American Presidents: Totalus Rankium - 37.2 Richard Nixon

Episode Date: September 17, 2022

Part 2 of 3 of President Nixon. We cover his first term as president, otherwise known as 'not the watergate stuff'. So we figure it must be all good and scandal free right? Right? 

Welcome to Totalus Rankium. This week, Richard Nixon Part 2. Hello and welcome to American Presidents Totalus and Rankium. I am Jamie. And I am Rob and this is episode 37.2. It's Richard Nixon, part two, and wait for it Jamie, of three. Of three? I had no idea. Yeah, as listeners will know, if you listen to this you probably know uh i've been resisting going up to three episodes per president for a very long time just because i really like consistency and i like the idea of every president having two episodes um so what changed your mind i mean you get washington down to two and he's incredible maybe okay ladies and gentlemen rob

is going off so i'll make predictions this episode um i think nixon will be amazing very successful um and rule the world hey rob i could see your lips moving no oh okay i i noticed uh the window's open and the trains come through the window oh my goodness you need to get that sorted out. Got to keep the windows closed, otherwise those trains, they just keep coming. You really take out those rails. Yeah, consistency. I like consistency. But I realised, writing up Richard Nixon Part 2,

I was condensing so much that it was becoming boring. I think the episode was becoming like a Wikipedia article. No one wants that. We need jokes and japes. Yeah, it needs a bit of room to breathe. So, you know what? Doesn't matter. Doesn't matter.

Who cares about consistency? Name one thing that's consistent in the world. Inconsistency. Oh, that's good. I like it. So anyway, two or three. That's all it is. Let's go into part two.

Are you ready for an introduction? three that's what it is let's uh let's go into part two are you ready for an introduction fade in on somebody watching the last hobbit film because that's what i finished watching yesterday so the battle of five armies right okay yeah okay so right it's black you fade in and uh it's all in black and white it It's very arty, this shot. And it's just a close-up, extreme close-up of just someone's face watching a screen. You can't see the screen, but the guy's wearing glasses, and you can kind of see in the reflection of his glasses that he's watching something. And in his glasses, you can see the words The Hobbit in reverse, because it's reflecting off his glasses.

You know he's watching The Hobbit, because he's watching The Hobbit in reverse because it's reflecting off his glasses. You know he's watching The Hobbit because he's watching The Hobbit. Yeah. And he's a little tear in his eye because it's a bit emotional at the end there, isn't it? A couple of characters have died. Smell. Yeah, yeah. Sort of sad. And then just as the music is swelling

and this guy, he's about to settle into some good credit watching. Suddenly there's a huge smash sound. And he jumps. And the camera pans up, but quickly. And you see, almost in slow motion, the shards of glass hitting the wall as a whiskey glass just explodes against the wall. And the camera spins, pans around quickly. And there is a Richard Nixon shouting abuse across the wall. And the camera spins, pans around quickly,

and there is a Richard Nixon shouting abuse across the room, throwing another glass of whiskey against the wall. He had two, why not? He is shouting things about how he's going to bomb this and destroy that, and then how he's going to just kill everyone in the world. And then at this point, you just see some hands and arms grab Nixon

and pull him away, saying, sleep it off, sir, sleep it off. kill everyone in the world and then at this point you just see some hands and arms grab nixon and pull him away saying sleep it off sir sleep it off and then the guy's looking a bit shocked and he just takes a breath it's okay and he turns back to the screen to watch the hobbit film but of course this is the last hobbit film that was uh the original hobbit films that were made in the uh in the 60s so as it pans around it is just some some people like just wearing like a sheet with the word hobbit written on it or something yeah and uh yeah i am a wizard yes exactly and uh yeah as as the credits roll in the old hobbit film the very last credit comes up and says, with special thanks to,

and then it comes up as Richard Nixon, part two. It's all part of the credits. I think a bit of a lazy ending there, I think. Yeah. You could have had a time travel element in there. That'd been fun. Bring a bit of sci-fi fiction into it. But we'll roll with it.

I could have done. I feel like you were far more supportive of my opening credits at the beginning i mean i feel like the critiques have become more focused and sharp yeah i just don't like you as much anymore oh that was we've been doing this for six years i'm sick of this history podcasting that's where it end. You've ignored three cease and desist letters. Stop calling me. I'm so handcuffed to this bloody computer. Okay, Nixon part two. We left Nixon, if you remember, at a low point. He had been defeated by Kennedy, so he wasn't the president.

And then he tried to become the governor of California, and he was defeated there as well. He gave that very embarrassing press conference and stormed off. And if memory serves, we left him sitting in a chair, staring out of a window with Lionel the Lemon on his lap, looking up as if to say... I forgot about the lemons. Oh, in fact, I'm going to say at this point,

all our listeners who sent in photos of Lionel the Lemon, they were amazing. There were lemons with beards, lemons with eyes and beards. There was just a lot of Lionel love. There were corals. Yeah. So anyway, that's where we left Nixon. But life goes on. He's not going to sit there and wallow with Lionel his entire life.

He's got stuff to do. So he moves to New York. He's not going to sit there and wallow with Lionel his entire life. He's got stuff to do. So he moves to New York. He's going to get away from California. He's been very embarrassed there. He's full of bitterness, he is, after New York. Down to lefty liberals, he's thinking. That's what he's thinking, yes. And then he has a six-week holiday in Europe and the Middle East

where he meets various world leaders, which always cheers you up a bit. You're treated like royalty as you go abroad. Even though he's a no one. Exactly. I mean, not like royalty royalty, just like one of the lesser loyals that most people can't. It's a three star hotel. Yeah.

Most of the public can't remember the name of you unless you have committed some kind of scandal, that kind of royal family member. Yeah, maybe that. Andrew, what? Who? A six-week holiday in Europe. He cheers up a bit. And then he goes back to New York.

He's walking through Manhattan one day when he hears the news, probably a newspaper boy on the corner calling it out like they did in the olden days what's what's the news what year are we in we 63 yes yes we are is it presidential news at all it is presidential news yes does it come from does it stem from somewhere like dallas it does stem from somewhere like dallas yes oh yeah in Yeah. In fact, Dallas, in fact, Nixon had been in Dallas just like the day before, if memory serves correctly. That's not in my notes.

Oh, that's a good point. Yeah. Kennedy's dead. Kennedy is dead. Oh, I didn't see that coming. I know.

Yeah. This, this woke Nixon up. Not literally. He had been telling everyone that he's out of politics. No more. I'm done. Don't want to do this anymore. he probably believed it himself for a while but his biggest rival

was no longer quite so much of a threat suspiciously now gone so he knew that maybe just maybe he might get a chance at the top job once more. However, if you remember, the upcoming election is actually not too far away. It's coming up within the year. So would he be able to jump on the boat to get to the 64 election? Probably not. In fact, the Republicans were in the middle of a battle between a man named Rockefeller, don't know if you've ever heard of those guys. And Goldwater. Big names in the Republican Party. So who's going to be the nominee? Goldwater or Rockefeller? That was what everyone was debating.

And using some backroom dealing, Nixon attempted to see maybe he could just squeeze his way in there. Maybe he could be a compromise candidate, maybe. I know I said no, but I'm coming back but I'm coming back. I'm coming back.

Hey, guys, come in. No, no, you've already decided the machine's running. We can't stop the train. Okay, fair enough. There's no room in 64. But that didn't mean there wasn't going to be room for him. He was just a bit too late to join in at this point. Because the next election, well, as we saw, the Republicans were destroyed in the 64 election.

And Nixon was one of the very few high-ups in the party who were not blamed. Because most people high up in the party, it's like, well, that was your fault, we're a mess now. But Nixon stepped back. Not my fault, Gov, he said. Probably didn't use the word Gov. It's a bit too close to home after losing the governorship. Oh yeah, it just brings up painful memories.

Yeah, exactly. So he bides his time. He's an up-and-coming Republican, if you can say that about a Republican who was the vice president for the Republican Party. He's in the wings, is a better way of saying it. So Johnson's presidency pans out.

The Vietnam War grows and grows. Martin Luther King is assassinated, as is Bobby Kennedy. And all these shocking events only help Nixon and his campaign, because he comes across as part of a potential stable administration, going back to stability. Someone who knows what he's doing. Firm hand on the rudder kind of guy. Yeah.

And what's going on now? It's nothing but chaos, war, assassinations, riots in the streets. So, yeah, it's Nixon, fella. And you don't want it to get to such a boiling point as well where a president would have to leave halfway through his term as well. No, no, that would be awful. You want someone calm, collected.

It's Nixon, or it's chaos with Ed Miliband. So Nixon is able to get the Republican nomination on the first vote this time round. So we skipped right forward to the next election here. Rockefeller no longer has the clout he had last time. And also there was this new governor of California knocking about some actor fella by the name of Ronald Reagan. But, nah.

Oh, I heard of him. Yeah, yeah. He played a cowboy or something. Yeah, yeah. But, nope, it is Nixon. He is going to run for president once more. And this time he's not up against Kennedy. That would have been a turn up for the books if he was.

He also wasn't against Bobby Kennedy because equally, that's not going to happen anymore. The Democrats have gone for Herbert Humphrey, not, I should say, Humphreys, which I said last time. I got a few corrections about that. But what they didn't know is that there was actually more than one Herbert Humphrey. And I was actually talking about both of them. They were twins. Yeah, they were twins. They time shared. It was fine. The Herbert Humphreys And I was actually talking about both of them. They were twins. Oh, there we go. Yeah, they were twins. They time shared. It was fine. The Herbert Humphreys people would call them.

See, don't those critics now feel really ashamed of themselves? It's okay. I'm not blaming them. It's a little known fact. I'm not here to judge. I'm here to educate. Yeah, so there we go. Which one runs the election then?

Herbert or the other one? Oh, both of them. Oh, no, sorry. No, last time it was Herbert Humphrebert humphries but then one died very tragic so there's now only one herbert humphrey fair enough thanks i mean one of the herbert humphries was found over the body of the other herbert humphries with a knife saying i'd do it again damn it but but uh he got away with it but that's a story for another podcast. Well, an unsolved case. Yes.

