Robert G. Nixon Oral History Interview, October 21, 1970

Notice
This is a transcript of a tape-recorded interview conducted for the Harry S. Truman Library. A draft of this transcript was edited by the interviewee but only minor emendations were made; therefore, the reader should remember that this is essentially a transcript of the spoken, rather than the written word.

Numbers appearing in square brackets (ex. [45]) within the transcript indicate the pagination in the original, hardcopy version of the oral history interview.

RESTRICTIONS
This oral history transcript may be read, quoted from, cited, and reproduced for purposes of research. It may not be published in full except by permission of the Harry S. Truman Library.

Opened December, 1978
Harry S. Truman Library
Independence, Missouri

[283]

HESS: Mr. Nixon, let's continue on with the Potsdam Conference.

NIXON: I think I had mentioned what a pleasant voyage this turned out to be.

HESS: There is one point. We have [William M.] Rigdon's log, and we have a list of the President's party. Should we mention some of the men who were on the trip?

NIXON: Well, perhaps briefly.

We've covered Jimmy Byrnes. Fleet Admiral William D. Leahy was along. He had been Roosevelt's Chief of Staff. A remarkable and very able man. During the war, he perhaps was Roosevelt's closest adviser. He then became Chief of Staff to Truman, and continued in that role for a number of years.

I had occasion to phone him one day after

[284]

he retired. It turned out to be very sad. I don't recall why I needed to talk with him, but his aide answered the phone. He said that Leahy was ailing, but Leahy picked up the phone, and we talked a little. I remember that it was a very sad occasion, because Leahy said, "Bob, I'd love to see you, but I can't. I'm very ill and I'm dying." He died shortly afterwards.

Well, he was along, and he was the President's chief adviser on military matters.

Rosenman, Special Assistant to the President, was with us. What part he took in the Conference, if any, I frankly don't know. The reason for him being along was to write a speech for the President, which he undertook on our return trip aboard the Augusta. This was a report to the Congress and the American people on the Potsdam Conference. I'm not sure, but I know that was his obvious reason for going along. Others such as Harry Vaughan and Dick Vardaman, the

[285]

Military and Naval Aides at the time, were along just because they were part of the President's staff. They were just fulfilling the normal role of the Military and Naval Aides. They really were along just for show.

Freeman Matthews, Chip Bohlen, and Benjamin Cohen were all from the State Department. Their role was as advisers to the President. Chip Bohlen's role was a double one. In addition to being the top Russian expert in the State Department, he was also fluent in the Russian language, and he was the President's interpreter at these sessions.

Stalin, of course, conducted everything in the Russian language. They didn't go back to the Congress of Vienna, or earlier international conferences, where the French language was the language of diplomacy. They used their own languages.

Bohlen was a very valuable man. Afterwards

[286]

he was made Ambassador to Russia, which was a continuation of a longtime assignment to Moscow.

Walter Brown was Jimmy Byrnes' errand boy, or aide if you want to call him that. Brown was from Byrnes' home state. Earlier he had been a newspaperman. When Byrnes was made Secretary of State, he hired Brown and put him in the State Department as his assistant. That was his capacity in going to the Potsdam Conference. Also Jimmy Byrnes was going to write a book later, and Brown was along to corral all of the information he possibly could in behalf of Byrnes to be put into this book, which I'm sure Brown had a great deal to do with writing.

The rest of them were just the people you would expect to be along.

For instance, Captain Frank Graham was in the Map Room at the White House from the U.S. Army. He was a Map Room watch officer. He was along in this capacity, but he also worked with

[287]

White House communications.

Lt. William "Bill" Rigdon was along in the capacity of a stenographer. I notice on this list that he's down as personal secretary to the President, which is fair enough, but his function was to take down in shorthand the minutes of meetings. That's the function that he had at the White House and also on any and all of these trips that the President took.

Captain Alphonse McMahon, Medical Corps, U.S. Navy, was personal physician to the President at that time. He very shortly afterwards was succeeded by Wally Graham, who then was a colonel and rapidly became a brigadier general because Truman promoted him. Wally then remained the President's personal physician throughout the rest of the time in the White House. He was from Kansas City, and his father had earlier been physician to Truman. There was a very close attachment there. That is really why the President

[288]

made him his personal physician.

Charlie Ross was Press Secretary to the President. His role was obvious.

Then there are these others, members of the Secret Service. Leahy's aide, Julius Edelstein, who was a lieutenanant in the Naval Reserve; George Elsey, who was then a lieutenant in the Navy and also a White House Map Room watch officer. He later became more and more important around the White House. He had a role similar to Clark Clifford and Charlie Murphy. He is now head of the American Red Cross.

