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Background Briefing at the White House with Henry A. Kissinger, Secretary of State [Press Conference]
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Background Briefing at the White House with Henry A. Kissinger, Secretary of State [Press Conference]
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Digitized from Box 9 of the White House Press Releases at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library
This Copy For
BACKGROUND BRIEFING
AT THE WHITE HOUSE
WITH HENRY A. KISSINGER
SECRETARY OF STATE
7:15 P.M. EDT
APRIL 10, 1975
THURSDAY
SECRETARY KISSINGER: I thought that the most
useful thing that I could do is to explain what those
who were discussing the speech, and above all the
President, had in mind, what problems they were consider-
ing and what they were trying to achieve with this speech.
Then we can answer specific questions on the meaning of
the speech.
There obviously are two parts to the speech.
There is the tragic problem of Vietnam, and there is the
conduct of foreign policy in the face of the difficulties
and, indeed, the disasters that have been encountered in
Vietnam.
Those of us who are concerned with the conduct
of foreign policy and the President feel that we have
two problems: One is to manage the existing situation
in Vietnam, but secondly, to keep in mind that the purposes
of the Nation go forward, that the long-term interests
of the country have to be preserved, and that our
foreign policy has to be carried out with design and
with conviction and with purpose and, therefore, we are
trying to say that whatever happens in Vietnam, there
is a design in our foreign policy that will become more
difficult as a result of what has happened in Vietnam,
but that as a united people, we can carry forward
and whose essential objectives can be realized, and we
will do our utmost to realize. This is the basic thing.
Now, let me turn to Vietnam. You have to
remember that in talking about Vietnam at this moment we
face many audiences, and what we say can produce its own
consequences. We have a domestic audience, we have a
Vietnamese audience, and we have an international
audience, and each of them have their own requirements and
their own consequences.
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- 2 -
It is quite possible -- in fact, it is very
likely -- that what we say charts not only a policy but
produces immediate consequences. We know, for example,
we are aware of the public opinion polls with respect
to military assistance to Vietnam, but there is also
the fact that if the President tonight announces certain
conclusions that reflect these convictions of that majority,
that this would produce immediate consequences in South
Vietnam that in turn would lead to results that I would
seriously question that majority could live with because
we are dealing in Vietnam at this very moment also with
the lives of 6000 Americans.
Also, there is the problem of the international
perception of the United States, how it comports itself
in the face of an undoubted disaster.
I am not asking you to agree with our conclusions.
I am telling you that these were complex considerations
that were as prayerfully considered as any Presidential
speech that I have seen in the six years that I have been
associated with this level of the government.
Let us take the situation in Vietnam. If the
United States were to announce what many Congressmen have
recommended, that we would stop all military assistance,
there are foreigners here who will be able to judge on
their own what the foreign perception of this problem
would be, but there is no question what the result in
Vietnam would be.
It would lead to an immediate collapse of the
situation under the most chaotic conditions imaginable.
What the President is attempting to say in
this speech is not rested on legal obligations by them-
selves; even less does it rest on alleged secret commit-
ments that nobody ever claimed, nobody ever tried to
implement as a commitment.
The attempt is raised on the basis that
when the United States has been engaged for over a
decade with a people, whatever the judgment may be of the
original decision, there are literally tens of thousands
of these people now whose physical existence, as well as
that of their families, is tied up with us and, therefore,
as we examined our choices, it became clear that whatever
we did, whatever conviction one has about the ultimate
outcome of the struggle in Vietnam, unless we were going
to do nothing, the conclusions that we could reach were
not really all as varied as might appear.
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- 3 -
Whatever our convictions may be about the
American obligation towards the Americans in the
country and towards the Vietnamese who have been
associated with us or towards the possibilities
of a political solution, a degree of stabilization of the
military situation is an essential prerequisite.
The Administration is as capable of counting
up the number of North Vietnamese divisions against a
maximum number of South Vietnamese divisions as anybody
else, and it is highly probable that the South Vietnamese
will also do this counting, but for the immediate problem
that we face,a degree of stabilization of the military
situation seemed to us an objective that we had no right
to reject.
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- 4 -
Now, then, a one-step basic decision had been
made. Once it had been decided that we would not do
anything, we were in the position +hat there was no
sensible figure short of the figure that had been given
to us by the mission sent by General Weyand.
Any one of you or any one of us could invent
any other figure and it would have the status of a
guess. It was the President's conviction that if he
put forward any figure, it would be a figure on behalf
of which he could testify before the Congress or
his senior advisers could testify before the Congress.