Anyway, this is a rare occasion where, yes, you've got the Republicans and the Democrats, but you've also got a third party. Not had a third party for a while. That doesn't exist in the US. Oh, yeah. No, this is the last time it happens properly. After this, it is purely two-party.

It wasn't Kanye West again, was it? No, not this time. But you're kind of close with the party. This was the American Independent Party. We don't have time to go into the American Independent Party, but they're as fun as you probably guessed they're going to be. What are's ape no it's not aip american independence party ape oh i was thinking ape ape oh no i always spell ap but they are still their like mascot their motto and their oh okay yeah that makes sense uh right simplification of the american independent party here uh george wallace the horribly racist governor of Alabama that we came across in Johnson's episode. He was a horrible man. Anyway, he led this party,

and he ran on a simple platform of being racist. Ah, splendid. If you remember in Johnson's episode, if I remember correctly, I said he ran on an election saying segregation yesterday, segregation today, segregation forever. That was basically it. All pro-segregation. Essentially, what this is, is a result of the Democrats supporting the Civil Rights Bill and losing the support of the racist wing of the party.

The Southern Democrats that we have been dealing with since the start of the podcast. And this is it. This is the Democrats. They have finally lost the South. Just as Kennedy and Johnson and many others predicted, we can support civil rights because it's the right thing to do. And we will gain some support in areas, but we will lose the South. Sure enough, they do. Now, Nixon campaigned on crime and how the United States need to maintain a nuclear superiority. He dog-wristled to the racist faction of the population, talking about law and order, but in a way that everyone knew he was talking about,

like, you know, the black neighbors. Yeah. Yeah. But he didn't actually do this too much, because he didn't, there's no point, because with Wallace in the running there's no point being racist to win votes all the racists were going to go to Wallace

So there you go So instead he talked big on other things such as I've got a plan to end the war in Vietnam he said To which, what do you think people said? No you can't No, they just asked him what the plan was Oh, okay, yeah To which, what do you think people said? No, you can't. No, no, they just asked him what the plan was.

Oh, okay, yeah. Yeah, yeah. To which he said, oh no, no, I can't tell you. Actually, to be fair to Nixon, he did have a plan for Vietnam. It was to stop any chance of Johnson putting into place a ceasefire before the election to boost Humphrey. I do not want a ceasefire in Vietnam. I want the war to carry on until after the election. That wasphrey. I do not want to satisfy in Vietnam. I want the war to carry on until after the election. That was Nixon's Vietnam plan. Now, it's never been proven what I'm about

to say, but it happened. It's almost certain this is what happened. Most historians agree, it's just a case of you can't really get that smoking gun. It would appear that Nixon sent ambassadors to Saigon to convince the current president of South Vietnam to drag his feet over the halt of bombings of North Vietnam. In other words, don't try and put a ceasefire in. The current president is going to suggest ceasefire. You say no, drag your feet, wait till Nixon's in charge, and then you'll get a better deal from the Republicans. Now, this is very, very illegal. This is a private citizen negotiating with

a country on behalf of the US for political gain. Yeah. Yeah, this is the kind of thing that if you get caught doing, you should be immediately banned from running for office, or if you're caught after you're in office impeached and thrown out that's this this is not on you shouldn't be doing this but it'll appear

he did uh he's always come across as such an upstanding honorable man i know yeah breaking such rules i don't know why but uh he did it um again i should say never been proven but he did it. Again, I should say, never been proven, but he did it. Johnson found out and was furious. Like, I'm trying to get a peace deal in and Nixon's trying to sabotage it. So he attempted to blow the whistle on Nixon. Fuck, this idiot's ruining our chances of getting out of Vietnam. But there was a problem because Johnson had come across the information because of a tip-off. Because of that tip-off, they had then put Nixon's ambassadors and the president of South Vietnam under surveillance, including tapping the phones. Now, Johnson wanted to point the finger at Nixon, but didn't want to admit that he had tapped the phones of a war ally and a political opponent.

It just doesn't look good. So they just left it. Okay, we'll just have to swallow this one and hope Nixon fails. Now, to cut a long election short here, to a backdrop of riots over race equality, riots about the war, assassinations, just general unrest, the country is not in a good way at this time. Nixon wins the election comfortably, looking at the Electoral College anyway. Wallace got the Deep South, obviously, that was where he was going to win. Humphrey got Texas and most of

the Northeast. Nixon got pretty much everywhere else. He got 301 electoral college votes to 191 for Humphrey, and Wallace got 46. That is the best result for a third party, as in no one's beaten that since, is what I'm trying to say. So that sounds good, doesn't it? But it hides the fact that actually Nixon got 31.7 million votes in total, and Humphrey got 31.2. It was actually really, really close in the popular count,

but just the way it worked out, Nixon comfortably won. But Nixon was aware of this. He was not happy. He thought, surely this time, it's not up against Kennedy, the people will realise how good he is. So actually he wins, but he's a little bit bitter about his victory. Yeah. Which is a shame. He's always but he's a little bit bitter about his victory. Yeah. Which is a shame.

He's always moaning, isn't he, about something? He is always moaning. Do you think Lionel's there going, come on, cheer up? Yeah. With his eyes. Lionel obviously hasn't got a mouth, but with his eyes he's like,

Yeah. Cheer up, Nexum. Could be worse. It's a good Lemon impression. Thank you. That's all right do you think lionel although he's got no mouth can still like hum slightly oh yeah oh no that sounds like he's a hostage well we don't know so anyway uh he's president nixon's done it. Hooray. Let's get into it. Okay. Obviously, biggest item on the agenda is communism. It's the Cold War. The wall's up. West Berlin's surrounded. Also,

we've got the Vietnam War raging on. South America also is a mess at the moment due to communist states and the United States intervening in the area and just trying to economically dominate it. China also is in the middle of a cultural revolution devised by Mao. Sure, that's going well. So there's a lot going on in the world. A lot of it is full of tension. However, that's

the big picture. And Nixon realises, this kind of man who knows that as long as you get the little details sorted first, the big picture will follow. Something like that. That's how it works. Again, he's saying this to himself in the Oval Office and Lionel's just in the corner.

Because there were corners right now. Lionel's desperately wishing he had hands so he could do the reverse symbols. Like, oh, wrong way! Oh, next time. Oh, Rich oh richie it got it wrong again thanks uh anyway little things to be sorted nixon was very annoyed that the fireplaces in the white house didn't roar right yeah yeah nixon nixon liked a good roaring fireplace he liked nothing better than in an evening, having a couple of drinks until he was smashed out of his face

and listening to soundtracks of war films or just epic surging music. So that's what he liked to do. But apparently the fireplace in the White House was just a bit tame, a bit weak, a bit whimpery. So he didn't like that. Other things that needed to be fixed in the country was the shower in the White House was too strong.

So let's get on that. You can't have a too strong a shower, though. Well, I know. This is a clear sign that Nixon's got problems. Unless it's, like, pushing your feet through the bottom of the bath due to water pressure. There's no such thing as a too strong shower, surely? No.

If you're not bleeding, it's fine. You want to feel the grease running out of your hair, terrified. Before you even turn the shower on. Just the sight of the shower in the background. It just knows. But no, apparently it was too strong. Nixon liked nothing more than a weak, dribbly shower, obviously. And also, Johnson had made his Oval Office very high-tech.

He had a row of TVs, each tuned into the major news stations, so he could watch all of them at once. It's probably because Trump didn't do that. Well, I mean, this day and age, I'm sure he did. It was just much easier to install. Just get some iPads or something. But yeah, this got moved. Nixon didn't like it.

It was a bit too high-tech for him. And also, there was a secret recording device in the Oval Office that was just recording everything. There was a switch that could turn off that Johnson could use, so he could choose whether to record it or not. But no, Nixon went,

no, I do not want all my conversations recorded. No, thank you you get rid of that so i don't know if it's apocryphal or not but it's something about russia donated something like this school donated this carving to the us oh in some way and they gave it over and inside there's a like a tracking bug or something or an audio recorder i don't know how that's this this rings a bell i've not come across it in my research yet but that is something i've definitely heard a bit like when uh putin gave uh trump that football and everyone was like oh you need to you need to rip that ball apart because there's no way that's not full of bugs. Anyway, so he revamps the Oval Office.

I'm sure he made a little tiny lemon desk for Lionel that sat on his desk. I can only see. It was like curved seats so it can sit in properly, like nestled in. Yeah, yeah, exactly. He also became obsessed with micromanaging the little details of the running of the White House, such as sending memos detailing exactly how much the waiters should be tipped at state dinners, how thick the steaks should be, and whether there was time for soup. Right. Yeah. These were the details that Nixon was focusing on in his first days of office, which is very interesting, considering the world was going to hell in a handbasket.

Yeah, wow. But all this is harmless. If you call the most powerful elected leader in the world micromanaging the menu harmless, it's harmless. But then there was his temper. That was less harmless. To be fair to Nixon, however, he was very aware of his temper. That was less harmless. To be fair to Nixon, however, he was very aware of his temper. He was very aware that he would fly off the handle

and sometimes even issue orders he didn't mean. So right at the start, he told his aides that look, look, there's going to be some times where I'm going to shout things and tell you to do things. Just ignore me if you think I've gone too far,

but make sure you tell me afterwards that you ignored me so I know what's been done. Just imagine one of the aides is carrying a little silver box with a big red button on it and a plastic cover. It says nuclear on the side. I'll just put this over here. Hide this in my office. I don't know whether to be admiring or terrified

of that. It's like the guy knows that he's going to go off the rocker and he's in charge of the nuclear codes. So he tells people. Rather than just thinking, right, well, I need to get a lid on this, then he just goes, yeah, well, it's going to happen. It's up to you guys to make sure I don't blow the world up.

Yeah. And he was right, by the way. He did absolutely do this. One day, in a fit of rage, he ordered that Damascus be bombed just because he was angry at the news of a hijacking that happened of American equipment. So some people stole, like, a few cassette players. Was that right?

