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OCR Page 1 of 29This Copy For
PRESIDENT RICHARD M. NIXON'S NEWS CONFERENCE #19
Held in the Oval Office
At The White House
Washington, D. C.
September 16, 1971
At 4:02 P.M. EDT (Thursday)
Official White House Transcript
THE PRESIDENT: We will go right to your questions.
QUESTION: Mr. President, the Senate is now in the process
of deciding whether to extend the draft bill or not. Mr.
Ziegler this morning reflected some of your thoughts on the
subject. I wonder if you could tell us if the draft bill is
defeated, where that will place you in negotiation with the
Soviets on mutual troop withdrawals from Europe, the SALT talks,
and any other negotiations that are going on?
THE PRESIDENT: I don't like to speculate as to what would
happen if the draft bill is defeated, because I think this
would be one of the most irresponsible acts on the part of the
United States Senate that I could possibly think of.
When we consider where the United States is in the world
today in terms of world leadership and in terms of our peace
initiatives, what we have to recognize is that if the draft
fails to pass the Congress, and if the United States then must
build its defenses without the draft, that our peace initia-
tives around the world would be jeopardized, our peace initia-
tives in the Mideast, our peace initiatives in Europe with re-
gard to mutual balanced force reductions which you mentioned,
our peace initiatives with the Soviet Union which are in other
areas, and also our talks which will take place later in Asia.
Now, I say this for the reason that all of the talks that
we have planned are based on mutuality, and putting yourself
into the position of those on the other side of the table, if
they can get what they want -- in other words, a reduction of
America's ability to maintain its own defenses without negotia-
tion -- they are not going to give anything.