Whether there is enough time to implement this
entire program; whether this figure will in fact
be enough, can be shown only by events, but if he is to
level with the American people, then he had to give the
figure for which there was some objective basis.
It is a figure, moreover, which I would like to
stress that is important, regardless of what your estimate
is of the probable outcome of military operations because
it permits a discussion with the government of South Vietnam
with respect to some of the contingencies that could arise
since no outcome of any battle is ever for a day.
And this was the basis at which the particular
figure was achieved.
Let me make two other points. The first is,
it seemed imperative to the President, and to all of
us, that this debate not be infinitely protracted --
one, because the situation in Vietnam does not permit
it; and secondly, because the requirements of American
national security do not permit it, either.
We believed that it was extremely important
that we state our case, that we put it before the Congress
and that we then get a clear decision as to the Con-
gressional and public will. So, that we can then turn
one way or the other to the essential agenda which, in
any case, remains and which, in any case, must be carried
out and which, in any event, will be carried out.
I want to say on behalf of the President that
it is not the intention of the Administration to look
for scapegoats, that once the decision is made, it will
not be used to start a national debate on who lost or
who was responsible, but precisely because we do not
wish to do this and precisely because we owe it to the
rest of the world to continue our international responsi-
bilities as a united people.
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- 5 -
Precisely for this reason, must we now be
honest and state what we think is needed to have a
chance to stabilize the situation, to save the lives
that can be saved, to permit an orderly negotiation and
to conduct ourselves in this tragic moment with dignity
and purpose.
Now, this is what we attempted to do in this speech
and I would point out again that we have no intention, what-
ever happens, of letting Vietnam paralyze the basic obliga-
tion of the United States which in the entire postwar
period, has preserved the global peace and has attempted
to lead other countries towards common objectives.
This, we will continue, but how we conduct our-
selves in this tragedy will play an important role in it.
This is the purpose of the speech. This is what was
uppermost on our mind.
There were many possibilities. I can give you,
for example, one possibility that was very seriously
considered. The figure of $300 million that was put
forward as necessary under conditions in January would
have been an absurdity to put forward under current
conditions and would have had almost the same effect
in Saigon as to put forward nothing at all. But we
did consider the proposition of putting forward the figure
of $300 million and warning the Congress that if that helped
we would come in with another figure in a few weeks.
The President's judgment was that the country
should not have an endless debate every four weeks on the
same basic set of facts and on the same fundamental
issues and he, therefore, decided to take the route of
asking for the amount which he considered the minimum
amount that could achieve the objective that he had
described, but we are prepared to discuss with the Congress
other methods and we are not approaching the Congress
with an attitude of finding scapegoats. We are approach-
ing the Congress with an attitude that we absolutely must
find national unity now in the face of the other problems
that are ahead of us.
Now, this is what was the thinking behind the
speech. I will be glad now to answer questions.
0
Mr. Secretary, when you speak of negotiations
to South Vietnam, you are in fact talking about surrender,
aren't you?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: I am not talking about
surrender. I am talking about what the negotiations will
produce depends very importantly on the military situa-
tion that exists and the terms that can be achieved in
negotiations will depend importantly on our own actions.
But obviously, the terms are not brilliant.
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- 6 -
0
Mr. Secretary, when you come to the Congress
with a $722 million aid request when they, in turn, had
rejected, in effect, the $300 million, aren't you actually
putting the monkey on the Congress' back despite all
of your disclaimers about not looking for scapegoats or
not engaging in the recriminations?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: Peter, whether they
reject $300 million or $722 million does not change that
basic principle. Whether we are going to put the money
on anybody's back depends on what we wil do after the
decision has been taken. We strongly urge this as
being in the national interest under the current conditions
that we face.
I believe that when the Congress addressed the
question of the $300 million, it faced totally different
circumstances, it did not have to confront the question
of the possible evacuation of maybe tens of thousands
of people, and it was then dealing with what seemed
like a totally different set of facts.
Q
How do you want the law revised to take care
of those Vietnamese that have become associated with us
and are endangered if worst comes to worst?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: There are two legal issues.
One has to do with the extraction of Americans and the
other has to do with the extraction of Vietnamese.
Under a literal reading of that Indochina
amendment, some lawyers argue that we do not have the
right to use American military forces in any hostile
action for any purposes in Indochina or in any situation
where hostile action may result.
Other lawyers hold the point of view that the
President has the residual constitutional right to pro-
tect American lives and that overrides a literal reading
of existing legislation.
We would like the Congrees to clarify this
constitutional point, and frankly, we have no question
that the Congress will support the constitutional
point that the President does have the residual powers
to use American forces to evacuate Americans. We
consider this a relatively simple point.
