Wife of our president newly elected hugh hewitt. [applause] our distinguished speaker was to dr. Kissinger as dr. Kissinger was to president nixon. He joined kissingers security staff in 1969 as special assistant traveling the world on virtually every Major Initiative in the greater cold war. He was with dr. Kissinger during the talks with go she ate her in purse that culminated in the paris peace accords. He was with president nixon in moscow in during his first trip there in 1972 and he was therefore kissingers shuttles between the arabs and israelis after the yom kippur war. He was a key actor in nixons trip to china in 1972 known as the week that changed the world. Was president of the council on formal relations and assistant secretary of state for Southeast Asian and pacific affairs. From until 2016 he conducted oral histories of Henry Kissinger on behalf of the foundation. They cover a variety of subject , andr china, vietnam statesmanship and are and now adable book is available for purchase in our museum store. Investor lord will sign copies for you. Ambassador lord will sign copies for you. He will be interviewed by after working in advertising, he worked with sir Randolph Churchill to write the definitive biography of the Prime Minister of a winston churchill. A workhousework fellow under donald rumsfeld. In 1970 four, gannon left washington to california aboard white house one and was an assistant he has the rare distinction of having interviewed president nixon for 38 hours, which are all available in digital format been nixon president ial library. We will see some of these videos in the presentation tonight. I should mention that yesterday our president hugh hewitt visited kissinger in new york city. He asked tio to pass on his best hugh to pass on his best wishes to the audience watching tonight. It is my pleasure to introduce dr. Frank gannon and ambassador lord. T lord winston [applause] well, thank you all for coming and thank you all for being here. Honora great pleasure and hewitt broughth fresh from kissinger. Read the memoir about him being a terrible punster, but in this one he says you became a one of my best collaborators, resident conscience and a close friend. He had a global, not simply original perspective. After the association with dr. Kissinger and the Nixon White House you went on to a very distinguished career, which could be the subject of another talk, but i am in the curious possession that you have an excellent book, which is your e you ed addition ition of the interviews. I will if to some things in the book, but it will be kind of open ended. The advantage of the book is that it is short, accessible, and interesting. The best thing to do is buy it and read it. You cannot go wrong. Also appropriate that you are here in the library because the Nixon Foundation played a part in the genesis of these interviews. I have been going around the country promoting this book with literally no other thing than this one, that compares with this one in terms of the appropriateness and relevance. You and jonathan have already touched upon it. Of course it is the Nixon Library and use em. And museum. 30 hoursself conducted of interviews with president hours. 38 that is also very relevant, not to mention the fact he was in the white house when i was. Is absolutely crucial and i am happy to see misses hewitt here. The new president will be terrific. , we didrviews we did several interviews, first panels on some of the key events that were in this volume and then we got kissinger to do one interview to reflect back on these events. It is extraordinary. When he did the interviews reflecting on the events that were 50 years old, it is amazing. Theasic barely touched transcript. And 92 a 92yearold talking about these events is pretty extraordinary. It was put together the National Archives supported these interviews and that no one was more indispensable than. Onathan, who ran the video he is absolutely was absolutely essential in the composition and editing of the video. Jeff shepard was also involved. Jonathan, jeff, and the foundation, without them we would not have this book. Mentioned my moving around. The fact you can buy this afterward, we are looking to make this we have another idea we were towing with. We put out the book before it was issued and a good friend of saw a brokaw, tom very small space. The iphone cut off the last two letters of the book, so tom [laughter] amb. Lord you see what is coming, right . Tom brokaw went out and bought 10 copies of the book thinking he was getting kissinger on kissing. [laughter] amb. Lord i have a short bit dr. Gannon i have a short video that was made for dr. Kissingers birthday in new york in may. It is a couple of clips from the interviews, so you conducted was it six two hour interviews . Amb. Lord that is right. Dr. Gannon this gives a brief flavor of what the book is based on. Nixons grand strategy, that Foreign Policy would see each other, balancing selfinterest, would promote peace and the security of the united states. I havent studied any other american president who thought in such conceptions. Richard nixon was focusing on objectives. He did so in terms of experiences in meeting with leaders. My approach was very similar to his in terms of focusing on objectives, but the odd material for my thinking was historical and philosophical. I saw the world in terms of situations that i had studied and had lessons one could draw from. A strategic objective was to prevent the soviet union from becoming the dominant country. The soviet army had occupied czechoslovakia and 42 russian divisions appeared on the chinese border. The use of soviet military pressure was a feature of the cold war world. Nixon began by opening arms control negotiations on nuclear weapons. The plan was to use the summit with the soviet union to create incentives in china, but the soviet union tried to blackmail us. We said, ok, we are going to try this. You look at what nixon said about china. He addressed the problem of china from the view of world order. His view was that by getting china involved in the International System the whole of International Politics