KISSINGER/GROST

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(conversation)

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of

Frost: Dr. Kissinger, I guess the subject in the next hour one and another is going to be power, and power during your White House years and you came to us at a time when America was very uncertain. Perhaps more uncertain than ever before of its role in the world./What was your plan for holding on to, and perhaps strengthening America's power in the world?

Kiss: Well, I wouldn't say the problem was only power. The problem for the United States when I joined the Administration was er, how to define its role in the world, that includes power, that included our values and that we were also involved in a tremendous domestic debate about the war in Vietnam. The problem we faced at the end of the sixties was that the traditional patterns of American foreign policy were beginning no longer to apply. We had been secure behind two great oceans, we/had a tremendous economic superiority over the rest of the world. We had an atomic monopoly and we were beginning to learn in the sixties that we couldn't do everything simultaneously and this came hard to the American people and we had to try to adjust American conceptions to the reality and maintain the American position in the world because we were still the strongest free country and the security and the progress of so many other nations depended on our decision. That was our key problem.

Fr: You mean you were the strongest free country but as it were,

KISSINGER/FROST

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you no longer had 51% you had 37%, say. I mean that in
other words, you no longer had a voting majority in the
world.

Kiss: We were the strongest free country but we now had to set priorities. Through most of our history we could wait until the problem became nearly overwhelming, and then address (resources?) to it. Now, a great deal would depend on whether we could anticipate issues, whether we could select our priorities properly and whether we could act in anticipation of events. And, of course, we had to liquidate a war in which we found ourselves involved. All of these events occurring simultaneously created a rather complicated situation.

Fr: Well, that, as you saw it, was your agenda and that is the agenda we'll be examining in the course of the next themes hour and we'll return to those/things at the end.

(comment about adhesive tape)

Let's turn, at this point, to the subject of the war.
And, I suppose the basic issue was, do you think having
written your memoirs, hav'd reanalyzed the situation, that
you ended the war as expeditiously as humanly possible?

Kiss: We ended the war as expeditiously as was humanly possible, on terms compatible with our honor and our values. We could always have ended it by surrendering but if we wanted to maintain our fundamental principles we ended it as expeditiously as possible.

the
Fr: Well, let's go through the war and since/% the first major issue that arose was er, Cambodia, let's turn to Cambodia, and then let's come back to, to er, the general overall

KISSINGER/FROST

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subject of, of the war. Er, I suppose Cambodia is the most controversial subject, certainly currently. Er, in connection with your foreign policy during these four years. Er, I suppose one could summarize the critic's case by saying, they say that in order to help you in the military conduct of the war in Vietnam, your policy engulfed Cambodia in the war in a way that was not the case when you took office and it set in train a course of events that was to destroy the country. And they say that was because it wasn't thought through, Cambodia was peripheral, that your intention was on Vietnam, that your calculations ignored any real consideration either of what was happening (prolifically?) inside Cambodia or what the consequences of something as potent as American intervention would be. I mean, that, I suppose, is the critics case.

Kiss: Er, the first thing to keep in mind is, that we inherited a war in Vietnam. That is very often forgotten. When we came into our office there 530,000 Americans..

Fr: (over) We were not in the war at Cambodia at that point.

Kiss: (over) No..(both speak)

Fr: From the American point of view, that war was your war.

Kiss: Er, that is not exactly correct. We were in the war in er, Cambodia, because the North Vietnamese had established for four years, base areas along the r..er, Cambodia border in which they had, we estimated, some hundred thousand troops. Later on, the Cambodian Communist Government announced that they had had 300,000 troops there...

Fr: (over) You mean..the Pol Pot government...

Kiss: ...the Pol Pot government

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Fr: ...you don't normally quote them as authoritative sources.

Kiss: No, but it was certainly-our estimate was a hundred thousand...

Fr: ....(over) later on Nixon said 40,000.

Kiss: It was, er, I don't know when Nixon said 40...

Fr: (over) December 10, 1970, he said 40,000.

Kiss: Well, our estimate was around a hundred thousand, er, something like (forty regiments?) it fluctuated because they were coming back and forth...

Fr: (over) Let me say I would..I don't defend the North Vietnamese er, violation of Cambodian neutrality for four years. I do think that two wrongs don't make a right and that..

(Kiss over unintell)

...analysis had previously been that it wasn't worth risking destroying Cambodia er, to take action against..

Kiss: (over) Yes, but first of all, er, if you'll let me answer the question and then make your case, I think would be better. We have 40,000, whether it's 40,000 or a hundred thousand, it's very hard to determine because the sanctuary areas were on both sides of the border and the troops were fluc..were moving back and forth. Er, er, between them. Secondly, any we were beginning to withdraw troops which the previous administration had not done. Third, the previous administration was bombing North Vietnam which we were not doing due to the bombing, er, that had been agreed upon. So we faced a totally new er, strategic problem. Within three weeks of coming into office there was a North

KISSINGER/FROST

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Vietnamese attempt to, despite the bombing hold, which killed up to 500 Americans a week, for four weeks before there was any reaction by the United States. I cannot accept the proposition that two wrongs do not make a right when there is...when there are base areas, established by the North Vietnamese from which all north...from which all Cambodian authority had been expelled, in which the ruler of Cambodia had announced that he no longer knew what was, which er, what was going on and/in self-defense, we were attempting to, er, to limit that North Vietnamese offensive which was er, launched against us in an unprovoked manner.

Fr: Right. Now, well the....? One, you say in your book that this was a strategic response to the North Vietnamese assault and (Under: that's right) that you considered bombing North Vietnam, said that you had the alternative but bombing North Vietnam, not embroiling Cambodia. And..