The second question is that under the Indochina
resolution, there is no doubt that we do not have the
right to use American military forces under conditions
in which they could become involved in hostilities
for purposes of evacuating South Vietnamese or third
country nationals which could also arise.
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- 7 -
In this case, if the Congress went along with
us, we would have to be given explicit authority for
perhaps a limited period of time, and clearly defined
purposes to do this.
So, we need two kinds of Congressional action.
The first one we can probaBly do without, but given the
situation and the sensitivities, we would prefer to
happen. The second one is, if there is to be an
evacuation, we must get --
Q
Mr. Secretary, you referred several times
to negotiations.
SECRETARY KISSINGER: Yes.
Q
As far as we know, there are no negotia-
tions going on.
SECRETARY KISSINGER: No.
Q
The PRG says they will not negotiate as
long as Thieu is in power. Do you expect him to remain
in power?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: I don't think it is for
me to speculate what the political evolution in South
Vietnam may be. I believe that under the conditions that
now obtain, some sort of negotiation is probable and
that the terms of this negotiation can be importantly
affected by the military situation.
Q
What sort of negotiations?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: I would rather not go
into that at this point.
Q
Mr. Secretary, are you conditioning that
on getting the $722 million when you say some sort of
negotiation is probable?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: We have seen in Cambodia
what happens when one side achieves total predominance
and the other side is deprived of the most elementary
physical means, and it appeared, of course, in Cambodia
that even the departure of Lon Nol did not produce a
negotiation.
Based on my own experience with the North
Vietnamese, any negotiation with them will reflect the
existing balance of forces to a considerable extent and,
therefore, it is difficult to predict what the negotiation
will be in the abstract.
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- 8 -
Q
Mr. Secretary, if I understand you
correctly, and I realize there are some problems of
subtlety, and perhaps deliberate ambiguity here. If
I understand it correctly, you are not really saying give
us the $722 million and we are promising it will save
South Vietnam.
What you are saying is it will give us
stability and a chance to get out in a somewhat orderly
fashion. Is that a correct understanding?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: I am saying the judgment
of General Weyand seems to be that the $722 million could
stabilize the situation perhaps on a permanent basis. I
am saying that even if this is not correct -- and, after
all, not every military judgment in the Vietnam war
has invariably been exactly on the mark, but not every
diplomatic judgment, either, not every journalistic
judgment (Laughter) -- but even if this is not achievable,
I would say the other purposes that America has would
still be best served by the granting of this sum, and in
that sense you have correctly summarized my views.
Q
Mr. Secretary, the last sentence on page 2
of the President's speech deals, I believe, with a very
basic premise. What evidence is there to support the
statement that there was universal consensus in
the United States in 1973 that the United States would
continue to provide adequate materials to support South
Vietnam,-- an impliedly open-ended basis.
Q
I can add to that the Democratic platform
in 1972 specifically called for the end to all military
aid, and that certainly is a part of the national debate.
SECRETARY KISSINGER: Yes, it is also true that
they only got 38 percent of the votes.
I think this is subject to research. The
general impression that many of the critics of the war
in Vietnam left was that their major objection was to the
endless involvement of American combat forces in the
region which sooner or later would have to stand on its
own feet, and the impression that was widespread was that
if the United States could withdraw from the war and
reclaim its prisoners, that it would be prepared to
assume the same responsibilities or at least with
respect to material help toward Indochina that it did
toward South Korea, for example, in similar circumstances.
We have never claimed a legal obligation. We
have always stated that we thought it was a moral obliga-
tion. I have stated at press conferences, and I repeat
it now, that we told the South Vietnamese that we believed
that the Congress and the American people, in gratitude
for being relieved of the nightmare of the prisoners and
the loss of life, would be generous in its assistance.
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- 9 -
We do not claim this is a legal obligation, and
we do not claim there were secret commitments, nor have
we ever claimed it, nor have we ever invoked it to
oppose any particular legislation.
Q
Mr. Secretary, do you suppose 6000 Americans
are in danger of losing their lives in Vietnam? Could
they not get out on Pan American in nine days by the
time this bill is considered?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: We are going to make an
effort to reduce the number of Americans in Vietnam. We
have to consider that if the United States precipitously
pulls out of Saigon, it will also produce the very conse-
quences, with respect to all its other concerns, that it
is attempting to avoid. But, we are reducing the numbers
of Americans to the minimum that is considered necessary
to perform the functions that remain.
Q
Are they in grave peril, as the President
says?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: Whether they are in grave
peril or not depends on possible evolutions that
can be foreseen. If there is a collapse produced by despair
and a sense of abandonment, you have one situation.
