than knowing this history, i think it allows us to look at the world can see that struggle can affect every aspect of life in the system. even the ivory tower known as sports. >> join our three-hour calls, aion, with your males, facebook questions, and tweets like sunday, february 3 at noon eastern on book tv's in death on -- in depth on c-span2. and what's next on the presidency, richard moss talks about how presidents have used covert means to conduct sensitive diplomacy. mr. moss is the author of "nixon's back channel to moscow: confidential diplomacy and detente." we learn about presidents kennedy, johnson and nixon and a soviet overture of help to hubert humphrey, which he declined. the gerald r ford presidential

library hosted this event. >> now to tonight's engagement. we are honored to have richard moss with us to speak about his book, "nixon's back channel to moscow." this reveals behind-the-scenes deliberations of nixon, his advisors and their soviet counterparts. his book draws on newly declassified documents as well as the nixon tapes and he has spent an enormous amount of time looking at the takes. hear some snippets tonight. this explores the central role of confidential diplomacy in shaping america's foreign policy during this time. the book received high praise from people well known to those of us in these circles. a professor at the university of isas-austin is a positive -- positive about it, and a friend and colleague of our speaker and an expert on the nixon tapes. we have high praise and people

we respect. a book published by oxford university press talks about the book as drawing back curtain of history, shining light on high-stakes conversations that participants cryptically allude to only in their memoranda or their memoirs . tonight, you are getting a sneak peek behind the scenes. professionally, richard moss is an associate professor at the center for naval warfare studies at the u.s. naval war college. he is a specialist in u.s.-soviet relations during the cold war and as mentioned, and next part on the nixon presidential recordings. he was an historian with the u.s. department of state and we were talking earlier, this is beenirst time, we have visited by people who are working historians, writing histories of our foreign policy during various times. we have never had one as a speaker. tonight is a first and i am excited because these are people

who know their business. the earned his ba from university of california and masters and doctoral degrees from george washington university. he spoke at the next library last summer but it is about time he came to the best in the system. welcome to the ford library tonight. [applause] moss: thank you to the gerald r. ford presidential foundation and the national archives for having me. it is a pleasure, my first time in michigan. glad to be here. it is a great and warm welcome. also, soundsn professor, this lecture, the carrier, look forward to.

working for the government, i am obligated to give you several disclaimers. the views in this presentation are my personal views, not those of the u.s. government or its navalents like the u.s. war college. the material eyesight, especially from the nixon tapes, has profanity. return --f you remember the term expletive deleted? thank you richard nixon for your tapes. we will get into my sources to drop back the curtain of history and go beyond what the memoir accounts have about back channels. a brief outline about what we i will give you definitions. diplomatic historians know what back channels of diplomacy is general audiences it wasn't as familiar. i will give you examples of

different back channels in recent history and ways back channels can be used. i will talk about the sources. the nixon tapes are just one of many illuminating sources that of come to light in the last two or so decades. i will also describe why back channels continue to be relevant. i will compare 1968 took 2016 -- to 2016. it should be interesting. maybe a little controversial. i hope we can have a great discussion after the lecture. you may have heard about bottom line on the bottom. i will give you the bottom line in the middle of my presentation . i will describe the development kissinger-dobhe and the reduction

in tensions between the superpowers. it takes place in 1972 and was one of the feathers and richard nixon's cap. -- a man who saw himself as a peacemaker. it mattered tonight's in and to u.s. foreign policy in the 1970's. historians have focused on the to taunt. we will open it up to questions at the end. whatu want to know about back channel diplomacy is, you have to understand what diplomacy is. according to the source of all google, diplomacy is the profession, activity or internationaling

relations typically by a countries representatives abroad. the country's representatives abroad has certain connotations. in the u.s., we have the state department where i used to work. other countries have foreign ministries. these are formal mechanisms that have an developed as a result of treaties and agreements over centuries literally. the languages used in diplomacy, some of the customs, shall we say, and the culture, these are things that are built on a structure. we will contrast this formal structure that exists between the state department and foreign ministries with back channels. the oxford english dictionary traces the origin of all words and i think this is interesting. for back channel, it is a means of communication which circumvents official channels in order to facilitate informal or