Kiss: But Cambodia was embroiled...that's an absurdity...to say that a country can occupy a part of another country, kill your people and that then you are violating its neutrality when you respond against its foreign troops that are on that neutral territory.

(both speak)

Kiss: ...total hyprocrisy...

Fr: I've already not made that point...don't, don't give me points that I'm not making. The point is, in this particular case, er, Sianouk, two things you said...Cambodian authorities were no longer active in this area, however you knew, presumably from all these voluminous reports from Joint Chiefs of Staff, that Camb...innocent Cambodian peasants

KISSINGER/PROST

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were still in these areas. Er, in one case, more than
a thousand in one case a number more than that they
could...

Kiss: (over) Now just a minute...you are quoting a source that has had a very selective list of documentation. The White House can operate only on the basis of the report it receives from the Joint Chiefs of Staff. It cannot be responsible for the report that subordinates send to the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The reports we receive from the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the recommendations made by both the Department of Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, were, that there were no Cambodians living in the Tonken areas. What subordinate officials may have reported to other subordinate officials......

Fr: (stutters) Well, you, you mean that... (both speak)

Well, this is very important cause this is new...you asked the question, Are there any Cambodian peasants at all in this area, and you received the reply (Kissinger protests over)....Joint Chiefs of Staff were rubbish.

Kiss: We didn't receive any reports from the Joint Chiefs of Staff, except that there were civilians living in these areas.

Fr: So the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, sent to the Secretary of Defense, serial number JCM..207/69..a thing in which he specifically said to the Secretary of Defense, it wasn't some junior in the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said to the Secretary of Defense, 198 770 and all of this, that er, don't let's bomb 704 because there are so many.... (both speak)

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(over)

Kiss: / Well, then, we probably didn't bomb 704.

Fr: Yes we did, we bombed 704, (it became supper??) and 6,780 tons were dropped on it. And that was to the Secretary of Defen.. it wasn't some trivial offense..we knew we were killing Cambodian peasants.

Kiss: (over) ..Xxagmax.. Every....that is simply not correct.
And you are simply repeating tendentious ....

Fr: (over) Well, if the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to the Secretary of Defense..

Kiss: (over) The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs ... every recommendation that was received in the White House from either the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff or from the Secretary of Defense, indicated that there was no danger of civilian casualties.
Er, that was a criterion for target selection. Sàeondly, Sianouk publicly stated, when he was asked about B-52 bombing, in the sanctuary areas, which were five miles from the frontier, er, we are axa not talking here about bombing all over er, er, Cambodia.

(Frost over...)

Kiss: (over) Wait a minute. Sianouk quickly stated that no Cambodians were being killed, that if there were any Cambodians casualties, if there were one Cambodian buffalo injured, he would protest but he does not know what is going on in territories occupied by the North Vietnamese in which there are no Cambodians living and in which there were no Cambodian cattle. He said that publicly.

Fr: He said that publicly and he said it publicly in May, 1969. Er, and you quote it in your book. But on March the 28th, 1969, he called a special press conference which you don't quote in your book, to ask comment on a UPI report from

KISSINGER/FROST

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Saigon that (Abrams?) had requested B-52 strikes in Cambodia and be..let it be known that he would not oppose them. That was the rumor. Er, this is one of the earliest leaks on the bombing and Sianouk said, and I'm not suggesting here that Sianouk is anybody's witness, I'm just suggesting that he's not yours, in the way you're portraying. He said, "nobody, no Chief of State in the world, placed in the same situation as I am, would agree to let foreign aircraft bomb his own country. They never dared to say I would authorize such bombing but they have said I wouldn't oppose them. Well, I will oppose it for the simple reason they've never been able to kill a single communist. They've only killed ordinary peasants, male and female. I don't want to run the risk, because of their bombing of the communists (and?) seeing the escalation of the war, extend to Cambodia. That is, I would in all cases, oppose all bombing on Cambodia, (and territory?) under whatever pretext. The real intention of the Americans is to wreak (this everyday among the Commair?) people so that they're likely to think that because of me, there can never be peace with the Americans. Thus I will be obliged to...(this is incredibly farsighted) thus I will be obliged to resign, give room to more Rightist and Pro-Western and pr..more Pro-U.S. regime. Two things will happen, first, the sufferings sustained by the peasants and the inability of my government, or so they feel, to stop the U.S. bombing, and secondly the flight of the citizens who possess villas, these people will become frightened. That will be the moment the two conditions, the sufferings of the

KISSINGER/FROST

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people and peasants and the flight of the rich will be fulfilled to force the Right (sanguine?) fruit from the Cambodian tree. That is the way things will go, according to the American wish, the Americans know very well that will not be so as long as I exist. I will defend myself with all my means, I will always stand neutral. The Americans want Cambodia to become another Saigon. I'm not suggesting man, but I suggest that you should have quoted that press conference as well as the next one.

Kiss: The fact is, that the May press conference followed this press conference. The fact is, that after er, the May press conference, Sianouk reestablished (dramatic) relations with the United States, invited President Nixon to visit Pnom Penh, er, that for the whole period, we were prepared to acknowledge the bombing, to pay damages if Sianouk had protested. We wanted to give him the opportunity to define er, the nature of, of the pressure that could be put on the North Vietnamese. Our problem was, that hundreds of Americans were being killed partly from these bases.

(both speak: Partly.....)

Kiss: ...partly from these bases. Er, that Sianouk did not protest, er, that, that, that the press conference that I quoted was after er, the bombing had taken place, er, and..

Fr: ...so was this...