If you have a relatively, even temporarily,
stabilized military situation and a government that
appreciates that fact, you have another situation. If
you have a negotiation, you have yet another situation.
So, the exact status of both the Americans and the
endangered Vietnamese cannot be stated in the abstract,
it depends on a whole set of circumstances.
Q
Mr. Secretary, you have said several times
tonight that what is important now is that we make this
decision on the $722 million, and then what is important
is what we do after that decision is made.
SECRETARY KISSINGER: That is correct.
Q From all indications, Congress has shown
no inclination to pass $300 million, and you perhaps agree
that it is not reasonable to expect them to pass the
$722 million either, so my question is twofold. Number
one, do you agree with that assessment; and number two,
what will we do if they reject this additional aid
request?
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- 10 -
Q
Question?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: The question is, that
since Congress in effect, rejected $300 million, it is
almost certain to reject the larger figure. Do I agree
with this assessment and what shall we do if this assess-
ment turns out to be correct? Is that a fair statement
of your question?
The $300 million were put forward as a supple-
mental appropriation under conditions that were totally
different from the circumstances that we face today, both
within Vietnam and in terms of our international
consequences.
We did not ask the Congressional leadership yes-
terday about any particular figures because we did not
think it was fair to them nor did the President think it
was fair to him to get into a debate about 2 figure in
which he felt he had to make the preliminary decision
of what was necessary.
I had the impression, however, from the leader-
ship that they were approaching this issue in a prayerful
and serious manner and not in a contentious manner. And
if the Congress looks at this not in terms of an old
debate, but in terms of something of a transition to
a new period of cooperation, then I would not make a pre-
judgment of what they will vote and I believe that
something can be worked out with them.
Now, if it turns out that they will not vote it,
I have stated that the Administration will do its absolute
utmost to prevent an orgy of recrimination and will attempt
to focus the American people on the duties and obliga-
tions we now have which have not ended.
We have been the central power in preserving
the peace and many of the initiatives of the postwar
period have been due to our leadership. That is what we
must maintain under now more difficult circumstances,
but we can attempt to do it with a united people.
Q
Mr. Secretary, is the President planning
a conference in the Pacific with the leaders of our --
SECRETARY KISSINGER: No, all of these leaders
that I mentioned will be coming to Washington.
Q The NATO?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: No, we are now talking
about the Asian leaders. All of those have been scheduled
to come to Washington.
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Page 11
Q
In the near future?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: Over the next three
months, beginning in the near future.
On the NATO meeting, no precise date has been
set and the surest way to keep a precise date from being
set would be for me to try to try to interfere with the
prerogatives of the permanent representatives of the NATO
Council, but I think it is a reasonable assumption that
it will take place -- if you speculate on that on your
own -- sometime between the end of May and the end of
June, and more in the earlier part than in the later
part of the period. But it really has not been set.
Q
The President refers to $722 million as being
for very specific purposes. Can you tell us what those
specific purposes are?
Secondly, can you tell us how many Vietnamese
are contemplated in the description of those whose lives
may be dependent upon us?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: On the first question,
there is a very precise list which we looked over in
San Clemente -- in Palm Springs, and which will have
to be -- (Laughter)
Q
Will you stand on that statement, please?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: Will you put that on the
record, Murray?
-- which we looked over in Palm Springs and
which I do not have with me, but I am sure the Defense
Department witnesses before various committees can testify
to that.
With respect to the second question, we have
tried to make as careful an analysis as we could. If
you make a list of all of those whose lives could be
endangered, you come up with horrendous figures because
in Vietnam, the whole family is involved, it is never
a question of just saving an individual. There is
always the question of his entire family.
The figure of those that are endangered that
we could put together amounts to something like
1.5 million. The figure of those that are endangered,
we have some obligation to, but this is beyond our capa-
bilities. The figure that we think we have a special
obligation to is between 150,000 and 200,000, but that
is a massive logistic effort whose feasibility depends
entirely on the conditions in which it will have to be
executed and therefore, an important concern of ours
is to provide conditions in which we can at least think
about it.
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Page 12
Q
How many Americans might be required to
evacuate 150,000 to 200,000 South Vietnamese?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: You will have to get this
from the Defense Department, but it is not an insignificant
figure.
On the other hand; it is not a very extended
operation, either.
Q
When you get these Vietnamese out, don't
you have to negotiate either with the South Vietnamese regime
or the Communists?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: Or both.
Q
What circumstances do you envisage? The
South Vietnamese, so far, have indicated they would not
allow this to happen.
SECRETARY KISSINGER: We are not talking
under conditions now. We are not saying this will happen.
