The Nixon Defense: What He Knew and When He Knew It

by John W. Dean

  Pumped for further information, Petersen said they were assessing the credibility of Magruder and Strachan, given the conflicts in their testimony, and they were contemplating giving them both lie detector tests. Strachan had claimed that Haldeman did not get the budget for Liddy’s activities nor the intercepts from the DNC; Magruder said Haldeman received both.

  Nixon decided to give Petersen a preemptive version of his March 21 conversation with me, which he introduced as a by-the-way bit of information. He claimed he had asked me what it would cost to support these men, and when I said a million dollars, he was outraged. Nixon said he told me, “You can’t go down this road, John,” and said I’d added that Bittman was demanding attorney’s fees. The president was extremely adept at reading people, and realizing he had stunned Petersen with this disclosure, he quickly and awkwardly said, “Forget what I just told you.” He then proceeded to personally vouch for Ehrlichman and Haldeman, insisting that neither of them was a liar, but having opened the topic of money for the defendants, the president felt it needed to be given context.

  “Now let me say that Ehrlichman, [and] everybody around here, had to be aware of the fact, everybody in town, of the stories to the effect that these defendants were getting something. You know, that they were getting attorneys’ fees, the Mrs. Hunt stories and so forth, when she died. And Dean, on one occasion, did apparently talk to Ehrlichman about the need for that. And Ehrlichman said, frankly, being a very good lawyer, ‘I can’t have anything to do with it.’ That’s a problem you’ll have to work out with the lawyer.” Nixon next told Petersen that Ehrlichman had been the antagonist on all this, for it was he who wanted to let it all hang out. He then described Mitchell as the key figure in the affair. While Nixon said he had never spoken to Mitchell about it, “never asked him, what should have happened after this was that Mitchell should have stepped forward and taken responsibility, say he was not minding the store, and watching these jackasses, and I am very sorry, and pleaded, and get on with the campaign.”

  “It would have been much better, Mr. President,” Petersen agreed, at which Nixon noted, “But it’s too late now. There started the tragedy.”

  Nixon changed the subject to seek further clarification of the differences in Strachan’s and Magruder’s accounts regarding Haldeman. Nixon said that, as he understood it, Magruder was claiming that Haldeman got the results of the bug, but Strachan was saying they did not recognize them as such. “Awfully hard to make a case on that,” the president observed. “One man against the other, which one do you believe?” He then raised the matter of the money Haldeman had available, which, Petersen said, “may turn out to be the toughest issue.” Nixon mused that John Wilson would have to sort the money matters out.

  “Dean’s position is that he was a conduit?” the president asked, after briefly covering a number of other concerns. Petersen responded that my position was that I was an agent and information gatherer, and he judged that it was going to be a very difficult case to prove, because it would be all testimonial, with very little documentary evidence. The president acknowledged that it was Petersen’s call regarding immunity for me, and Petersen said nothing was happening on the decision. My lawyer was patiently letting events play out, which was part of the bargaining process. Meanwhile they were gathering evidence before the grand jury. The president noted that they obviously had evidence on me—in fact, Nixon asserted, I had come in and confessed my involvement to him. The president asked if I had knowledge that Liddy’s plans had gone forward, and Petersen said I did not. Nixon next said that I had been involved in subornation of Magruder’s perjury—was I claiming to be an agent on that? This was a matter beyond Petersen’s knowledge, but the president gave him his take on the case against me, speculating on facts that, in fact, did not exist.

  “How far away are you?” the president questioned. Petersen said it was hard to say, since it was a terribly complex jigsaw puzzle. Nixon wanted Petersen’s advice on the case against Ehrlichman and Haldeman, and he reviewed what was known about both, trying to downplay the facts regarding each. Petersen explained that for the break-in they were developing “a conspiracy case, in which all the pieces will fit together. But in such a conspiracy case, the fact—assuming it were true, and we still have a question on the credibility of Magruder—that Haldeman was given a budget, which he had the power to veto, which included operation Gemstone, which he knew to be an electronic-intercept operation, would be a tremendously important fact.” Nixon asked, “That’s Magruder versus Strachan?” Petersen confirmed and continued, “When you add to that the receipt of the product of the illegal intercepts in identifiable form, coupled with the conspiracy, and his relationship with Mitchell, and his position of authority, I have no doubt whatsoever that we could include him in a conspiracy. The question is one of credibility, which we’re trying to resolve. But even if that were to fail, on a question of proof, well, then you come into the secondary aspect of it, that even if you have not found him guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, rather by a preponderance of the evidence, you have—” The president interrupted and said he understood, meaning there was the consideration of the morality of the situation.