Kiss: ...wh..er,

Fr: (ovr) March 28th...

Kiss: This was after one had taken place. And er,

(Frost speaks over)

Kiss: (over) country..could be????

KISSIN

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Fr: (mumbles).....but in May...er, very little bombing had taken place. The bombing stepped up after that. In May he could be comfortable about the bombing, you, yourself eleven villages?? in your...(unintell: eeenemists?) say that it stepped later and, I mean, I'm sure, know...

Kiss: (over) /.....he had every opportunity to protest.

Fr: (over) ....? but I mean he did protest...

Kiss: (over) ...they did not protest...

Fr: On the 20th of November, '69, Wheeler? says we have had a complaint from Cambodia about eleven villages-killed in B-52 raid. OK..he didn't do a formal protest and, and sit on the steps of the er, of the White House, but then... nobody suge..

Kiss: (over) He didn't have to make..he didn't have to sit on the steps of the White House, he could have made... inglorious

Fr: (over) (unintell: it was an injurious compromise?)

Kiss: {over): {untuk diibatkan{saking}xx.

XXXXXXXXXX Fr: (repeats) ..it was an inglorious compromise and we both know that...

Kiss: Neutrality we would have gladly welcomed. When you have a large number of enemy forces on your territory, when we picked up, when we, during the incursion, tens of thousands of tons of supplies, that er, that were on their territory, then you're not talking about neutrality. You're talking about the invasion of the neutral country by the military forces of the North Vietnamese. That is what had happened for four years prior to any American reaction.

Fr: But on the (cost benefit analysis??) we admit to that because we didn't have...

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Fr: (over) ...a country.

Kiss: We weren't destroying a country we were...

Fr: (over) We started to destroy a country..

Kiss: (over) We did not start to destroy a country..

Fr: (over) From our point of view..

Kiss: We did not start to destroy a country from any..

Fr: (over)....enemies were there for four years before..I agree.

Kiss: (over) We did not start to destroy a country from anybody's
point of view when we were er, bombing (southern?) isolated
North Vietnamese base areas within some five miles of the
er, of the Vietnamese border, from which attacks were being
launched into South Vietnam.

Fr: Well, you quote, your press conference later and you quote
your meeting of...er, this April with, with, with Sianouk
also in your book and that er, and therefore, one wanted to
know the latest news from Sianouk, so we got in touch with
him last week in Pyonyang and he said the American bombing
and invasion are now both responsible for the expansion
of the Vietnamese and Commair communism in Cambodia. Direct
verbatim quote from Telex. So that I mean, that's the latest
quote and an adhesive...now, I'm not saying that he is infallible.
But, I mean, that's what he says.

Kiss: Er, that maybe er, that is i not what he was saying at the
time, er, that is not the problem as it presented itself at
the time, er, he now/mxx the problem of trying to get back
into power, if at all, er, with the toleration of Hanoi, so
it is obvious that he will not make statements today, er,
that would be highly critical of Hanoi. The historical fact
is, that Hanoi invaded Cambodia years before there was any
American reaction. But we inherited a war that we intended

KISSINGER/PROST

(con'd from p. 11--may be a few words repeated)

that we inherited a war that we attempted to end on
honorable terms, that the North Vietnamese started an
offensive against us within three weeks of our coming
into office. Er, that these base areas were an important
part in that, and that er, the basic cause for the problem
in Cambodia, was the North Vietnamese invasion and it is...

Fr: (over)...invasion!

Kiss: Well, what would you call it?

Fr: I mean, an unwelcome presence...it wasn't a sudden invasion.

Kiss: (over) Well, I, I..

Fr: (over) ...in '70. But the, the, it was an unwelcome presence.

Kiss: (over) ...it now, just a minute....

Fr: (over) It was not a sudden, sudden invasion. You're making it sound as though it were sudden. It had been there for four years and...(Kiss, under..?) and, rotten as it was, had we/lived with it.

Kiss: We lived with it under conditions, when we were pill-building up our forces. When we were bombing North Vietnam. Our problem was that we were withdrawing forces, that we were no longer bombing North Vietnam and nevertheless the North Vietnamese were launching massive attacks er, in er, in South Vietnam at the time when we could not have formulated a policy yet, because we were totally, er, because we were totally now in office. If you, of course define, what the North Vietnamese so with an unwelcome presence, while what we do in response is an invasion, then you have tough-cooking your questions in such a way that...

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Fr: (over) that is not cooking questions and I'm not domestic enough to do cooking. It is not cooking questions to say the people have been around for four years and all that a sudden, imply that that's a sudden invasion.

(both speak)

You did the cooking, not me.

Kiss: It must have been a sudden...whenever it started, er, it was...

Fr: (over) and you were saying you were responding to an invasion. You were not responding to an invas...(Kiss under)....? you were not responding to an invasion they had been there for four years.

Kiss: (over) Of course they had, they had been there for four years under the conditions that I have described. Of course the response then would have a starting point and that starting point you can call er, you can call sudden..

Fr: But I mean the start..the starting point you call sudden and implied it was what you responded to as in the book you say you were responding to an overall military threat. But the indictment of the..

Kiss: (over) Of course we were responding to an overall military threat in which these (base?) areas were an integral part.

Fr: (over) (unintell)..(tell the truth??) that you were responding to a military threat solely (manufactured??) that the main target..there's two targets, the secrecy of the bombing er.. but the other thing is that it started the process of destabilizing yet further, Cambodia. It did push the North Vietnamese deeper into Cambodia, you see they, in your

KISSINGER/FROST

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[L.C.]

book you don't think it did, you think that if they moved
any way they'd move into South Vietnam. But if we were
attacking the Sang...?, because this was where people were
hiding, the North Vietnamese (Kiss. under) ..?