would be transfer because all other countries would have to consider the impact of china in terms of the new system. He calculated we might produce a situation in which america would be closer to most of the contestants and each other. The second or third day in office i looked at the war plans and the expected consequences of a nuclear war were ended. He said, we cannot let these weapons pile up and in a way that did not destroy civilization. Occurring at a high point of the vietnam war they would say that was one of the main themes of the Nixon Administration. We saw the possibility of negotiating agreements for peace and to indicate specific steps toward it and to combine these two actions in one relatively brief period of time. It specializes the special nature of Foreign Policy nixon conducted. The breakthrough in negotiations would come when one of the arab countries concluded that soviet military support was not the way to achieve their objectives. During the war we managed to establish ourselves as mediators between the arab and the israeli side. The war had to be ended and we had to do this in contention with the soviet union because the soviet union still had the major influence in the arab world. Somebody said, we are going to have a big array of negotiations with the soviet union after we have opened china. People thought this was madness. That took society from where it was to where it has never been. You need courage to walk alone part of the way. [applause] dr. Gannon nixon liked to spring surprises and his announcement of his first two principal advisors ticked all those boxes. The harvard professor who was a kennedy supporter and a member of the Kennedy Administration and his principal foreign advisor work for his political rival. Dr. Kissinger says to you, if i spent 15 years of my life trying to keep him from becoming president , it is astonishing he chose me for his security advisor. [laughter] the politics breeds strange bedfellows, but nixon and kissinger were odd. What do you think nixon signed kissinger and why do you think he said yes . Ambassador lord let me thank you for that excerpt. That set the book very nicely. It was a strange honor. Nixon was a conservative from the west coast, distrustful of ivy league and harvard professors. You have a jewish immigrant working for nelson rockefeller. [laughter] they had actually never met. Maybe once at a social meeting. Nixon had read kissingers books. Nixon wanted to dominate Foreign Policy when he was so interested and he knew to do that he needed an ablebodied, National Security advisor. He put politics aside and thought about the National Interest and also what would serve his interest in forging a new world order. Just the sheer brilliance of nixon already exhibited. I will get back to one other aspect, but let me get to the acceptance. When he was asked by the president to be National Security advisor instead of saying, yes immediately, he hesitated. Partly out of misplaced loyalty to rockefeller. Not entirely sure of what nixon was going to be doing and he went to rockefeller who chewed him out and said, youve got to serve your country. What are you doing . He is taking the chance by picking you. Henry immediately saw that and henry would have said yes anyway because his motto was serving the National Interest. As someone who analyzed Foreign Policy in history all his life, and i am sure he left at the chance to do something about it in terms of policy. He had been advisor to jfk and consulted with johnson and other president s. These are the main motives and that is what brought them together. It is in the foreward to the book. He looks at the world in a longterm trend that takes into account the impact you have in one country and does not just react and lead your faction to discrete events, but tied them together. It was clear they each shared a strategic worldview which was probably a major reason nixon chose, as well as the others, and why kissinger was happy to join him. They brought different strengths. Nixon as a congressman and Vice President , then as a private citizen, had traveled the world extensively and new many leaders, studied Foreign Policy, and was the best prepared president ever for Foreign Policy. Kissingers strength was historical, philosophical, strategic, conceptual. They had the same instinct and strategy, but when used history and the other thought of the immediacy of knowledge. It was a wonderful mix. Dr. Gannon you mentioned the president s and the president elect wanted to bring the for policy apparatus into the white house. You have an interesting thing i had not seen before we are nixon and kissinger go out to see the ailing and dying general eisenhower. He gives them some specific advice and Henry Kissinger has a brush with the former general. Ambassador lord the thing about this book is henry not only recalled strategy and specific milestones, he punctuates the recounting with anecdotes. It was early in the administration. Kissinger had the conventional mistaken views eisenhower was a decent guy. He soon learned differently and by the way, i think eisenhower is a great president , that is my opinion. Given eisenhowers interest in National Issues they had a meeting and briefed him at the hospital. The very next day, not because of the meeting, but because somebody in the nfc there was a leak. Eisenhower chewed kissinger out saying, how dare you let this get out . The public just told me about it. Kissinger said, i am not sure i can control this. He said, young man, do a better job. He gained henrys Great Respect because of that. Dr. Gannon that was the first week of the administration, plagued by leaks. They had briefed eisenhower on the most secret plan for the middle east and on the next day it was on the front page of the New York Times. I want to talk about you. When you were a High School Student in the early 1950s what did you think you want to be when you grew up . Ambassador lord secretary of state. [laughter] actually, i did have an interest in international relations, Foreign Policy very early on for two reasons. One, my mother was very much into public service. She was ambassador to the