Bomb them to the ground. I'll be honest. I have forgotten what the equipment was, but it was like expensive military equipment, possibly like a plane kind of thing. Think more that than like the paper clips out the stationary cupboard. Fine. But I mean, it's a scale, isn't it?

Yeah, I guess so. Yeah. Spectrum. Yeah, exactly. But anyway, isn't it? Yeah, I guess so. Yeah. Spectrum. Yeah, exactly. But anyway, he ordered the bombing of Damascus. One time he also ordered all the personnel in Laos be fired, so all the ambassadors over there,

just because he was angry at what one of them had done. So that's it, you're all fired then. Neither order was followed through, much to Nixon's relief when he calmed down. So his aides did learn when to say yes and when to go of course sir and yes and keep nodding and then back out of the room and shut the door and then hear the whiskey glass smash on the door

and then turn to each other and just go we won't be doing that I'm also going to put this here because it fits although it didn't happen here or more to the point it didn't happen at all. There's a story that is very popular that Nixon, whilst

drunk and angry, ordered a nuke to be dropped on North Korea. North Korea shot down a spy plane. The story is that he ordered a nuke to be dropped on them. And apparently it was decided to wait till he was sober in the morning to see if he still wanted to do it. That's a even wait a day after that so the hangover yeah exactly uh now

as far as i can tell this isn't true uh i i looked into it because it's one of these stories i i've heard for years i never thought to actually look how true it was so i went looking into it the claim comes from one person who was a CIA Vietnam specialist who claims this happened, but no other evidence is there that this happened. And you would have thought something this big would have kind of leaked over time. It's still just this one person who says it happened. And that person's dead now, so we can't go and ask him again. So who knows knows it's most likely not true but nixon getting angry and drunk and ordering things he didn't mean is well established so it's

not beyond the rounds of possibility but who knows anyway who knows that's that's how we're going that's just a bit of background of how nixon is when he's going into the white house so knowing all this it's time to tackle the big problem, the biggest problem of them all. The fireplace is still, they still don't roar. Yeah. Put a nuke in there. Yes, sir, of course, sir. Back out, back out.

No, not the roar, the war, the Vietnam War. That's what the big problem is. It's a big one. Nixon was convinced that he could actually bring the war to an honourable end in a matter of months. He wasn't lying to the public when he said he had a plan. He did have a plan. He was just very overly confident about what his plan was. So here is the top secret plan. He would stall North Vietnam with tough talk. He would help raise South Vietnam up to make them stronger. And then

he'd take his troops out. Yeah, well that worked good well for Afghanistan. It also worked perfectly well for Johnson because that's exactly what the previous president was doing and failing. But apparently Nixon obviously thought Johnson just wasn't trying hard

enough, dammit. So, nice and easy. Right. He said, shout more. Well, in the meantime, Nixon was going to please people at home by stopping the draft, which is obviously going to please people. Yeah. Right. So all this sounds easy. Yeah.

And if it worked, it arguably would have been the right move. Definitely. But as we see, it didn't work. It obviously didn't work. It was never going to work. It's too complicated. Many historians have pointed out that what Nixon and Kissinger

should have done at this point is just pull out immediately. And yes, it would have been a knock to American prestige. Yes, it would have been awful to South Vietnam. But ultimately, like a band-aid being ripped off quickly,

it probably would have worked out better. But hindsight, eh? And oh yes, you might have noticed I just dropped a name in there. Kissinger. Oh yes. Need to introduce you to the new National Security Advisor. It's Henry Kissinger, a man who we will be hearing a lot of. He's already had an impact on our story so far.

He's been in the background and I've not had a big enough reason to bring him to the fore. But he's becoming a major player now, so it's time to bring him in. There's a slight chance, although it's not been confirmed, that he lives in a volcano lair somewhere that's been abandoned for some time. And loads of rabbits on the outside. Wild rabbits have just been, you know. Just looking really happy. And in the bowl game

yeah enjoying life they're just they've set up rabbit swings and rabbit parties and then and then in comes Kissinger all the rabbits look up

and stare they all start backing away to the door I like the idea that with Kissinger he's a bit like Dracula he moves but his shadow stays and his shadow does his own thing.

Yes, that's what happens. Now, when I'm talking about Nixon's decisions on Vietnam in this episode, assume I'm talking about Kissinger as well, unless I say otherwise. The two of them were very close and in step most of the time with Vietnam. Anyway, step one of the plan like i

say stall the north might just stop them from being successful for a while now the best way to do this they figure is to bomb them hey hey so exactly what johnson was doing but no no there's more to the plan there's more to the plan they're not just going to carry on doing what they did before that way there's the definition of madness, isn't it? We will use more bombs! Yeah, yeah, you got it. Okay. We're going to use more bombs. And not just more

bombs, we're going to drop more bombs and we're also going to neutral Cambodia as well. Oh, splendid. Yeah, because the North Vietnamese were not honouring the borders and had men and equipment in Cambodia, so we're just going to bomb those in Cambodia. I mean,

after all, that's a bit like bombing France in 1944, they said. It's like, we weren't bombing France at the time, we were bombing the invaders who happened to be in France. What's their argument? I see the argument he's making.

Yeah, it's a sensible argument to make. But France at the time was occupied completely. Cambodia isn't. Exactly. I'll quote Nixon here. We bombed the hell out of those sanctuaries. I'd like to think he put both feet upon his desk at the time. Just gives a little wink to one another. Hands behind his head.

Yeah. Unfortunately, however... Woof! Woof! Woof! Woof! Woof! Poor Lionel.

Unfortunately, they haven't destroyed the camps. This just pushes the Norfolkmanese further into Cambodia. And it also created resentment against the United States in Cambodia, leading to a revolting communist faction within the country taking over the country. Now, this is stupidly simplified because this is very complex, but effectively, this is a major contributing factor to the rise of Pol Pot and the Cambodian genocide. So, yay. Now, just as the United States did not want to get dragged into another war in the area,

I don't want to get dragged into explaining it. So I'm going to do what the administration did and just kind of wash my hands of that. Now, to be fair, yes, I'm being slightly flippant here. The United States government didn't wash their hands at this point. They did go and invade at one point. The difference here, of is the uh the administration doing nothing helped lead up to two million deaths uh me not going into this just means that our listeners if you want to know more about cambodia and what happened there you're gonna have to look it up

yourselves we don't have time in this episode just know not good i think it's how you can sum up yeah or they can listen to our sister one, Cambodia, Totals Ranking. Oh, yes, yeah. A new one came out just this week, if you're listening. Who's doing that? Jeff and Soundguy, isn't it? Jeff and Soundguy. Yeah, that's good.

That'll be good. Yeah, check that one out. Anyway, so let's focus on Vietnam, but just know all that's happening in the background as well, and that's also a mess. So Nixon's thinking this will hold back the North, so now let's start making the south stronger so how do we make the south stronger give them weapons or build a wall well um actually the wall had been suggested at one point and then it was just like no that's a stupid idea it would never work why in the hell would you do that yeah

um giving them weapons is what they've been doing for ages and fighting for them, in fact. No, Nixon decides a new tact to make the South stronger. He announced that they were no longer going to fight for a country that would not fight for itself and stated that the United States would no longer fight on the front line unless the South Vietnamese did. So in other words, tough talk, tough love. It's like, we will no longer fight in this country

unless you have just as many men on the front line as we do. But don't you think they were kind of going, but we have been. And there aren't as many of us as there are you. Yeah, no, that's the point. Yeah, it's like, yes, they've been fighting. There's five of us in the

entire army. Come on, Nixon. They simply did not have the resources. The South is too weak. It's not about plucky spirit. It's about cold, hard facts of numbers. They do not have the strength. But still, Nixon's going, no, pull your bootstraps up. Anyway, the plan was slowly to replace those who were fighting on the front line with Vietnamese soldiers.

This was called the Vietmanization policy. We're going to Vietmanize the front line. Sir, can I suggest an easier code name to say? Let's call it the V policy, please. No, it's the

Vietmanization... It's that one, and we're sticking with it. Anyway, advisors in the United States military had bad news for Nixon, however. I still haven't got the fireplace assorted, sir. The problem is, if we do what you're suggesting, the South will fall. They are not strong enough. This is kind of why we're here in the first place. If the South were strong enough to fight the North alone,

we wouldn't be here. Is Nixon going to use it as an excuse to leave, though, Mendes? Well, we will see. It was becoming very clear that stalling the North was not working, despite using more than three times the bombs used in all of World War II. Wow. Mm-hmm. Oh, my goodness. That's insane.

They threw a lot at Vietnam. Yeah. So, yeah, it just wasn't working. Strangely, every time they kept bombing the country, the country just got more and more angry at the United States and got more and more recruits. But why? I don't know.

How? As for building up the South, no, also not working. And more Americans were being drafted. Nixon said he would up the South, no, also not working. And more Americans were being drafted. Nixon said he would stop the draft, but he just couldn't at this moment because it just wasn't working. Too many of them are dying. Yeah, Nixon was waking up to the realities that he was stuck in a war that most of the country hated and had no easy answers.

It turned out the reason why Johnson was stuck in this war was not because Johnson was lazy or idiotic. It's because it was a quagmire of awfulness. That's not to say Johnson didn't make mistakes, as we covered in his episode. But this bravado Nixon had going in that, oh, well, I hereby able to sort it, was definitely misplaced. This is going to be tricky to get out of whoever you are.

But don't worry. There is hope. The chief of, whoever you are. But don't worry. There is hope. The chief of staff's come along. They have with them Operation Duck Hook. Ugh. I... Do you think Nixon had the same reaction as me? What?

What? I think Lionel did. I think Lionel just raised one little lemony eyebrow and no one noticed. I think Nixon was just like, anything, anything. Come on, duck hook, you say? Why not? Let's hook a duck.

Duck me up. What is this? How about we, said the Pentagon. Do you want to hazard a guess? I don't know. I literally don't know. I can't think of anything stupid. How about we bomb Hanoi some more?

Genius! Absolute genius! This is revolutionary! Yes! Let's just bomb it more! That'll work! Remind me how long Operation Tuck Hook was in planning for? About three or four minutes.

