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

by John W. Dean

  Admissions of error in his May 22 defense statement: “The question, Ron, of when I knew that funds were being raised for the defense, because, you know, we have nailed ourselves pretty tightly to the twenty-first of March. But I’m confident that I must have had something on it earlier in March.”2 “We don’t want to be knocked down on the idea that we said we didn’t know anything until the twenty-first of March about any fundraising.”3

  False protestations of his innocence: “I didn’t know about any funds before March.”4 Instructions to Buzhardt of what to say to special prosecutor Cox: “The president is cooperating and doing everything he can do on this thing, and that the president is totally innocent and everybody knows it, including me.”5

  Falsely recasting the June 23, 1972, conversation: “Presidential purpose is not to get the CIA in the Watergate [mess].”6 Nixon learned that Haldeman and Ehrlichman had different recollections of the events on this day, namely that Ehrlichman recalled it was all about the Mexican money, while Haldeman had no memory of that being the reason they met with the CIA. Nixon simply could not recall.7

  Falsely recasting the March 21, 1973, conversation: “But he [referring to me] didn’t tell me about his suborning perjury of Magruder. He didn’t tell me the fact that Liddy had told him everything on June nineteenth.”8 “Bob was there, thank God, for the last portion of the meeting. Bob said, he’s got his own notes, that the president said, first, it’s wrong [to raise money for the Watergate defendants], second, it won’t work.” “And third, because, basically, you can’t provide clemency.”9 This conversation “is what triggered my own investigation.”10 “I said, ‘How much would it cost over four years?’ But then I said, ‘No, we can’t go that route.’”11

  How to attack Dean: In addition to a lot of name-calling—“asshole,”12 “bastard”13 and “son of a bitch”14 were particular favorites—and planting false stories,15 other tactics were explored. “We’ve got to hit him right between the eyes [on statements Nixon claimed I had not made to him].”16 “[Dean] was the fellow that was really doing it all, Chuck, as far as the cover-up was concerned.”17 “You don’t want to take him on [from the White House] until you are ready to knock him out of the box.”18 “The guy that can really embarrass the president or raise any questions on him is Dean. The guys that answer that, basically, are Haldeman and Ehrlichman. And to a lesser extent, Colson.”19 “And after thinking a little about that [referring to going through Dean’s files], I think it’s got to be done, it’s got to be done probably in the dead of night.”20 “We’re pulling together a chronology of the different statements he’s made,” Ziegler advised Nixon, material that could be used by the White House staff against me, although it was all pure hearsay.21 “Well, it will be John Dean’s word against a lot of other people.”22 Buzhardt told Nixon: “I don’t want to let [Dean] know what evidence exists until he goes under oath, because I would like for him to worry about it.”23 Nixon asked Ziegler, “Has it occurred to you and Buzhardt and the rest that it should be about slapping [Dean] as a traitor, a turncoat, at the proper time, Ron?” Ziegler reported that they had been doing that. “It’s got to be done in a brutal slam-bang gut-fight way. We’ve got to draw the sword on him,” Nixon instructed.24

  Notwithstanding Nixon’s concern that I might have secretly recorded him, he kept his recordings going while plotting and planning his effort to cover up the Watergate cover-up. No one on his immediate working staff—other than Steve Bull—knew they were being recorded. Not even the fact that the Watergate special prosecutor demanded more and more of his records gave the president second thoughts about his secret recording. While he had given passing consideration to removing the system, he knew Haldeman had not done so, for he would have been told. He seemed both impervious and oblivious to the fact that this secret system might be revealed, although he was well aware it contained material that could destroy his presidency and create an entirely new set of monumental problems. Executive privilege was then an entirely untested legal concept, more a political stance vis-à-vis Congress than a legal doctrine recognized by any court.*

  May 23, 1973, the White House

  When talking with Haig about the Huston Plan, the removal of restraints on domestic intelligence gathering, Nixon said, “I ordered that they use any means necessary, including illegal means, to accomplish this goal. The president of the United States can never admit that.”25 Later that day he told Rose Woods, “Good old Tom Pappas [had] helped at Mitchell’s request fund-raising for some of the [Watergate] defendants.”26 Nixon said that Pappas had come to see him on March 7 “about the ambassador to Greece that he wanted” but that “we did not discuss Watergate at that point.” This was untrue, but as he explained, “It’s very important that he remembered that.” The president told his private secretary he wanted her to speak to Pappas to make sure he understood this, explaining to her that Pappas’s fund-raising activities were not illegal unless “his purpose was to keep the defendants shut up.” The president said it was important that he not talk to Pappas about this matter, but rather she should inform Pappas that the president’s recollection “was that there was no discussion of Watergate.”

