A Secret Service agent had already: Trainor Secret Service report; interviews with Giordano, Gens, and DeAtley about what route the procession took to the OR.
Ben Aaron had informed: Interview with Aaron; Nancy Reagan, My Turn, p. 6; Deaver transcript, which provides the basis for the dialogue between Aaron, Mrs. Reagan, and Deaver. Aaron confirmed it.
clasped his left hand: Gens diary.
took his place at Reagan’s: Interview with Edelstein; The Saving of the President. Edelstein had arrived at home with his wife and their newborn son just an hour or so before his pager went off and he learned the president was in his emergency room. He then raced to the hospital.
“Watch your legs”: Gens diary.
might be bleeding to death: Speakes, Speaking Out, p. 10.
Reagan spotted: Interview with Baker; Nofziger notes.
“I love you”: Nancy Reagan, My Turn, p. 6; interview with Gens.
Only a few minutes: Interview with Kobrine.
“You have to save him”: Interviews with Kobrine and Sarah Brady.
“God damn it, I told”: Interview with Kobrine.
Ben Aaron adjusted: Interview with Aaron; The Saving of the President.
“I just put a chest tube”: Interviews with Dr. Michael A. Manganiello and Giordano.
Parr had put his scrubs: Interviews with Parr, other Secret Service agents, and various doctors and nurses.
Parr noticed a windowed observation deck: Timothy Burns Secret Service report.
A nurse squeezed: The Saving of the President.
“We’re going to be putting”: Interview with Lichtman.
“I hope you are all Republicans”: Interviews with Giordano, Aaron, and Gens.
An ophthalmologist was summoned: Interview with Manganiello; Gens notes.
Lichtman began the: Interview with Lichtman.
just after 3:08 p.m.: OR circulating record.
An hour earlier, Richard Allen: Interview with Allen; Allen notes.
The complex had been built: Interview with Michael K. Bohn, former director of the Situation Room, and author of Nerve Center: Inside the White House Situation Room. The Situation Room is technically in the White House basement but has windows that look out on the lawn between the West Wing and the Old Executive Office Building.
no other televisions or even a phone: Allen had at least one secure telephone installed in the room as the day wore on.
At about 3:15 p.m., Allen: Allen notes; Allen brought a personal tape recorder into the room and began recording at 3:24 p.m.
the hospital’s phone lines: Interviews of participants and Secret Service reports; Secret Service agent Patrick Miller, a supervisor in the Washington field office, told inspectors that agents encountered “significant problems … with telephone and radio communications.” The “telephones available at the hospital were overburdened to the extent that they were virtually useless on many occasions,” the report said. “He in fact recalls having attempted to use the phone where there was no dial tone. The phones appeared to be dead.” As the day wore on, communications improved, especially between the Situation Room and a command post established at the hospital.
had heard from Jim Baker: According to Allen’s notes, Baker called at 3:17 p.m. That was more than fifteen minutes after Reagan was taken to the operating room but still nine minutes before the belly tap began. I suspect that Baker and Meese did not want to alert anyone to Reagan’s surgery until it had officially started.
“Remind me to tell you a sensation”: Allen tapes; Allen notes.
Jim Baker knew that the administration: Interview with Baker.
“We have this information”: Television video footage of press briefing.
He had ordered that a heart bypass machine: Interview with Cheyney.
2.275 liters of blood: Gens notes; Aaron reflection.
Joe Giordano asked for: Interview with Giordano.
12: A Question of Authority
At about 3:30: Interview with Allen; Allen notes and Allen tapes. Caspar Weinberger arrived at about 3:30 p.m. He was late, in part, because he had sent his military driver on an errand for his wife, according to Bobby Inman, a former navy admiral and deputy director of the CIA. Inman and his driver gave Weinberger a ride to the White House.
Meese reported: Interview with Allen; Allen notes. At times, Allen put his tape recorder up to the phone’s receiver.
He then reminded Weinberger: Weinberger memo, RRPL. In relaying this conversation in his memo, Weinberger wrote: “He then said to me, ‘Under these circumstances, it is my understanding that National Command Authority devolves on you.’ I said that I believed the chain started with the Vice President. Ed Meese said the Vice President was on a plane in Texas, which was being diverted back to Washington and that it would take him approximately two hours to get here. I asked about the communication to the plane, and which plane it was, and Ed said that he did not know but he did not think there was secure communication. He mentioned again the chain of leadership under the National Command Authority and I confirmed I was the next in line after the Vice President.”
The National Command Authority is distinct from the order of presidential succession. The details of National Command Authority are classified but generally concern procedures that “cover certain delegations from the president to the vice president and the secretary of defense in the event of specific circumstances,” according to a memo drafted by White House counsel Fred Fielding the day after the shooting.