Well, that about covers it.

HESS: I noticed that there were very few newsmen who went along on this particular trip.

NIXON: Oh, that's right.

HESS: Why was it decided to hold down the number of newsmen who went? How was it decided who would go? How are those decisions made?

[289]

NIXON: Well, there are four names here, my own, Merriman Smith of the UP, Anthony Vaccaro of the AP, and Morgan Beatty, the radio announcer with NBC. He was taken along to cover for all the radio networks.

HESS: As a pool man.

NIXON: He was a pool man. This was before the television era came in.

I notice also that Jack Romagna's name is down here as secretary to Mr. Ross. I also see that he remained in England for a visit. That is why Rigdon became the President's stenographer because ordinarily Romagna was the White House stenographer and took all the private minutes of meetings and all the President's top secret papers and dictation and that sort of thing.

The reason that there were only four newsmen aboard was that this was the ordinary order of things. On all the wartime trips that Roosevelt

[290]

made, there were only three newspaper correspondents permitted to go along. They were the representatives of the three news services. I was the representative of International News Service, and then there was the UP and AP. We traveled with the President. That was our role to be with him all the time, wherever he went, and on this occasion, the radio networks were permitted to have a man along.

HESS: Before we move on may I ask you just a general question about your relationship with your principal competitors--the reporters from the other news agencies. Just what was your relationships with those gentlemen?

NIXON: We got along. It was a marriage of convenience. It must be remembered that perhaps there is no more highly competitive business in the world than the newspaper business. The three news services were intensely competitive. Each tried to beat the other, twenty-four hours a

[291]

day. Each worked completely independently. The relationships, under these circumstances, depended upon the individuals. Despite the competitive atmosphere, some were pretty nice guys. Some could be quite the reverse. It was a throat cutting business most of the time. I don't think it would be right for me to mention any personalities. If I mention the good guys in the white hats, I'd have to mention the bad guys in the black hats; so I had better drop it there.

HESS: I think in our chronology of our trip to Potsdam, we are pretty well to Europe. What do you recall about the events after the ship reached Europe?

NIXON: As I said yesterday, this was a most unusual route that we followed across the Atlantic. It was right over the top of the globe, just a straight line out of Norfolk. It was many, many hundreds of miles away from any of the shipping lanes.

[292]

Incidentally, there would be no German U-boats there, whatsoever, had any remained. I am sure that is the reason this route was chosen. You see, the U-boats hovered in the shipping lanes.

Anyway, when we came into the English Channel off the south coast of England, around Plymouth, it was a beautiful, crystal clear, bracing morning. We were met there by an escort of destroyers from the English fleet. It was quite impressive. All of the personnel on the destroyers "lined the rail" in their Sunday best, shoulder to shoulder in their colorful uniforms, along the main deck of the destroyers from bow to stern. Salutes were exchanged. The panoply of vessels from two fleets meeting each other were gone through.

We went on up through the Straits of Dover past the White Cliffs of Dover. We went on then into the Scheldt, which is the river approach to Antwerp. We got to Antwerp, and who was on the

[293]

dock but Dwight D. Eisenhower. Standing there on the dock alone awaiting for the President to arrive. He came aboard and was greeted by the President, and they went off to the President's cabin for a chat.

Antwerp had been bombed considerably. But the destruction didn't seem to be too heavy in the port we saw. In other words, it was still an operational port and an operational city, though heavily damaged.

We then left by motor car for Brussels. The President traveled in a White House car with the top down. We were met there (in addition to Eisenhower) by a man in mourning coat and striped trousers and top hat. He really looked a little ridiculous. He, of course, was our own Ambassador to Belgium, Charles Sawyer. Truman later made him Secretary of Commerce. After all this, he turned on Truman, as so many others did.

From Antwerp to Brussels, was about thirty-five

[294]

or forty miles. The entire route was lined (a few yards apart, on both sides of the road) by American soldiers standing at attention.

We went immediately from Brussels out to the Army airfield. The President got in one Air Force plane, and Byrnes got in another one. This was a separation in case of accident. They took off immediately for Berlin, landing at the Gatow Airfield, which had been a Luftwaffe airfield adjacent to Potsdam. We lost them there. The rest of the party had to wait for a plane to be brought up. There was a lot of air movement, so it took some time for the airways to be cleared for us to take off.

I remember it was a dreadfully hot day. We were cooped up in a DC-3. When we finally took off the pilot of the plane, a young Air Force colonel, invited me to come up and sit in the pilot's cabin with him in the copilot's seat. With the windows open on both sides, I finally

[295]

got some fresh air and cooled off. I felt sorry for the other men, who couldn't be up there.