Don't worry. Don't worry. There is more three or four minutes. But no, no, don't worry. Don't worry. There is more to it than that. We're going to use bigger bombs. Yes. Instead of just... Oh my goodness. They weren't just going to bomb Hanoi some more.

They were going to target the North's method for transporting food. They were going to try and cripple their infrastructure as well. So there was, again, being flippantant there was actually more to it than that but yeah it was mostly let's bomb some more because here's where it gets fun we could use some of those nukes that we've got stockpiling up oh you look a bit scared there don't worry tactical ones yeah that makes all the difference isn't it sounds so much better doesn't it? Sounds so much better, doesn't it?

I made this flippant joke before an episode, and someone did comment that actually there is a difference between strategic and tactical nukes, and yes, there is. Strategic nukes are the big ones that you drop on enemy's homeland, think Hiroshima. The only two that have happened, yeah. Yeah, the tactical nukes are smaller and meant to be exploded in the

field when your men will be roughly in that area, but not too close. So they are basically small nukes. Lethal dose of radiation, but won't get vaporised. Unless you're close, in which case you're very much getting vaporised. They are just smaller nukes, but let's not lose sight of the fact that they are

nukes. Yes. I mean, small of the fact that they are nukes. Yes. I mean, small is... It's relative. There's like a... You could say our sun is also very small compared to Canis Majoris. Yeah. But still, the sun's very big. Yeah.

You wouldn't fly into it. Just the sheer political ramifications of using a nuke as well. It's just, yeah. Anyway, they weren't idiots, the Pentagon, obviously. They realised that if they started using nukes, the Soviets and China weren't going to be happy. So to pre-empt that, what they were going to do is put all of their nuclear arsenal on high alert.

Oh, brilliant. Perfect. Escalate. Yes, escalate when no one else is pushing. We will just ramp up the escalation as much as possible. Let's do that. Fortunately, Nixon, you can criticise him for many things, and we will be this episode,

but he wasn't insane and didn't go for this. But it is scary that we are now firmly in the 70s and the US military are still at first opportunity, just going, can we use our nukes? Can we use our nukes? Can we use our nukes? Oh, please, nukes? Can we use our nukes? Please, please, please, please. So instead, Nixon appealed to the public in what

became known as the silent majority speech. He said to the country, and I'm hugely paraphrasing here, look, I know we don't like the war. You don't like the war. I don't like the war. But it is our duty to our allies to stop this war peacefully and not lose. And the only way the most powerful nation on earth can possibly lose this war

is if internal problems make it too hard to win. So just give me a bit more time. If we unite as a country, this will be easy. And that speech worked because there is some common sense there. If we all pull together, we'll be able to pull out of Vietnam quicker. Okay, think the public? You've just been elected in, you're in your honeymoon period. Okay, we'll give you a chance.

We'll give you a chance. For a time, it works anyway. The casual rate is falling. Nixon, bit of breathing room here. But as you can imagine, only for a while. Meanwhile, let's move away from Vietnam for a bit. Internal issues were ticking along in the background. Nixon had made it very clear to his advisors right at the start of his presidency, I don't care about the internal stuff. This country, the internal stuff could be

ran by my cabinet and Congress. I'll deal with foreign affairs. That was just the way he saw the presidency, which kind of makes sense. the president is much easier able to deal with foreign affairs and internal things and the way the country was set up yeah congress should be dealing with the laws and his cabinet should be administrating it so yeah fair enough so he was fairly hands-off with internal stuff which is why we're not going to talk about too much internal stuff this episode but a couple of things of. He did get interested with internal affairs when he saw that it would benefit him politically, because he would use it as political capital to do more for foreign affairs, which makes sense. So for example, he was no fan of the New Deal or the Great Society,

obviously. These were massive democratic pushes. but he also knew that they were very popular so he wasn't going to waste capital on fighting them and if things came to him that were seen as liberal but popular he quite often went well why not then he was no idealist that's more like will of the people rather than my will and my my thinking correct. Yes, exactly. It comes out quite well here. For example, when plans for an extensive welfare reform came to him, and this plan to exchange, interestingly, two weeks of the gross national product of the United States. The plan was to get that two weeks,

and with that they would eliminate all family poverty for everyone in the entire country. Just for two weeks' profit. Nixon was quite impressed by that. Seriously, what, like just two weeks' profit and we'll make pretty much everyone in the country love me? Because no one's poor anymore. Yeah, go on then. Now, one of his aides pointed out, hang on no this this is not our conservative philosophy

we're republicans this is this is not what we believe in why should we help people yeah this is hands out this sounds like socialism another aide just laughed and said don't you realize the president doesn't have a philosophy so yeah the family assistance plan eventually was shot down in the senate the liberal wings of the parties felt it was too stingy, didn't go far enough. The conservative wings thought it was too generous. So a popular bill that would have helped out millions dies in the Senate. Never mind. Oh, welly.

But still, they got their two weeks' profit, so I'm sure they spent it on bombs. So that's good. Yeah. it on bombs. So that's good. It is interesting to see, however, that a president many consider to be the birth of the modern GOP was more than happy to enact sweeping welfare reforms if it helped him politically. Yeah, to help him politically.

Which, incidentally, is also why some people don't see him as the birth of the modern GOP. They see Reagan. Yeah, I can see that. But some people do point to Nixon. Anyway, another example of going for some popular internal wins. When polls showed that the public were worried about the influx of drugs into the country, Nixon declared war on drugs. I've heard that before.

Yes, well, but they hadn't at this point. It's a popular move. It sounded tough, didn't it? He was going to fight the drugs and the drug dealers. But, and this is what's interesting, he was also going to fight addiction and poverty, things that lead to drugs and continue drugs. Now, one part of this was to use methadone treatment centres in DC to help people kick heroin. That's what happens now, isn't it?

This initial war on drugs didn't really look like anything that it morphed into, but that's for a future episode. When people talk about the war on drugs with just dismay in their voice nowadays, it's not Nixon's war of drugs they're talking about. But this is the seed.

Oh, no, no, no. Yeah, now it's between. But we're coming to it. But just know it's started. The idea of declaring war on something has started. Yeah. Now, around this time, also, a major landmark case hit the Supreme Court. This isn't hugely relevant to Nixon, but it is hugely relevant to us right now. It's very depressing, so I'm fitting it in.

Because it's around this time that Roe v. Wade hit the Supreme Court. Yes, a woman's right to have an abortion was ruled on. It concluded that under the right of privacy, women's rights to an abortion was held up by the Constitution. Overnight, countless women's lives were saved. Just generally, healthcare of humanity went up a notch. Generally, things were better. Was this a federal law? Yeah, this is federal. That's it. Every state now has to provide abortions. Now, many states went on to do the very bare minimum to the point where it was essentially impossible to get an abortion, but that's it. It's now federally, you've got to

provide it. Now, Nixon, that's nothing to do with this, like I say, so I'm not going to get too sidetracked, but he did have some thoughts. To begin with, in Nixon's first term, like we're covering here, abortion, along with gun rights, interestingly, neither a big thing for the Republicans. The whole Second Amendment thing, the whole abortion thing, Republicans didn't really care about these things at this time. But this is the birth of it. It's all about to start. And these are going to become two pillars of Republican ideology.

Now, as the debate on abortion started up, Nixon's opinion was to keep out of it, keep it out of national politics. In fact, I quote him here, get the hell off it, just say it's a state matter and get the hell off it. Keep it out of national politics. In fact, I quote him here, get the hell off it. Just say it's a state matter and get the hell off it. Like, no, no, no. I don't want anything to do with this. This is a mess. Well, yeah, that's also a more conservative

thing to think. It's like, it's your own state choice. Yeah, exactly. So that was his thought. One time, however, when he discussed it with an aide, Nixon admitted that there obviously were times that an abortion was necessary. Do you want to hear one of the most horrible quotes

that we're going to hear today? Yeah, for historical reasons, yes. Yeah, so when did Nixon think abortion was necessary? I will quote here. Oh. He's talking to someone else. Well, I know you know, between a black and a white.

Ah. Yeah, you weren't expecting that, weren't you? I thought he was going to say something he'd done. Yeah, you knew it was going to be bad, but you weren't expecting that. His aide replied, or rape. And Nixon replied back, or rape. You know what I mean. There are times.

Yeah. You remember last episode when I said Nixon wasn't particularly actively racist, as in he didn't go after civil rights and the like. That's taken a left turn, isn't it? Yeah, well, this proves that he's either changed his views as he aged, or he was now more willing to act upon those views he only privately aired previously. Likely a bit of both, but he is definitely getting more extreme as he ages. Apparently people do get more conservative as you age.

Well, yeah, exactly. Because there were obvious, that we covered last time, there were signs that he just wasn't hugely racist for his time. But then you see things like this and go, oh, wow. Yes. Yeah, not good. Anyway, things then get worse, apart from frequent rants about Jews, Blacks, Irish, Mexicans in the Oval Office. Sorry, to be clear, he was ranting in the Oval Office about Jews, Blacks, Irish, and Mexicans, not ranting about

Jews, Blacks, Irish, and Mexicans being in the Oval Office. Although that perhaps would have been a good thing. Maybe it would have given him some perspective. Those rants happen a lot. He then starts thinking about acting against some of the progress made in the civil rights recently. So he does start to turn. He's no longer that person he was. He writes a memo saying, segregated white education is probably superior to education where there's too great a degree of integration of inferior black students with white students no he's a bad man yeah pan over to lino little little lemony tear just going down his eye there what what has happened to his Richard? That's not how he brought him up. Anyway, this said, Nixon soon stated publicly that the Supreme Court had ruled for integration

and it was the law and it would be upheld. So he wasn't actually going to actively fight it, but he didn't think it was good. He spent time, money and effort meeting with leaders of local communities in the South to ensure that another little rock didn't happen when the schools down there integrated. So he also actively tried to help integration. He did. But you also weigh it up with the fact that he didn't want to do it.