South
hiding from our troops in/Vietnam it's INSANE insane to
say, Whoopee, here's a chance to get into greater danger.

move?
I mean, the logic of the thing is that they would DO WHAT the

Kiss: It is not at all insane. Er, they had their supply depots in, in the Cambodian area. Er, it wasn't just that they were hiding there, their supplies were there. Er, their supplies were aimed at South Vietnam. It is also in... it.. is.. doesn't make much sense to say they were going to move their supplies further away from where they were going to use it. After all, they also had supply depots inside South Vietnam. I have no evidence that they moved them in either direction and I'm not saying that they moved them one way or the other.

Fr: I think the implication of your book.. that, the implication ...

Kiss: I said, if they move them, it is more likely that they moved them into South Vietnam.

Fr: (over) Well.. as you know, General Abrams sworn testimony to the Senate in '73, he confirmed that the bombing "made it almost inevitable they would have to expand their area of control or operation, thus bringing them into increasing conflict with the Cambodian authorities...Now again, Abrams is one voice, but he's a fairly authoritative (fades).

Kiss: Well, I would take Abrams authoritative...I would consider him an authoritative voice.

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(LC)

Fr: So then we move on to the next *xkxk*, stage in the unfolding tragedy of Cambodia...

Kiss: (over) I would only say he didn't say that in 1969 and 1970, when he was recommending it.

Fr: He did not say it then and er, that..fair point but it..he said it when he reconsidered. I guess he had second thoughts. The, the er..

Kiss: (over) Yes but we, but we had to act on the basis of his recommendation in '69. (Frost under)....and not on the basis of his second thoughts in '73.

Fr: No, second thoughts are the luxury of people who *just* judge events but on the other hand, they will be the judgment of history..will be whether people were right or wrong at the time, admitting that it's not easy to be right or easy to be wrong. But the, the er, coming on to the step..the next step you say in your book, er, there have been all sorts of allegations about the Long No coup but you say that it took us, both in the book and in the (Economist?) you say, it took us completely by surprise..the Long No (under: that is correct) the Long No coup. And the CIA report that had been circulating had not reached your desk at that time.

Kiss: (over) Well, what CIA report that had been circulating?

Fr: Well, there was a report that that generally became available on the day of the coup...I mean, there's no evidence to suggest that er, that it was seen earlier. I mean I accept.. (Kiss under...?) that..

Kiss: There was a report that became available on March 18th, or or thereabouts which was describing a general situation that had already started on March 11th with er, with the riots

KISSINGER/FROST

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in Pnom Penh. Er, the sequence of events that led to the overthrow of Sianouk was not what happened on March 18th but what happened on March 11th.

Fr: Well, the, the point that this report was available on the 18th, as I said, the point that I don't understand is, and I, and I'm not an subscribing to the American coup theory, but I don't understand why it was a surprise and that we couldn't have been better prepared when you..you didn't have to read the CIA report, you only had to read the N.Y. Times of March the 11th, March the 12th, March the 13th, where the predictions were specific because..from Sianouk was specific..now, I know your opinion of the N.Y. Times, but I would have thought it was the duty of somebody to read the...

Kiss: Now, now, just a minute. Er, er, everybody knew, on March 11th, that riots had taken place in Pnom Penh and in other areas against the Vietnamese. Er, that has nothing to do with anybody's regard for the N.Y. Times and incidentally, my re..I had er, I have high regard for the N.Y. Times, even when I disagree with its editorial policy on specific.. unspecific issues. So, er, ..

Fr: Well, put it this way...it wasn't the favorite journal of the White House.

Kiss: (over) That has absolutely nothing to do with it...the.. (both speak)

Fr: (over) it wasn't just a report..the point is it wasn't just a report of rioting in the streets and so on, and it was a prediction from Sianouk that a coup d'tat is possible or

KISSINGER/FROST

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likely. He raised the possibility that General Lo Notten, commander of La No, the armed forces might lead the coup. I mean, on March the 13th, that was. I mean to say that all I mean.. shouldn't have been a shock..

Kiss: On March 11th, the riots took us by surprise. The sequence of events that led to Lon.. to Lon No's succession to power took us by surprise. That is er, the key issue. At first I thought, and I wrote a memorandum to the president to that effect that there was even the possibility that Sianouk had staged all of these er, events because he had announced that he was going to go to Moscow and Peking to ask them to use their influence with Hanoi to reduce their er, military presence in his country. Er, the result, therefore, at that time, all the meetings we had about the situation in Indo-China, concentrated much more on Laos, where there was also a North Vietnamese offensive going on, than in Cambodia. We thought that this might be one of those Byzantine games that Sianouk was playing, even after March 18th, after Sianouk was deposed, er, president Nixon held a press conference, I forget now on what day, two or three days after wards, and even there he still kept open the possibility that Sinouk might, er, might return. We had only seven personnel in our Embassy at the time. We had no CIA personnel, in Pnom Penh and er, maybe our information was inadequate but this, this was our perception at the time.

Fr: But, but I mean the N.Y. Times could've...

