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May 26, 1971

Introduction

This almanac page for Wednesday, May 26, 1971, 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, May 25, 1971

Next Date: Thursday, May 27, 1971

Schedule and Public Documents

Archival Holdings

Any selection of archival documents will necessarily be partial. You should use the documents and folders identified below as a starting place, but consult the linked collection finding aids and folder title lists and the collections themselves for context. Many documents to be found this way do not lend themselves to association with specific dates, but are essential to a complete understanding of the material.

  • Selective document listing

    President's Office Files

    The President's Office Files consists of materials drawn together by the Special Files Unit from several administrative subdivisions within the White House Office. It is the handwriting and sensitive papers sent to the Staff Secretary that now comprise much of the President's Office Files. Visit the finding aid to learn more.

    President's Personal File

    The President's Personal File is essentially a President's secretary's file, kept by Rose Mary Woods, personal secretary to the President, for two purposes: (1) preserving for posterity a collection of documents particularly close to the President, whether because he dictated or annotated them, or because of the importance of the correspondent or the event concerned and (2) giving appropriate attention–letters of gratitude, invitations to White House social events, and the like–to members and important friends and supporters of the Nixon administration. This generalization does not describe all the varied materials of a file group which is essentially a miscellany, but it does identify the reason for the existence of the file group's core. Visit the finding aid to learn more.

  • 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.

    • Transcript of diary entry (PDF)
      Wednesday, May 26th. Back in the mill in Washington. Actually he had a light schedule set for today, the address to the Associated Council of the Arts. But the news this morning featured the funeral in New York of the policeman who had been shot in the back, and the President was extremely disturbed that we had apparently missed this point, had done nothing to tie into it. He feels that this is exactly the kind of thing Dick Moore should be watching, and he wanted us to get going on trying to think of what could be done as of now. It's too late to make phone calls, and so forth, but, that we could push Mitchell to come up with a law, get a statement from the President drafted, try to really make some mileage on this. As the day wore on, he became more concerned with this and called a meeting this afternoon of Mitchell, Ehrlichman, and J. Edgar Hoover to get into the whole subject, after he had spent an hour with Colson going over the PR and general follow-up on it. As a result, we'll probably get some pretty good action.

      At the Arts Council deal, he was considering doing a drop by afterwards at a foundation conference on narcotics, and we had the press moving to it and everything all set up, when the President discovered that Dr. Brown, the head of the NIMH had been on the program and was still on the platform, and he refused to go on the platform with him, so we shot out and headed back to the White House.

      He made the point earlier this morning that he wants to put out a statement on marijuana that's really strong, as he said, one that tears the ass out of them. He also commented on the question of why all the Jews seem to be the ones that are for liberalizing the regulations on marijuana. He wants to find a way to hit hard, head-on, dramatic, do it through Congress. As a follow-up on this, he has Ehrlichman and Krogh going and I think they'll probably be coming up with something pretty good.

      He had Henry in for a while this morning before going over to the Arts Council, and we settled on doing Midway the 28th, so Henry can complete his meeting first. We also decided to do the press conference on Tuesday, and have Ziegler announce it today. He then delivered himself of a whole series of fascinating Nixonisms as he discussed various international matters with Henry. In talking about the problem of India invading Pakistan...

      -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
      DECLASSIFIED - E.O. 13526, Sect. 3.4: by MS, NARA, June 12, 2013
      Audio Cassette 8, Side B, Withdrawn Item Number 1 [AC-8(B) Sel 1]
      Duration: 16 seconds

      ...the President made the point that the Indians need a mass famine. He also quoted Ayub Khan as having told him, in reference to the Johnson and Kennedy Administrations, whom he felt had betrayed him,..
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      ...that they have an old saying in their country that trust is like a thin thread, once you break it, it's very hard to splice together again.

      He brought this up in the context of Laos, making the point that in effect we had broken our thin thread with the American people as to the winding down of the war when we moved into Laos, and that it's going to be very hard to put that together again. He made the point to Henry that all wars are close. This was also in reference to Laos and the question of if we'd only hung on two weeks longer, we would have had a success there instead of the mess that we ended up with; but he said to Henry, You've got to realize that all wars are close. That nobody wins big in any war...