We flew in a very short while across Belgium into Germany. I remember he asked me if I would like to take a little tour. I was not adverse to it at all. So, he then flew us all over the Ruhr, this great industrial valley of Western Germany.

This, without a doubt, was the most appalling sight that had ever met my eyes. Our Flying Fortresses and the British air force Lancasters, had literally pulverized Western Germany, the industrial part. At Cologne, the great cathedral was purposefully spared. The freight yards were almost adjacent to this great and magnificent gothic cathedral and the big station was there, but everything else was a shamble.

The railroad tracks were a great snarl. It looked like somebody had thrown great coils of barbed wire around, but they were torn and

[296]

twisted and thrust into the air in great semi-circles of twisted metal two and three stories high. The entire Ruhr (and this is a vast area), was in the same condition. Destruction was everywhere.

We flew up the Rhine from Cologne. It was the same thing. The young pilot was flying at just around a thousand feet, which is almost on the ground, so we got a very detailed and graphic look at this destruction. After this trip, which took hours, we headed across Germany for Berlin. I remember we flew over what had been two cities.

The roofs of the houses and buildings in smaller German towns were tiled. They were molded tiles very similar to the types of tiles the Spaniards use on their houses. Some were golden yellow, others were brick red. One town, had had yellow tile on the roofs and as we flew over there was nothing left, except in one instance a

[297]

great splotch of yellow where the bombs had pulverized, not only the buildings, but the tiles.

From the air Berlin reminded me of one of those graphic drawings that illustrates Dante's inferno. Here was one of the largest and oldest cities in Europe, just an utter shambles. Berlin had had one of the finest subway systems in Europe. Block after block of the streets that had been over the subways were just great gorges in the earth between a few standing walls of the buildings that had been gutted by bomb destruction and fire. Where the streets had fallen in on top of the subways, from two thousand feet in the air, you could smell the effluvia of the unburied dead. It was a ghastly sight. Even though the Germans had been our foe, it sort of wrenched my heart. They brought it on themselves. They followed Hitler. It was just too bad, millions dead.

[298]

Again this nice Air Force colonel was having a ball himself. He took us on quick tours, flying us around over the city to let us see this ghastly sight. Then we landed at Tempelhof, the principal Berlin airport.

We got in Army jeeps and went out to a suburb near Potsdam where we were quartered in very fine German homes that had been taken over on a street called Katerinastrasse. Press headquarters had been set up there by the Army. We were some distance from the President's villa and Potsdam proper, but close enough to be readily accessible.

Stalin, as I recall, had not arrived. He was in one of his moods. He wasn't about to be the first on the scene. These big shots really are strange.

There's a story told about the head of state who attended the Congress of Vienna. I believe this was the peace conference held to slice up Europe after Napoleon was finally defeated at Waterloo.

[299]

As the story goes, the Chiefs of State from five countries met in this place in Vienna. It was found that there were only four doors going into the room, but there were five Chiefs of State. So, before the Congress could begin their deliberations, they had to have a fifth door cut through the wall so that no one would be in a position of lesser degree than the others. This in a sense was what was going on there at Berlin.

Stalin decided he was going to be the last one to arrive, which meant in their strange fashion that he was the real big shot. Truman and Churchill, with Attlee, had already arrived. It was a couple of days before Stalin came on the scene. Meanwhile, Truman had a ball, and I'll be glad to tell you about it.

Truman was a restless man and liked to be on the move. He was full of beans and energy most of the time. When he learned that Stalin

[300]

hadn't arrived, he took off for a blue plate special tour of ruined Berlin. This gave us our first level view of the ruins of Berlin.

The Russians had brought in bulldozers and cleared a few streets. Everything before this had been impassable. The rubble from these destroyed buildings were two and even three stories high on either side of the streets that had been cleared. We went all through Berlin, where it was passable. First we went to what had been Hitler's headquarters, the Reich Chancellory. This was very close to the Brandenburg Gate.

Truman went into Hitler's headquarters, which was only partially in ruins. Large areas of some of the floor had collapsed. I remember particularly, the large inner circular room, just beyond where Hitler's quarters were. The floor was partially down. He had to walk around a narrow ledge thirty or forty feet to get beyond it.

[301]

We went out into the yard, I guess you'd call it. This was really a vast area of central Berlin with gardens, buildings, and palaces. It was a very elaborate layout. Goering's quarters were in this great area, as was the SS Secret Police headquarters. In other words, this was the center of the Hitler regime.

