New Nixon Tapes are Big News at U.Va.’s Miller Center
Today’s release of 154 hours of tapes made by President Nixon in January and February 1973 are creating a bit of a stir over at the Miller Center of Public Affairs‘ Presidential Recordings Program, which features audio and transcripts of the recordings of six American presidents, plus research and annotation to put them in context.
For today’s release, Ken Hughes, the coordinator of the Nixon Project for the Presidential Recordings Program and a research fellow at center, has created a primer for journalists covering the release.
Hughes has launched an all-out social media blitz, writing about the tapes on his blog, Fatal Politics, and also Twittering about them.
Already, he’s repairing history. A previously released version of a Jan. 20, 1973 telephone conversation between Nixon and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger over the Vietnam War had only been documented from Kissinger’s side; the new Nixon tapes have allowed Hughes to fill in some missing words and phrases. The result can be pretty illuminating:
On January 20, 1973, when Nixon and Kissinger were discussing the threat of a cutoff of U.S. aid to South Vietnam spearheaded by congressional conservatives — a threat designed to force South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu to accept Nixon and Kissinger’s settlement terms, which all three realized would lead to a Communist military victory following a face-saving (for Nixon) “decent interval” — Nixon said, “I don’t know whether the threat goes too far or not, but I’d do any damn thing, that is, or to cut off his head if necessary.”
Pretty important sentence, no? But whoever transcribed the conversation for Kissinger didn’t include it.
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Gerald Cooper, A&S 1958 | July 5, 2009 @ 11:29 am
” the new Nixon tapes have allowed Hughes to fill in some missing words and phrases. The result can be pretty illuminating:” from UVA Today blog.
Any chance Miller Center or UVA Today blog might publish short excerpts from the new Nixon tapes–say 100 words each–daily or weekly? This might keep readers mindful of what happens when an unscrupulous egotist has control of the reins of our government. It would be a service especially to remind Republicans, who have a penchant for demagogues–currently Gingrich, Linbaugh and Palin.
Equal time could also be given to Bill Clinton, if you have tapes of any of his conversations that aren’t rated “R.”