WPT Archives: 1960s

[ Beeping ] [ Inaudible Discussions ] >> WHA TV Public Affairs presents a conversation with Richard Nixon.

Talking with Mr. Nixon is David Fellman, Professor of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin.

>> Our chief spokesman in foreign policy and I know that you've identified yourself as a student of foreign policy, but doesn't he have equal responsibilities for domestic policy?

Doesn't the country look to the president, must it not look to the president for leadership for our domestic programs as well as our foreign policy?

Or is his responsibility there more diffused than it is in the foreign relations field?

>> Yes, I think your suggestion that the president's responsibilities in domestic policy is more diffused is an accurate description.

I think in the foreign policy field, we have to recognize that this is the one area where only the president, when the chips are really down, must make the great decision.

Now in the domestic field, it is possible for a president to have around him strong men in his administration.

That means cabinet officers, strong advisors, for example, in his party across the country, who will advise and direct and guide and in some instances to whom he can delegate the decision-making responsibility.

But when it comes, for example, to what will be in the next ten years, the decisions that will determine whether we have war or peace, whether we have surrender or whether we have an extension or even retaining the boundaries of freedom, here it will be the president of the United States and whoever happens to be the leader of the Soviet Union, the leader of communist China.

Unfortunately, it is not the case that a secretary of state can handle that responsibility.

He can handle it up to a point.

But I have found, and I'm sure this is something that others who have been at the height of power have found, that the leaders of totalitarian states talk only to their opposite numbers at the leadership level.

For example, let's put it this way.

Gromyko is basically an errand boy.

He's not a decision-maker.

If there's going to be, for example, a real detente, a real detente between the United States and the Soviet Union, between the United States and China, that the dialogue is going to have to, in the final analysis, take place between the president of the United States and whoever happens to be in charge in one of those countries.

And that's the point that I make.

In a strategic policy, however, the president must furnish the direction, the purpose, without oversimplifying the moral thrust, the moral leadership.

And only he can do that because people are not going to take, for example, from a secretary of treasury or from a secretary of agriculture or the rest, they're going to take from them the leadership, the idealism that they can get from a president.

The president speaks from a pedestal that no other person in his administration possibly can reach.

But you think there's been some qualitative change in the net impact of the world upon American history in the sense that foreign policy is more vital to us today than it was, say, 50 years ago, and that the president is primarily the spokesman for foreign policy.

This seems to be your view.

50 years ago, we can look back to our great secretaries of state.

And 50 years ago, the secretaries of state could pretty well speak for this country in the field of foreign policy.

And would let the British Navy keep the peace of the world.

Exactly.

We didn't have this responsibility.

Today, the president more and more, and I don't mean that this development is necessarily a healthy one, but it's because the world is as it is and because of the way that the major, shall we say, threats to peace in the world, which are at the moment in the Soviet Union and Communist China, because they look at power the way they do, the president, unfortunately, must be called upon to deal at the highest level with those particular problems.

Now, Mr. Nixon, bearing this in mind, I'd like to put a question to you as a professor of political science.

In view of the president's responsibilities, his crucial responsibilities, in view of the fact that we are engaged in a serious military involvement in the Far East, in view of the terrible domestic problems we have, the race problem, the poverty, the city slum problem, what do you think are the legitimate functions of an opposition party of which you are a national leader?

What are the limits of opposition?

What should an opposition party be doing?

At what point are you interfering or upsetting the apple cart?

At what point do you make a contribution, a desirable contribution to the national interest?

Would you care to explore that point?

You are an oppositionist, aren't you?

Yes.

Well, I don't like the term.

No, I mean in the political context.

Sure, but putting it in the British sense, a member of the loyal opposition, I think has today a greater responsibility than he has ever had in the history of this country.

I say that if we can put it in more precise terms in relation to the war in Vietnam.

Now, looking at dissent, dissent which is necessary for change and peaceful change and any kind of progress in any great country, but looking at dissent in this nation as it relates to the war in Vietnam, we have two different kinds in my view.

You have individual dissent and then you have party dissent.

Now, an individual who dissents about our policy in Vietnam, it seems to me, has a very different responsibility than a party leader.

When an individual, for example, a columnist or a college professor or somebody, vigorously indicates that he does not support our policy, that he believes that we should withdraw or what have you, that's one thing.

