehrlichman’s claim that I had not told him about my meeting with Liddy on June 19, 1972, after the arrests at the Watergate, when Liddy confessed all. Buzhardt told the president, almost a year later, that I had learned about the Ellsberg break-in shortly after the arrests at the Watergate. Buzhardt said that that was the reason why I had sent my deputy, Fred Fielding, to Europe to find Kathleen Chenow, who had been the plumbers’ secretary, so that she would not tell the FBI about their operations. The president responded that he didn’t know about that, but he did not blame me, for that was a matter of national security. (It had, in fact, been Ehrlichman who had approved Fred Fielding’s first-class flight to Europe to retrieve Chenow and to fly them both back to Washington; needless to say, he had been given the full story before he authorized the undertaking.) Nixon was disconcerted to learn I had, in fact, reported about Liddy’s confession on June 19, 1972.