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Remarks at a Briefing for Five Congressional Committees on the Antiballistic Missile Treaty and the Interim Agreement on Strategic Offensive Arms

June 15, 1972

Ladies and gentlemen:

We are beginning a little late because I understand traffic is quite heavy around the White House this morning due to the arrival of the President of Mexico. We, however, must go forward with the schedule, because there is a joint session, as you know, today, and we do want the members of the committees present here to be able to attend that session. We will have to adjourn this meeting at approximately 12 o'clock, or at best, 5 minutes after 12, and we want to give you plenty of time for questions.

A word about the format of this meeting. I will make a statement, and then I will have to depart in order to prepare for the arrival of the President of Mexico. Dr. Kissinger will then make a statement, and then will be open to questions to the members of the committees that are present here.

In order to get some recognition factor developed by someone who knows all of the members who are here, Clark MacGregor will moderate the question-and-answer period, but we will try to be just as fair as possible among the members of the committees and between the House and the Senate, and Clark, of course, will be responsible in the event that it isn't fair.

In any event, let me come directly now to my own remarks, which will not be too extended, because Dr. Kissinger today will be presenting the Presidential views. He will be telling you what the President's participation has been in these negotiations. The views he will express I have gone over with him in great detail, and I will stand by them.

I noted in the press that it was suggested that I was calling down the members of these committees for the purpose of giving you a pep talk on these two agreements. Let me lay that to rest right at the outset. This is not a pep talk, and Dr. Kissinger is not going to make you a pep talk either.

When I came back from the Soviet Union, you will recall in the joint session I said that we wanted a very searching inquiry of these agreements. I want to leave no doubt about my own attitude.

I have studied this situation of arms control over the past 3 1/2 years. I am totally convinced that both of these agreements are in the interest of the security of the United States and in the interest of arms control and world peace. I am convinced of that, based on my study. However, I want the Members of the House and the Members of the Senate also to be convinced of that. I want the Nation to be convinced of that.

I think that the hearings that you will conduct must be searching because only in that way will you be able to be convincing to yourselves and only in that way will the Nation also be convinced.

In other words, this is not one of those cases where the President of the United States is asking the Congress and the Nation to take on blind faith a decision that he has made and in which he deeply believes.

I believe in the decision, but your questions should be directed to Dr. Kissinger and others in the Administration for the purpose of finding any weaknesses that you think in the negotiations or in the final agreements that we have made.

As far as the procedures are concerned, as you know, you will be hearing the Secretary of State, the Secretary of Defense, the head of the CIA, and, of course, Ambassador [Gerard C.] Smith in your sessions of the various committees.

I know that a number have suggested that Dr. Kissinger should appear before the committees as a witness. I have had to decline that particular invitation on his part, due to the fact that executive privilege, I felt, had to prevail.

On the other hand, since this is really an unprecedented situation, it seemed to me that it was important that he appear before the members of the committees in this format. This is on the record.

All of you will be given total transcripts of what he says. All of you will have the opportunity to ask these questions, and in the event that all of the questions are not asked on this occasion, he, of course, will be available to answer other questions in his office from members of the committees as time goes on, during the course of the hearings.

What we are asking for here, in other words, is cooperation with, and not just rubber-stamping by, the House and the Senate. That is essential because there must be follow-through on this and the Members of the House and Senate, it seems to me, must be convinced that they played a role, as they have up to this point, and will continue to play a role in this very, very important field of arms control.

Now, let me go to the agreements themselves and express briefly some of my own views that I think are probably quite familiar to you, but which I think need to be underlined.

I have noted a great deal of speculation about who won and who lost in these negotiations. I have said that neither side won and neither side lost. As a matter of fact, if we were to really look at it very, very fairly, both sides won, and the whole world won.

Let me tell you why I think that is important. Where negotiations between great powers are involved, if one side wins and the other loses, clearly then you have a built-in tendency or incentive for the side that loses to break the agreement and to do everything that it can to regain the advantage.

This is an agreement which was very toughly negotiated on both sides. There are advantages in it for both sides. For that reason, each side has a vested interest, we believe, in keeping the agreement rather than breaking it.

I would like for you to examine Dr. Kissinger and our other witnesses before the committees on that point. I think you also will be convinced that this was one of those cases where it is to the mutual advantage of each side, each looking to its national security.