clandestine negotiations. it can be within a system but also to bypass a system. this is another good definition by william safire, a speechwriter for nixon. it was informed by what nixon -- wereinger went doing. a method of high-level communications by passing the usual routes of messages through your rocker sees -- bureaucracies. this describes what kissinger and nixon did in bypassing the state department. channels are useful for establishing relations between countries. there may have been a back channel element in the establishment of diplomatic ties between the united states and the soviet union in 1933. the example everyone thinks of, the movie star trek 4, only in

and could go to china. it was an anti-communist with the credentials to go to the world's largest communist cap -- country and establish relations after they ceased for more than two decades. the story of that is interesting. it isn't just nixon wanting to establish relations with china but the chinese wanting to establish relations with the united states. playing the china card and mao zedong playing the america card. you get a lot of that in the nixon tapes. out feelers to establish relations with the communist chinese and they tried it with poland originally. the johnson administration tried it didn't go anywhere. they tried other channels, it didn't work. the one that did work was between a mutual ally between the u.s. and communist china, dictator.led by a

inn this channel went active --ch and april of 1970 81, have had a message, we messages from different sources from the united states in the past but this is the first time a proposal has come from ahead, to a head, through a head. nixon sending it through the dictator to mao zedong. back channels were useful. uncover, ifamazing you want to call it that, when andn announced to the world kissinger announced in 1971 the kissinger had visited china and they agreed to set up a summit meeting for the coming year, and in february 1972, the united states was pursuing a normalization of relations with communist china. that is one use of back

channels. here is another one. this is more current although less relevant. the comprehensive plan of action, the iran deal. you have heard about the iran deal at president trump pulled the u.s. out of it in the last year. but it is aant, recent example. the united states and iran don't relations.atic they haven't had them since 1979. how can you have an agreement if you don't actually have a diplomatic mechanism in place? back channels are good at that. this one was probably set up between the iranian foreign minister on the left, and the who is minister of oman, friendly with iran and the united states. oman was the facilitator by back channel means in order to get the united

states and iran to start talking and agree to what they could talk about. it eventually resulted in the iran deal. granted, there are shortcomings, but again, that is another use of back channels. back channels can save the world. crisis,he cuban missile an intermediary with john f. kennedy's brother on the left, he passed messengers -- messages twog today ask a late -- deescalate the crisis between the u.s. and soviet union. there were other back channels between a news man who served in the nixon administration and another soviet agent, and there in aplaque in georgetown

restaurant in washington, d.c. that says in this spot, the world was saved. back channels can be useful. they can also have murky ties to intelligence. think the soviet agent was a , and in reality he was kgb. he had a direct line to the criminally -- the kremlin leadership. he was able to de-escalate the crisis. you are going to wonder why i am going back to this. it is to show you the magic of photoshop. the

the book cover. the lampshade reappears. this reminds me, your event at camp david, they had recording devices at camp david. some really great tapes because nixon used to blow off steam when he went to camp david. that was the last taping system installed. he didn't just have them in the oval office. my book, the focus is on the two of richardher side nixon, henry kissinger and dobrynin wasnin. from the kennedy administration through the reagan administration. he was moscow's man in washington and he was a very capable diplomat. you really saw his skill shining through when it was -- she was working with kissinger to establish detente. they

developed a friendship and respect for one another. here they are in 1972, close to the peak of the back channel relationship that existed between them. both men wrote memoirs. kissinger wrote many volumes. three volumes of memoirs in addition to numerous other books. memoir inrote his english and russian. the copy that dobrynin gave to kissinger said, "to henry, my partner, opponent, friend. " they worked with each other for years and met with each other .undreds of times they communicated with each other on the phone. eventually, the back channel relationship was such that there was a secure line between the soviet embassy and washington, d.c. in henry kissinger's office .

