1. Home
  2. Research
  3. Almanac

December 13, 1972

Introduction

This almanac page for Wednesday, December 13, 1972, pulls together various records created by the federal government and links to additional resources which can provide context about the events of the day.

Previous Date: Tuesday, December 12, 1972

Next Date: Thursday, December 14, 1972

Schedule and Public Documents

  • The Daily Diary files represent a consolidated record of the President's activities. Visit the finding aid to learn more.

    The President's day began at The White House - Washington, D. C.

  • The Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents made available transcripts of the President's news conferences; messages to Congress; public speeches, remarks, and statements; and other Presidential materials released by the White House.

    Digitized versions can be found at HathiTrust.

  • The Federal Register is the official daily publication for rules, proposed rules, and notices of federal agencies and organizations, as well as executive orders and other Presidential documents.

  • Argued

Archival Holdings

  • The H. R. Haldeman Diaries consists of seven handwritten diaries, 36 dictated diaries recorded as sound recordings, and two handwritten audio cassette tape subject logs. The diaries and logs reflect H. R. Haldeman’s candid personal record and reflections on events, issues, and people encountered during his service in the Nixon White House. As administrative assistant to the President and Chief of Staff, Haldeman attended and participated in public events and private meetings covering the entire scope of issues in which the Nixon White House engaged in during the years 1969-1973. Visit the finding aid to learn more.

  • The National Archives Catalog is the online portal to the records held at the National Archives, and information about those records. It is the main way of describing our holdings and also provides access to electronic records and digitized versions of our holdings. 

    The Catalog searches across multiple National Archives resources at once, including archival descriptions, digitized and electronic records, authority records, and web pages from Archives.gov and the Presidential Libraries. The Catalog also allows users to contribute to digitized historical records through tagging and transcription.

    Nixon Library Holdings

    All National Archives Units

National Security Documents

  • The President's Daily Brief is the primary vehicle for summarizing the day-to-day sensitive intelligence and analysis, as well as late-breaking reports, for the White House on current and future national security issues. Read "The President's Daily Brief: Delivering Intelligence to Nixon and Ford" to learn more.

  • The Foreign Relations of the United States series presents the official documentary historical record of major U.S. foreign policy decisions and significant diplomatic activity. Visit the State Department website for more information.

    Vol. IX, Vietnam, October 1972-January 1973

    Paris Negotiations Collapse, October 24-December 13, 1972

    Vol. XX, Southeast Asia, 1969-1972

    Thailand

    Vol. XLII, Vietnam: The Kissinger-Le Duc Tho Negotiations

    Breakdown of Negotiations, November 1972-December 1972

    • 41. Memorandum of Conversation, Paris, December 13, 1972, 10:30 a.m.-4:24 p.m.

      Source: National Archives, Nixon Presidential Materials, NSC Files, Box 865, For the President’s Files (Winston Lord)—China Trip/Vietnam Negotiations, Camp David Memcons, December 1972 [1 of 3]. Top Secret; Sensitive; Exclusively Eyes Only. The meeting took place at 31 Boulevard de la Saussaye, Neuilly-sur-Seine. All brackets are in the original. Tab A is attached but not printed.

      A paper by NSC staffer John Negroponte, prepared for Kissinger on December 14, summarized “Hanoi’s negotiating behavior both in substance and procedure” in the negotiations since their reopening on November 20. Negroponte concluded that “Hanoi has no intention to meet any of the basic requirements that we made clear to them at the end of October; and through a series of irritating dilatory tactics has pursued a course which can be interpreted as desire to achieve either no agreement at all or an agreement substantially worse than that achieved in late October. Hanoi’s tactics have been clumsy, blatant, and fundamentally contemptuous of the United States.” (Foreign Relations, 1969–1976, vol. IX, Vietnam, October 1972–January 1973, Document 174)

      Kissinger flew back to Washington on December 13, and he, Nixon, and Haig met the next morning to decide on a course of action. As Kissinger summarized: “We are now in this position: as of today, we are caught between Hanoi and Saigon, both of them facing us down in a position of total impotence, in which Hanoi is just stringing us along, and Saigon is just ignoring us. Hanoi—I do not see why Hanoi would want to settle three weeks from now when they didn’t settle this week. I do not see what additional factors are going to operate. I’m making a cold-blooded analysis.”