Kiss: (over) The N.Y. Times could have told us nothing that we did not know. We knew there were riots going on. We thought that S..we thought that Sianouk might go back to Pnom Penh

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from Paris and later on I learned that he was, in fact,
seriously considering going back to Pnom Penh from Paris.
He suddenly went to Moscow. That surprised us as well. Er,
while in Moscow, er, he was deposed. I cannot believe he
would have gone to Moscow if he had expected to be deposed.
Fr: But the point is that we, er, continued our recognition of
Long No the next day and..
Kiss: (over) So did the U.N., so did over another hundred govern-
ments including the Soviet Union.
Fr: The next...morning?
Kiss: Well the next day, I don't know.
(both speak)
Frost: I don't, I don't think it was that quick..
Kiss: It was within a week or so.
(both speak)
Fr: Yeah.. but with us, it was within a day you had the midnight
meeting and it was the next day.
Kiss: (over) What do you mean we had..what/meeting?
midnight
Fr: Well, there was a midnight or, or a late night meeting or
whatever to.....

END OF TAPE

OPENS ON:

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Fr: .....continued our recognition of Lon No the next day and.

Kiss: and so did the UN and so did over a hundred other governments
including the Soviet Union.

Fr: The next....morning?

Kiss: The next day I don't know...

Fr: I don't, I don't think it was that quick

Kiss: Well, it was within a week or so..

(both speak)

Fr: But with us it was within a day. You had the midnight
meeting and it was the next day.

Kiss: (over) What do you mean we had..what midnight meeting?

Fr: Well, there was a midnight meeting or, or a late night
meeting or whatever to discuss it on the night...

Kiss: ...there was certainly not a midnight meeting and I don't..
there was no late night meeting. I don't know when the
meeting..whether there..I don't remember whether there was
a meeting or not. I don't even recall exactly what day we
recognized Lon No..

Fr: Next...day..

Kiss: Well, so did every other government..or practically every
other government.

Fr: I don't think that's the case. I think, as you said earlier,
it was within a week...but the point is..

(both speak)

Kiss: I'm not saying they did it within..they did it the next
day. I am saying, that the United Nations, the Soviet Union,
and the overwhelming majority of countries er, recognized
Lon No within a short period of time.

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[cc]

Fr: Of course the Soviet Union did because they ran to China, but, but the..

Kiss: (over) But at that time it wasn't obvious whether it was pro or anti China.

Fr: But I think the basic point of this is this: You say, and what you just said, that for ten (in the Economist) for ten days or so you thought this was all a Sinouk plot.

(under: that's correct)

And..in the book you also say that within three or four days er, Sianouk had removed your alternative of supporting him by allying himself with hostile forces. But as you said on er, NBC, Sianouk was always, at root, a Cambodian and the thing is, that if we had su..and what I am suggesting, is, that Sianouk, as we've seen, was more flexible than you anticipated. In one case you thought =for ten days, he might be back, in another case, four days ruined our alternative, that in fact we made the second big mistake by backing Lon No, rather than trying to get Sianouk back because it led inevitably to what happened a year later, rather than this, admitted, I know, I know it for (neutrality?) I know Sianouk rule would have not been renamed and would have been closed to the North Vietnamese and so on..but history will show that this would..you were on the record er, I don't know whether on the record is the correct remark for conversation for many members of your staff, as, as, as thinking of Lin..Lon No as an incompetent er.. had

Kiss: (over) I have no opinion of Lon No..at that time..

Fr: Well, many people have quoted you as saying you regarded him very soon, as a joke.

Frost as a joke

Frost You regarded him very soon as a joke.

Kissinger At that time I had practically no opinion about Lon Nol
because I didn't .. I knew next to nothing about him.

Frost But we Lon Nol came to power and then it just lead to
two km weeks later, the next step was the invasion. Now
in your book.

Kissinger Now just a minute uh, I think with all due respect your whole
line of questioning is making a mockery of what was going on
in Indo china. You are concentrating on one country. Uh
you are not discussing what was going on In Vietnam
at all. You are not discussing the constant un peace
overtures that were being made. You are accepting one
particular theory of one particular group of people who
are now concentrating on Cambodia because the outcome
in Vietnam could not fulfill all of their predictions.
The sequence of events was not as you described it. The
sequence of events was that the North Vietnamese broke out
of their sanctuaries after Lon Nol had overthrown Sihanouk
without our help, without our help, without our knowledge,
and without our intelligence that for five weeks we did
nothing.

FR The South Vietnamese took a hell of logs which you don't
quote in your book. There is an enormous list of things
they.

K Like what.

FR Well I mean the list goes on for two pages. I mean.

K Yeah but the question is who prepared the list?

FR Pardon

F I did. Like you prepared the list in your book.
The list in your book of things that went on just before the
invasion. A lot of the things, most of the things Nixon
didn't quote when he announced the invasion. Half of them he
couldn't on June the 30th. And

K Like what?

F If you go through the book. And I think this is very
very detailed. On June the 30th he didn't mention Hang Loi.
He didn't mention the two bridges at Spei ring

K I Don't know Hang __________

F Well they were in your book

He didn't mention the several Cambodian posts near Sam
Monarong. He didn't not mention the Cambodian batallion
army badly mauled in the west bank of the Mekong. He did
not mention enemy forces unscueessfull attacking Son
P province He didn't mention the Communist forces
striking the town of Taiporo. I mean he didn't mention
leading
the rail line/south from Phnom Penh was cut at several
points in Taiporo province, and so on. What I

K In other words you are saying these incidents were not true.

F NO what I am saying it was only when the outrage of the
world about Cambodia came to life that these events were
researched.

K No these events

F We know it is common knowledge that ________ went beserk.
That you had to rule out your sections the Cambodian
sections.

K That just isn't true.