It's such a shame because he is actually doing things to help, but reluctantly. He's doing it because he knows that it would be damaging him not to. Again, it's the political thing rather than the moral thing. Yeah. And also the feeling in the country was kind of shifting. The positive civil rights movement birthed in the newsreels of black girls being beaten in Birmingham and Martin Luther King talking of dreams. This was starting to ebb away. The general public stopped seeing this as a fight of this oppressed people. And newsreels started showing more and more things

like the Black Panthers with their guns and militant black power. The people who were on the fence about civil rights who not long ago were going well of course civil rights everyone deserves to be equal but not committing too much were now thinking well they got their civil rights didn't they we should all move on now there is no racism anymore because the civil rights act happened and support yeah support for a racially equal country actually started to ebb away. Now, those who really were supporting and advocating for racial equality knew there's a huge amount of work still to be done, and they were angered by this relatively swift drop in support,

but there's very little they can do. And as racial tensions yet again start to escalate the nixon administration saw an opportunity a memo from one of the aides was passed to the president with the following words written on the envelope oh okay so just imagine picture of the oval office it's completely empty someone comes in and just puts this memo in an envelope on the desk. There's no one in there but Lionel looking at the envelope. And it says, Caution. Danger. With the respect to the calculated polarisation described in this paper,

absolute security cannot be overstated. There would be no way of calculating the damage to the administration. In other words, no one can see what's in here. It would destroy us. So the kind of memo you want to get on a Monday morning when you walk into work. And slightly hungover. Yeah. Do you want to know what's inside?

Yeah. You don't, do you? It was a suggested plan of action to gain voters. That's nice, isn't it? Yeah. Now, as we've seen with the New Deal, Great Society, the Civil Rights Act, the Democrats had torn themselves in two and reshaped into a different party. Yeah.

Not a completely different party, but it definitely did not look like it did 100 years ago. Unrecognisable, in fact. Now, the Republicans saw a way to capitalise on this. The memo suggested that the President start spreading this message, and now I'm going to actually quote it. Today, racial minorities are saying that you can't make it in America. What they really mean is that they refuse to start at the, Jewish people with the idea of socialism. irish people jewish people with the idea of socialism and yeah in other words the idea is very simple what we should do as republicans to get more votes right now is start appealing to the racist faction that have just abandoned the democrats there is this massive voting block in the south who just voted for a third party let's get them before the democrats try to pull them

back well i can say right here right now I don't think it'll ever happen. Now, this is known as the Southern Strategy, and it's now underway. So there you go. Oh, I've said it a couple of times before. It's like this is the pivot point where the parties swap. But this is yet another one where it's clear. It's like, yeah. A lot of pivots.

Yeah. The Southern faction have left the Dems. They are now going to the Republicans. but this is yet another one where it's clear it's like yeah a lot of pivots yeah the southern faction have left the dems they are now going to the republicans so there you go anyway so that's fun uh the war's continuing by the way talking of fun things yeah still creating problems uh nixon's speech to appeal to the public had worked for a time but not long it looked increasingly like the united states attempt to end the war was actually just spreading it to other countries, like Laos and Cambodia. More riots erupted. In Ohio, the National Guard were called in to quell an anti-war demonstration at a university. Things got nasty, and four students were shot dead.

Bloody hell. Yeah. Nixon was appalled, apparently. He wrote down that he could not get the images out of his head. It really physically affected him. But you wouldn't have known it if you were a member of the public. No. Because publicly, all he said was this. When dissent turns to violence, it leads to tragedy. Yeah.

Oh. Yeah. Didn't go down that well with many, as you can imagine. Oh, no. Especially the parents. No. Anyway, Nixon's very stressed at this point. Nothing seems to be going quite how he wanted it to go. He increasingly turns to drink. And it would appear from what I've read that it wasn't so much that Nixon drank more than any of the other presidents recently. Eisenhower, Truman, Kennedy, Johnson, they all enjoyed their whiskey, their daiquiris, their martinis.

But apparently Nixon was just someone who didn't handle his drink well. After one drink, he started to mumble, and after three, he just became downright drunk and paranoid. One aide later said, and I'll quote, there are things I'm not even going to discuss that were said, but they were a result of drinking. So we don't want to know. So we don't want to know. No.

Don't want to know. At least on one occasion, he was unable to talk to the Prime Minister of Britain because Kissinger deemed him to be too drunk. So that's not great. Oh, and on top of the booze was the sleeping pills. The stress led to sleepless nights, and the pills helped somewhat, but made the effects to the drink worse. So, yeah.

His mood was not improved when the midterms did not go well. His approval ratings were in freefall. So he decided to put back in place the recording equipment. Again, I'm guessing puzzled look on Lionel's face at this point. Yeah. It's like... It's like how he took it out going no i don't want people listening to what i'm saying well now he does he wants people to listen to what he's saying he feared that people

in the future historians would look at his record and go oh he was useless wasn't he he wanted people to hear exactly what he was saying the tough tough decisions he needed to make, the minutiae, the details. And then he would be remembered better. If only people in future could hear exactly what he said, we'd all like him, he thought. And because of this, we get a sense of his mental state. Because from now on, we get pretty much all the conversations that happened in the Oval Office because it wasn't a switch anymore. It was noise activated. The moment someone spoke, it automatically recorded.

That's very high tech for the 70s. Oh, they love their high tech stuff in the 70s. Did you have a clapper light? Oh, they did. They did. Another side effect of not having a switch to turn on and off your recording equipment is obviously you kind of forget it's there.

Oh. Nixon didn't see it. It had nothing to do with it. I mean, he installed it, but after that, there was a technician in the basement who just changed the tapes and stole them away. Anyway, because of this, like I say,

we get a sense of his mental state soon afterwards when he said to an aide, politics over the next two years is not a question of bringing in the blacks, the liberal senators and making them feel wanted. It's going to be cold steel. So he's going to war against those that he has decided have not supported him. Not long after this, his daughter gets married. That's nice. Has a wedding in the White House, in the Rose Garden.

That's nice. We get to hear about what he was talking about in the Oval Office just before. I say talk, let's instead say rant. He ranted about long-haired, dirty-looking protesters, the Eastern establishment, feminists, teacher unions, Jews, who at this point he described as a vicious bunch, black people, the Ivy League, he called them softies,

and the press, who were referred to as a lousy, dirty bunch of b****. He put the recording equipment in so we go, what a good guy. Yeah, what a guy. Yeah. When he's starting to make those kind of comments about Jewish

people, you're on the way to Hitler. Yeah, it's not good, is it? Anyway, despite all this, there was actually some hope in Nixon's mind. Because him and his aides have been thrashing about some ideas, how can they turn the next two years around? They've got a three-point plan. They could achieve these three things they figure re-election would be certain number one get out of vietnam yes or at least make it look like it's inevitable now

even if you're not fully out yeah and in fact they'd already started along these lines some secret talks with north vietnam had started possible, but maybe this could happen. We'll see. Anyway, number two, make a deal with Russia to reduce the arms race. Or to slow down the arms race. Reduce the number of nuclear weapons. Again, there's actually some movement in this. Again,

secret back-channel talks with Russia about limiting their arsenals, known as SALT, the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty. I've heard of that. Yes, big deal. And then number three, China. China's our enemy at the moment, but if we can turn them into our ally,

well, we can probably stop with all these tiny little proxy wars in Asia because we'll have one of the big players in Asia and it just will be a lot easier to deal with. And then also Russia will be a lot weaker. So there we go. Number one, get out in Vietnam. Number two, make a deal with Russia. Number three, become allies with one of our enemies.

Easy. Yeah? Yeah. It's just like two years to do this. It's like decorating your house. Just take them off of this and you do them. The irritating thing for Nixon was this would go down hugely well

with the public um but he wasn't allowed to talk about any of them because they were all very secretive yeah yeah so he's there he's got i'm doing stuff i'm doing a plan but no one knows about it and they all hate me it didn't help his stress uh he was being battered in the press and he couldn't share what he thought he was actually doing well. And then things get even worse, because a 7,000-page study into the war in Vietnam, which was written

for the government, by the government. A thousand pages? 7,000 pages. 7,000 pages? Yes. Yeah. This report had been commissioned by the government so the government could read it so they had a full, real understanding

of what happened in Vietnam, what was going on in one place. You just, you need to keep a record. Yeah. Okay. This whole thing was leaked to the press. Ooh. Ooh, yes.

Suddenly everyone could see in black and white what most suspected, but now everyone knew. Successive administrations had been lying to the United States people continuously about its involvement in Vietnam. From Eisenhower actively working against the Geneva Accords, Kennedy knowing about the 1963 coup in South Vietnam, Johnson expanding the war when publicly saying he wasn't, to Nixon's full involvement in Cambodia.

No one was getting off lightly here, Republicans or Democrats, although arguably the Democrats got it worse, and there were some close to Nixon who were saying, just wash your hands of it, and hope the mud sticks to the Democrats and not us. On top of this, a memo was included from the Department of Defense that admitted that continuing the war in Vietnam was 70% to avoid a humiliating defeat and only 10% to help the people of South Vietnam. So there goes all of the government lines of saying, we're doing this for the South Vietnamese

people. It's like, well no you're not. You're admitting that to yourself. Yeah. So Nixon and his aides, instead of deciding to just hope it falls on Johnson and Kennedy more than him, they decide to fight it. They told the Times that they would be prosecuted

under the Espionage Act if they continued to publish the report. The Times just ignored this. No, you won't. And all the other newspapers rallied around the Times. No, you won't. The Supreme Court were then very quickly involved, and they handed Nixon a humiliating defeat. No, they won't. Freedom of press means just that. You can't tell them what to print. A major anti-war protest then took place in Washington, and now, by this point, it's not just the long-haired hippies anymore. They're flowers, and they're talks of peace, and they're excellent, excellent music.

