The Nixon Defense: What He Knew and When He Knew It

by John W. Dean

  “No, they hadn’t, but they had infiltrated it by a secretary and a chauffeur. There’s nothing illegal about that.” The president agreed, and I continued. “Now, so the information was coming over here, and then the next point in time where I became aware of anything was on June seventeenth,* when I got the word that there had been this break-in at the Democratic National Committee, and somebody from our committee had been caught in the DNC. And I said, ‘Oh, my God, that, I can only—’ you know, I essentially, putting the pieces together—” Nixon rhetorically finished my sentence: “You knew what it was?” I confirmed, “I knew what it was. So I called Liddy on that Monday morning, and I said, ‘Gordon,’ I said, ‘first, I want to know if anybody in the White House was involved in this.’ And he said, ‘No, they weren’t.’ I said, ‘Well, I want to know how in God’s name this happened.’ And he said, ‘Well, I was pushed without mercy by Magruder to get in there, get more information, and the information, it was not satisfactory. Magruder said the White House is not happy with what we’re getting.’”

  “The White House?” the president asked, startled. “The White House. Yeah,” I reported, and Nixon asked, “Who do you think was pushing him?” I told him I did not know. What I did know was the way things worked at the Nixon White House, so I explained that “probably Strachan” thought Haldeman wanted information, because I had seen times when things had gotten into Haldeman’s staff’s tickler system and they pushed and pushed on matters they deemed important that in fact were not. The president noted that the Democrats had just nominated McGovern, which he suggested might have been the impetus. At the time of this conversation I was not aware that on June 17, 1972, Liddy’s prime target had been McGovern’s headquarters, where they were headed after they stopped by the DNC’s Watergate offices to fix the malfunctioning bug they had installed earlier and take a few pictures from the files while there, so I told the president, “I don’t know, other than the fact that they might have been looking for information about—”

  “The convention,” he injected, and I copied what he asserted was the target at the DNC: “The convention.” He affirmed that to be his understanding, “Well, that’s right.”* And I provided the information I had: “Because, I understand, also, after the fact, that there was a plan to bug Larry O’Brien’s suite down in Florida.” I added, “Liddy told me that this is what had happened, and this is why it had happened.” The president sought clarification: “Liddy told you he was planning, where did you learn there was such a plan? From whom?” I was not sure what the president was asking, so he clarified his question. “Where did you learn of the plans to bug Larry O’Brien’s suite?” I answered, “From Magruder, long after the fact.”

  “Oh, Magruder, he knows?” the president said, clearly feigning surprise. “Yeah, Magruder is totally knowledgeable on the whole thing. Alright, now, we’ve gone through the trial. I don’t know if Mitchell has perjured himself in the grand jury or not. I don’t know how much knowledge [Mitchell] actually had. I know that Magruder has perjured himself in the grand jury. I know that Porter has perjured himself in the grand jury.” Again, it is not clear if Nixon had a memory problem regarding Bart Porter or he was affecting ignorance for my benefit when he asked, “Porter?” I answered, “He’s one of Magruder’s deputies. They set up this scenario, which they ran by me. They said, ‘How about this?’ I said, ‘Look, I don’t know. If this is what you are going to hang on, fine.’ But they—” The president cut me off, uninterested in my role in the Magruder and Porter perjury. “What did they say before the grand jury?” he asked. “They said, before the trial and the grand jury, that Liddy had come over as a counsel, and we knew he had these capacities to do legitimate intelligence. We had no idea what he was doing. He was given an authorization of $250,000 to collect information, because our surrogates were out on the road. They had no protection. We had information that there were going to be demonstrations against them, that we had to have a plan to get information as to what liabilities they were going to be confronted with. And Liddy was charged with doing this. We had no knowledge that he was going to bug the DNC.”

  “Well, the point is, that’s not true,” Nixon acknowledged. “Magruder did know that.” I informed the president that his involvement was far more direct: “Magruder specifically instructed him to go back in the DNC.” Nixon, acting surprised, asked, “He did?” Since Magruder himself had admitted this to me, I said, “Yes.” Nixon asked, “You know that? Yeah. I see.” Clearly troubled, the president said, “Okay,” so I added, “I honestly believe that no one over here knew that. I know, as God is my maker, I had no knowledge that they were going to do this.” Nixon added, “Bob didn’t, either,” and then added, “They know you’re not the issue. Bob could have known.” “Bob,” I replied, “I don’t believe specifically knew they were going in there.” The president agreed, and I said, “I think he knew there was a capacity do this, but he wasn’t giving it specific direction.”