u. N. For human rights. She was involved in international and domestic issues. We sat around the dinner table and these issues would come up. Secondly, i did a lot of traveling when i was young. One of my vacations was uzbekistan and kazakhstan. These two forces suggested i wanted to go into this field, but i was not quite sure how. I made sure to take a broad education. English major, i took a lot of political science, history, then went to graduate school where i met my wife. She took extremely good notes and economics class and that was my week subject weak subject. I decided to become her friend. [laughter] dr. Gannon you were an english major that became a diplomat and she was an economics major that became a best selling author. [laughter] ambassador lord she said, you better go into some other discipline. [laughter] dr. Gannon you also had a very distinguished academic career. What was the path that led you to kissinger . Ambassador lord i worked for a brilliant young person who ended up suing kissinger later. I will not get into details, but kissinger you halpin and halpin wanted me to go with them. I went over to join the staff a month after it started in february 1969. We should not spend much time on me. We ought to spend on kissinger and nixon. It was obviously a great opportunity. I had to have an interview with kissinger. It was a 15 minute interview and you could see the chaos. The secretary of the treasury was on the phone, but he zeroed in on the key issue. He said, i want this agreement, i want debate, i went intellectual exchange from my staff, but if we lose the battle, i want you to carry it out loyally which i think is the correct approach. I passed that test. The point is the first year i was not in the front office. I was sitting across the eisenhower office. Would send kissinger memos like looking ahead and i wrote several memos that were raising questions about some of the things nixon and kissinger were doing. He did not like the yesmen or yes women. He wanted debate. This was a great example of somebody who encouraged debate. Dr. Gannon he goes to the office every day. He is a legendary difficult boss. Some of the stories have to be where there is smoke, theres fire. Ambassador lord i was not there so i am not entirely sure, but it is a good story. He stepped over the body to get to the door. To get to the phone and start working. [laughter] i will give you another example. Look, i have unbelievable respect and affection for henry. If you do not send him the transcript, i will be nice behind his back. He was not perfect. He was extremely demanding. If you read nothing else, read my foreword. I refer to some of them as attractive aspects. He stretched my nerves in patientience, but also stretched my horizons. I learned a great deal about how to approach Foreign Policy. I have always been, as i say in the book, appreciative to him for the climb as well as the view. The climb could be arduous. I will give you one example. Speechwriting. I can write fairly well, nowhere near my wife and she does fiction. I do nonfiction. I did speeches for henry and sometimes indirectly for the president. It would go Something Like this. The timing would generally be just before the redskins kicked off against the cowboys in a football game. [laughter] i was a rabid fan. He would call me up. Saying i needed to work on a speech. That was pretty annoying. Thats why i quit once a week. Heres how it goes speechwriting. This is about 90 true. He would give me a topic to write a speech and i would come into days later with a draft. He would call me into his office the next day and say, is that the best you can do . I would say, i think so, but let me take another whack at it. I would come in with a second draft. He says, are you sure this is the best you can do . Let me try again. This goes on for six drafts. [laughter] i am getting a little annoyed. I finally say, henry, i looked at every sentence, tweaked every colon and semicolon. This is the best i can do. He said, in that case, now i will read it. [laughter] by the way, he would push me on speechwriting or writing memos for the president for him because he knew i could write. Another staff member might be good on researching negotiation. He would not push that person. He had a sense of where to push and where not to push. Dr. Gannon you recommend reading your foreword. This book not only has and not only has the unedited transcripts in a very interesting and useful way, but it has an introduction by dr. Kissinger, it has your setup, and then you have introductions to each of the chapters. Ambassador lord i wrote the introductions. Dr. Gannon occasionally, the questions you asked. It is not uninterrupted at all. In the book he has an interesting assessment of the nixon Strategic Vision and talks about him as one of his main contributions that he was interested in the conceptual aspects of for policy. He says to you, nixon was the founding father who thought of Foreign Policy is grand strategy. It was the structural improvement of the relationship of countries to each other in a way the balancing of their self interests would promote global peace and security for the united states. He thought of that in relatively long range terms. Is that the way you think of nixon . Ambassador lord absolutely. I am the last remaining centrist in america. I am a flaming centrist. I mentioned that because i worked for democratic president s, i have voted for both, i worked for reagan and clinton. Of the seven president s i have served nixon was by far the most formidable in Foreign Policy. This is coming from a relatively objective person. The man had flaws, we all know that. Who doesnt . You cannot take away the strategic approach. It is one reason why he and kissinger got along. They approached things the same way. He did a couple of things that were important. He knew exactly how to work with kissinger. First of all, their worldviews coincided. But he struck a beautiful balance. Some president s micromanage. Jimmy carter use to determine who could play on the tennis court. That is a pretty important subject. [laughter] not a bad idea. Some others delegate completely. Nixon