that was our primary adversary at the time. that is a statement how close the relationship was. kissingerclose that jokes before dobrynin was elected the was full member of the central committee, quite a big deal for a diplomat. before dobrynin departed, kissinger joked, you and i are going steady. --should expect range exchange telephone numbers. they had their stressful moments and their disagreements. they represented powers that in ci tie but they -- didn't ci tie but they were able to achieve quite a lot of things. and tellen the curtain

you about the sources i used to try to do that. a lot of sources. ,he secretive administration the central irony of nixon is that it is probably the best documented administration in history thanks to the nixon tapes. i used to be normal, then i listened to several hundred hours of nixon tapes. it didn't help my social skills but it is an invaluable source, because every time kissinger held meet with dobrynin, would go and brief the president on what he talked about. sometimes they would meet at the white house. it wasn't a far cry. there were a few meetings where dobrynin was in the oval office. nixontapes.org. there were over 2600 hours of nixon tapes.

i have listened to only a fraction of those, between 500 on 800 hours, focusing foreign policy primarily. those will be the things that make nixon look the best because he was good at foreign policy. ironically, the first tapes to be released where the watergate tapes, the ones where nixon looks worst. the truth may be somewhere in the middle. not everything he did was bad, not everything he did was great. the source is a way to balance that scale. cover,eframe that i there was a wonderful resource 2007, soviet american relations, the book in the middle. in a time of decent relations 12 ands ago, between the u.s. russia, the u.s. state department and the russian form

ministry -- foreign ministry compiled, annotated and produced this volume. one of the volumes of the russian version of it, we had one giant book for the state department and the russians had 2 six smaller versions. relationsrican captures the memoranda of the conversations, the telephone conversation transcripts that both men kept. it shows both sides of the story. it is not he said, he said, although it is, because it shows meeting sides of each and sometimes, when kissinger record, --and labor didn't leave a record, dobrynin and vice versa. you can use the contrast to try to uncover what really happened. you have that source which is invaluable. you have the memoir, henry

kissinger's white house years, memoir was in confidence. in addition, you have a number conflict --lephone transcripts. kissinger would have a secretary listened in on the phone and take it down in shorthand, then type it out in long hand. there are tens of thousands of pages of these telecom transcripts in the national archives. it is an invaluable source. every time kissinger talked to someone, almost every time, there is a record for it. other people in the nixon administration started doing that same type of practice. ,hen you get to the ford years after nick's and resigned the presidency, a lot of that stuff disappears. you can add to that the foreign relations volumes which exist

for the earlier timeframe, as well. they hadn't come out when i was doing my initial research but they came out afterwards. for the ford years, they are the preeminent source that takes everything from the u.s. side, but unfortunately there are no russian records of equivalent value. there is no soviet-american entetions, that -- the det years, two point oh. a lot more is left open for interpretation. you don't have that fidelity you had earlier. can, iese sources, you draw conclusions and i try to examine the relationship as it developed over years. the best place to start is 1968. the kissinger-dobrynin channel wasn't the first back channel with the soviets, either for nexen or kissinger or dobrynin. dobrynin was an intermediary

earlier. he had contacts during cuban missile crisis with robert kennedy. -- hekissinger had been knew kissinger had been an advisor to the johnson at a nest ration, -- administration, and had worked on vietnam peace negotiations. they ended up failing. what wasn't known until recently was that kissinger tried to revive the negotiation, a bombing halt in exchange for negotiations with the north vietnamese. instead of being brokered by the french, he tried to do it through the soviets in december 19 60 seven. those documents have been declassified in the last 10 years. kissinger and nixon are no stranger. with the release of dobrynin's memoir, we learn the soviets influence the 1968

election on behalf of hubert humphrey. there were back channels before, during and after that election. i will take you on an aside ennault affair. we will get into that. weis not one of my focii. will talk about 2016, what we know now and the echoes of what happened in the past. this is a great picture of richard nixon, the republican candidate, staring down at lbj before the election. these men both lied to each other pretty excessively. we will get into that. richard nixon in 1968 was running primarily against democrat hubert humphrey. said,rynin's memoir, he