That may have an effect on the potential enemy of the United States.

But on the other hand, if the leader of a party or if a considerable number of the leaders of a party take a party position, which is directly opposed to what the American commitment may be in Vietnam, then that would have the effect of completely destroying the ability of the administration to lead.

Now, I don't mean by that that the party, the Republican Party in this instance, should just go down the line for the Johnson administration's policy in Vietnam.

My own view as to what our position should be briefly is this.

I happen to think that the commitment that the United States is involved in in Vietnam is one that must be met in the broadest sense.

I think that we must end the war, end it without escalation, and end it without a reward for aggression.

And I think that that is the administration's goal, and that goal I believe should be supported by the Republican Party.

I'm not, of course, saying what individuals should do.

That is their own conscience.

On the other hand, insofar as the means to keep that commitment is concerned, whether or not, for example, the South Vietnamese should carry a bigger share of the load, whether or not they should fully mobilize, whether or not we should use more economic and diplomatic leverage with the Soviet Union so that they would use their diplomatic power for peace rather than for promoting the war in Vietnam, here I believe that the opposition party can, with good conscience, criticize.

But where the criticism goes to the point that it gives the impression to the enemy that if they just hang on long enough that an opposition party will come in and allow them to gain the victory that they are seeking and that they aren't able to gain from the party in power.

Now, having said all this, I want to make it clear that some Republican leaders would disagree with my position.

But assuming that you begin with the proposition that the commitment is a necessary one and a proper one, I believe the opposition party has very definite responsibilities, completely different from what an individual dissenter would have.

But you don't think opposition is morally justifiable or even politically justifiable merely for the sake of opposition?

I couldn't disagree more with the proposition that the duty of the opposition is to oppose.

I couldn't disagree more, for example, in this whole agony of the cities which we're going through.

It is the duty of the opposition simply to point out that we're having terrible problems with lawlessness and violent protests and the rest and that the responsibility is solely that of the President of the United States.

He's concerned about those problems, just as we are.

He's concerned about peace in Vietnam, just as we are.

I think, however, that the opposition does have a responsibility to indicate those areas where we could do a better job.

And sometimes the line is hard to draw because no matter how I would put this, if it were carried in a news story the next day or in a tiny television clip, inevitably what makes news is what you say in opposition.

Anything that you say is constructive simply isn't newsworthy.

But you recognize that there is a distinction between legitimate and illegitimate opposition, and the fact that there is such a distinction is an important fact in your thinking about American politics.

It certainly is.

It goes back to my thinking from the time I came to Congress, 20 years ago.

I remember then that when I supported the Marshall Plan, when I supported our foreign aid programs, when I supported the exchange programs, all of these were considered to be then first Truman administration programs during my first four years in Congress, and I used to get rather irate letters from some of my constituents, Republicans, etc., saying that we should be against the administration.

Well, the reason was that I had traveled abroad in that early time, and I had become convinced that the interest of the United States would be served by supporting the Greek-Turkish loan program and the Marshall Plan and a foreign assistance program, which I thought would be in the interest of reducing the possibility of an American military commitment at a later point.

That, I think, is constructive opposition.

I was a vigorous, and I shouldn't speak in such a personal term, but we always translate this in personal terms.

I was a vigorous opponent of the administration in some of its domestic policies.

I supported the Taft-Hartley Act, which Mr. Truman vetoed, because I believed that the administration's policies in the field of labor management had swung the pendulum too far on the side of labor union leaders and far from the interest of the public.

And all divisions in Congress are along straight party lines anyhow, and many times.

Very few of them, very few of them these days.

And it isn't just a case of the party divisions being the Republicans and the Southern Democrats.

I find more fragmentation even among the Northern and Western Democrats than there used to be.

And I think the Republicans are more fragmented.

We live in a time when the problems are new.

And if I may say so, where doctrinaire solutions for problems no longer, I think, are relevant.

Let's take again the problem of the cities.

To me, one of the men that makes the most sense on the problems of the cities and the problem of the Negro is Moynihan.

Now, Moynihan made a speech to the ADA, which I'm sure you've read.

Many of our listeners have read it.

It got great coverage in the country.