had the white house dominate the process. He made the courageous decisions on how to end the vietnam war, open to china, you do not know what the reaction is going to be. He had to back up kissinger. He had a strategic approach which kissinger could reflect. Then he left it to henry to do the actual negotiations and tactics and never secondguessed him. Henry always have the confidence they had enough shared worldviews they could backup each other. In china, negotiating the shanghai can occasions before the historic meeting before the historic meeting, there was no way to communicate back home. Kissinger was sufficiently confident under the president s view that he agreed to the chinese approach which proved to be successful in the shanghai communications. That was extremely affluent as well. Dr. Gannon in addition to nixons longterm grant Strategic Vision there is an axiom dr. Kissinger quotes several times in the book. Something about no half measures. Ambassador lord he believed you were going to pay price for controversy. Whether you go halfway or all out. The china visit was carefully set up. It was a very bold move to send the National Security advisor secretly to china. We had enough confidence the china self interest would want to engage with us and we made sure to go beyond before we went. He could not know how the reaction was going to be back home. He was taking a chance negotiating in the middle east versus the soviet influence. Before the moscow summit which came shortly after the china summit came about because of the china summit. We got their attention. There was a major operation launched against vietnam. Even though he thought it might jeopardize the summit, which we had worked on for so long, it wouldve been a tremendous loss. He was not about to go to moscow when the americans and South Vietnamese were getting slaughtered by allies. Kissinger and i and others thought that the bombing was correct in terms of policy in vietnam. It was probably going to sink the summit. I remember going up to camp david to write the speech. We were bemoaning these agreements that were going down the tube. Nixon said, no. The soviets will go ahead with the summit. They have too much selfinterest. He was absolutely right. An interesting episode happened to play out when we are in moscow. I was in charge of henrys and the president s briefing book. We were sitting in an office near the kremlin or in the kremlin and it was an agreement being signed. They were going to take a break and we were going to go out in a motorcade to talk about vietnam. Even though they agreed to have us come while we were bombing their allies they had to be tough with us and send a transcript to prove they were loyal. They got nixon to go out in a motorcade leaving me behind with the briefing books. Knowing henrys temper i said, oh my god. He is going to be so mad even though it was not my fault. We got there in time, thank god. It led to an interesting evening getting into this question of nixons courage. We sat for three hours while the soviet leaders attack nixon on vietnam so they could send the transcript on. Nixon basically sat there. He knew they were going to charade. Would go upstairs for a banquet in the mood changes completely. It is camaraderie and like nothing had ever happened. That he made kissinger sit down with the Prime Minister and negotiate at 2 00 a. M. After three hours of vodka. [laughter] my whole point in this meandering story is that nixon did have the qualities of both tough for a leader to make these decisions. Early in a crisis you do not have full information and therefore, you have to make courageous decisions based on inadequate knowledge of the landscape of what is going to happen. You are quite lonely in taking a risk based on incomplete knowledge. But if you wait until you have so much knowledge that the path of certain, you are hemmed in and you cannot do what you want to do. It is very tough. Tactical decisions made by president s these big step decisions are the most difficult. That is what you need. Dr. Gannon dr. Kissinger says it is 5149 the decisions that can be made at the lower level. The president gets the tough ones. Ambassador lord nixon in terms of his policy, i put together his briefing books. We put together six briefing books about this big. I swear nixon read every page. It was marked up, every page. Even as we were flying and air force one, sitting on the back of air force one would send memos back and say, i want to know about this, what is the poem i could use my toast, went out the chinese going to say anything on korea . Ive never seen a president work that hard. Dr. Gannon i am sure you know that the ambassador is an introduction for the videos of the library. None were as prepared. This book as a master class and apply diplomacy. Start with china, we know that it worked out well. At the time the idea of going to china was crazy. It was unthinkable. Even a major ambassador refused to believe until he was called back. Nixon also announced at the first week in the white house. How did you receive word of this and what did you think . Ambassador lord i want to make sure we have time for other questions. Getting a china decision they consulted many outside experts as well as collecting information. We got a lot of help from experts. They also called in outsiders. Nixon talked to the four top experts in the state department on the soviet union. They all told him do not move toward china. They can see we were trying to change policy. They said, if you go toward china, you are going to record relations with moscow. Nixon and kissinger did not believe this. It took courage to go against the soviet experts. It is the opposite. The soviets were dragging their feet on a summit. We had resisted pressure, but we were not making progress with the soviets. On arms control, berlin, any of these things. In a public trip that covered the secret trip in 1971 i called the deputy to kissinger and said in sign language the russians once again turned down a summit. We gave the chinese the summit first. Nixon announced the fact that kissinger had been and he was going to go the next year. Within