  “Strachan, did he know?” the president asked again. “I think Strachan did know,” I repeated, based on information Magruder had given me and Strachan’s reaction in the aftermath of the arrests at the DNC.6 I continued, “Alright, so those people are in trouble as a result of the grand jury and the trial. Mitchell, of course, was never called during the trial. Now—” The president had a question: “Mitchell has given a sworn statement?” I said Mitchell had effectively testified to the grand jury, via an arrangement whereby he actually testified at the Department of Justice and that was read to the grand jury. And the reason he had been called was that the grand jurors wanted him. The president thought that good. “I don’t know what he said,” I added. “I’ve never seen a transcript of the grand jury.” I paused, sighing, for I had a long way I wanted to go and was not making much progress with my narrative.

  “Now, what has happened post–June seventeenth? Well, it was—” I stopped and shifted ground, because I wanted to remind the president that his talk about my supposed investigation was baseless. But I was not about to call him a liar, since for all I knew, Haldeman or Ehrlichman may have told him I had indeed undertaken such an inquiry. Instead, I simply noted diplomatically, “I was under pretty clear instructions—” I chuckled nervously “—not really to investigate this. That this was something that just could have been disastrous on the election if it had been investigated, and all hell had broken loose, and I worked on a theory of containment to try to hold it right where it was.” The president said he understood, and I added, “There is no doubt that I was totally aware what the Bureau was doing at all times. I was totally aware of what the grand jury was doing. I knew what witnesses were going to be called. I knew what they were going to be asked, and I had to. There was just—” The president interrupted, and in doing so indicated he knew how I had stayed informed, “Why did Petersen play the game so straight with us?” Nixon clearly understood that Petersen had been my source of information.

  “Because Petersen’s a soldier,” I answered. “He kept me informed. He told me when we had problems, and the like. He believes in you. He believes in this administration. This administration has made him. I don’t think he’s done anything improper, but he did make sure the investigation was narrowed down to the very, very fine criminal things, which was a break for us. There’s no doubt about it.” Nixon asked, regarding Petersen: “He honestly feels that he did an adequate job?” I answered, “They ran that investigation out to the fullest extent they could follow [they followed the leads], and that was it.” But the president saw a problem: “But the point is, that’s where I suppose he could be criticized for not doing an adequate job is, why didn’t he call Haldeman? Why didn’t he get a statement from Colson?” Then the president remembered, “Oh, they did get Colson.” I confirmed that and explained, “But see, the thing is, based on their FBI interviews, there was no reason to follow up. There were no leads there. Colson said, ‘I have no knowledge of this’ to the FBI. Strachan said, ‘I have no knowledge of—’” I stoppe
d to correct the path of my statement. “You know, they didn’t ask Strachan any Watergate questions. They asked him about Segretti. They said, ‘What’s your connection with Liddy?’ and he just said, ‘Well, I, you know, I just met him over there,’ and they never really pressed him. They didn’t, you know, so Strachan appeared, as a result of some coaching, he could be the dumbest paper pusher in the bowels of the White House,” I said, since all witnesses had been advised they only needed to answer the questions asked. “Right,” the president said.

  I began: “Alright. Now, post–June seventeenth,” I began, then remembered, and was struck by the irony, that a member of my staff had accompanied Liddy to a meeting at Henry Petersen’s office on campaign law matters on Friday, June 16, which I mentioned in passing to the president, and then continued, “After the incident, [Liddy] ran Kleindienst down at the Burning Tree Country Club and told him that ‘you’ve got to get my men out of jail,’ which was kind of a [shocker]. Kleindienst said, ‘Now, you get the hell out of here, kid. And whatever you’ve got to say, just say to somebody else. Don’t bother me.’ And this has never come up,” I noted, but I wanted the president to be aware that his attorney general had understood what was going on from the day after the arrests at the DNC.