      Gradually, a consensus emerged at the meeting that if Saigon absolutely rejected the settlement, the United States would be forced to deal directly with Hanoi to achieve a bilateral agreement, and leave South Vietnam to go it alone. But first the United States would unleash a massive air campaign to shock the North Vietnamese into the minimal concessions necessary to reach an agreement.

      Given the threat of Congressional action to cut off funding for the war, Kissinger suggested: “Now, I would recommend that we leave open the possibility of this settlement, if the other side meets the very minimum conditions that we have indicated. I would then recommend that we start bombing the bejeezus out of them within 48 hours of having put the negotiating record out. And I would then recommend that after about two weeks of that, we offer withdrawal for prisoners, about the time that the Congress comes back and say, ʻIt is now been proved that the—the negotiation’s too complex involving all the Vietnamese parties. Let them settle their problems among each other. The South is strong enough to defend itself.’”

      The course of action selected in the end was to conduct an all-out air offensive against the North Vietnamese heartland. If the North Vietnamese had not offered the necessary concessions by December 28, the United States would move to propose a bilateral deal with Hanoi: the return of U.S. prisoners of war and an end to the bombing, in exchange for U.S. withdrawal from the war. While Kissinger and Haig focused on the strategic aspects of the decision, Nixon repeatedly worked through the political implications of the renewed bombing and the means by which it could be explained to the U.S. people. (Ibid., Document 175)

      Senior planners on the Joint Chiefs of Staff, at the direction of the Chairman, Admiral Thomas Moorer, had previously prepared and recently updated contingency plans for the bombing. U.S. forces, therefore, could begin the bombing, officially called Operation Linebacker II, in a matter of days. For documentation on the planning, see ibid., Documents 132, 149, 164, 169, 176, and 184.

      Despite the increasing willingness to go it alone, Nixon wanted to give Thieu another opportunity to accept the agreement in return for continued U.S. support. To this end he sent Haig to Saigon to meet with Thieu and personally deliver a letter from him regarding America’s determination to go it alone if Thieu did not accept the agreement. The letter, drafted by Kissinger and revised by Nixon, is printed ibid., Document 189. Haig later characterized the letter as being “brutally frank.” (Haig, Inner Circles, p. 309) Haig saw Thieu on December 19 and 20. Thieu remained noncommittal on the agreement, despite the sustained pressure imposed by Nixon over the previous months. For Haig’s reports on the meetings, including the text of a letter from Thieu to Nixon, see Foreign Relations, 1969–1976, vol. IX, Vietnam, October 1972–January 1973, Documents 197, 198, and 206.

      The bombing began on December 18 and continued until December 29, with a 36-hour break at Christmas. For contrasting narratives of the course of the bombing and its impact on the negotiations, see Kissinger, White House Years, pp. 1446–1461, and Luu and Nguyen, Le Duc Tho-Kissinger Negotiations in Paris, pp. 415–422.

    Vol. E-1, Documents on Global Issues, 1969-1972

    U.S. Policy Towards Terrorism, Hijacking of Aircraft, and Attacks on Civil Aviation: The Olympic Attack and the Anti-Terrorism Initiatives, September−December 1972

    Vol. E-5, Part 2, Documents on North Africa, 1969-1972

    Libya

  • The Kissinger telephone conversation transcripts consist of approximately 20,000 pages of transcripts of Kissinger’s telephone conversations during his tenure as Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs (1969-1974) and Secretary of State (1973-1974) during the administration of President Richard Nixon. Visit the finding aid for more information.

    Digitized versions can be found in the National Archives Catalog.

Audiovisual Holdings

Context (External Sources)