A speech in which he pointed out that what we needed, as I understood it, he didn't use this term, but I will use it, what we needed is a new center in which we got away from doctrinaire liberalism and doctrinaire conservatism.

What we need are solutions to the problems of the cities, and not put it in terms of simply, well, that's not liberal or that's not conservative.

Well, he also argued very cogently that liberals and conservatives have a common interest in maintaining the method of democracy, which is the real issue in the life of this country, I should think.

Certainly in this whole area of dissent, whether we're going to have peaceful change or change by violent means.

Mr. Nixon, I'd like to go back to Vietnam.

I don't want to go into the question as to whether we should have gotten involved or escalation or anything, but we are involved.

We've been involved deeply for some time, and I know you've been over in that part of the world.

You're interested in that part of the world.

What have been some of the consequences of this involvement?

Obviously, we're divided at home, and it's costly and all that, and domestic programs suffer for it, but in terms of Asian politics or America's posture in the Orient, what has been the byproduct of the Vietnam involvement, besides what's happened in Vietnam?

What is really most important about Vietnam is that by keeping the cork in the bottle there, it has enabled the non-communist nations in the vicinity of Vietnam to strengthen their political and economic institutions, and to a certain extent, their military strength internally, so that they are less likely targets for revolutionary communist takeover.

To me, the most striking thing that has happened in Asia has been what has happened in Indonesia.

Indonesia, of course, makes, as far as the stakes are concerned, makes Vietnam look like Panayani, because Indonesia is a thousand miles of islands strategically stretched across those southern seas.

And a hundred million people, I guess, is the fourth biggest democracy.

And here, Indonesia turned the corner.

It turned the corner from what would have been a communist Chinese takeover, and is now, starting from the bottom, true, but on the way back.

This wouldn't have happened if you hadn't kept the cork in the bottle in Vietnam.

Thailand is another case in point.

Thailand was under very serious attack in the north.

Those attacks are still being mounted there, and the ties have strengthened their situation.

Malaysia and Singapore, small nations but important ones.

I think the effect on Japan is quite significant.

Japan, of course, is the big prize in Asia.

Now, the Japanese leaders have been very reluctant to give any open support to Vietnam until Sato's recent trip to the United States.

But privately, Japanese leaders two or three years ago, and publicly today, agree that by holding the line in Vietnam, it is in effect bought time for the balance of non-communist Asia to develop their institutions.

Now, what this means is that we now have a chance in Asia, in a very different way, to create around the perimeter of communist China a chain of nations strong enough economically, politically, and eventually militarily to contain the outward thrust of China.

Our goal is not to destroy China.

Our goal is not to get in and invade it or anything of that sort.

But by keeping China contained, this means that communist China will eventually turn in as the Soviet Union has tended to turn in, at least as far as Western Europe is concerned.

Now, Vietnam plays a part in this whole picture.

That's why I, speaking as a Republican, say that as far as the goal in Vietnam of concern is concerned, that there shall be no reward for aggression.

We must seek that goal and must stand by it.

As far as achieving that goal is concerned, I believe that the administration could have done far more economically, diplomatically, militarily than it has done.

You mean in the whole area, not merely in Vietnam?

In the whole area and in Vietnam as well.

Yes.

But the point I was trying to bring out, and I know you're associated with this point of view, is that there's more involved in Vietnam than Vietnam.

Exactly.

And that our commitment there is a commitment that has an impact on a whole region which you regard as vital to American interests, don't you?

Yes.

Perhaps you could discuss the American stake in the Far East.

We have an Atlantic community.

Should we have an Asian community?

I believe so, yes.

I suppose I, to an extent, am influenced by the fact that I'm a Californian.

Yes.

You look in that direction, don't you?

And we look there.

I suppose I'm influenced by the fact that the world has become much closer drawn together as a result of the communications breakthroughs.

But looking at Asia today, let's look ahead to the end of the century.

Japan, by the end of this century, if present trends continue, will have a higher per capita income than the people of the United States.

That's an indication of how the economic balance of power will be changing in the world.

China will have a billion people.

Now, at the present time, I do not favor the recognition of communist China or admitting it to the UN.

I think that would be counterproductive insofar as getting China to change its policies.