days the russians agreed to a summit. Within weeks they moved on arms control in berlin. It shows you how even the smartest people can get things wrong and what courage it took to go against it. Dr. Gannon in the section on vietnam dr. Kissinger really definitively lays world war ii, i think you call them troublesome, and the notion that the agreement that was achieved in 1973 could have been achieved earlier. Ambassador lord no one can sit here and say it was a splendid outcome. It was a terrible outcome. The north vietnamese violated the agreement. I understand the controversy. I respect those who felt we should not go or that we shouldve got out sooner. I do not those who glorify the north vietnamese. I do respect those who disagree, but on the agreement itself there are two consistent critiques i disagree with completely. I mentioned this in the book. We could have had the deal sooner and the other is the deal we got was the cynical fake knowing South Vietnam would collapse after a peaceful integral. We never should have made the deal that we made sooner. [laughter] you cannot have both arguments now. We ought to get to other things. They said leave the political fight of vietnam to north and South Vietnam. We were not going to overthrow the saigon government, which is what they demanded, and they thought nixon was going to get reelected. Its going to be for more years of this madman. They gave in and give us a military deal. This exceeded expectations of critics who thought we would have a Coalition Government and a Coalition Government was the first step toward collapse. We held out against that and we managed to face the vietnamese. However, that was never possible. We outlined it as early as 1970. We gave a sevenpoint proposal i helped draft in 1971 which laid out the eventual settlement. They said, youve got to get rid of the saigon government. You cannot just leave. The first argument is absolute nonsense. Second argument, people could not disagree on. People can say we should have known the South Vietnamese would not have been strong or congress would not backup enforcement, but we felt the deal nixon refused to have any settlement before the election because he wanted a deal that was credible. They did the best they could and we felt we were not naive about the treachery, but we felt with this military settlement the deal could survive and we were not looking for a decent integral. We were looking for decent opportunity for South Vietnam to determine its future and america could not be there forever. We expanded our lives and treasure, built up their forces, and the American People deserved to have us turn over the world. We felt that it was a minor ceasefire violation the South Vietnamese were Strong Enough to handle it. We felt, incorrectly and naively perhaps, that the u. S. Congress and people would back bombing to prevent that. Not sending in troops. Nobody wanted to do that. After all these spent years and north vietnamese treachery we thought even with the Antiwar Movement people would be willing to go back and bomb. That was wrong. We honestly thought that would be the case. Thirdly, we offered economic incentives so that the bureau could debate amongst themselves. Is put off our objectives. We got rid of the american troops and we would bide our time. Forth, we thought china and russia, not wanting this issue to flare up, would help persuade them to behave themselves. These assumptions did not work out. Reasonable people can challenge it, but they have to come up with what should be done. Stay longer . With the American Opinion the way it was with South Vietnam, for go all out with nukes and bombs, i do not respect these two arguments which i think are phony. Dr. Gannon earlier tonight didnt you say dr. Kissinger says that moment in october 1972 when the north vietnamese changed their position and made a settlement possible was the most emotional . Ambassador lord henry said that was the single greatest highlight of his career. He said when they came around in october 1972 after years of secret negotiation and the fighting, that he went out in the garden after the meeting and he shook my hand and said, we have done it. It was meaningful mostly because of the vietnam situation getting our pows back, but it was personal between us because, in 1970, i came very close to quitting this death because i opposed the cambodians. I was very close to quitting. My wife talked me out of it. Henry said, as did my wife, you go around waving a placard or you can stay here and work for peace. It was emotional for me, but i was touched. Dr. Gannon one last question for me before we open to the audience who i expect well have more contemporary questions. On august 8th, the night the president made his resignation speech, Henry Kissinger asked if he could walk nixon home. I think trying to cheer up Nixon Kissinger says, you know, mr. President , history will treat you well. Nixon says, well henry, that depends on who writes history. [laughter] it is 50 years since he became resident, 45 since he resigned, 25 since he died. How is history treating Richard Nixon . Ambassador lord that is a great question. Its hard to generalize. It depends on what platform you are talking about. I think its oversimplified. Critics will point to the china opening is the only thing he did. Domestic policy whether it is environment, gold standard, womens rights, the middle east, it is wrong for the critics to say that is the only good thing he did. Even on china they say, it was inevitable. Nixons right flank and humphrey would have pummeled by the republicans. It took great courage as i said and even on air force one coming back home from beijing nixon and kissinger were worried about the reception, domestically, to what happened. The Chinese Military playing american songs in the first summit on television had a major impact. It was seen as a great triumph. By the way, it helped to the morale of the American People who were fatigued not only by the vietnam war, but racial riots, assassinations, demonstrations, and people were just depressed. To see that you could open humanity put the ambivalent exit from vietnam into