We are saying we have an obligation to consider the
worst contingency and we are trying to create circumstances
where we can talk with a South Vietnamese government about
the worst contingencies.
Barry?
Q
Excuse me. Just a technical point, maybe.
It is not clear to me.
Is there a remaining aid request for Cambodia?
What is it or are you just abandoning any hope now?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: It is very probable, as
the President has indicated, that the fate of Cambodia
will be decided in the next few days and that therefore
we are not, tonight, in a position to make a plausible
request to the Congress.
But if that should turn out to be wrong, we will
then do it but we do not want in Vietnam a similar
situation to arise in which there is an endless debate
while there is a constant deterioration of a situation over
which we lose progressively any capacity to exert influence.
Q
Dr. Kissinger, is the use of American air
power considered in any way in your proposals?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: The President has pointed
out that this contingency, that the introduction of
American combat forces was a theoretical possibility which
is, one, proscribed by law, and secondly, will not be
requested by the President except for the limited
purpose of refugee evacuation.
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Page 13
Q
Mr. Secretary, what about troops on the
ground?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: It depends, really,
entirely on the situation under which this takes place
and the degree of cooperation and indeed, whether it is
feasible at all.
Q
Did you get a range of figures?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: We had a very rough
guess, but we have not made a detailed study of this.
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- 14 -
Q
Mr. Secretary, to take that point a little
further, do you contemplate the need to put in enough
American troops to draw a protective ring around Saigon
if that becomes necessary to evacuate?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: Right. I hope you ladies
and gentlemen realize we are now talking about the
absolutely worst contingency which has, if you analyze
it, many nightmarish aspects to it and, therefore, depends
to a very important degree on the degree of cooperation
that is achieved by the South Vietnamese government, the
kind of negotiation that might be going on at this
moment, the kind of cooperation that could be achieved
from the North Vietnamese.
Therefore, it is very difficult -- and also
the degree to which it is possible -- to assemble ahead
of time those whose lives might be most endangered. All
of these are factors on which I think it would be
dangerous to speculate, but they are being considered.
Yes, sir.
Q
Mr. Secretary, some of us were told today
that the tone of the President's speech this evening would
be optimistic, yet you presented anything but that. Can
you cite something optimistic in the outlook for U.S.
foreign policy?
In the President's speech we were also told that
the President was sounding a conciliatory note in this --
Carl Albert, Speaker of the House. I was wondering if you
would cite what is conciliatory in the President's
speech?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: I think the President
considered it his duty to present the situation as he
saw it, and I do not think the President should be asked
to be optimistic or pessimistic.
The President should be asked to explain the
situation as he sees it to the best of his ability.
Secondly, what is conciliatory in the
speech is his repeated expression that this is not an
attempt to begin a period of recrimination, that at his
repeated insistence that the duties before America
remain constant, whatever setbacks we may suffer in
Vietnam, and that he will work with the Congress and
with the public to try to achieve a united approach to
this.
This is his attitude. He did point out those
things that have to be remedied in order to get the
forward momentum, but the spirit of this speech and the
spirit of the man is conciliatory, it is not vindictive.
It is not bitter, and it is not accusatory.
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- 15 -
It is also serious because it is a serious
situation which we cannot escape by pretending that
it is not serious or by pretending that it does not
affect international affairs. We can master them, but
we cannot explain them away.
Mr. Osborne?
Q
Mr. Secretary, two clarifying questions.
Would it be intended to bring the endangered Vietnamese
to the United States, number one. Number two, there is
a reference on page 3 to diplomatic notes being sent to
members of the Paris Conference. That is a reference to
the January notes?
SECRETARY KISSINGER: No. We have sent a new
set of notes tonight. The destination of these
individuals has not yet been decided, but we will be
approaching other countries and we, without any question,
will have to take a substantial number of them.
Q
Sir, as I understand the reading of +his,
you will not only have to get the money, but you will
have to get -- isn't it two laws on the books now that you
will have to have taken off the books? You will have to
go back and say we want to nullify these two laws in
case the Church-Case law and continuing resolutions --
SECRETARY KISSINGER: No. We are asking for
the money, and we are asking with respect to the law, for
a clarification of one point, which I believe will present
no difficulty whatsoever; namely, the President's legal
authority to use American forces to extract American
citizens.
We could probably do that on a unilateral
interpretation. We simply would like to get this clarified.
I am confident from consultations that this is no problem.
The second is not to take the Church-Case off
the books, but rather to get an exception for a limited
period of time for a specific purpose for a one-time
operation.
THE PRESS: Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
END
(AT 8:00 P.M. EDT)