      -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
      DECLASSIFIED - E.O. 13526, Sect. 3.4: by MS, NARA, June 12, 2013
      Audio Cassette 8, Side B, Withdrawn Item Number 2 [AC-8(B) Sel 2]
      Duration: 5 seconds

      ...unless, of course, you’re fighting the Italians.
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      Then he got to talking about the fact that foreign policy was not doing us any real good, although we had accomplished a lot of things. And he explained that to Henry's country, the intellectuals and the social jet set, etcetera, we're doing an outstanding job, but in what he referred to as my country—that is, the plain folks out in the middle of America—they don't know anything about what you're doing on SALT and all these other things, they just want things to simmer down and be quiet, and to them we have not accomplished very much.

      Then he got to talking about election issues and made the ironic point that the only, of all the major issues, the only one that is a sure thing for us is Vietnam; that all the rest are in doubt, but we know precisely what we're going to do and where we're going to be on Vietnam.

      We had some discussion of when and how to notify Rogers about the Sainteny meeting and some of the other activities, and the President's going to call, or actually, he called Rogers while we were in there, to set up a meeting Thursday afternoon on China going into the UN.

      He got into some more analysis of the trip, feeling that his briefing materials were way too bulky and that it should be gotten down to a couple of pages, with some backup material if needed. Most of the stuff is useless, and he feels it reflects on our staff and indicates that we have too much staff who are making work by going through the same stuff over and over. He feels we've got to have one guy in charge and have him pull it all together. He then made the comment that the bigger the staff, the more paper you get. What we need is a tough editor-manager type. He felt, however, that the advancing for the trip couldn't have been better. We still have a problem regarding stops in motorcades, but overall it had worked out extremely well.

      He spent the afternoon at the EOB and the meeting with Ehrlichman and others, and called me after I got home just to see if there were any late development; was pleased with the Congressional situation—we defeated another bad amendment—and it would certainly appear that our successes of last week have had their effect on the reaction of Congress.

      I had a long talk this afternoon with Mitchell on a number of political things. He called to explain the background on Taft's decision to go ahead as a favorite son in Ohio, and Mitchell feels we should let him do it. He also came up with an opportunity we have to work with AMPAC on a health bill that they could put their lobbyists behind to give us some help. So I discussed this with Ehrlichman to see if we could work that out.

      End of May 26th.
    • Original audio recording (MP3)

  • 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

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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. V, United Nations, 1969-1972

    Secretary-General Succession

    Chinese Representation in the United Nations

    Vol. XI, South Asia Crisis, 1971

    South Asia Crisis, 1971

    Vol. XIII, Soviet Union, October 1970-October 1971

    "One of Two Routes": Soviet-American Relations and Kissinger's Secret Trip to China, April 23-July 18, 1971

    Vol. XXIII, Arab-Israeli Dispute, 1969-1972

    • 233. Memorandum From President Nixon to Secretary of State Rogers, Washington, May 26, 1971

      Source: National Archives, RG 59, Office Files of William Rogers, Entry 5439, Lot 73D443, Box 25, WPR-President Nixon. Top Secret; Eyes Only. Haldeman referred to this memorandum in his diary when recording a conversation that he had with Kissinger on June 1. He wrote: “What really is bothering him [Kissinger] is he thinks Rogers is engaged in secret negotiations, that the P[resident] knows about it and isn’t telling Henry. So he asked me to ask the P what he sent to Rogers last week via military aide, which the P mentioned to Rogers on the phone while both Henry and I were in there, and also the direct question: is Rogers conducting a secret negotiation that K[issinger] doesn’t know about. Henry says if he is, then he, Henry, will have to quit, that he can’t tolerate something of that sort.” ( Haldeman Diaries: Multimedia Edition, June 1, 1971)

    Vol. XXIV, Middle East Region and Arabian Peninsula, 1969-1972; Jordan, September 1970