  Petersen agreed that there was no case against Ehrlichman for the break-in and only a thin case for obstruction of justice. As the conversation continued, Petersen began telling the president everything he knew, while Nixon offered nothing. To end this sorry manipulation, Nixon could not resist one last appeal to Petersen’s ego: Would he like to be director of the FBI? Petersen replied that while he would never seek the job, if the president appointed him director, that would be fine; if he did not, that was fine, too. Nixon closed by saying, “Let’s take Easter off.”82

  Following Petersen’s departure, Ziegler returned to the Oval Office to report, “John Dean issued this statement, just a short time ago,” and placed a copy on the president’s desk.83 I had had my office dictate it to the press office immediately after the statement was read by my secretary to the wire services, The Washington Post and the Washington Evening-Star. In short it was a message I sent to Nixon, Haldeman and Ehrlichman, since they had become incommunicado, to inform them that I was not willing to become the Watergate “scapegoat.”84 Nixon read the statement silently, and as he was finishing, Ziegler read the last paragraph aloud and asked whether or not the White House should respond. He did not think they should but expected to be quizzed heavily about it at his morning briefing. The president told Ziegler to say, “No, there won’t be a statement” but wanted to know if I had informed Ziegler I was going to issue my own statement. When Ziegler said I hadn’t, Nixon asked, “Do you think you can communicate with him?” Ziegler said he could, but he had wanted to consult with the president first.

  Appreciating that the president was not reading the newspaper coverage of Watergate, Ziegler continued, “The Christopher Lydon piece in the New York Times today was moved by [Dean’s] former brother-in-law, I do know that. And the basic thought of that is that”—here Ziegler read the subheading of the story—White House Counsel Described as Alone but Confident as He Prepares to Face Senate and Grand Jury Inquiries. Ziegler continued, “Goes on to say that Mr. Dean has intimated he can show his own innocence of wrongdoing and guide investigators to other members of the president’s inner circle.” Then, paraphrasing from the story: “According to close friends of Mr. Dean, there never was a full written report to the president, which Ziegler said was ‘not disputed.’” Nixon asked if he had indeed said that, and Ziegler replied, “Yes sir, we’ve never said the Dean report was written.” Then, continuing to paraphrase: “On Mr. Dean’s investigation, the same sources said that Mr. Dean never met with Mr. Nixon to talk about the Watergate case until last month, shortly before the president came upon ‘serious charges’ and started the new investigation he reported yesterday.” “So then,” Ziegler ended, “there were some paragraphs of differences.”*

  Nixon felt that they should not make any comment but, rather, requested that
Ziegler call me immediately—“No, no, no, don’t tell him you are in my office”—to tell me what he planned to say at the press briefing. The conversation lasted about a minute.85 Ziegler said he had seen my statement. I asked if he had any problem with it, and he said he didn’t think so. I said that since Ziegler was in a position such that he could not issue anything, I had done so myself. Ziegler told me the president’s statement on April 17 was not intended to identify a scapegoat but rather to ascertain the truth. We signed off, and after Ziegler repeated our conversation to the president, the two speculated about my intentions.