perspective. It showed we could act on the world stage. I think nixon and kissinger deserve great credit for these generic points as well as the specific agenda. I think the longer we go on let us face it. He did some bad things and he paid for it. It is a shame. I am not saying it was deservedly paid for. He did things that were unfortunate. Because of paranoia about his enemies, some of which was justified, went into a dark area and it is a shame. He was poised to be a truly great president and now it is going to be a mixed bag, and it should be. He made mistakes. He had the war behind us, he opened up china, he disarmed the soviet union, he was moving to solidify alliances with friends, he was moving into the middle east, he had a record with domestic policy that was sufficiently attractive. A liberal columnist with the New York Times said, that nixon was loudly in Foreign Policy, but great in domestic affairs. It is just a shame and we know it was a coverup. He will still go down as a good president , but he could have been a great president except for this unnecessary selfinflicted wound. It is really tragic. Kissinger is doing an extensive portrait of nixon. He has already done that for a upcoming book. It will be very interesting to see what he has to say. Dr. Gannon before you go to questions, ladies and gentlemen, join me in thanking ambassador lord. [applause] i want to remind everybody of the quote kissinger on kissingers in the store. As the former ambassador to the peoples republic of china, could you comment on the situation right now . Ambassador lord as it relates to china . In the Current Situation in hong kong. Ambassador lord hong kong, excuse me. I think the hong kong demonstrations are, on the one hand, extremely hopeful and a bright spot on the horizon, but also makes one extremely apprehensive. As for the birth after the berlin wall fell democracies were returning to democratic regimes and it looked like the end of history. We got to confident about it. The last 10 years, particularly the last few years, we have gone in the rivers. Whether it is china getting regressive, putin, hungary, turkey, saudi arabia, and others, nationalism is on the rise. I do not think that is permanent, but it is depressing. We have seen a few flickers lately around the world that maybe somewhat of a comeback. People who want freedom have not given up. You see it in turkey, hungary, even the soviet union. Hong kong is the most dramatic example. It is about other issues as well. It is essentially hong kong wants to be hong kong and not another chinese city. They want freedom. The agreement the british made with the chinese on the one hand guaranteed Civil Liberties, but it was it more vague on elections. Democracy is more than elections. It is the freedom of press, independent judiciary, and so on. The Civil Liberties were eroded over time. It started out well when china promised hong kong on a one country, two systems. That has been eroding. Censorship in the press, rule of law is fraying, and the chinese have been kidnapping publishers of books, literally who publish books. Then it was brought to a head by a bill the Hong Kong Government introduced which said, you should extradite china. It was for anyone we do not like. That was the final straw. Extraordinarily they have gone on for 15 months. That is the good news. The bad news is that we should speak out on their behalf, put a bill into congress that would try to deter the chinese from cracking down by saying, if you crackdown, you will get the same financial and economic treatment as you get elsewhere in china. That would really hurt them. Their gdp, 20 in hauppauge, only 3 but they depend on hong kong. This would be a great deterrent against the chinese cracking down. I think we should pass this bipartisan bill. It is nice to have something in washington that is bipartisan. It would hold accountable people involved in the crackdown whether it is hong kong or chinese. That is what we ought to do. There is no way that china, and this leader in particular, will let hong kong get out of control. And so they are not going to give in on the major mans. Part of the problem in this demonstration, the good news is there are no leaders. The bad news is there are no leaders unlike previous administrations. To come up with a demand, they have five demands, one of watch was real one of which was reelections. If they had some leaders, they could renegotiate with the Hong Kong Government, as tough as that is. Now it is sort of in cohate. The chinese dont want to go in. But trust me, if that is the only option they have to put this down, they will go in with some sin camouflage like the soviets in ukraine wearing green uniforms. They prefer the strategy. If you ask me to predict, it is where we will end up. They are going to exhaust the protests. It has been going on now for 15 weeks, but how many times can you leave your school and your business, put on a teargas mask and go out and risk your future career weekend after weekend . Unfortunately, some has been violent, which has not been good, which gives the chinese propaganda. The chinese strategy is these people are going to wear themselves out at some point. Although they are surprised how long it has gone on. They censor their own news and get the citizens of stoked on nationalism and portraying the protesters as thugs beating up the police. Chinese nationalism is on the rise. That is one way that they stay in power along with the economic gain. They get the tycoons in hong kong nervous about their Economic Future and disruption, which is happening. They jail past leaders, not future ones, some of whom are in this country right now, temporarily on bail. And they figure through censorship, propaganda, pressure, tycoons selfinterest, they will get this thing to subside. I think that is probably what will happen. We do have a deadline of october 1, the chinese anniversary, 70th anniversary of the founding of the party, and it is embarrassing for this to be going on when thats happening, i think they have to put up with that rather than resorting to a crackdown. Sorry to take such a long time on one question. I will be