  May 24, 1973, the White House

  At a midday meeting Ziegler mentioned that Kissinger was bitter toward Haldeman and Ehrlichman for “the plumbers activity and so forth.”27 “Bullshit,” the president erupted. “He knows what was going on in the plumbers activities. Don’t let him give you that crap. He was clear up to his ankles himself.” Ziegler was surprised, and Nixon added, “I don’t want people around here pissing on Bob and John.” In an after-midnight call to Haig, a weary Nixon again raised the possibility of his resigning, since the Democrats controlled Congress and Republicans were weak.28 Haig would not hear of it, but Nixon was apparently serious, and was also concerned that “Richardson is sort of a weak reed.” Haig was spending time with him and thought he was coming along. But Nixon returned to the topic as the conversation progressed, bemoaning the fact that he had “so many weak people in our cabinet.” As Nixon viewed it, “Richardson’s in the spot where, as you know, he’s going to have to prove that he’s the white knight and all that bull, and so he and Archie Cox will try to try the president, you know, and all that crap. How do you handle that?” Haig said he had been doing some checking and found that Cox was “not an effective guy.” He did not think many of the cases would ever come to trial, for Cox would have them “so screwed-up, nobody will be able to be brought to court.”

  May 25, 1973, the White House

  Shortly after noon Nixon had Elliot Richardson in the Oval Office for a visit.29 It was a broad-ranging discussion of the activities of the Department of Justice, with the president praising Richardson and telling him that his experience at the State and Defense departments was of value to the president. Not until the end of this twenty-minute chat did the subject of Watergate come up. Richardson, as he had earlier, vouched for Cox: “He’s certainly fair, honorable, scrupulous and so on. He’s going to get a fellow who has had some experience in prosecution,” Richardson explained, a lawyer like U.S. Attorney Whitney North Seymour, Jr. “You’ve got complete support there, and you can talk in total confidence,” the president assured him, and then he made a point about his papers: “When you’re sitting here making a note for me, or if you write a memcon, that’s made for me and not for anybody else. Even if we discuss whether or not I’m going to burglarize the ten-cent store. But you can testify. Because, you see, if you ever break into the president’s papers, Elliot, we’d have a hell of a problem here.”

  May 29, 1973, the White House

  During an Oval Office conversation with Al Haig, the president said he agreed with Ziegler on Watergate: “Ron has a good point. This is just a gut political fight now, this whole thing. Cox is going to be a gut fighter.”30 Neither man had any illusions about Richardson’s being of much help. Nixon’s solution was to “just kick the shit out of them.” When meeting later that morning with Bill Roger
s, and their discussion turned to Watergate, Nixon said, “There was a cover-up. We know that. And now it’s very apparent, the whole God damn thing, frankly, was done because it involved Mitchell.” Rogers reported that Mitchell “looks awful,” and “I think there’s a good chance he’ll kill himself.”

  That afternoon Nixon had another long conversation with Haldeman,31 who said that he was telling reporters, and would tell the Senate investigators as well, that the president “had absolutely, categorically, nothing to do with any cover-up of any kind in any way, shape or form.” And he was going to state “categorically” that he “had nothing to do with any cover-up or with any attempt to cover up.” Nixon approved of that and thought Ehrlichman should say the same. Haldeman reminded the president that their involvement with the CIA on June 23, 1972, had related to “the Mexican money,” and when the CIA had no problem with that matter, it was dropped. After a great deal of speculation about testimony, and a rehashing of the events now haunting the Nixon presidency, Haldeman mentioned that I was conducting “a very credible campaign” by doing “interviews with Walter Cronkite and Time magazine.” Nixon said that his “theory of the case now is this: That Mitchell was the one who led Dean around.” “I guess so,” Haldeman concurred. Haldeman was also worried about his former colleague, reminding the president: “Mitchell hates Ehrlichman, Dean hates Ehrlichman, Colson hates Ehrlichman.” Haldeman had concluded that I had broken ranks because the prosecutors had lied to me and told me that Liddy had talked, so I figured it was over, and I should go after others. Haldeman thought the prosecutors had turned Magruder by similarly telling him that “Hunt was going to spill everything.” This conversation ended with them attempting to figure out how it had all fallen apart over the last few months.