These were now veterans from the war who would come back, letting people know, it is awful over there. What are we doing this for? The response to the protest was to make illegal mass arrests and then just pen people up. Didn't go down well. Could have been worse, however. The tapes show that Nixon at first wanted to hire teamsters

to go and, and I quote, beat the shit out of some people. Nixon was talked down at this point. Good. But he wasn't going to be talked down over going after someone for the leaked Pentagon Papers. That's what these papers were called. Now, the leaker was a man named Alsberg. He was a graduate of Harvard and a defence scholar who had helped shape the strategy in Vietnam during the Kennedy and Johnson years. He knew what he was talking about. He had been approached to write parts of the report, and he was fed up with all

the lies behind the war. So he just decided to leak the report. Nixon was going to go after him, and go after him hard. Someone had to pay for this, and he was in no mood to be nice about it. He asked a couple of trusted advisors who worked with him and Kissinger to create an anti-leaking department. He hates the leakers. Here's a wad of cash and some high-tech toys that we've loaned off the CIA. Yes, we have signed them out, and yes, we do need to give them back. The couple of advisors were soon joined by an ex-FBI agent and an ex-CIA agent. These were two men who were seen as tough.

They could get things done, damn it. Yeah. Yeah. The top secret group were officially known as the Special Investigative Unit. But when one of them went home and his grandmother asked what he was doing in his new job,

and the guy replied he was stopping leaks in the White House, the grandmother replied, ah, you're a plumber then. Ah, wonderful. Yeah, nice. Well done, granny. And the group liked the name.

They even put a sign up on their office door that said the plumbers. Well done, top secret group that no one's supposed to know about. Yeah. This kind of shows how inept these people were, by the way. Yeah. Yeah. It was pointed out that maybe top secret groups shouldn't have their own office with a name on it. So the sign came down, but the name stuck.

Anyway, they were given free reign. Discredit Augsburg. That is your one job. Make him seem crazy. Do whatever you need to do. Make him go away. Oh God, no, not like that. No.

Or maybe like that. No, no, no. No. Your discretion. Your discretion. Yeah, yeah. Make him comfortable. Take him out to dinner. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Yeah.

Shh. Just silence him. Yeah, it's all very messy. Anyway, the plan was soon cooked up. The plumbers were going to go to LA, pretend to be the CIA, which is easy enough. They had connections to the CIA. They had CIA equipment.

And then they were going to... All their equipment had CIA printed on it. Yeah, exactly. They broke into Augsburg's doctor's office. They were going to break into the office and steal some files that proved that Augsburg was, I don't know, medically insane or something. There was a flaw in this genius plan. Augsburg was, I don't know, medically insane or something.

There was a flaw in this genius plan. Augsburg wasn't medically insane. No. No. So the incriminating evidence they were looking for just simply wasn't there. And also they weren't subtle. Like I say, the equipment was from the CIA. The camera they took was from the CIA.

And obviously what you do when you're on a top secret mission and you're going out and you're breaking into an office is you stop for selfies. Oh, of course. How else are you going to remember it? Or anyone else knows that you were there. Yeah, exactly. I mean, when you say to someone, yeah, we broke into the doctor's office of Ellsberg last night

and someone says, Pixar, it didn't happen. Well, what are you going to do? What are you going to do? So obviously, obviously. You don't want to be seen as a liar. But they weren't idiots. If you're taking photos of yourself there, you're not going to just go to the local photo shop

and get them developed. It's a CIA camera. So what are you going to do? Get the CIA to develop them. You get the CIA camera. So what are you going to do? Get the CIA to develop them. You get the CIA to develop them. Yeah, of course. That's what you do. I've got to ask them what's your step.

Which the CIA do, and they give the photos back. We've got a few questions. They may have kept a copy or two and just put it in a folder, probably labelled accidents waiting to happen. Anyway, this gets back to the aides of the president.

They were appalled. What do you mean you went down there and you smashed your way into an office, made it look like a burglary, didn't manage to find anything, and now the CIA know exactly what you did. We thought you were going to bribe a nurse or something to see if she could give you some information. What the hell is this? Have you been watching too much James Bond?

What's going on? Because I can tell you, you are not James Bond. Definitely not. He would not do this. No. So, right, okay, this is dangerous, they thought. These guys are not quite the smooth operators we thought they were. We need to distance them from the president.

We'll keep them along. We don't want to annoy them, and they might be useful. Really? Really. But we'll just put them to the side. How about the re-election campaign? The Campaign to Re-elect the president or the acronym as it became known creep which is just brilliant that is wonderful campaign to re-elect

it'd be crep yeah but crep doesn't sound as funny as creep does it re-elect oh okay yeah yeah yeah it's not great it's not great but it's it's it's amusing so why not it sounds more spy like yeah exactly creep yeah creep that's probably what they thought they probably thought oh tiptoes sunglasses not you creepy creepy yeah stop staring at me yeah so yeah did you think when they were doing whatever they did, they just hummed theme tunes? Pink Panther music, Mission Impossible, obviously the James Bond thing. On a loop, all the time. They would sing loudly as they went down the corridors.

With an orchestra behind them. That's where most of that budget went. Anyway, yeah, so the plumbers end up in Cre some distance between them and nixon they think the plumbers however they weren't about to stop playing with their spy toys they needed a reason to keep being funded they didn't want to send the orchestra home they'd only just got them that's like a two monthsmonth pay. Yeah, exactly. So they sat down and the plumbers created Operation Gemstone. Ooh, so that's better than hooker duck. Yeah, it's better than hooker duck. They're already doing better than the Pentagon.

Gemstone would ensure that Nixon was nominated to run and then win the election. 100% guarantee. Nice. Sounds good, doesn't it? What i love about this is it's 100 legal as well it's the confidence i admire most yes we were unable to discredit one man but we can do this definitely anyway stop playing the trumpet now's not the time we're discussing strategy well the chief operator of the plumbers. Let me start introducing you to their name, shall I?

The ex-FBI man who I mentioned before was named George Gordon Liddy. We're going to come across him quite a bit over this in the next episode. Liddy was chief plumber at this point. Had his own wrench. Yeah. Said chief on it. He kept it above his desk. It was great.

Liddy, by the the way was the kind of man who collected war memorabilia not by the way war memorabilia but war memorabilia knowing look right yeah he liked nothing more in an evening than arranging his swash stickers and settling down with friends to watch nazi propaganda. All for history, of course. For history. Appreciating history. That's all it is. Of course.

All it is. Yeah, oh. It's heritage or something or whatever we use to hide the fact that we're massive racists. Yeah. It's just Aryan privilege. Yeah, that's all it is. Yeah.

Anyway, Liddy's there. He's going to give a presentation on operation gemstone he's going to try and sell it to get funding and he's giving this presentation to the attorney general and a couple of nixon's top men the attorney general of course being the lead legal person for the united states of america not meant to be working for nixon but we'll brush past that bit. Anyway, Liddy starts off. For $1 million, he says, I'm hugely paraphrasing here, but I'm not making up the fact that there were strobe lights and lasers

because obviously there were. And flares, massive, massive flares. Well, yeah, it's the 70s. Massive massage. Yeah, definitely. Some soul and funk playing in the background. Anyway, for $1 million, he said, the plumbers will, for you,

make sure Nixon is nominated and re-elected. How will we do this? Well, we will create havoc at the Democratic Convention and ensure the Republic One goes smoothly. You might be thinking, how are we going to do this? Well, to ruin the Democrats, we will use sex workers as honey traps, accrue photographs of Democrats in compromising positions,

and blackmail them all. We will then tap their phones and steal all their documents and use this information to create said havoc by leaking the information to rival Democrats within the party that's really brutal like difference between the us and and britain even i'm sure it's happened in britain as well but like we're gonna hire sex workers and try and entice the opposition to sleep with them to yeah trap them yeah uk give them a bacon sandwich take a dodgy photo. Isn't he a fool? This is only half of Operation Gemstone, though.

Half? Okay. Yes, remember, that's caused chaos in the Democratic Convention. How do you make sure the Republican one goes smoothly for Nixon? Bounces? Or select your audience? Well, sort of, yes. Let's continue with the presentation. To ensure the Republican Convention

goes smoothly, don't worry, we've got something good for this, said Liddy. We're going to hire men to kidnap radicals within the GOP and take them to Mexico for the duration of the convention. We'll sit on them and we'll only release them afterwards. They won't cause any trouble. I'm guessing at that point you gave a big wink and a thumbs up. I'm really hoping, so I don't know if this is true but everyone listening to this

mouth open like no no absolutely not I'm guessing Lionel's in this room at the back just screaming internally yeah after the presentation you're spot on in this room at the back, just screaming internally. Yeah.

After the presentation, you're spot on. Apparently there was just a huge pause. And then the Attorney General said, Gordon, that's not quite what I had in mind. Just a few rumours. Leak a few things to the newspaper, maybe. We're going to kidnap members of our own party and cross international borders wow so obviously the attorney general and nixon's top aides say no way that's stupid you're talking

crazy never speak of this again oh no wait no they said go away and see if you can make it cheaper really yeah a million dollars is a bit too much uh maybe maybe tone it down a little yeah and also make it cheaper we'll give you 750 yeah uh quite quite seriously come back in a week with a better pitch is what they said it's like the dragon's den bloody hell i'm in uh yeah no liddy came back a week later. How about, he said, half a million. We don't do the kidnapping or the honey traps, but we do all the wiretapping and we take all the illegal photos.

Let's bug the hell out of those Dem Party leaders. Sold, damn it, said Nixon's men. Fantastic. You can probably see where this is leading. Oh, I imagine it's mass leading to a massive gate wow this is because i don't know much about watergate i know it was people snooping around trying to find stuff that's all i know in a hotel but this is insane it could have been so, so much worse. Yeah. So anyway, is this a massive point in the US history?

I mean, Watergate is huge. It has no name. I mean, all scandals are named after it. So is this where a political party starts spying on another and this is a huge turn? Well, obviously not. We've seen it time and time again. Politics of the country can hardly be described as squeaky clean. There's been cheating, there's been spying and all sorts. Politics of the country can hardly be described as squeaky clean. There's been cheating,

there's been spying and all sorts, but I think what this is is a case of technology starting to provide opportunities that simply didn't exist before. Yes, it's the OG.

It's like you weren't able to tap phones back in Washington's time. And back in Lincoln's time, I mean, you might have been able to kidnap someone, but getting them to Mexico would have been a pain.