  “Yeah,” the president said. When he left it there, I continued, “Liddy said that they all got counsel instantly and said that ‘we’ll ride this thing out.’ Alright, then they started making demands that ‘we’ve got to have attorneys’ fees. We don’t have any money ourselves, and if you’re asking us to take this through the election.’ Alright, so arrangements were made through Mitchell, initiating it in discussions, and I was present, that these guys had to be taken care of. Their attorneys’ fees had to be done. Kalmbach was brought in. Kalmbach raised some cash. They were obv—” Nixon interrupted, indicating he was aware of this activity, saying, “They put that under the cover of the Cuban committee.” Although I had heard a passing reference to a Cuban committee, I did not really know anything about it.7 In fact, not until writing this book did I understand that on June 20, 1972, Nixon had suggested the creation of a Cuban committee to Haldeman to take care of those involved in Watergate. I replied, “Yeah, they had a Cuban committee, and they had—” at which point I stopped, as I did not know what I was talking about, so I returned to what I did know. “Some of it was given to Hunt’s lawyer, who in turn passed it out. This, you know, was when Hunt’s wife was flying to Chicago with ten thousand; she was actually, I understand after the fact now, was going to pass that money to one of the Cubans, to meet him in Chicago and pass it to somebody there.” I had been given this information after the initial reports that she had been carrying the cash for a family investment.

  “Maybe—” the president began, then restarted, “Well, maybe it’s too late to do anything about it, but I would certainly keep that—” he chuckled nervously “—that cover for whatever it’s worth. Keep the [Cuban] committee.” I was talking as the president was sharing his thinking, which caught me off guard, so I decided to make it clear to him that this activity was criminal: “Well, that, that’s the most troublesome post thing, because, one, Bob is involved in that; John is involved in that; I am involved in that; Mitchell is involved in that. And that’s an obstruction of justice.”

  “In other words, the fact that you’re taking care of witnesses?” the president asked. “That’s right,” I said. “How was Bob involved?” the president asked. “Well, they ran out of money over there. Bob had $350,000 in a safe over here that was really set aside for polling purposes. And there was no other source of money, so they came over here and said, ‘You all have got to give us some money.’ I had to go to Bob and say, ‘Bob, they need some money over there.’ And he said, ‘What for?’ And so I had to tell him what it was for, because he wasn’t about to just send money over there willy-nilly. And John was involved in those discussions, and we decided that there was no price too high to pay to let this thing blow up in front of the election.”

  “I think you should handle that one pretty fast. That issue, I mean, that the three-fifty went back to him,” the president said, pushing back and wanting this issue to disappear. I both pulled back and pushed forward by informing him that this problem continued: “But here’s what’s happening right now. What sort of brings matters to the [moment]. This is the one that’s going to be a continual blackmail operation by Hunt and Liddy and the Cubans. No doubt about it. And McCord, who is another one involved. McCord has asked for nothing. McCord did ask to meet with somebody, and it was Jack Caulfield, who is his old friend who’d gotten him hired over there. And when Caulfield had him hired he was a perfectly legitimate security man. And [McCord] wanted to talk about commutation and things like that. And as you know, Colson has talked to, indirectly, to Hunt about commutation. All these things are bad in that they are problems, they are promises, they are commitments, and the very sort of thing that the Senate’s going to be looking for,” I said, but I did not want to sound threatening to the president, so I again pulled back, adding, “I don’t think they can find them, frankly.”

  “It’s pretty hard,” the president agreed. I repeated, “Pretty hard. Damn hard. It’s all cash.” “Well, I mean, pretty hard as far as the witnesses are concerned,” the president observed. “That’s right,” I agreed. But the problems were ongoing and increasingly unsolvable, so I pushed forward. “Now, the blackmail is continuing. Hunt called one of the lawyers from the reelection committee on last Friday to meet with him, over the weekend. The guy came in to see me to get a message directly from Hunt to me, for the first time,” I said, reporting Paul O’Brien’s visit on March 19. “Is Hunt out on bail?” the president asked. I confirmed this and continued, “Hunt now is demanding another seventy-two thousand dollars for his own personal expenses; another fifty thousand dollars to pay his attorneys’ fees. A hundred and twenty-some thousand dollars. Wants it, wanted it by the close of business yesterday. Because, he says, ‘I’m going to be sentenced on Friday, and I’ve got to be able to get my financial affairs in order.’ I told this fellow O’Brien, ‘You came to the wrong man, fellow. I’m not involved in the money. I don’t know a thing about it, can’t help you.’ I said, ‘You better scramble around elsewhere.’ Now, O’Brien is a ball player. He’s been, he’s carried tremendous water for us.”