shorter from now on. But it is a complicated situation. As i said at the outset, both hopeful and dangerous. Frank we have a question in the back row. Sir, in light of the current trade war with china, what is the likelihood, because of the severe stress on the chinese economy, that the Chinese Government opts for a shooting war rather than losing face by caving to washington . Winston a shooting war . No, they wont have a shooting war. By the way, xi, as you know, hes dictator for life, has all all the powers of control, which means all the successes he gets credit for, but hes going to get the blame when things go wrong. Between hong kong and the slowing of their economy, partly by trump being tough, he may be in some difficulty. Not to mention the anticorruption campaign, which is on a scale, which has wiped out enemies as well as bad people. You know, we are talking hundreds of thousands of people, including highlevel. So, hes in a dilemma on both of these issues, and i already mentioned hong kong. With respect to the economy, the problem is they cant figure trump out. He is unpredictable. Some say that is an asset. I think it can be to keep them off balance, but i think in this case the chinese will just wait him out. Whether we get a solution before the election depends on trumps calculation. Which is better for his reelection . Should it be mr. Tough guy, not get a bad deal and be attacked for doing it . Or is that going to spook the stock market and the economy, and you better make a deal . I think what will happen, we will have a new deal where the chinese buy more soybeans, etc. , america will lift tariffs, and both sides agree to kick the can down the road on the real issues, which is technology, intellectual property theft, cyber theft, making our companies turnover technology and subsidizing. I think trump, number one, he shouldnt have withdrawn from a Major International trading pact in asia, of 12 nations, the transpacific partnership, which did a lot of things for our economy and new issues like the environment and workers rights. But because it was under obama, trump didnt like it, and pulled out. Japan has reconstituted its with others. We should have had that, as leverage on the chinese, both on economic issues. Because all these countries dont like what china is doing, either, the protectionism as well as their geophysical geopolitical presence in asia. It was a big mistake to pull out of that. What i would do frankly is to go back to that pact, join it. I would settle with our allies the trade wars with our allies, to get them on our side to pressure china. And on tariffs, id be more selective, going after state enterprises, which run against chinese reforms, so it is in their selfinterest over time to go back to private enterprise. And which are the companies that are the most subsidized, the most dangerous to compete with. I dont know if that would solve the problem. But china wont go to a shooting war. It will wait trump out, be willing to make a deal and kick the can down the road. Frank we have a question here. Winston i am a new immigrant, from china, living in yorba linda. And in china, both Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger are very well known, and have a high reputation among Chinese People, particularly for Henry Kissinger. And the chinese official propaganda, in the state run newspaper like china daily, every time Henry Kissinger visited china, they called him Chinese Peoples old friend. Ok . This is a very noble title from chinese newspaper. And among them, only a handful of leaders, foreign leaders enjoy that noble title, including cuba, castro, and the and kissinger is Chinese Peoples old friend. Do you think this is a positive, objective comment that Henry Kissinger well deserve . If the Chinese People gave you that title, will you gladly accept it, or not . [laughter] many parts to the question. I am happy to say there will be a chinese edition of this book, because of the interest and approval of kissinger. Certainly not because of my name, although i had something to do with the china opening. This will be published in china. It will be published in russia. And tomorrow, it comes out in the german edition. Thats the good news. But unless we change the title, i dont think it is going to be a bestseller in america. [laughter] no, it is obviously an honorable acclamation for kissinger. Not only what he did for nixon with the opening, but he has been working tirelessly ever since as a intermediary between any american president , democrat or republican, and china. He believes in serving whatever president is in office, whatever they think of that person. So they respect not only the revolution he brought about in the relationship together with the chinese leaders and nixon, but also that hes worked so hard ever since to have the relationship go well. He believes in serving whatever president is in office, whatever they think of that person. So they respect not only the revolution he brought about in the relationship together with the chinese leaders and nixon, but also that hes worked so hard ever since to have the relationship go well. And the chinese the fact they have some bad ideas, like calling mr. Castro an old friend, that is not henrys fault to be in that company. I dont mean that in any way. But they genuinely respect him. By the way, they stick by old friends. When nixon was downed by watergate and was expresident , the chinese warmly welcomed him, had him come over. That is their tradition. They are good at doing this, and they also play on that. They play on your friendship, to try to get you to do favors for them. It is part of their very skillful diplomacy. Frank we have a question right here. Winston what subtle differences are you noticing in the approach to Foreign Policy from the Nixon Administration to other republican administrations since then . I also served in many othr administrations, republican and democrat. Weaid this at the outset did make mistakes and kissinger failed. Of course they did. There were humans. There were not perfect. This strategic effect we are describing has not been replicated since. You do not necessarily