But on the other hand, we have to realize that to have a billion people in communist China, ostracized from the rest of the world with atomic weapons that they could distribute to forces of liberation around the world, would create a situation of danger that we simply couldn't live with.

Looking at world peace, we simply have to build in Asia areas of strength as we built them in Europe to contain this threat to the peace of the world.

From a positive standpoint, I think too that in terms of trade, in terms of exchange of peoples with these very great peoples with their great heritages, and you must go to Asia in order to appreciate the depth of their backgrounds, that this part of the world just simply shouldn't be put aside.

Let me put it this way.

I respect Walter Lippmann particularly for his views on Europe.

And I think Walter Lippmann happens to be right on Latin America where he points out that what we must do is develop the central part of the continent, which is not adequately being developed at this point.

But when Walter Lippmann talks about Asia and talks very lightly about withdrawing to Australia, and letting the communist Chinese in effect be dominant, the dominant power with the balance of Asia, this to me is simply something that is unthinkable for the United States because it would mean we would create an immense power antagonistic to the United States in that part of the world, and once that part of Southeast Asia came under communist Chinese domination, Japan could not go any other way but lean in that direction.

Well, isn't it true though that while the American people recognize and are sympathetic with the idea of an Atlantic community that we face naturally towards Europe, isn't part of the problem that we have no such consciousness of a Pacific community?

I take it you think it would be the task of leadership to direct attention towards a Pacific community.

Yes.

I think in that connection it's understandable that we look toward the Atlantic community because our heritage is that we are Europeans.

But I don't believe, I'm not a half-worlder.

I'm a whole-worlder, and I believe that we've got to look at the whole world.

We must remember that World War II, while we eventually became involved in Europe, started because of what happened in Asia.

We must remember that Korea is a war that was an Asian war.

Vietnam involved us.

Now maybe we shouldn't have gotten into Vietnam.

That argument could be made.

I am convinced that the major source or the major threat to world peace in the last third of this century will come from Asia and not from Europe.

I am convinced, therefore, that if we want peace, we must turn to Asia.

But putting it in a more positive terms, I think we've got to quit thinking in terms of color.

Color in any sense, but particularly in color, those people are Asian and foreign.

Once you go there, once you work with these people, you realize that we can have a community of nations, nations that are different with different backgrounds, but that can work together for progress for all of us.

Now in that connection, Mr. Nixon, I was very much struck by a comment you made in your article in Foreign Affairs, the current issue of Foreign Affairs, entitled "After Vietnam" or "Asia After Vietnam."

You said that the American program in the Pacific world is essentially a program of American support for Asian initiatives.

I thought that was a rather fruitful idea.

Just what did you have in mind?

What I have in mind is this.

And here is where what we talk about Asia differs completely from what we've done in Europe.

In Europe, the approach was the alliance road.

I think that the United States must think in very different terms as far as Asia is concerned and the balance of the world.

And the reason for that is that when the United States has an alliance with small, weak nations, any part of the world, inevitably, in the event those nations come under attack, we then become involved militarily.

Now that means that the danger of a confrontation with the major communist powers thereby escalates.

Because if we go, for example, to Bolivia in order to save Bolivia, or to Nigeria in order to save Nigeria from a communist takeover, as a result of perhaps some treaty we had with those particular areas or an alliance, that means that we come directly in confrontation with the communist powers and the danger of world war goes up immensely.

Including nuclear war.

That's right, nuclear war.

Now I think that what we need now are what I would call buffer collective security arrangements, which the United States would support.

We would support it economically.

We would encourage it.

But of which the United States would not necessarily be a part.

I think, in other words, the Asians should take the responsibility for their own defense.

I think, for example, the Latin Americans must take the responsibility to handle their guerrilla wars.

I believe eventually the Africans must take the responsibility for handling attacks on the integrity of any one of their countries.

And I think that the United States, and this is a long-range goal, must reduce those areas in the world where we automatically have to respond with an American force whenever a nation seems to be under attack.

And the reason that I have here is not simply because I am concerned about the spreading of American power around the world.

We can't be the world's policemen, but the reason is much more important.

We must reduce, in this last third of the century, to the absolute minimum those times when there is confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union and the United States and Communist China.

That is why the war in Vietnam must be ended as quickly as we can in an honorable way.