  “He isn’t Hunt’s lawyer?” the president asked. “No. He is our lawyer at the reelection committee,” I clarified. “I see. Good,” he replied. Reacting to the president’s concern, I assured him, “So he’s safe. There’s no problem there.” Again, though, I had to continue to give him bad news. “But it raises the whole question of, Hunt now has made a direct threat against Ehrlichman, as a result of this. This is his blackmail. He says, ‘I will bring John Ehrlichman down to his knees and put him in jail. I have done enough seamy things for him and Krogh that they’ll never survive it.’”

  “What’s that, on Ellsberg?” the president asked. “Ellsberg and, apparently, some other things. I don’t know the full extent of it,” I answered. “I don’t know about anything else,” the president said, professing his own innocence. I told him, “I don’t know either,” and then, with an uncomfortable chuckle, added, “and I almost hate to learn some of these things.” I then resumed my narrative: “So that’s that situation. Now, where are the soft points? How many people know about this? Well, let me go one step further in this whole thing. The Cubans that were used in the Watergate were also the same Cubans that Hunt and Liddy used for this California Ellsberg thing, for the break-in out there. So they’re aware of that. How high their knowledge [goes] is something else. Hunt and Liddy, of course, are totally aware of it, and the fact that it was right out of the White House.”

  “I don’t know what the hell he did that for,” the president declared, further undercutting in my mind any claim that this Ehrlichman-Krogh-Young-Colson-Liddy-Hunt operation was based on national security needs. When I had no answer, the president asked with a tone of frustration,
“What in the name of God, did that—” As the president was expressing his displeasure, I interjected, “Mr. President, there’s been a couple of things around here that I have gotten wind of. There was at one time a desire to do a second-story job on the Brookings Institute, where they had the Pentagon Papers. So I flew to California, because I was told that John [Ehrlichman] had instructed it, and he said, ‘I really hadn’t. It’s a misimpression, but for Christ sakes, turn it off.’ And I did. I came back and turned it off.” Something in the president’s reaction caused me to pull back; at the time I was not aware that it had been Nixon who had personally ordered the Brookings break-ins.* So I added, “Because, you know, if the risk is minimal and the gain is fantastic, it’s something else. But with a low [I misspoke; I meant to say “high”] risk and no gain, gee, it’s just not worth it.”

  After instinctively softening the blow because of Nixon’s reaction to this tangential matter, I resumed my Watergate narrative: “Well, who knows about this all now? Alright, you’ve got the Cubans’ lawyer, a man by the name of Rothblatt, who is a no-good, publicity-seeking, son of a bitch, to be very frank about it. He has had to be turned down and turned off. He was canned by his own people because they didn’t trust him. They were trying to run a different route than he wanted to run. He didn’t want them to plead guilty. He wants to represent them before the Senate. So F. Lee Bailey, who was the partner of one of the men representing McCord, got in and cooled Rothblatt down. So that means that Lee Bailey’s got knowledge. Hunt’s lawyer, a man by the name of Bittman, who’s an excellent criminal lawyer from the Democratic era of Bobby Kennedy, he’s got knowledge.” “Do you think that he’s got some? How much?” the president asked, undoubtedly thinking of his clemency conversations with Colson.

  But I could only speculate, conservatively, and did: “All the direct knowledge that Hunt and Liddy have, as well as all the hearsay they have.” The president made an unclear comment as I continued. “You’ve got the two lawyers over at the reelection committee, who did an investigation to find out the facts. Slowly, they have gotten the whole picture. They’re, now, they’re solid, but they’re—” Nixon made my point that they were knowledgeable, so I continued to suggest that, not only did all the principals know, but their wives likely did as well, and as an example I used Dorothy Hunt: “Mrs. Hunt was the savviest woman in the world. She had the whole picture together. Apparently she was the pillar of strength in that family before the death.”