Concerned that they might need the: The football contains the nuclear war plans and attack options; the laminated code card has a series of alphanumeric codes that the president uses to authenticate his identity in the event he wants to launch a nuclear weapon. If the president cannot be reached, the military finds the next person in the chain of command—the vice president and then the secretary of defense, who also have authentication cards. The FBI seized Reagan’s card when it collected evidence from the hospital. This set off a fight between FBI agents, who considered the card to be evidence, and military officers, who wanted it back because it was a national security secret. The FBI took the card and put it in a safe. It was eventually returned to the military after Attorney General William French Smith mediated the dispute. The clash became public in December 1981, when the Washington Post published a story about the FBI’s seizure of the card. Fischer said in an interview that he was questioned by FBI agents at the hospital after the shooting. During the interview, an agent pulled the nuclear code card out of a plastic bag and asked Fischer what it was. “It is critical to national security and it should immediately be turned over to the military aide,” Fischer responded. When the FBI agent pressed for more information, Fischer simply told the agents that the card was classified and they did not have the necessary clearances to possess it.
The agent took off his shoe, put the card in it, placed the shoe back on his foot, and left the room.
Just as Allen and Weinberger: Allen tapes.
John Hinckley, leaning: Interview with Stephen T. Colo.
It was 3:50 p.m.: Interview with Colo; Colo Secret Service reports.
The agent said nothing: Testimony of Colo at a pretrial evidence suppression hearing.
Colo tracked down Eddie: Interview with Colo.
At 5:15 p.m., FBI agents: FBI reports and time line.
Richard Allen, however: Interview with Allen.
some of Reagan’s closest: Martin Schram, “White House Revamps Top Policy,” WP, March 22, 1981, p. A1.
raising the unlikely prospect: Interview with Baker. Numerous newspaper and wire service stories detailed Haig’s comments about Latin America in the weeks preceding the shooting. Haig even threatened to “go to the source” of arms shipments from Cuba to El Salvadoran guerrillas. White House advisors were upset that Haig “placed public emphasis on El Salvador as the bulwark of the Reagan stand against communism at a time when Reagan was trying to place public emphasis on his economic program,” the Washington P
ost reported on March 26, 1981.
he wasn’t happy either: Haig details his displeasure with White House staffers in Caveat. Allen showed me extensive notes he took of conversations with Haig in the days and weeks before and after the shooting in which the secretary of state sharply criticized Reagan’s top White House aides.
he’d nearly resigned: Haig, Caveat, p. 146.
Afterward, Reagan: Reagan Diaries, p. 29; Haig, Caveat, pp. 147–48.
Haig was concerned: Interview with Goldberg, who shadowed Haig for most of the day and was one of his closest advisors; Haig, Caveat, p. 156.
Haig was shocked: Interview with Goldberg.
watched saline solution: Interviews with Gens and Giordano.
He’d never seen: Interview with Gens.
“Does anybody know”: Interview with Gens; Gens tape-recorded interview with Pekkanen, 1981.
Gens checked the Pleur-evac: Gens diary; interview with Gens.
2.6 liters: Gens diary; Aaron reflection; interviews with Gens and Aaron; anesthesia record.
The office was so cramped: Gens diary; interviews with Gens and Giordano.
Nancy Reagan found: Interview with Sarah Brady.
The first lady then followed: Interview with Opfer; interview with O’Neill, the doctor who suggested the chapel; interview with Marie Miller, an executive coordinator at the GW medical library, who used to work down the hallway from the chapel and described it to me.
“All we can do is pray”: Interview with Opfer.
A little later, Sarah Brady: Interviews with Opfer, Sarah Brady, and Baker; Nofziger, Nofziger, p. 294.
Baker and Meese left: Interview with Baker.
Olson, the assistant attorney general: Interview with Theodore Olson.
There were no precedents: Interview with Olson. In describing the Twenty-fifth Amendment and its history, I relied on John D. Feerick’s The Twenty-Fifth Amendment. The first transfer of authority from a president to a vice president under the Twenty-fifth Amendment came when President Nixon resigned in 1974 and Vice President Gerald Ford took over, according to Feerick, the country’s leading authority on the amendment. Without the Twenty-fifth Amendment, Ford would never have been in position to become president. Nixon utilized the amendment in 1973 to nominate the Michigan congressman to replace Spiro Agnew, who had resigned. Ford was then confirmed by a majority vote of both houses of Congress, a requirement under the Twenty-fifth Amendment.