F They say that they had

-3-

that you did not spend

K I

F especially write and add a rebuttal to Shawcross

K I added to the book _exactly_ one paragraph and I added one or two footnotes. The basic text which can easily be researched of what was in my book was completed 99% before the there was any

F But the thesis

K There was no talk of _AND_ _IXX_ and outrage was simply making a mockery of what has gone on in Cambodia. Uh every attempted thing that I have _AKKED_ _IXX_ to write a book that will stand historical scrutiny. I have written from the documents that were available to me at the time and the papers of which were active. I have no interest in writing a his a debate with a journalist and looking for documents that in order to rebut a journalist. I have written from the documents on the basis of which we acted, in which we were conscious at the time and which were the reasons for the decisions Whether that were taken. President Nixon in a document listed every _IXX_ single event or not is really going into a problem of detail that was at that time not necessary.

F When you say in the book, you refer to the book, that "Nixon in his April the 30th invasion speech added a sentence that was irreveleant to the central thesis as it was untrue. That would he or Theiu not move against the sanctuaries overlooking the secret _IXX_ bombing

K That statement should not have been made.

F Why did he make it?

K Because he was given to hyperbole

F Why did you make the same statement in your background briefing to the press on the same day.

K Because I suppose we did not have to us this bombing of the sanctuaries had become so much part of the landscape that we did not really focus that that was not a correct statement

F And cause it also Nixon said it again on June the 30th. the immunity of the Cambodian sanctuary had been a serious military handicap for so many years but we would refrain from moving against them in order to contain the conflict and he went on about preserving.

K This does not change the

F And then he did it again in the State of The World message which I think you were involved with in '71

K It does not change the basic proposition that I'm making that it was the North Vietnamese who first established themselves in Cambodia. That it was theVNese who broke out of the sanctuaries in 1970 and cut communications over all the country and tried to isolate Phnom Penh and so they were our perception that it would lead to a collapse of the government that was after recognized by the UN the and by most of the other and turning all of Cambodia into one big base area at a time when we were withdrawing Hundreds of thousands of troops, uh from Vietnam and it is after all Vietnam that has occupied after there were no Americans there.

F Well no the thing is that I mean that taht the secrecy of the bombing leading Nixon and yourself to untrue statements is an example of something that started in a small way and obviously uh obviously escalated. As we know your

-5-

25 [LC]

staff couldn't prove that Phnom Penh was really in danger prior to the invasion. But I suppose

K What do you mean Phnom Penh? my staff could not prove

F Will of your staff that we have spoken to say that they could not find evidence to back up the claim that Phnom Penh was in imminent danger prior to the invasion.

I don't know that you mean by all of my staff, but you

K WSC acted on that assumption might have been speaking to

F 4 or 5

the well you know as well as I do that there are a
number of my staff members who resigned immediately
afterwards and have consistently taken certain positions.
since then. The ones that I have mentioned and the
facts that I have mentioned were the facts and the basis
on which we acted. And the purpose was to enable us to
U.S. to withdraw from Vietnam from Vietnam under conditions
in which we would not be forced to overthrow a government
and to enable to Communist rule a people that had
relied on us. And commitments made by a previous administration
and not by our administration, so it would have been an easy
matter simply to blame everything on our predecessors.
That was the key tack.

K

Let me try and sum up the subject. After the invasion
the hugely ambitious military program took place.

F

That is also nonsense

K

In Cambodia, 35,000 to 200,000 was pretty ambitious.

F

-6-

K Pretty ambitious

F You said originally

K The country is limited total American aid to Cambodia to something like $200 $250 million which was a small fraction of

F Well they are not our troops I'm saying

K The amount of military assistance we could give within the Congressional limits uh was relatively finite, and in addition the number of American advisers we were not permitted to have any advisers there. So that the ability to either monitor this or to train these people / didn't exist

F Well basically that doesn't affect the fact that from 35,000 to 200,000 in Cambodia led to hopelessly inexperienced officers. Twelve year-old troops documented by the Australians 750,000 dollars documented by the GAO for nonexistent so called phantom soldiers, the massive bombing campaign according to the Senate refugee committee led that the people who fled up until '74 cited first of all the American bombing the South Vietnamese bombing and so on what I hav is a picture of a policy out of control, I am not suggesting for one second, that you did not have a great many other imperatives. But I am usggesting that the *quality* policy was out of control.

K No, what you have is the one-sided documentation of people who are now using Cambodia as an alibi for the general attitude towards Indochina, ah, what you have is a totally one-sided and misleading presentation of the

-7-

two quotes, let's not just stay with let's first of all stay let's first of all quote the Nixon Doctrine in all its purest form. Nixon's own quote: "The best investment the U.S. has made in my lifetime the Cambodinas are people of 7 million only neutralist previously. untrained, nightmare word, untrained are tying down 40,000 North Vietnamese regulars" Certainly worth tying down 40,000 regulars, if true, but to sacrifice a nation of seven million, the cost/benefit analysis is questionable to say the least.

K

We had offered to the North Vietnamese negotiations about the neutralization of Cambodia. That had been rejected, we had offered an immediate deescalation of the war that had been rejected. We had offered ceasefires all over Indochina. That had been rejected. The North Vietnamese were conducting and supporting an operation and were supporting the Khmer Rouge, the alternative was the complete take over of Cambodia by the Communists and

F When?

K '70 '71

F But those genocidal, crazy

K There were no

F genocidal, crazy lunatics.

K There were no other Communist leaders at that time.

F The Khmer Rouge was 4,000. It could never have taken
Cambodia, in 1970.

K It could have taken it over with North Vietnamese help.