Because the longer it goes on, and the more Communist China's nuclear strength grows, the greater the danger of a confrontation.

This, in essence, is a foreign policy.

I haven't had the time to spell it out, but that's why I tried to spell it out in Vietnam.

That's a wonderful idea, I think, Mr. Nixon.

Well, since our time is running out and our audience is interested in domestic questions as well, I'd like to turn our attention for our remaining moments to some of our domestic problems.

I suppose one of the major problems of the day is the poverty program.

That is to say, what are the American people going to do about those who are poor in this age of affluence?

I wanted to ask you rather directly, and to come directly to what I think is the major point, do you think that the responsibility of the federal government for dealing with poverty, I assume you think there ought to be some public policy someplace on poverty.

Yes.

Is that true?

I do.

There's no argument about that.

Do you think the federal commitment should be escalated or increased?

Or should it be changed?

Do we have the wrong kind of federal poverty program?

Should there be a larger state involvement?

Should we be spending more federal money?

Should we have to wait until the war is over and so on?

It's the federal responsibility, because that's where the money is these days, that concerns me.

Perhaps you might care to -- Well, let's begin by this proposition.

The federal government must provide the leadership, the overall planning.

As far as the implementation of programs are concerned, and here I would depart from the administration's policies to a great extent, I believe that here we must move more toward the states and toward local government.

Incidentally, our friend Mr. Moynihan supports this view, too.

And I think Bobby Kennedy has moved in this direction.

But don't you need a federal assurance that the states will do the things they're supposed to do?

Oh, I think the federal -- I want to make it clear.

The federal government can't abdicate.

The federal government must provide, shall we say, guidelines.

It must provide overall planning.

In terms of implementation and control, and let me say also experimentation, I think that the more that we can get the states and the cities, when government does have to work, into this responsibility, the better.

And then I would add one other thing.

If there was ever a job that was too big for government, it's this job.

The cities of America have to be rebuilt.

We have to build a new America.

And if this new America is going to be built, it's going to have to be built not only by what government does, but it has to be built by enlisting the immense resources of private enterprise.

I think here that the federal government, through its tax policies, its credit policies, its insurance guarantee policies, can enlist private enterprise on a massive basis in handling the problems of poverty.

This means better housing, better education, better job training, all of these areas.

I think here are the areas where we need breakthroughs.

I believe that up to this point, the federal government has assumed too much the total responsibility.

And I think that now we have to share that responsibility and diffuse it if we're going to get the job done.

But doesn't this involve the expenditure of more federal money?

It will eventually, yes.

Doesn't it involve that now?

At this point in time, I would not spend more federal money.

I may sound partisan, but I would not spend more federal money on the existing programs.

I think they need to be reappraised.

I think the Goodell suggestions, I think the Javits recommendations with regard to various programs in the cities, I think that the Percy proposal for housing, I think the Human Investment Act the Republicans have been proposing, all of these areas and programs should be given consideration rather than simply adding more funds to programs that I think in many instances have perpetuated the problems of poverty rather than solved them.

Now as our time ebbs out, I have one more question that I've been saving for you, Mr. Nixon.

There's a graduate student who comes to my home once a week and helps my wife clean up.

Some of our students still work in this age of affluence.

I remember I did.

And he asked me to ask you this question.

He's a very thoughtful young man and I thought I'd put it to you.

He said, "Do you believe that there are any grounds for concern about the threat posed by the military-industrial complex to American society, which President Eisenhower referred to in his farewell address?

And if so, how would you propose to deal with this threat?"

That's a nice point on which to conclude.

In the world in which we live, the United States has the major responsibility if we are going to have peace in this last third of a century.

This means a major military establishment.

We must always guard against that establishment becoming so strong that it too much infringes upon our basic liberties, which are so important in this nation.

I think President Eisenhower raised a warning signal here that the American people should pay attention to and the fact that he as a military man raised that particular question indicates that your graduate student asks a very perceptive question.

And when we're on another program, I'll try to give you a more perceptive answer.

Well, I thought we were running out of time, but I had promised that I'd raise this matter.

You don't feel that the general principle of civilian control of the public policy has been jeopardized by the military?

No, I do not.

of WHA-TV Public Affairs.

I think that the administration.