A Savage Game of 20 Questions

"It will be like throwing red meat into the lions' cage," a Washington correspondent predicted, imagining the mood of President Nixon's then still-to-be-scheduled first press conference since Watergate blew up into a major scandal. When the President finally summoned reporters to a confrontation at San Clemente last week--after deciding, out of some mysterious love of surprises, to give scarcely an hour's notice--they were ready to pounce. The result was the most grueling public interrogation of a President in memory.

Hardly had the newsmen scrambled to the Western White House compound when the President appeared and announced, with a quiver in his voice, that his old friend Bill Rogers had resigned as Secretary of State and that Henry Kissinger was being named to replace him. Normally, such news would have prompted numerous follow-up questions. This time, having been deprived of presidential give-and-take for so long, the reporters ignored Nixon's announcement and zeroed in on stories that they thought he had been avoiding. Of 20 questions put to the President --some with a hostility that bordered on rudeness--no fewer than 16 involved Watergate and directly related matters. Two others concerned Vice President Spiro T. Agnew's legal troubles, another concerned assassination attempts, and a final query centered on the Cambodian bombing. Of this single-mind-edness, the President complained at one point: "We've had 30 minutes of this press conference, and I have yet to have, for example, one question on the business of the people." The extraordinary implication was that the Watergate scandal is somehow not the business of the people--and the press. Nevertheless, in fielding one question after another about that business, Nixon gave not an inch. The highlights:

ON His SECRET TAPES. Nixon said that both John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson had had "the capability" for taping conversations. Implying that he had early recognized the possible risks of compromising confidential conversations--his principal argument now in refusing to give up tapes relating to Watergate --Nixon said that he had originally ordered the taping system dismantled. On the advice of aides, he said, a system was later reinstalled to provide a record for the future.

ON IGNORING GRAY'S WARNING. Nixon said that he could not remember the exact words that Acting FBI Director L. Patrick Gray had used when Gray warned him that certain White House aides were trying to "mortally wound" the President by interfering with the FBI'S investigation of Watergate. Nixon implied that he had not regarded the phrase, if it was used, as particularly significant, and he added that he thought Gray was referring to the possible danger of compromising a CIA operation. That was why, he said, he simply told Gray to press on with the investigation. ON THE HALDEMAN PLAYBACK. Nixon contended that former Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman heard only one presidential tape after his resignation. Nixon did not explain why Haldeman was permitted to have possession of several other tapes during the same period, as Haldeman has testified he did. Moreover, the President offered no reason why his former aide should be any more entitled than the Ervin committee or the courts to review "absolutely correct" data.

ON MITCHELL'S SILENCE. Nixon said that former Attorney General John Mitchell had "expressed great chagrin" for his failure to run "a tight enough shop [at the Committee for the Re-Election of the President, of which Mitchell assumed command in April 1972], and that some of the boys, as he called them, got involved in this kind of activity." But as to why Mitchell had failed to give him a complete accounting of the Watergate breakin, Nixon claimed, somewhat oddly, that this was understandable because if Mitchell had spoken out, "I would have blown my stack --just as I did at Ziegler the other day." The reply brought a round of laughter; it also enabled Nixon to escape further interrogation about the incident.

ON THE OFFER TO JUDGE BYRNE. CBS's Dan

Rather got into a verbal joust with the President. (Rather: "I want to state this question with due respect to your office ..." Nixon: "That would be unusual.") Why, Rather continued, had he and John Ehrlichman summoned Judge Matthew Byrne to San Clemente to discuss Byrne's possible appointment as FBI director at a time when Byrne was presiding over the Daniel Ellsberg trial? Said Rather: "You are a lawyer. Could you give us some reason why the American people should not believe that that was at least a subtle attempt to bribe the judge?" Nixon replied tartly, "I would say that the only part of your statement that is ... accurate is that I am a lawyer." He then attempted to explain the incident by saying that then Attorney General Richard Kleindienst had recommended Byrne as the best man for the FBI job, and that Byrne had made the decision to discuss it.

ON THE INVESTIGATION OF AGNEW. Nixon expressed confidence in Agnew's "integrity" but refused, as before, to provide a blanket endorsement of his second in command (see page 24).

ON BREAK-INS. Since Nixon had explicitly authorized a 1970 intelligence plan that included illegal break-ins and mail surveillance, he was asked whether, if he still served in Congress, he would consider impeachment proceedings against a President who had thus violated his oath of office. Nixon bristled, but held his temper in check. Citing the President's "inherent power to protect the national security," he denied that he had violated his oath of office. Furthermore, he charged, "burglarizing of this type took place" during both the Kennedy and Johnson Administrations and yet "there was no talk of impeachment." Nixon declared that Robert Kennedy, as Attorney General, had authorized far more national security wiretaps than were authorized under either the Eisenhower or Nixon Administrations.

Because records of such activities are highly dubious, there is no way to verify the President's numerical claims. Nixon was factually correct in maintaining that frequent burglaries occurred during previous Administrations. What he failed to mention, however, is that the great majority of the missions were undertaken by the FBI without the knowledge or approval of either the President or the Attorney General. The FBI'S "bag jobs" were mostly attempts to obtain material to break the codes of foreign governments (inevitably, the agency imbued its own efforts with a code name: the Anagram Program) or to tap the telephones of organized-crime figures. Some of the burglaries directed against Mafia types were authorized by various Attorneys General, but J. Edgar Hoover apparently never revealed the full scope of FBI burglarizing to his many bosses. Hoover eventually decided in 1967 that surreptitious entries should be discontinued because they posed more of a risk to the FBI's reputation than he wished to take.

The last question, another rude one, was whether Nixon felt he owed "an apology to the American people" for lying about the bombing of Cambodia. Nixon snapped: "Certainly not." He added: "I think the American people are very thankful that the President ordered what was necessary to save the lives of their men and shorten this war --which he found when he got here, and which he ended." On that ringing note, he closed the press conference, walking briskly away even as U.P.I.'s Helen Thomas was uttering the traditional words "Thank you, Mr. President."

Most Unsatisfied. Throughout the cut and thrust, Nixon tried determinedly--and for the most part successfully --to appear unruffled by the reporters' tactics. He even assured them that "I'm not criticizing the members of the press, because you naturally are very interested in this issue [Watergate]." However, he reiterated his contention that the story has been overemphasized.

Asked whether he still had the capacity to govern, Nixon said that "to be under a constant barrage--twelve to 15 minutes a night on each of the three major networks--tends to raise some questions in the people's minds with regard to the President." Furthermore, he said, "most of the members of the press corps were not enthusiastic" about his reelection, and as a result, some were trying to "exploit" Watergate.

Certainly Nixon failed to add enough new information to what he had previously said about Watergate to satisfy most reporters. Clark Mollenhoff of the Des Moines Register and Tribune, who worked for the Nixon Administration until mid-1970, called Nixon's performance a "snow job." But White House aides were delighted. "It was all I hoped it would be and more," said one. Another bragged: "The Old Man obviously handled himself superbly." Some newsmen agreed. "He added nothing new," said James Deakin of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, one of Nixon's harsher questioners. "But to borrow a phrase from John Ehrlichman, I suspect it'll play in Peoria." Aides said that the President was so pleased with his performance that he may soon invite the press back for more.

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