Another point that I would like to make is Presidential intervention in this particular matter--Presidential coordination-due to the fact that what we have here is not one of those cases where one department could take a lead role. This cut across the functions of the Department of State, the Department of Defense, it cut across, also, the AEC, and, of course, the Arms Control [and Disarmament] Agency.

Under these circumstances, there is only one place where it could be brought together, and that was in the White House, in the National Security Council, in which all of these various groups participated.

There is another reason, which has to do with the system of government in the Soviet Union. We have found that in dealing with the system of government in the Soviet Union, that where decisions are made that affect the vital security, in fact, the very survival of a nation, decisions and discussions in those cases are made only at the highest level. Consequently, it is necessary for us to have discussions and decisions at the highest level if we are going to have the break-throughs that we have had to make in order to come to this point of a successful negotiation.

The other point that I would make has to do with what follows on. The agreement that we have here, as you know, is in two stages: one, the treaty with regard to ABM defensive weapons, and second, the offensive limitation, the executive agreement, which is indicated as being, as you know, not a permanent agreement-it is for 5 years--and not total. It covers only certain categories of weapons.

Now we are hoping to go forward with the second round of negotiations. That second round will begin, we trust, in October. That means that we can begin in October, provided action is taken on the treaty and on the offensive agreement that we have before you at this time, sometime in the summer months; we would trust before the 1st of September. I don't mean that it should take that long, but I would hope you can finish by the 1st of September so we can go forward with the negotiation in October.

The other point that should be made with regard to the follow-on agreements is not related to your approval of these agreements. It is related to the actions of the Congress on defense. I know there is disagreement among various Members of the Congress with regard to what our defense levels ought to be. I think, however, I owe it to you and to the Nation to say that Mr. Brezhnev and his colleagues made it absolutely clear that they are going forward with defense programs in the offensive area which are not limited by these agreements.

Under those circumstances, since they will be going forward with their programs, for the United States not to go forward with its programs--and I am not suggesting which ones at this point, you can go into that later but for the United States not to go forward with its offensive programs, or worse, for the United States unilaterally to reduce its offensive programs would mean that any incentive that the Soviets had to negotiate the follow-on agreement would be removed.

It is for that reason, without getting into the specifics as to what the level of defense spending should be, as to what the offensive programs should be, I am simply saying that if we want a follow-on agreement, we have to have two steps: We need first, of course, to approve these agreements, and second, we need a credible defensive position so that the Soviet Union will have an incentive to negotiate a permanent offensive freeze. That is what we all want.

These are just some random thoughts that I had on this matter. I will simply close by saying that as one stands in this room and in this house, one always has a tendency to think of some of the tragedies of history of the past. As many of you know, I have always been, and am, a great admirer of Woodrow Wilson. As all of you know, the great tragedy of his life was that after he came back with the Treaty of Versailles and the League of Nations, due to ineffective consultation, the Senate rejected the treaty and rejected the League.

We, of course, do not want that to happen. We do not think that it will happen, because we have appreciated the consultation we have had up to this point, and we are now going forward with this meeting at this time.

I will only say that in looking at what Wilson said during that debate, when he was traveling the country, he made a very, it seemed to me, moving and eloquent statement. He said: "My clients are the children. My clients are the future generation."

This is an election year, and I realize that in an election year it is difficult to move as objectively as we ordinarily would move on any issue. But I would respectfully request the Members of the House and Senate, Republican and Democratic, to approach this in the spirit that Wilson explained in that period when they were debating whether they should go forward with the League of Nations, remembering that our clients are the next generation, that approval of these agreements, the treaty limiting defensive weapons, the agreement limiting offensive weapons in certain categories, and also the continuation of a credible defense posture, will mean that we will have done our duty by our clients, which are the next generation. Thank you.

Note: The President spoke at 9:18 a.m. in the State Dining Room at the White House. He spoke without referring to notes.

Invited to the briefing were 122 members of the five Congressional committees having jurisdiction over the details of the agreements: the Joint Committee on Atomic Energy, the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, the Senate Committee on Armed Services, and the House Committee on Armed Services.

On the same day, the White House released the transcripts of remarks on the agreements by Henry A. Kissinger, Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, and the question-and-answer session which followed. Dr. Kissinger's remarks are printed in the Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents (vol. 8, p. 1045).

Richard Nixon, Remarks at a Briefing for Five Congressional Committees on the Antiballistic Missile Treaty and the Interim Agreement on Strategic Offensive Arms Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/254540

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