thank you google translate, was orderedynin against his repeated advice, he was ordered by his boss the feelgn minister to try to out humor humphrey -- hubert humphrey and see if the democrats might be willing to accept assistance against richard nixon. humphreyin wrote, wasn't only very intelligent but a very clever man. he knew what was going on. great humphrey, a american, demurred and said, we have it in hand, thanks for your moral support, moscow. that was the end of it. relieved, but he warned, if you look at the middle paragraph, he warned that if discovered, it would have backfired. there is the potential for

interfere inou other people's elections. we have been watching that for the last two years. in 1968, there were two back channels that than -- the nixon campaign and the transitional had. the first is between robert ellsworth and the treasury affairs, the number two guy at the soviet side. there was also one between .issinger and a kgb guy it predated the election and apparently the kgb officer was the guy assigned to the kissinger beat. an influential harvard professor, maintained contact, let's see if we can maintain communication with kissinger. wasn't able to find a photo of the kgb guy.

those kgb types are camera shy. maybe it could be one of these guys. i don't know. these are the gr you guys ripalved in the sk poisoning in london. this is an online investigations for him that do open source stuff and are able to track the identities of these guys who are in englandtourists when in reality they were trying to poison a former russian intel officer. neither of these are actually found one on google, available on amazon.com for a low price. maybe it is the real boris. he writes novellas about mafia and spy craft and such so maybe it is the real boris. henry kissinger kept the fbi

informed of these contacts. , and duringection the transition right before nixon's inauguration, boris sedov suggested to kissinger that it would be a nice sign for u.s.-soviet relations if there was a line in the inaugural trying to improve relations between the superpowers or improving relations. -- center suggested it kissinger suggested it and it to nixon and next thing you know, there is a line about lines of communication being open to moscow. we are trying to aim for peaceful relations. that is the net result of the kissinger-sedov channel. it was supplanted in 1969 by the kissinger-dobrynin channel. to be the guy in charge. he is the ambassador. , it would've had

to many potential avenues for messages.g if you keep everything secret and focus, that is a better way to conduct relations. 1968, theide about chennault affair is the idea nault, who is on the right when she married a general of the flying tigers in world war ii, it was -- he was shedes older than she was, was an intermediary primarily with the chinese nationalists, so taiwan. chennault, she -- the affair is the theory that anna acted as a back channel intermediary to get south vietnam to kill a piece

negotiation for a bombing halt by the johnson administration. so south vietnam kills the negotiation and south vietnam gets a better deal from next and then it would from humphrey or -- a better deal from nixon then it would from humphrey or lbj. this has been written about in many books. surprising evidence continues to surface. most recently, this gentleman wrote an excellent single volume biography of richard nixon and he believes, his assessment is that out of all the bad things richard nixon did, the worst thing was using this channel ult to killa chenna peace negotiations. this was worse than watergate because it could have extended the war in vietnam, and as many

americans died under nixon as had earlier. nixon started withdrawing them intooff -- after getting office. there was a handwritten note on the chief of staff of richard campaign served in the , and to his great credit he found this in the archives, a handwritten note said keep anna and quit onrking the johnston conditions. there was another telling one, is there any so this biography of nixon has reignited a focus on anna chennault. i offer a few observations and justifications as to why he did not going to the chennault affair. my book is about soviet relations. different focus.

great find. a number of lbj tapes have been released in which he discusses intelligence that had been southepted by the vietnamese embassy in washington in which they discuss anna chennault. the allegations were known for a long time. the reason anna chennault did not get a job in the nixon administration is because she was controversial because of this alleged role. she died this year, in april. the last interview she gave to a historian, she insisted there was no deal going on, she worked for the nixon administration and there was no quid pro quo or shady deal. another observation is sources

come to light after the fact thanks to d's classification -- declassification the job the archivist do. that is a testament to our system of government and the way we do business. thank you to the archivists. i found it surprising that they -- there seemed to be no good actors in this. johnson in the earlier picture promised richard nixon there would be no october surprises about vietnam to influence the election. lbj lied. he timed the peace initiative with the south vietnamese and north vietnamese to boost hubert humphrey. at the same time, richard nixon lied to his base about not wanting to do anything to interfere with a chance for peace. no good actors in this. this is disappointing. the central question remains,

maybe there is a graduate student who has a vietnamese or chinese language capability -- the vietnamese sources and chinese communist sources could be invaluable and answer the questions, how much did saigon need to be twisted to project -- reject the johnson deal? we know they were a thorn in the side of kissinger and nixon in terms of negotiating. in december 1972, the line ever -- the line as i recall kissinger saying was we had to bomb north vietnam until south vietnam accepted our concessions. that is telling. client states or allied partners can have a role in what goes on. they have a say. the question remains. jumping ahead to current times, 2016.