-8-

28/2
[LC]

F There was no cooperation between the North Vietnamese who we are talking about until the invasion. The Khmer Rouge were almost pariahs in '70. That 's what I am saying with American policy

K What You have said

seige

F created an opportunity to exercise power

K Now be realistic, you are not talking about Indochina
You are talking about Cambodia because this happens to be
the most convenient issue now, and on which to hang
the debate. You are not talking about the North Vietnamese
attacks into Cambodia. You are talking about the American
reactions to these attacks. You are not talking about the
fact that the North Vietnamese were insisting that the
governmental structure in Phnom Penh had to be overthrown
as a condition to any conversations in Cambodia as was the
condition in South Vietnam. When you are only talking about
the American attempt not to turn over a country to Communist
rule. We did not know at that time,

F But

K Please let me finish, We did not know at that time that
the Khmer Rouge were genocidal murderers. This went beyond
our imagination

F Nor did they have the power, thank God, in 1970 to be
genocidal murders. They were 4,000 of them. They had the
power in '75 when by a series of mistakes, I'm not talking
about villainy now, I'm really talking about mistakes, by a
series of mistakes you had allowed a situation to emerge
in which these bastards, and that word will definitely
be bleeped, to seize power which they could not have done
in '70.

F. By a series of mistakes, we had allowed a situation to emerge in which these bastards--and that word will probably be bleeped--could seize power, which they could not have done in '70.

K. They had the power in 1975 because after 1970 there was a consistent attempt to cut off and limit aid to Cambodia and there was an actual cutoff of aid in 1975. That is why they had the power to do so.

F. No, the reason they had the power to do so was as Sihanouk said last week that they could have been prevented, maybe, by the USA with which I decided to have a reconciliation in '69. I think would have been able to prevent both Vietnamese and Khmer Rouge communism. Maybe. But the reason I am discussing this subject is not because Vietnam is more difficult, but that Vietnam--and I absolutely sympathize with you--was a problem you inherited...

K. We have now spent all of our time on Cambodia. We have spent no time on the various peace negotiations.

F. Well, I'm happy to talk about those.

K. We have to do that on some other day. We cannot do that now.

F. Yes. The last question on Cambodia is this one. Which is that what I am saying, let me underline again, I am not suggesting that you were not inhumanly busy, I'm not suggesting that your main concentration--indeed, I think it was one of

reasons--was on South Vietnam.

K. Mr. Frost,...

F. But I'm merely saying..

K. Mr. Frost...

F. Now, now, now, please let me finish. The thing is that when the Cambodian sections of your book are examined, people will say this is the reverse of the Forsythe Saga, it's the hindsight saga, that the Americans, not through villainy but through negligence were responsible for what happened--not solely responsible--for what happened in Cambodia, and this is why we're discussing it, Americax was not in Cambodia until your administration. Well, Nixon's administration. And since you claim, totally falsely, that I am quoting solely from William Shawcross, when I am quoting from the Joint Chiefs of Staff...let me quote from Emergency William Swank, publicly, your ambassador, who said, as he was leaving Cambodia, that this was America's most pointless, most useless war; he also said that Lon Nol was inept, and he said it was the most pointless and useless war, it had lost its point, and what I am suggesting to you is that history's judgment of events in Cambodia,-and what we see today is the aftermath--xwill be that the Nixon-Kissinger regime was guilty, not of genocide, but of gross negligence in the decisions they took.

K. Well, I think that is totally incorrect. I think we inherited a tragedy. We attempted to, and succeeded in, extricating America with honor from this tragedy, that we faced a domestic situation in which those who wanted to end the war honorably and those who identified honor with the most rapid termination of the war on almost any terms, managed to paralyze each other; as a result nothing could be carried to its conclusion.

F. What about Cambodia?

K. I'm talking about Cambodia.

F. You didn't inherit a tragedy. You inherited an unwelcome situation.

K. You are assuming that the situation in Cambodia could be totally isolated from the situation in Vietnam. We could not both withdraw, withstand North Vietnamese offenses, and permit the Communists to act in Cambodia with total impunity ...which they had occupied before we did anything.

F. But the previous regime had managed, from our point of view, to isolate Cambodia...

K. The previous regime...

F. We embroiled Cambodia...

K. The previous...

F. We engulfed Cambodia.

K. The previous.... No, the North Vietnamese engulfed Cambodia.

F. Four years earlier.

K. The North Vietnamese engulfed Cambodia...

didn't

F. They/engulfed it. They didn't bomb the hell out of it.

K. They/engulfed it in 1965 and six with large numbers of troops. They did it in 1970 by breaking out of the sanctuaries and cutting communications all over the country. And they engulfed it after American withdrawal because a communist... to be true...to be a genocidal government, had, they had to be independent of them. Those were the facts. But I think we've reached the end of this.

F. We certainly have, and I'm glad we debated this subject...

End

20 SEP '79

ATTN DAVID:-

FOLLOWING IS A VERBATIM COPY OF THE TELEGRAM SENT TO
SIHANOUK:

''WHAT IN YOUR VIEW WAS THE EFFECT OF THE SECRET AMERICAN B52 BOMBING OF THE VIET CONG SANCTUARIES IN 1969-70 UPON CAMBODIA?

DID IT FORCE THE COMMUNISTS TO EXPAND THEIR SANCTUARIES AND COME INTO INCREASING CONFLICT WITH THE ARMY AND WHAT DO YOU THINK WAS THE LONG-TERM EFFECT OF THE AMERICAN INVASION OF 1970 UPON CAMBODIA?

WHAT WOULD HAVE HAPPENED WITHOUT THAT INVASION AFTER YOUR OVERTHROW?

TP

27613 TALKIN G
236858 DPPI UR

236858 DPPI UR
27613 TALKIN G

28.9.79

ATTN DAVID:-

THE FOLLOWING IS SIHANOUK'S VERBATIM REPLY:-

''THE AMERICAN BOMBING AND INVASION ARE BOTH RESPONSIBLE FOR THE EXPANSION OF VIETNAMESE AND KMER ROUGE COMMUNISM IN CAMBODIA.