  June 3, 1973, Camp David

  When talking with Ron Ziegler from Camp David by telephone, Nixon had another of his lapses into the truth.32 While speculating about charges I might make, Nixon pointed out, “What the hell, he can say, I suppose, that I was trying to cover up for Haldeman and Ehrlichman, right?” And before Ziegler could respond, the president added: “Which was somewhat true.” Ziegler also told Nixon in this conversation that the addition of Charles Alan Wright to the legal staff “is going to be a big help.” Wright, a law professor from the University of Texas, was an a expert in federal court practice and procedures. While a highly respected scholar and acclaimed appellate advocate, he brought no expertise in the federal criminal law, however, which was still the glaring weakness in Nixon’s defense team.

  In midafternoon that day, Nixon phoned Haig, and both wanted to believe the Watergate story was finally dying, although the president acknowledged that “they’re going to try to crap on us about once a week.”33 Nixon did not think the overall situation was bad, however, for “I must say, we’re getting a little thicker skin.” Late that afternoon, before departing Camp David for the White House, Nixon called Haldeman to set up another off-the-record meeting at the Lincoln Sitting Room an hour later.34 Although no record was kept of these private sessions, it is very clear from his later conversation with Ziegler that they once again speculated on my testimony regarding the March 21 conversation but this time versus Haldeman’s likely testimony about it.35 They also apparently discussed the president’s papers, as he mentioned to Ziegler: “Bob raised this to me today. Around 90 percent of the papers would help us, basically. But the other 10 percent would kill us.” Nixon reminded Ziegler during this conversation, “It’s going to be a God damned mean pissing match.”

  June 4, 1973, the White House

  During a morning EOB conversation, Haig told the president that, while he felt “we’re over the hump on this thing,” he urged Nixon to listen to all of his conversations with me.36 “I think you should get these tapes replayed for you, alone, and take notes of your discussions with Dean,” in order to learn from them “what the son of a bitch” had. “You’ve got to know what he is specifically going to charge, and then you can sit down with Buzhardt with your notes and give Buzhardt whatever he wants, so that we can strategize whipping this son of a bitch, and structure the kind of strategy we have to have to deal with him.” Nixon agreed, however reluctantly, as he was still concerned about what he had actually said in them, although he assured Haig, “I know my motives were right.”

  Shortly after nine o’clock that morning Steve Bull, at Haig’s instruction, had prepared the tapes for Nixon to listen to in his EOB office. Having never been through the tapes before, Bull initially found it difficult to locate particular conversations, since they simply went from day to day, reel to reel, recording whatever was said with no markers to indicate when one conversation ended and the next began. Because of this, it took Bull almost an hour to find the first conversation and queue it up for the president.37

  From late morning to early afternoon, the president listened to the conversations in the order in which Bull was able to locate them: starting with February 28, followed by three on March 1, and then the February 27 discussion.38 When Nixon finished with these he took a brief break for cottage cheese and pineapple and told one of the EOB secretaries that he would be working late into the evening: “Be sure they know at the house.” Bull told the president he would start queuing up reels for March outside the president’s office on another machine, which would speed up the process. When the president learned that all of the March telephone conversations with me were on a single six-hour reel, he asked Bull to listen to that tape and make summary notes of it, as well as of the two conversations with me on March 14 and the one on March 15. The president told Bull he did not want to listen to the March 21 conversation, nor to the one on April 15 and the two on April 16, for he could still recall them.