    Saudi Arabia

    Vol. XXIX, Eastern Europe, 1969-1972

    Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty

    Vol. XXXIX, European Security

    MBFR and the Conference on European Security, December 1970-December 1971

    • 54. Memorandum From the President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs (Kissinger) to President Nixon, Washington, May 26, 1971

      Source: National Archives, Nixon Presidential Materials, NSC Files, Box 715, Country Files, USSR, Vol. XIII. Secret; Sensitive; Outside System. Sent for information. A notation on the first page reads: “The President has seen.” Sonnenfeldt drafted this memorandum and forwarded it to Kissinger on May 18 for his signature. In a covering memorandum, Sonnenfeldt wrote: “As you requested, I have redone my memorandum to you on this subject as a memorandum for the President. I have omitted the comments on Secretary Rogers’ remarks.” In his original memorandum to Kissinger, May 17 (also attached), Sonnenfeldt wrote that “our own position” on MBFR “is becoming highly confused, since the Secretary of State on Sunday stated that we had always favored MBFR as part of CES (completely wrong), and if the Soviets now come around to that position we would favor it (also wrong since we are maintaining the Berlin precondition).” For Rogers’s comments to journalists on the National Broadcasting Company’s television and radio program, “Meet the Press,” see Department of State Bulletin, June 7, 1971, pp. 734–736.

    Vol. E-4, Documents on Iran and Iraq, 1969-1972

    Iran 1971

    • 128. Memorandum From the President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs (Kissinger) to President Nixon, Washington, May 26, 1971

      Kissinger summed up the series of letters from the Shah which assured Nixon of the UAR’s good intentions and requested that the U.S. Government press the Israelis to change their position in the peace negotiations.

      Source: National Archives, Nixon Presidential Materials, NSC Files, Box 755, Presidential Correspondence, Iran, M.R. Pahlavi, Shah of Iran Correspondence. Secret. A stamp on the document reads “The President has seen.” Tab A is published as Document 129. Tab B is not published. Tab C is published as Document 124.

    Iraq 1969-1971

    • 291. Telegram 92470 From the Department of State to the Embassy in Belgium, Washington, May 26, 1971, 2123Z

      The Department forwarded a message from the Belgian Ambassador to Iraq, in which he cautioned Washington against retaliation for the seizure of the U.S. Embassy property.

      Source: National Archives, RG 59, Central Files 1970–73, POL 17 US-IRAQ. Confidential. Drafted by Scotes. Cleared by Papendorp; approved by Seelye.

    Vol. E-7, Documents on South Asia, 1969-1972

    India and Pakistan: Crisis and War, March-December 1971

    Vol. E-10, Documents on American Republics, 1969-1972

    Peru

    • 629. Memorandum From the President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs (Kissinger) to President Nixon, Washington, May 26, 1971., Washington, May 26, 1971

      President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs Kissinger speculated that the reasons why President Velasco declined an invitation for a state visit to the United States might include: still-tense relations between the United States and Peru, internal political problems, and/or scheduling problems.

      Source: National Archives, Nixon Presidential Materials, NSC Files, Box 793, Country Files, Latin America, Peru, Vol. 2, July 1970–13 December 1971. Confidential; Nodis. Sent for information. Nixon wrote on the bottom of the memorandum, “Cool it.” In his May 18 covering memorandum Nachmanoff recommended that Kissinger sent the memorandum to the President, stated that “a successful Peruvian experiment, with a constructive relationship with the United States, may be a better defense against the extension of Chilean or Cuban models than regimes based on the rapidly deteriorating traditional structures of the oligarchy, the church and the ‘traditional’ military.”

    Vol. E-16, Documents on Chile, 1969-1973

    Cool and Correct: The U.S. Response to the Allende Administration, November 5, 1970-December 31, 1972

    • 69. Telegram From the Embassy in Chile to the Department of State, Santiago, May 26, 1971, 1835Z

      Summary: Korry reported that negotiations between Chile and the Kennecott and Anaconda copper companies were not proceeding well. He then discussed the increasing pace of the socialization of the Chilean economy.

      Source: National Archives, RG 59, Central Files 1970–73, INCO 15–2 CHILE. Confidential; Immediate; Exdis.

  • 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)