BUT THE COUP OF LON NOL IS THE MAIN CAUSE OF THE CATASTROPHIES WHICH HAVE FOLLOWED.

IF THE USA, WITH WHICH I HAD DECIDED TO HAVE A RECONCILIATION IN 1969, HAD HELPED ME MAINTAIN THE LEADERSHIP OF CAMBODIA, I WOULD HAVE BEEN ABLE TO PREVENT VIETNAMESE AND KMER ROUGE COMMUNISM CONQUERING CAMBODIA.''

TP

27613 TALKIN G
236858 DPPI UR

460

1970-1971

forces had heavily infiltrated into Svay Rieng province. In the October 1969 issue of *Sangkum*, a journal of which Sihanouk was editor, an article entitled "The Implantation of Viet Cong and North Vietnamese along Our Borders" protested the North Vietnamese occupation at length; a map showed the location of 35,000 to 40,000 North Vietnamese and Viet Cong troops occupying Cambodian territory (not unhelpful to our intelligence). In a signed article in the December 1969 issue, Sihanouk went so far as to pay tribute to the American role in Vietnam. He argued that "in all honesty and objectivity," the presence of American forces in Southeast Asia established a regional balance of power that permitted small nations like Cambodia "to be respected, if not courted, by the European and even Asian Socialist camps." America's Asian allies could not compensate for a withdrawal of American power by turning toward the Communists because, wrote Sihanouk, like a bird before a serpent, "the bird, gentle or not, always ends up by being swallowed up." Sihanouk concluded his article with a ringing endorsement of the Nixon Doctrine:

> It is possible and even probable that the new Nixon Doctrine which foresees not having American troops intervene . . . may enter into effect. . . . But, they [the Americans] will be obliged in their own interest to support the popular nationalists in their resistance against the new imperialism, that of Asiatic Communism. . . . If the US brings aid without conditions and without physical intervention . . . they will certainly have more hope of seeing the flood of Communism contained than if they assume this task with their own soldiers. In effect, they would thus contribute to cutting the wings from the subversive propaganda of Communism, which calls the nation to rebellion, and to the "liberation of the nation" when the region is "occupied" by foreign forces. . . .

I sent excerpts from this article to Nixon on February 12, 1970. On his instructions, I also sent the full text to Senator Mansfield on February 23.

Sihanouk had no doubt of which side had committed the fundamental aggression in Indochina. For example, in November 1969 the Viet Cong had fired on a US Special Forces camp in Vietnam from Cambodian territory; retaliatory — and publicized — American air attacks were said to have killed some twenty-five Cambodians. Sihanouk had protested this to the United States; our policy was to pay compensation. Nevertheless, in a speech on December 15, Sihanouk placed the responsibility for this incident on the North Vietnamese:

> Who triggered the Dak Dam incident? It was the Viet Cong who fired at the Americans from our territory. When the Americans got hit, they became angry and bombed us. Then the Viet Cong and the Viet Minh fled, and only Khmer inhabitants were left to become victims. That is the whole story. . . .

The War Widens

461

The big Red powers who claim to be our friends, the European Reds at the United Nations, have forbidden us to complain to the United Nations. . . .

Sihanouk told his audience that he would not break diplomatic relations with the United States again, as some were urging, because if he did so, "we'll have to do the same thing with the Viet Minh and Viet Cong, because they still continue to commit aggression against our territory even after we established diplomatic relations with them."

On February 22, 1970, toward the end of his vacation in France, Sihanouk announced that on his way home in March he intended to visit the Soviet Union and China, "those great, friendly countries," to enlist their support to reduce or eliminate the North Vietnamese presence in his country.

But for the first time in his career Sihanouk lost his grip on events. On March 8, villagers in Cambodia's Svay Rieng province demonstrated against North Vietnamese occupation. On March 11, twenty thousand young Cambodians sacked the embassies of the North Vietnamese and the Viet Cong in Phnom Penh. (The Cambodian government clearly had a hand in organizing the demonstrations.) The two houses of the Cambodian Parliament held a special joint session and requested the government to reaffirm Cambodia's neutrality and to defend the national territory. The Parliament urged an expansion of the Cambodian army, which Sihanouk had kept deliberately weak because he feared that it might move against him.

From Paris, Sihanouk sent a public cablegram to his mother, the Dowager Queen, in Phnom Penh denouncing "certain personalities" in his government who were trying to "throw our country into the arms of an imperialist capitalist power." He announced his intention to return to Phnom Penh immediately "to address the nation and the army and ask them to make their choice." In an interview while still in Paris, Sihanouk warned the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong that they had a choice between respecting Cambodia's neutrality and seeing a pro-American faction take over his government.⁶ For reasons never fully explained, he hesitated in Paris, however, and the kettle in Phnom Penh began to boil over. On March 12 Deputy Prime Minister Sirik Matak announced suspension of a trade agreement with the Viet Cong and the expansion of the Cambodian army by ten thousand men. New anti-Vietnamese riots took place in Phnom Penh with attacks on shops and churches of the Vietnamese community. On March 13, the Cambodian Foreign Ministry announced that it had notified the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong embassies that all Vietnamese Communist armed forces were to leave Cambodian territory by dawn on March 15, 1970 — two days later.

The same day, March 13, Sihanouk made his single most fateful decision. He left Paris, not to return to Phnom Penh as he had announced two days before, but to carry out his scheduled visit to Mos-