  Because the president eventually started wearing a headset, and some of his EOB exchanges with Bull are inaudible, it is not clear exactly which conversations he ultimately listened to and when, but it appears that during the afternoon of June 4 he proceeded through the following conversations with me: March 6, 7, 8, 13, 16 and 17. It appears that he assigned to Bull a number of my telephone conversationsand ignored the rest.* Nixon apparently decided to pass over any conversation where either Haldeman or Ehrlichman was present, even if only during part of the conversation, on the theory that they would refute anything I might claim that could present a potential problem for him, or he was continuing to stick to his line that as of March 21, he himself was running an investigation into Watergate, so any information he acquired was then information he later acted upon. Needless to say, because Nixon approached these recorded conversations with the assumption that only he—or possibly Haldeman—would ever learn of their content, not to mention their existence, he would use what he could of them to his advantage. In fact, he began doing so as he listened to them, using select material he heard to reassure Haig and Ziegler of his innocence, and to underscore that press reports of my knowledge of what we had discussed were greatly exaggerated or, more likely, a bluff on my part.

  When the president called Haig at five o’clock, during one of his breaks from listening, he said, “This is the hardest work I’ve ever done in my life. I’ve really been at it for seven hours now, so [I’m going to] work the rest of the evening though. Just for my own satisfaction.”39 Haig asked how it was going, and Nixon reported, “I’ll tell you this: Based on what I’ve seen so far, that it’s a damn fraud, the whole thing”—referring to my knowing anything that would cause Nixon himself any problem. He continued, “But it may be something a little later, that, you know what I mean. I’m only up to the fifteenth of March.” Nixon said there were several occasions on which I told him that no one in the White House was involved, “but nevertheless, we can’t use this.” Nixon added, “And he was talking about, ah, he threw in Strachan’s name. This was about the thirteenth [of March]. But he didn’t expand on it.” He noted, “At the time it made no impression on me. I mean, it didn’t even ring any bells, you know what I mean. But on the other hand, looking back, I suppose Dean
could say I mentioned the fact that Gordon Strachan had some information or was involved.” The president was unconcerned, however, for Haldeman could take care of it.

  At 9:39 P.M. the president called Haig again, “I just spent nine hours on this crap, and boy, I got to go to bed.”40 But the effort had been worth it: “The whole damned Dean thing is a fraud. I can see where he may have been involved, but I wasn’t involved. And I’ve listened to stuff till I’m sick.” Nixon noted that he had obviously not listened to the four telephone calls with me that were not recorded, nor could he assign those to Steve Bull. They turned to other business, but the conversation ended with Haig reporting that Cox was “running a dogfight,” seeking information, giving Buzhardt “an ultimatum today.” “Isn’t that great?” Nixon responded sarcastically. “But what Buzhardt said he’s doing is posturing himself to quit. He’s going to resign,” Haig advised. That was fine by Nixon: “Okay, we got Richardson confirmed, so we’ll just have Petersen do it.”

  Back at the residence, and with a drink in hand, Nixon called Haldeman shortly after ten o’clock.41 “I thought you should know that starting at nine-thirty this morning, I have been working until just now. I listened to every tape,” he said, exaggerating his undertaking. “You know, the thing that you did, and boy, I know the agony that you went through. And I listened to every damn thing, and Bob, the son of a bitch is bluffing.” “Well, sure,” Haldeman agreed.

  Nixon told Haldeman, “Just for your private information,” that Buzhardt had gone through my files and found no memoranda of conversations. The president further reported that he learned from listening to our conversations that I had not mentioned the $350,000 returned from the White House to the CRP until March 21. But he did give Haldeman a bit more of what he had discovered than what he had told Haig: “[Dean] did mention the Krogh thing”—referring to the Ellsberg break-in—“on about the seventeenth [of March], but only in passing, as if it weren’t a big thing, or so forth.” Nixon noted that I had said, however, that I did not believe anyone at the White House had advance knowledge of the Watergate break-in (as I later testified, and find remains accurate to this day). The president returned to his long hours of listening: “I did nothing else. Just damn near broke me down. But you know how tough it is to listen to that stuff.” “Oh, it’s nerve-racking,” Haldeman said, and added, “and then, of course, I was trying to make notes, which you probably were, too.” Nixon reported, “I made notes all the way through.”