Yeah, it's like a four-month trip. Yeah, exactly. I mean, by the time been able to kidnap someone, but getting them to Mexico would have been a pain. Yeah, it's like a four-month trip. Yeah, exactly. I mean, by the time you get there, the Stockholm system would have kicked in, and then you'd all just be drinking tequila together, and then come back and form your own party. Yeah, so it just wouldn't work.

Anyway, so there we go. We're just going to leave the plumbers there for now. Yeah, but they've got their plan ready. Meanwhile, things were finally starting to happen with part three of three of the plan. That, but they've got their plan ready. Meanwhile, things were finally starting to happen with part three of three of the plan. That member is China. Let's see if we can get China and make them an ally. Now, this was

a few months before Operation Gemstone was discussed. I'm jumping around a little bit here. Henry Kissinger was walking through an airport when he was recognised by a British newspaper reporter. Well, nothing special or interesting there, you might think. But the reporter was shocked,

because everyone knew that Kissinger was really ill in Pakistan with a stomachache. He could barely move. So what the hell is he doing walking through an airport? The reporter quickly filed a report with his editor, who simply didn't believe him. You must have seen someone else. Kissinger's not in an airport.

Was it David Dimbleby? I'm just going to say yes, yes, it was. Brilliant. Yeah, so yeah, the editor didn't believe him, which is a shame because if the editor did believe him, they would have really got quite the scoop because it was Henry Kissinger. Kissinger had faked his illness

so he could secretly sneak into China and meet with the leaders there because him and Nixon had a plan. Kissinger was going to act as if Nixon was a bit of a madman who just as happily sided with China's rivals on a whim than China. And Kissinger was going to go over there and swear to them he was doing everything he could to keep Nixon on a leash and you need to help me out here.

Otherwise this opportunity might fly away. Typical negotiation stuff. Yeah. So that was their plan. It works really quite well. It's a frantic couple of days. Essentially, they agreed. Nixon would be allowed to visit China

and meet Chairman Mao in a few months' time. This was huge. No one knew about it at the time, but this is huge. The only thing the United States had to do was stop talking about Taiwan, how that was actually the Chinese government in exile. Kissinger and Nixon agreed. Taiwan simply was just no longer important.

In fact, I'll quote Kissinger here, it's a heartbreaking thing. They're lovely people. And then Nixon replied, I hate to do it. I hate to do it. They have been my friends. Such a shame. And then to do it. They have been my friends. Such a shame. And then they did it anyway. Yeah, they agreed with China. Fine, you guys are in charge.

Now, Nixon and Mao had a few months to soften the public, their own countries, to the idea of the countries meeting each other and perhaps becoming friendly with each other. Meanwhile, part two of the plan was also making some headway. This is the arms reduction treaty with Russia, SALT. A Moscow summit was being discussed. Let's have a summit in Moscow to discuss the reduction of arms. That sounds like it's a good thing. However, there was a bit of a stick in the works for this one,

because once again proxy wars were popping up. And this time it's the war between india and pakistan we certainly don't have time to go into the ins and outs of the indo-pakistani war of 71 but i'll sum up shall i yeah for the listeners benefit i'm sure you're all up to date with this war yeah well i i can imagine just suddenly ripping out a massive chunk of india World War II. Oh, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you've got it. You've got it.

Yeah. That's where we start. This will be great. We start with Britain saying, bye, India. It's been lovely. It's been lovely, like, ruling you slash, like, ripping out all your resources and making ourselves rich. Bye. Thanks to colonialism.

Oh, one thing before we leave. Pass that map yeah this bit here just to be at the top left new country Pakistan oh and sorry this bit on the top right as well also Pakistan sorry both Pakistan yeah both Pakistan

miles and miles and miles and miles apart from each other no both Pakistan like different ethnic groups, different histories. No, no. Bye, India. Bye, Pakistan. Have fun. You're working out.

Yeah. And Britain left. Well done, Britain. Now, the problem is you had India in the middle, you had Pakistan to the top left, you had other Pakistan to the top right, but let's start calling it Bangladesh because that's what it becomes. But Pakistan is to the top left. You had other Pakistan to the top right, but let's start calling it Bangladesh because that's what it becomes. But Pakistan is in charge of it. Bangladesh

starts uprising and India starts supporting Bangladesh's uprising. Pakistan are not happy about this. And obviously, because this is the Cold War, Russia and the United States take sides. Again, hugely simplified, that the United States were with Pakistan, keeping Bangladesh, and as were China, and the Soviets were working with India and the Bangladeshi people to have an uprising. Kissinger, in particular, was not happy with how this war was going,

because it looked like Bangladesh would indeed become independent, and he was not into this. It would weaken the United States' prestige in the area. It would weaken their work on becoming friends with China. After all, would China want to be their friend if they seemed weak? Can't be having that. So when reports start coming out of the area of the Pakistan-led genocide in Bangladesh,

the United States diplomats in the area wrote officially through the dissent channel to their own government saying, we're supporting the wrong guys here. The Pakistani government in the area are committing genocide. They're killing anyone who is the wrong race, religion, class, creed, anything.

This is awful. We're on the wrong side. Nixon and Kissinger get this and go, nope, creed, anything. This is awful. We're on the wrong side. Nixon and Kissinger get this and go, nope, no, we're not. We're on the right side. We can't change our minds. The Russians. Wonderful thing.

Yeah, the Russians are supporting the Bangladeshis, so we can't. Oh, for goodness sake. Yeah. On the ground is quite useful sometimes. Oh, no, no. Anyway, India, and obviously quietly Russia in the background, started to increase pressure on Pakistan

because India started to build up forces to go into Bangladesh to help the Bangladeshi uprising. Yeah. Kissinger told Nixon that if Pakistan lost Bangladesh, then there'd be a domino effect. The Philippines and Iran would go red, the Soviets would dominate all of Asia, the world

would end. The only answer was to scare the hell out of India to back down. So, Nixon agrees. Let's do it. He phoned a Soviet minister and essentially said, I don't care what you say or how you're not involved officially. I know you're involved say or how you're not involved officially

i know you're involved you know you're involved pull back the indian troops or we go to war united states versus russia yeah this is a huge massive escalation almost to the degree of the cuban missile crisis i think escalation is a good adjective. Yeah, this is massive escalation. He then sent a nuclear aircraft carrier to the Bay of Bengal. So he's putting nukes in the area and he's telling Russia, this is war if you carry on.

He then sends word to China. You know how we're meant to be friends now, at least soon we will be. How about you send some of your troops south to scare India? Let's just keep putting the pressure on. It was then decided to illegally provide Pakistan with arms, and we've got another quote from a conversation between Nixon and Kissinger in the Oval Office here. Nixon said, is it really so much against our law? Kissinger replied, what's against our law is

not what they do, but it's us giving them permission. Well, we'll give them permission privately. Kissinger said, that's right. And Nixon said, hell, we've done worse. And then they both turn to the camera and wink. Yeah. Ah! Ah!

In December of 71, the crisis peaks. China, agreeing with the US, did indeed start moving troops down. This is a massive gamble. I mean, we're not quite talking Cuban Missile Crisis here, but we're not far off. I mean, this is brink of nuclear war stuff. If China and India fight, Russia would side with India.

Russia would start fighting with China. The United States would start fighting against Russia. Nukes go off World War III. In fact, Nixon asked Kissinger at this time whether it was time to, and I quote, start lobbing nuclear weapons in. Now, Kissinger grimly agrees. Now, to be clear, Nixon wasn't saying, should we do this? It was a, is it going to be time to start lobbing nuclear weapons in? Kissinger grimly agrees, saying that yeah, if Russia go in and they defeat

China, and they've also got India on their side, well that's it. Asia is completely communist. The United States are finished. We're going to have to go to nuclear war. This is the end of days. No you're not! Because things change over hundreds

of years. You see the difference, the major difference No, you're not. Because things change over hundreds of years. Yeah. You see, the difference, the major difference I'm seeing between this and the Cuban Missile Crisis is this was the United States just starting it out of pretty much nothing. Yeah. Yeah. Whereas the Cuban Missile Crisis was the Soviets starting it

from pretty much nothing. Anyway, Nixon is heard to take a deep breath at this point, and then said, Russia and China are not going to go to war. And then Kissinger replies, I won't bet on that, Mr. President. The Russians are not exactly rational when it comes to China. So all this is taking place in a very stressed White House.

Nixon is increasingly getting drunk every single night and flying off the wall in fits of rage. He also starts telling others at this time that Kissinger needed psychiatric care because Kissinger's also losing it. He has several, and I quote, monumental tantrums at this time, ranting and raving,

using very sexist and racist language about India that I'm not going to repeat, but that sums him up. However, long story short, or terrifyingly story short, Siva, in the end, with the world on the brink of nuclear war once more, once more the countries step back from the abyss. After lots of secret chats, it was decided that Bangladesh would be liberated and become independent.

India, however, would not take over. And also, they would not invade Pakistan. We'll have three separate countries. Okay? And no one bombs each other. Everyone okay? That's a fair compromise. Right, everyone okay, says India, Pakistan, Bangladesh,

Russia, and the United States. Meanwhile, Britain's just going, lovely weather we're having, past the crumpets, hope everything's going well over in India. Anyway, Kissinger and Nixon pat themselves on the back. They succeeded in scaring the other side down.