need to strategies, but it helps, particularly when you inherit the landscape kissinger and nixon did where we had intense nuclear standoffs with the other superpower. We did not have any influence in the middle east except with israel, who were bogged down in a war. We had this you needed a grand strategy to get out of that, in my opinion. Since then we have not seen that because we have not had good Foreign Policy. I think bush senior, the way they ended handled the end of the cold war, the way bush assembled the coalition of arabs to oppose thees invasion of kuwait and was smart. Bout the arch on baghdad it does not mean you cannot be successful the march on baghdad. It does not mean you cannot be successful, but no one had the same approach kissinger dead. War,ring the yom kippur israel asked for help from the u. S. Kissinger recommended we give them help. Why was that his recommendation whereas president nixon stated they are kissinger recommended we not give them help. Why was that his recommendation whereas president nixon stated they are our ally, we will give them all the help they need. Dr. Gannon i didnt amb. Lord i didnt get the first part. Dr. Gannon henry advised caution. Amb. Lord i am not sure that is correct. Henry might have said that we should act in such a way that we do not destroy our opportunity to work with the arabs, but i am not sure whether the premise of your question is correct. Was somen there hesitation on the part of defense so. Amb. Lord i agree with the thrust of your question. Negotiating does you strengthened the negotiating position by doing this. Kissinger felt you do not separate pressure and incentive. You need both in strategy. Im sure he was in favor of it, but i will point out this is a good example of in foreign is , a sense of timing part of the strategy when they east,n for the middle both kissinger and nixon wanted to supplant control in the middle east, which was extensive because of the supply of soviet arms. Nixon and kissinger wanted to show them that they got fill up their armaments, but you will not get any territory back and you wont move towards peace unless you have an honest mediator like the u. S. A strong ally of israel, but willing to talk to both sides. When the yom kippur war broke 1973, by the way, i was at the u. N. General Assembly Session and we were putting his finishing touches on his speech to the u. N. And all hell breaks loose with the yom kippur war. He has on the phone with the andident, he is also sick he finishes off the speech. What henry saw into nixon as well in terms of timing was the following and nixon as well in terms of timing was the following egypt made major advances against israel, the first time israel had suffered military defeat. They began to move back and retake the territory. They were then at a point where they surrounded the egyptian army. Kissinger and i were with them. We went to moscow to freeze the situation in place with a cease because for the first time israel had sobered up a little bit by its military setback and some settlement. Before that they suffered from hubris about their military superiority. Done enoughddam had and had his army wiped out, which would have gone back to previous durations. They had some dignity and he couldect and without humiliation enter into a negotiation. By freezing that situation for sawfirst time kissinger after waiting for three years, we had a chance to go into the area and a soviet influence. It is a good example of strategy and a matter of timing with how you implement that strategy. Gannon kissinger cams up comes up with a good formulation during this time. We have time for one last question. Hi. It is a pleasure being here. Finally as ofcan yesterday. I changed parties. , from myon is knowledge or experience, i have not understood what was kissingers opinion on what would happen at watergate with how nixon handled it. From my opinion he should have and that i did, would have been the end of it. I do not recall kissinger making any comments on what his thoughts were on how he handled it. Amb. Lord i do not want to but i think he would describe the conventional that the initial seven of it breaking in into looking for research on the opposition carried out originally without nixons knowledge, if he had just said i did not authorize it, this was a mistake, it will not happen again, second term. That is why it is so sad. He went to unacceptable lengths to cover it up, including criminal acts and he paid for it as i said earlier and he deserved to pay for it. It is a real shame. What kissinger was saying is obviously he felt an incredibly lost opportunity for the country to have a second term in Foreign Policy. A personal tragedy for a man he greatly respected, but i am sure he would feel it was a terrible tactical mistake worn out of many experts of born out of he did have suspicions of certain and amaze and even somebody said paranoid of his enemies. He carried them too far. It is a real shame that it happened. We will see whether kissinger addresses this in his next portrait. In closing, i want to thank jonathan for what he did to get this book done and arranging this evening. And for putting this together as well as the clips. It has been a real pleasure. Thank you. [applause] we will convene in the annenberg court. The book is available in the museum store for purchase. Can find more information at nixonfoundation. Org. You are watching American History tv, covering history cspan style with event coverage, eyewitness accounts, archival films, lectures in college classrooms, and visits onmuseums, every weekend cspan three. In late april 1865 with the civil war drawing to a close, the barge Black Diamond sank following a nighttime collision on the Potomac River with a steamer carrying union troops. 87resulted in the death of men. Karen stone details the events of that knife and why this naval disaster is often overshadowed this navald why disaster is often overshadowed by other evens at the time. The National Museum of civil war medicine provided the video and hosted the conversation. Onto todays program. I am a very excited to share this story. Last year i had the honor