  Ehrlichman stepped away from the meeting with the lawyers to go to the Oval Office early in the afternoon.86 As he seated himself Nixon said, “I guess Dean has really been shot across the bow, claiming he’s the scapegoat.” Ehrlichman asked if I had made a deal, and Nixon said I had not, and that Ziegler would not respond to my statement. Nixon proceeded to give Ehrlichman the gist of his discussion with Henry Petersen; he reported that he had alerted Petersen to Hunt’s national security activities and instructed Petersen that the Justice Department should not investigate them (meaning the Ellsberg break-in), as well as nothing involving eavesdropping (meaning the 1969–70 electronic surveillance of newsmen and NSC staffers conducted by the FBI at the request of the Nixon White House and with the approval of attorney general John Mitchell*). Ehrlichman (falsely) assured Nixon he had done no bugging. Nixon indicated that he had instructed Petersen about not giving me immunity, and Ehrlichman said his own attorneys were going to “talk with Glanzer and see what’s going on” with respect to the immunity question. Nixon then informed Ehrlichman that Petersen was developing a conspiracy case against him, regarding “Dean going to Ehrlichman with regard for the need for funds for the defendants.” Ehrlichman conceded that he had told me “it was all right to call Kalmbach” about raising money, and while they were reviewing that situation with the attorneys, Ehrlichman did not think his actions with respect to Kalmbach were illegal, as he elaborated: “See, the reason [Dean] had come to me in order to call Kalmbach is that Kalmbach didn’t want to work for Stans anymore. And we used a pretext that Kalmbach was going to be under Bob and my aegis from now on to do special projects, so he couldn’t be a fund-raiser anymore. It was effective the sixth of April.” Nixon understood but asked if this still might not constitute a conspiracy, to which Ehrlichman admitted, “Well, that’s arguable. These fellows seem to think that there’s a legitimate defense, in that it doesn’t get up to the level of being an actor in a conspiracy.”

  Nixon laid out the Strachan-versus-Magruder conflict concerning Haldeman’s receiving Liddy’s budget for illegal activities and the fruits of his illegal surveillance of the DNC, as well as Haldeman’s rehiring Liddy after Magruder fired him. When the president mentioned that the prosecutors were investigating the $350,000 used to pay the defendants, Ehrlichman said, “We’ve got into that in elaborate detail with the lawyers this morning. John Wilson says, ‘There’s nothing illegal about what you did, Mr. Haldeman.’” Ehrlichman added, “[Haldeman] was attempting only to get rid of money that he had that didn’t belong to him, and what the recipient did with it, he didn’t have any control, intent or design.” Nixon, not finding this credible, pointed out, “Bob knew that it was going to the defendants,” but Ehrlichman countered, “Not of a certainty” and reported that Wilson had cross-examined him on the matter and noted, “This old boy is good; he’s quite something.”*

  They now turned to Hunt’s demand for $120,000 and his threat to “blow the whistle, right?” Ehrlichman carefully qualified Nixon’s characterization: “Blow the whistle on the national security operation, that was the threat. And you’ll remember our response to that was, you cannot defend blackmail in that kind of a situation, and that’s all that is, pure blackmail. And we said, ‘No dice,’ and I could be just as flat-out on that, as that’s the honest-to-God truth.” This account was, of course, only Ehrlichman’s latest version of the events, as Nixon well knew, since he had been involved in this particular matter, which may have prompted the president’s follow-up: “Now let me put one other question to you. Very painful, I know, it’s very painful for you to think of this, and it is for me, too, but anyway, I think it would be helpful,” he began. He wanted his aides to think about “the separation problem,” his less-harsh term for their leaving the White House, which he felt “has to be considered.” He wanted them to “look very coldly in terms of Bob, in terms of the presidency.” He said he did not know how others were involved with me, but “the son of a bitch is unsafe. I don’t know what you do with Dean; he’s obviously very upset. He’s just lashing out. God damn it, I don’t know what we’ve been told. Frankly, I’m at a loss. We were all talking frankly. That God damn Dean.”

  Ehrlichman again advised him to simply say that he was merely trying to probe my thought processes, and it paid off, because he sent me off to Camp David to write a report, and I couldn’t write it, and that was when I was uncovered. Although he had already been using this explanation, Nixon acknowledged, “I suppose that really isn’t true.” Ehrlichman argued that I would have been able to construct “some kind of artful evasion” had I not “been so pervasively involved,” and added, “I just had a mental image of the guy sitting there with big piles of paper saying, ‘I’ve just written a confession and I would be nuts to deliver this to anybody.’”