in january 2016, the u.s. government released an assessment of russian activities and interference in u.s. elections. if you have not read this, the document is available online. yourself as a citizen to read it. it says russia interfered in the election by altering and creating fake identities on facebook and manipulating search results in google to discredit hillary clinton, to boost donald trump. you do not have to believe it , but you owe it to yourself as a citizen to read it. come to your own judgment about it. we are in the middle of investigations for this. i am surprised it has taken this long. my antenna went up november 10

2016 when i read in the new york times that this guy, the russian federation deputy foreign minister. it is understandable that we know people who were close to trump and his inner circle. the new york times reported he said the russians had been in contact with members of trump's entourage. i thought that was an odd phrase. i looked it up. it was one of their state media outlets. the phrase could be translated to media entourage and inner circle. i saw this november 10, 2016 and i wondered what was going on. in december 2016, i read an article in a washington post

blog about this. it is an acknowledgment there was back channel diplomacy going on. maybe it is not a bad thing. the context is the most important thing. there are lessons to learn from the example of nixon and kissinger. back channels were effective. they also have drawbacks. if you are going to use a tool, you should be aware of strengths and weaknesses. it later came out that michael flynn and jared kushner met with the russian ambassador in washington. another odd thing was brought up in a news article that kushner and flynn approached the russians about setting up secure communication channels, which would raise red flags.

i talked about kissinger being in touch with the fbi. i do not think this was going on in 2016. jared kushner might not have known, but the former head of the defense agency should have known better. about informing. rafted up that back channels are an appropriate part of diplomacy. irie -- i agree. he is accurate on that. but you always have to look at the context. we continue to wait and we will try to find out more about the context in which this is going on. jumping in to the bottom line in the middle. back channel diplomacy was necessary and effective in policy, especially when it supplemented rather than supplanted traditional pharmacy. -- traditional diplomacy. there are incidents when

kissinger bypasses the u.s. department of state and there are examples where kissinger works with select u.s. ambassadors, keeping them in the dark and working with ambassadors to work through specific issues. that worked surprisingly well. that was a measure of personality. there was one example i found. negotiations over the status of germany and berlin. the center of the cold war that divided berlin in germany. the u.s. ambassador was kenneth rush, a law school professor of richard nixon. in the 1930's. he had the trust of nixon and kissinger. kissinger and rush traded information. that would go into the channel between kissinger and dobrynin. it worked really well. other examples where it did not

work well where when the kissinger-dobrynin handled things about the strategic arms limitation talks and the official negotiating team meeting with the soviets were kept in the dark. surprise! some intercept -- enterprising soviets, including a lead , he was getting information about what kissinger and dobrynin were talking about and he brought it into talks. not the best way to run things. other findings, back channel diplomacy appealed to the u.s. and soviet leaders. that is a reason it was effective. it takes two to tango. it takes two to tango in back channel diplomacy. sometimes three.

it can lead to paranoia and distrust. there is a flip side to every coin. but back channels could be a safety valve for tensions. i mentioned the cuban missile crisis. there was a mini cuban missile crisis in 1970. i will get into that in terms of the development. back channels can be used as an accelerator and a break and a link to unrelated areas of foreign policy to each other. you want better trade with us? you better work out an agreement with our military to work together. fair. that is called linkage in diplomacy. soviets used it to accelerate negotiations and slow them down. so did the u.s. back channels provided personal stakes. it was a weapon and bureaucratic warfare.