They see this as a victory because they got what they want. You can see why they saw it as a victory. They just didn't dwell... And it prevented World War III, so I guess it is a victory for the human race. Yes, well done them. They just didn't dwell too much

on how much of a gamble it was, and also the fact that their victory was in support of an anti-democratic regime that was literally committing genocide. Yeah. Ultimately, though, Nixon's self-proclaimed victory was not against Russia, but it was with China. This whole thing builds up trust between China and the United States. So that whole plan can continue. And then the trip to China takes place. Nixon meets Mao publicly. They chat for about an hour and they shake hands in public. This does more than any political chat in the background could happen. The whole

world see it. There you go. The United States and China, they're no longer enemies. Forget the Korean War now. Forget all the proxy stuff that's been going on. Yeah, this is great. It's official. China got out of this more security against India and Russia, the two major powers either side of them. They've got the United States with them now, sort of. I mean, they're not allies, but they're not enemies. Also, they got recognition over Taiwan for being the government of China. Worldwide recognition now, everyone agrees, which is nice, as long as you didn't live in Taiwan. And also, they got some intelligent reports on the Soviets, which is just a lovely little cherry on the cake. Here, have some intelligence. Nixon also obviously gets something out of this for the United States. They get a strong potential ally against the Soviets. It's not been set up yet, but I mean, it's just

a better place. And also Russia, now realizing they're in a weaker position, start taking more seriously the idea of this Moscow agreement and the salt talks. This is a huge, genuine victory for Nixon. Part three of the checklist is complete, and part two is looking closer than ever. The Russians are being forced into this. Genuinely good stuff. However, he also wanted to work on part one at the same time and just get it all sorted in one go, which would have been amazing.

Part one, of course, is to find a way out of Vietnam. He had less success there. China didn't want to look like they were abandoning any of their little communist allies, because that would lead to these smaller communist states turning to Russia, and Russia becoming stronger because of it. So he didn't get quite what he wanted. However, China did confirm that, okay,

if you guys want to pull out, we won't kind of jump on you whilst you do it. How about that? That's the best we can do. Which is better than they had before. Russia also, realising they're in a weaker position at this point, agree as well. And okay, it looks like the United States now kind of have a path out the war, or at least the two major players that are stopping them have agreed they were allowed to leave. We won't make fun of you and beat you up whilst you go.

them have agreed they were allowed to leave we won't make fun of you and beat you up whilst you go yeah so all in all a good trip or the week that changed the world as it became to be known quite literally yeah it genuinely as much as we can criticize nixon and we have done a lot there's some good stuff done here yeah nixon was perpetually stressed the entire time, often drunk, frequently angry, but for the moment, things are going well. Excellent. Just cut from the plane home from China, where Nixon finally has a little smile. Meanwhile, Liddy, head of the plumbers, is sat down at a table with some of his men and a quarter of a million budget's burning a hole in his pocket. Got hit down to a quarter of a million, not half a million.

Still, it's a quarter of a million dollars. You can't see what he's looking at, by the way. They're just standing around a table, but you can see Lionel in the corner on top of a wardrobe. He's just watching from the distance. His little lemony beard waving with worry. Because pan down

and pan around so you can see the documents that Liddy is looking at. Because, of course, they are the photographs of the DNC headquarters at the Watergate Hotel. That's where we're leaving it today. Oh, so this is the Watergate Gate. This is the Watergate Gate. Yes, it is. So there we go.

That's Nixon part two part two how you feeling um i mean it was kind of implied in the last episode that he wasn't that straight lace and he he sort of kept proving that again and again and again and again and again and again and again through the episode yeah but i mean if you balance that with actually he did make some good choices in terms of Eason's stability, or stability, whatever, made good things. You can't criticise one that.

What I'm most shocked at is the is the parallels to Trump. Yes. I thought they were going to be the obvious parallels to Trump. trump oh he gets impeached um but just little things like i've got a plan to get out of this war no i'm not gonna tell you i'm just just confidence that he will be able to do things because of course he will and then getting very

frustrated when it turns out the reason why the other guy couldn't do it wasn't because they were stupid it's because it was hard. There are definite parallels there. But in saying it to Trump, I think that, in fairness to Trump, that is something a lot of politicians do nowadays as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's trying to get to power. No matter what happens, that's their goal.

We will talk about Trump, obviously, in this episode. But, yes, there are definitely parallels there. He is definitely worse than I thought he was going to be. Yeah. I thought it's the Watergate thing that brought him down. But no, there were worse things that he did, or potentially worse things that he was going to do. But it's the Watergate thing that gets him in the end.

So yeah. Anyway, well, there you go. Thank you very much for listening to part two. Part three will be out in two weeks' time, I can say confidently, because I've written most of the next episode. Ah, okay. Yes, because it was when I realised

that my word count was getting close to almost like 50% again of a normal episode, and I still had a lot more to write. It's like, this is two episodes. I can't kid myself anymore. So yeah, most of that is ready. So ready to go. So yes, we will definitely be releasing the next one

in two weeks time. So we will get to see how Nixon fares, what happens in his second term. I wonder, I wonder if there's much to talk about. I don't think so. So thank you for listening, everyone. And, oh, yeah, it's the first time we've recorded since you went to America. You went to Louisiana, didn't you?

Was it good? Bloody amazing. Honestly, it's absolutely fantastic. I would go back again. Name three things that were the best, but you can only use one word with no context music drink bananas

I saw something really weird I've got to add this in I'll be even cut out if you want people have a skip button that's true back in 1982 it all started so I went to the death museum and i wouldn't have i wouldn't have

known about it until someone i think recommend on twitter for me it's great i can't remember who it was but thank you but basically it's like a thing of just death so it starts off with like like schools and animal and taxidermy and stuff then Then it goes into people. And there's a photograph of... Oh, because I'm quite... I'm not squeamish, but I don't like dead things. You weirdo. Yeah, I know. I'm so abnormal.

But there was a photograph of JFK on a slab after he'd been assassinated. And it was fascinating. Honestly, it was weird because his eyes were open. Ooh. I know. Ooh, and then someone stole his brain. Yeah.

But he's really weird. Yeah, but I saw photographs. There's a whole section about JFK. Oh, wow. It's really quite fascinating. Yeah, it's amazing. Yeah, it's good. Yeah, nice.

There's an air con there. The air con had broken broken so it's very hot in there oh god i thought like literally i thought the streets were air conned in america oh no no streets aren't but we that's why you keep going see we love the trick you keep nipping into shops every five or ten minutes so you can just like cool down but um and this is why their capitalist economy is booming because everyone has to buy things to stay cool exactly and live and live yes oh okay nice well glad you had a good time yeah it was great really enjoyed it

yeah I didn't go to Louisiana that's my contribution to this conversation of going to New Orleans I would love to go to New Orleans there out of all the cities in America that's the one I'd like to visit because it's just an exciting pirate haven of a city. I might be thinking historically, but in my head, it's not changed.

Right, okay. We should probably stop talking about New Orleans. I think I've already said thank you for listening, but you know what? Have another one. Thank you for listening, listeners. Yeah, thank you. And thanks for downloading us on everywhere that you do and we'll see you next time goodbye goodbye

okay right well this is uh our 32nd meeting of the plumbers. Quick roll call here. Liddy, I'm here, obviously. Hunt? I'm here. Good, good. McCord? I'm here.

Bond? Yes. Bond? Jimmy? Have you said your name is Jimmy Bond? Yes. Bond? Jimmy, have you said your name is Jimmy Bond? Yeah, what of it? Jimmy, your surname's Clifton. We all know it. Call me Bond.

Clifton, are you here? Yeah, I'm here. Good. Jack, reach... Seriously, who's been at my notes? Stevens? Yes. Billington? I'm here. Jack, reach... Seriously, who's been at my notes? Stevens? Yes! Billington?

I'm here! Jack Danger Mouse. Yes, I am here. And that is actually your name, isn't it? Indeed it is. Okay, right, while we're all here, obviously we all know I need to go and present Operation Gemstone to the AG in half an hour. Now, I know we all agreed that we are going with the kidnap plan. But just before I pitch the kidnap idea, quick brainstorm. Have we chosen the right thing

here? No. Clifton, you do not have the talking copper you bent. There you go. Yes, Clifton. No. What do you mean, no? You don't think we've done the right thing? No. Right, Clifton, if you go...

Slit their throats, slit their throats and make them bleed to death. Clifton, Clifton, Clifton, if you're going to do this, you're going to have to stop putting the voice on. We've talked about this. No more voice, please. We're in a safe zone here. Okay, fine. Okay, right.

Now, we've had a talk. We can't just slit the throats of all Republicans who disagree with Nixon. But they're so abominable. They just make me curse. I know, I know, I know. But who's going to clean up? Help me, Gerard, help me. Who's going to clean up, Clifton? You never help me. Who's going to clean up Clifton?

You never think this through, do you? No. Right, anyway, Hunt, what do you think? I think we use one of the tactical nuclear missiles. It's always tactical nuclear, Hunt. Well, it works. It would work too well, wouldn't it, Hunt? It would work very well, exactly.

Yes, now Hunt, the tactical nuclear option obviously would destroy all dissenting GOP members, but it would also destroy us. Ah, but did I mention they were tactical? Like, almost you put it in your pocket. Yes, yes, you did mention how tactical the nukes are. No, I definitely think... It's basically a firecracker.

I mean, you just let it go, bit of a bang, everyone's a bit startled and then we go clap and go, hurrah. Yes, no, I definitely don't think so. Right, anyone else? Anyone else? Right, Reacher. I mean, Perkins.

Perkins, what do you think? Definitely kidnap? Well, I think we could kidnap a few of them. We could tie them up, put them in bags, and then throw them in the sea. In the sea. Perkins the sea. In the sea, Perkins. Interesting. In the sea.

That way we wouldn't need to go to Mexico. Exactly. Yeah. Put a few bricks in there, they'll sink right down. Okay. Get nibbled by fish. It's a bit like snorkeling. We could say they went snorkeling.

Okay, Perkins. I like it. Are you getting this, Gerald Hunt? Are you getting this? This is what we need. We want, like, thinking outside the box. I like it. Are you getting this, Gerald Hunt? Are you getting this? This is what we need. We want, like, thinking outside the box. Yes, okay. Right, exactly.

Right, okay. So definitely yes on kidnap, but it's now just a question, do we take them to Mexico for the convention, or do we make them sleep with the fishes? Hands up for fish sleeping. Yes, okay. And hands up for Mexico. Okay. That's a tie. It's a tie. So I suppose I'm going to have to call it. I have wanted to go to Mexico for a while, actually, for a holiday. So I'm going to call it for taking them to Mexico.

Thank you very much, gentlemen. I'm going to go and see the AG. I just hope we haven't toned it down too much.