Before the Twenty-fifth Amendment was ratified in 1967, the office of the vice president remained vacant until after the next election. Although the Twenty-fifth Amendment was not invoked on March 30, 1981, Reagan became the first president to use it to temporarily transfer power to his vice president. In 1985, while undergoing surgery to remove a cancerous polyp from his colon, he shifted presidential authority to Bush. In his letter to the Speaker of the House and the president pro tempore of the Senate informing them of his decision, Reagan did not specifically invoke the Twenty-fifth Amendment. In fact, he went out of his way to say that he did not believe the amendment was meant to deal with “such brief and temporary periods of incapacity.” He added that he did not want to set a precedent for other presidents by invoking the amendment in such a situation. Even so, he followed all of the requirements necessary to transfer power to Bush under the amendment. Feerick said in an interview that “there is no question” that this was the first official transfer of power from a disabled president to a vice president. In his memoirs, Reagan wrote that he had indeed invoked the amendment. When Reagan signed the letter transferring authority to Bush, he told Fielding: “Tell George that Nancy doesn’t come with this.”
Sitting at the conference table: Interviews with Fielding and various other former White House officials.
“He’s on the operating table”: There is a distortion on Allen’s tapes at this point in the recordings. This is the only time where Allen and I disagree about what was said in the Situation Room. Allen believes that Haig says, “He’s not on the operating table.” And then Gergen responds, “He is on the operating table!”
Fielding turned to his right: Allen and Fielding recall exchanging glances at this moment.
13: “I Am in Control Here”
At about 4:30 p.m.: Interviews with Giordano, Gens, and Aaron; Gens notes.
Adelberg boldly asked: Interview with David Adelberg.
Aaron was determined: Interview with Aaron.
admired his physique: Interviews with Aaron, Cheyney, and Adelberg.
he could see the lung: Interviews with Aaron and Cheyney; Aaron reflection.
he scooped out: Aaron reflection.
the hole puzzled him: Interview with Aaron.
“He’s right upstairs here!”: Darman, Who’s in Control?, p. 51.
“Is the president in surgery?”: Transcript of briefing, RRPL; video of briefing on various television networks.
growing increasingly frustrated: Interview with Lesley Stahl.
in “over his head”: Casey memo, RRPL.
“What’s he doing up there?”: Ursomarso memo, RRPL.
For Haig, this was: Haig, Caveat, p. 159. Haig’s recollections of events in Caveat are inaccurate at times but provide insights into his thought process before he dashed to the press room.
Gergen and Ursomarso: Interview with Gergen; Ursomarso memo, RRPL.
Allen was stunned: Interview with Allen.
The secretary of defense was baffled: Weinberger memo, RRPL. The exchanges among the various officials in the next few paragraphs are drawn from White House memos, Regan’s For the Record, Weinberger’s Fighting for Peace, and Darman’s Who’s in Control?
the nearest sub could: Weinberger explained this conversation with the general to the other officials in the Situation Room, according to Allen’s tapes. Weinberger also wrote about his discussion with the general in Fighting for Peace, pp. 87–88.
“Al, are you listening?”: Allen tapes.
was not the sort to back: Weinberger, by all accounts, was a fierce bureaucratic infighter, and he rarely lost such battles. A fan of Winston Churchill, the defense secretary hung on his wall a partial quotation from the British prime minister: “Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty.” He was also very close to Reagan. The president called him “my Disraeli,” a reference to another British prime minister.
At 3:25, the plane had: Treasury report.
scribbling that it: Copy of card, GBPL.
he wondered aloud: Diary entry of Rep. Jim Wright, provided by Wright.
The pilots and Secret Service agents: Interviews with Orchard and Pollard.
Bush’s military aide and a Secret Service agent: Interview with John Methany, the military aide.
By 4:10 the: Treasury report.
lobby the vice president: Interview with Pollard; Bush, Looking Forward, pp. 220–22; Untermeyer diary.
Bush then dictated: Copy of message, which arrived at 4:50 p.m., RRPL.
Aaron eyed a clock on: Interview with Aaron.
They pumped several other: Anesthesia record.
an anesthesiologist carefully: Interview with Lichtman.
Cheyney and Adelberg took: Interviews with Cheyney and Adelberg.
“I think I might call it quits”: Interview with Aaron; Aaron reflection.
At one point: Interview with Cheyney.
“Having a good time, Ben?”: Interviews with Lichtman and Aaron; The Saving of the President.
his anxiety grew: Interview with Aaron.
ashtrays scattered: Photos of Situation Room, RRPL.
sipped Coke, coffee, and Sanka: Allen tapes.
Fielding had obtained the presidential succession: Interview with Fielding; Allen tapes; Darman, Who’s In Control?, p. 53; copies of succession letters, RRPL.
In Darman’s view: Darman, Who’s In Control?, p. 53.
in his view, Fielding: Interview with Baker.
Don Regan, the: Regan memo; Regan, For the Rec
ord, p. 187. Word of Brady’s death quickly spread from the Situation Room to Capitol Hill, where reporters learned about it. Within minutes, all three major networks were erroneously reporting that Brady had died. Max Friedersdorf, Reagan’s congressional liaison, describes the sequence of events in an oral history with the Miller Center (October 2002).
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