kissinger and dobrynin -- when kissinger and dobrynin -- when kissinger and nixon bypassed the state department, it was palpable and easily documented difference between kissinger and the secretary of state who was supposed to be in charge. i have quotes from the nixon tapes from that. we think about nixon and kissinger. it was also a tool for the soviets. dobrynin became a full member of the committee, unprecedented for an ambassador in the soviet union. there were various factions. there was opposition in the early 70's. this contact with the rival

superpower was a way for him to solidify his position. back channels can lead to telegraphing anxiety. the soviets had a conflict with communist china and a frozen tundra along a river in 1969. the soviets -- dobrynin and his conversations with kissinger, it is like he was signing a flare saying, look at this potential area the u.s. could exploit. in the same way, kissinger and nixon wanted a summit meeting because it was politically profitable. it makes you look presidential. two have a foreign counterpart and to have agreements that are substantive. the soviets knew this. dobrynin would drag kissinger along for years. the end of 1971, he was able to

hook kissinger on the idea of the summit meeting. the bottom line, the same mentality that worked for back channels, a reliance on secrecy, distrust of public discourse and desire for political gain, also destroyed nixon's presidency when it was applied to domestic politics. in his resignation speech, he had a memorable line, "always remember, others may hate you, and those who hate you do not win unless you hate them and then you destroy yourself." he hit the nail on the head. it can be useful in the international arena. when you do the same stuff at home, there are consequences. getting to the development of the channel.

i found this at the nixon library. it was a memo from a national security council staff to henry kissinger saying, "the soviets are skilled at pitting one man against each other and getting more information." he is referring to the channels. he is saying, the transition has happened and it needs to go to the secretary of state. they get rid of the channels and less than a month later start the dobrynin-kissinger channel. when kissinger attends a party at the soviet embassy in washington, d.c. on valentine's day, dobrynin is in bed with a cold when kissinger comes to him.

kissinger said there was an idea for a confidential exchange of opinion. dobrynin says kissinger said that. i think it was henry kissinger who suggested it. nixon took office in january and the channel began. then nothing happens. kissinger and dobrynin meet and talk and establish a working relationship. nothing substantive happened for 18 months until the crisis. ok, the u.s. navy is forcing soviet submarines to surface offer cuba because of shipments of offensive weapons. it was not anything that dramatic in 1970. it was about soviets having submarines visit cuba.

there was a question of whether the agreement meant nuclear power submarines or nuclear armed submarines. -- so there was still a gray area. it was discovered in a way that the cuban missile crisis was with photographic intelligence that there were a number of soccer fields at the soviet submarine base in cuba. hr haldeman was skeptical about it. he wrote that kissinger stormed into his office and said the pictures show the cubans are building soccer fields. they could be more. he was at a loss. kissinger explained, cubans play baseball and russians play soccer. russians played soccer and baseball. kissinger's point was it was an

expansion of the base. it becomes a debate between when to confront the soviets. the state department is suggesting waiting until october when there is a u.n. meeting. doing it through diplomatic channels. kissinger suggested using the dobrynin channel. he regularly went back to the soviet union. kissinger was able to play on nixon's neuroses about cuba. he lost in 1962 the goober at oriole race in cal of -- gubernatorial race in california. he gave his last press conference, you will not have nixon to kick around anymore. the memory was fresh for him.

kissinger ends up winning and establishes the medium of communication. in january 1972, there is a blurb on the nixon tapes where nixon is criticizing his friend bill rogers, secretary of state. i am going to play that. >> [indiscernible] mr. moss: bill rogers was a

personal friend. he was with nixon when he made the checkers speech and managed to keep his spot as the vice presidential candidate with eisenhower in 1952. that is how diplomacy by passing bill rogers plays out. the state department was sidelined. it continues. rogers knew it was going on. there were confrontations about it. they got to the point where the national security council was sanitizing communications with the soviets to give it to the state department. they got a sanitized version. a week before going to the

moscow summit, nixon says you have to warn the soviets to tell the soviet foreign minister not to talk about the back channel. it is like the first rule of fight club, do not talk about fight club. do not talk about the back channel in front of rogers, the secretary of state. you can hear it in his voice. >> [indiscernible] mr. moss: this was in 1972. in the is tourist -- in the interest in time, this is a back channel.

