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"Eisenhower made one flat statement. He said, 'We are certainly not going to fight a ground war in Europe.' But then he went on to say, 'What possible good would it do to send a few thousand more Americans to Berlin, even a few divisions? After all, there are 500,000 Soviet and German troops in East Germany and 175 Soviet divisions in that neighborhood.' [Nixon repeats "in that neighborhood" with relish.] Somebody brought up nuclear weapons. Eisenhower then went off on a monologue about how senseless nuclear war was. He didn't see how nuclear weapons could free anything. He gave the impression they were so destructive, so terrible. Naive readers of the transcript of that press conference will think that Eisenhower was ruling the Bomb out, because it was so terrible. At the end of the conference, someone raised the nuclear question again, and Eisenhower just closed the conference by saying the United States will stand by its commitments. 'We will do what is necessary to protect ourselves.'
"People asked, 'What in the world are we doing? [Nixon feigns bafflement.] We're not going to send in ground forces. Eisenhower speaks disparagingly of the possibility of using nuclear weapons. What does it all mean?' Four days later, testimony before a Senate subcommittee by Air Force General Chief of Staff [Thomas] White was released. White told the Senators that the Berlin crisis could lead to a general war with the Soviet Union and 'nuclear weapons have to be used.' [Nixon relaxes, delighted.] The Russians back down."
He notes that Berlin met all the conditions of successful nuclear diplomacy. He draws a comparison to the Berlin crisis of 1961, which resulted in the building of the Berlin Wall: "Khrushchev backed down with Eisenhower, and went forward with Kennedy." He attempts to emphasize that he is not criticizing the way Kennedy handled the 1961 situation, but then he points out that Kennedy capitalized on the term missile gap in the 1960 campaign, in which he defeated Nixon. "Maybe Khrushchev believed it." Nixon adds that there was no missile gap in 1960. "We actually had a 15-to-l advantage in strategic missiles at the time of the '62 Cuban missile confrontation. But the 'missile gap' phrase got people worried. Americans are sitting fat and happy on the ultimate weapon, and suddenly they think, well, maybe it isn't always going to be that way."
On the Cuban missile "complication," he focuses on the abilities of Khrushchev, with whom Nixon was linked in the public mind since the publicized "kitchen debate" at the American Exhibition in Moscow in 1959. He rates Khrushchev "the most brilliant world leader I have ever met." That brilliance was manifested, he says, in Khrushchev's having nurtured a reputation for rashness and unpredictability. "He scared the hell out of people." Yet he was the kind of leader, Nixon believes, with whom nuclear weapons were relatively safe--unlike "a nut like Gaddafi." As for those who now say that America's nuclear superiority in 1962 had nothing to do with Khrushchev's backing down, "Don't kid yourself."
But this time nuclear diplomacy worked both ways, he says. Khrushchev backed down, but Kennedy agreed to take U.S. missiles out of Turkey. He also agreed to "quit supporting anti-Castro forces stationed in the United States." Now, according to Nixon, the usefulness of the fear of nuclear retaliation was beginning to wear thin.