  “Well, that’s what we have to say,” Nixon agreed. Ehrlichman wanted Nixon to find some way he could exert privilege to prevent me from talking anywhere and offered a suggestion: “I’d send a fellow around to talk to Dean and say, ‘Look here, you are going to be separately liable for breach of confidentiality.’” When Nixon asked for clarification, Ehrlichman continued, “Well, I think you ought to get Petersen to advise you on this, but there certainly is a statutory protection, and I think you could invoke it.” Did Ehrlichman think there was a law covering breach of confidentiality with the president? Nixon asked. “Well, no, not as such,” he replied, but he did think there might be on “various national security bases. I’m just not that familiar with the statutes. I don’t know what all you have in the way of statutory protection, but you remember our CIA case, where the guy was enjoined by the court, we fell back on that body of law.”*

  Discussion of the Hunt demand, and Ehrlichman’s memory of it, was featured throughout this conversation, but Ehrlichman did not believe that either Bittman or Hunt was likely to talk about it. As the talk was concluding, Ehrlichman appreciated the information the president had “sucked”—to use his earlier description—from Petersen, which he said would fit right into the discussions they were having with their lawyers. “If you don’t mind, I will take John Wilson aside and talk to him about this separation business. He’s very wise.”

  After placing the blame on Mitchell, neither man had trouble doing so with Haldeman as well. “The Dean argument will be that he told me all these things about Haldeman and that I didn’t move on it. Correct?” Nixon asked. “Sure,” Ehrlichman replied. “And that Dean’s being made a scapegoat.” “And then,” Nixon said, “so all this about Haldeman comes out. Haldeman would probably have to go, wouldn’t he? To be quite candid.” That was how Ehrlichman saw it, explaining, “Yeah, because actually they’d drive him out.”

  Ehrlichman continued, “You’ve given me some stuff here, as a worry for him that we didn’t have before, that may add to this.” Nixon, surprised, asked, “Like what?” “Oh, this business about the dispute between Strachan and Magruder,” Ehrlichman replied. They contemplated how Haldeman might fight the charges, and Ehrlichman mentioned that they had discussed the issue at breakfast, and “Haldeman said, ‘I’m going to get Six Crises and I’m going to read the chapter about the fund,’ and he said, ‘That’s going to be my guide.’” Nixon ignored this remark and said they had to consider Haldeman’s “separability,” because the evidence being gathered by the U.S. attorney created “a very strong possibility that Haldeman will be indicted. Do you agree wit
h that?” the president pressed. “Well, they seem to think so,” Ehrlichman said, referring to their attorneys. Nixon asked if Haldeman would be convicted of conspiracy, and based on what they knew so far, Ehrlichman explained, the attorneys had not reached that conclusion, but “they’re being very guarded, obviously, because we’re just now giving them the facts, and they haven’t tested what we’re telling them.”

  In midafternoon on April 19, Nixon met with Dick Moore for what turned out to be a surprisingly informative meeting.87 The conversation began as an effort to probe Moore for what he knew about my thinking and actions, for the president was aware that we had worked together on a Watergate report. Although Dick Moore was anything but long-winded, Nixon, who often impatiently completed the sentences of others, did not really want to hear what he thought but to make it clear to Moore what he should be thinking and remembering. Deep into this rambling conversation, a new fact slipped out about paying the Watergate defendants. “Well, let me tell you what was said about that,” Moore remarked, referring to the money, “at the La Costa meeting. Did John Ehrlichman talk to you about the La Costa meeting?” “Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that’s right, in California,” Nixon replied, so Moore continued. “Just the background. Let me give you the focus or perspective.” Nixon interrupted to ask, “Dean was there?” “Yes,” Moore confirmed. “Dean and I got sent for on a Friday afternoon, the day after the Senate passed the resolution for the Select committee [on Watergate]. Could we come out for the weekend to talk about the Watergate? We got on the airplane.”