it works. one way it worked well was in a summit meeting, which was a big deal in moscow in may 1972. summit meetings make presidents look presidential. you are there with counterparts. it is a great photo op. we often think of reagan and gorbachev. it is telling. before the summit of may 1972, there was a threat that the u.s. might cancel the summit. remember how i was saying your partners or allies can be -- can have a vote a vote? the north vietnamese who were armed by the soviet union -- they did not develop their own service to air missile systems, they did not develop their own aircraft, they got it from the soviet union, ammunition, oil.

they invade south vietnam. it was known as the easter offensive. this was the end of march 1972. right in the middle of the beijing summit in february and mid-to-late may when nixon plans to go to the soviet union. the soviets enable the offensive. for nixon, there was a contradiction. >> [indiscernible] mr. moss: it is impossible to

do. that is what al haig, the military advisor to richard nixon, says. domestic politics often drive foreign policy. in late april and early may, nixon had polls conducted as to what americans thought about vietnam with the easter offensive starting. when they were supposed to be a weekend of peace, they launch a massive offensive. the offensive was the largest offensive since the tet offensive. the largest offensive action by north vietnam during nixon's presidency. there is a division of opinion. should nixon cancel the summit , the soviets made this possible, or is there not a

necessary link between the soviets knowing about or controlling the offensive and also the american public opinion, which is excited about the potential for agreements with the soviet union and building a structure of peace. nixon takes two tracks. he is considering canceling the summit, but he is also using back channels to try to have it both ways where he can respond to what is going on and south vietnam and if the soviets were willing to look the other way, he would look the other way in what the soviets were doing in terms of aiding the offensive. -- aiding the north vietnamese in the offensive. henry kissinger and nixon coordinating a video. it goes off well. the message nixon is sending is that we will bomb north vietnam but we want a summit.

nixon is proud of his wife. you can hear his pride in this phone conversation with kissinger. >> [indiscernible] mr. moss: the message goes back. ultimately, both sides were able to look the other way. nixon on may 8 launches operation linebacker, the and a harbor in

the vietnam. nixon did it because he felt if he did not have an escalation, there were not a lot of american troops on the ground anymore in may of 1972. airpower is what he had to rely on. nixon felt he had to do something to boost south vietnam. he launches linebacker. there is a massive increase in bombing. f-4 fighters and casey 135a tankers. there are b-52s flying. they bomb north vietnam. they bombed a lot. it was more than they had done in years. prior to that point, nothing had approached what had been done under johnson during rolling thunder. this takes the cake until later in 1972 when they launched

linebacker two, even bigger. i mentioned bombing north vietnam and tell the south vietnam came to our concessions. that is a different story. what made nixon change his mind in terms of being able to expect the soviets had made possible the north vietnamese attacks, you save south vietnam by escalating and go to moscow. you do not cancel the summit yourself. nixon had a strange relationship with his secretary of treasury, a democrat. he was in the car with kennedy when he was shot and had a bullet fragment from the kennedy assassination until the day he .ied assassination kissinger said he was nixon's image of himself. nixon spoke ill about many of his advisers, but never about john connolly.

he was respected and impressed with the strength of john connolly as a decision-maker. he is describing the evolution of his thought process vis-a-vis the moscow summit and the may 8 decision. mr. moss: that is what nixon does.

if someone is going to cancel the summit, make the soviets cancel the summit. do not make it look like president nixon has thrown away a chance for peace. has thrown away a chance to have an agreement. the soviet union had reached nuclear. a with the united states -- parity with the united states. you will have agreements over incidents at sea between the soviet navy and the u.s. navy, do not throw that away. nixon does this. the soviets had their own cancellation crisis. brezhnev was securing his position. he put the final nail in the coffin. the ukrainian party boss did not want to go through with the talk to improve relations because for the soviets, they saw the opposite of what nixon did. the u.s. has been conducting an

illegal war in vietnam, has been bombing our ally, we are supporting our ally, and you are throwing them under the bus. brezhnev did not see it that way. brezhnev saw like nixon, you do not let your allies or partners dictate your policy.