We went out into the side court where you could still see the blackened spot where Hitler's body had been burned by his aides after he had shot his mistress and then shot himself. You could also see where Goebbels poisoned his children and wife and killed himself. This took place in the immediately adjacent bomb shelter, which went deeply underground. Truman didn't want to go down in the bomb shelter, and none of us did. There were Russian guards on duty anyway.

I believe I still have a photograph of Truman and Byrnes in the car with the top down,

[302]

outside of the entrance to the chancellory.

Then we toured other parts of Berlin. The Brandenburg Gate was all scarred from Russian artillery fire. In the once beautiful park, that lay beyond the Brandenburg Gate, there wasn't a tree left standing. Weapons were still lying around.

I remember seeing some of the strange devices that the Russians had. They were small, steel, treaded, box like contraptions, trailing an electric cable. These were sent by the Russian troops over the land to where the Germans were or to where a German tank would be, to blow it up.

HESS: Remote control?

NIXON: Yes.

I climbed the roof of the Reich Chancellory, which was pretty badly damaged, and this was three or four stories above the street. I went up

[303]

to get a view around. Unexploded Russian rockets were still sticking through this concrete roof. These little rockets reminded me of the small rockets we used in our anti-tank rocket launchers, only they were larger and the Russians called them Katushkas. Katushka being a girl's name.

We saw the ruins of the Reichstag.

Everybody in the party, including Truman was glad to be able to get a firsthand look at what had happened--Berlin having been taken by the Russians.

HESS: Do you recall any comments that Mr. Truman may have made during this tour?

NIXON: No, I really don't. Most of the time he and Jimmy Byrnes were sitting together in the car. When I was able to stand immediately behind the car, they were just chit-chatting. I may have made a note of this at the time, but it's too long ago.

[304]

Let's see. There was something.

Sitting in the car outside of the entrance to the Reich Chancellory, Truman said to Byrnes and the others of us around: "The destruction is really terrible isn't it, but they brought it on themselves." Yes, I do remember it now.

After this grand tour, the President and Byrnes returned to their villa. The villa that had been turned over for American use by the Russians at Potsdam. It seems to me that the following day, there was still no Stalin.

So, this time we took off to review our troops. We had not taken Berlin; we stopped by agreement on the Elbe.

HESS: What's your opinion of that? Do you think we should have taken Berlin?

NIXON: Well, that is a great question isn't it? As events transpired, it would have been better had we taken it. But, I sympathized with the

[305]

decision, and I'll tell you why.

This was a military decision and not a political decision. You have to know the full facts of what was going on. Here were two great powerful armies approaching each other from opposite fronts with the remains of the German army caught in between them. We had to prevent an accidental clash between our own army and our ally's army.

That was the situation, and that is why this decision was made. At Yalta it had been decided that there would be three occupation zones for the three armies, plus the French who were given a part of ours.

HESS: We had no ironclad guarantee of access to Berlin.

NIXON: That is where our diplomatic people failed in their responsibility.

HESS: At this time in history, do you recall that

[306]

being mentioned?

NIXON: Apparently it never occurred to anybody. Roosevelt felt that this was tacitly understood. If you (and let's carry it a little further) have agreed that the American army, the British army, and the Russian army shall jointly occupy Berlin, then it goes without saying, that under that agreement, you will have access to Berlin. I am positive that is what went on in their minds. It never occurred to anyone that we might be shut off from Berlin. We had the corridor then.

Why did he let the Germans take Berlin? Well, Eisenhower has had his own latter day explanation. He explained in his book the military reasons surrounding it. They are easily accessible.

As I was saying, Berlin was to be jointly occupied, but the Russian zone of occupation was there in the east. Therefore, it was left

[307]

to the Russians to take Berlin. We were to stop on the Elbe, which we did. It's not too far from Berlin.

As I say, actually three great armies (Eisenhower's, Montgomery's, and the Russians) coming together with the foe being pressed between them, and with all the weapons of war being used, how are you going to prevent a clash of allied armies closing in on the foe. You have to have a stopping point.

At that time, the Germans weren't fighting us anymore. They were coming back in droves and surrendering through sheer fright of the Russians. They feared that they might not be killed, but taken captive by the Russians. The shooting had really stopped on our part at the Elbe, while the Russians were crushing the remainder of the German army in Berlin. There, after that, the shooting stopped. So, there were no untoward incidents as might otherwise have happened.

[308]

Also, remember that Roosevelt, on his way back from Yalta had pointed out that the Russians were our allies. And, as he said, "You have to trust your allies. You have to believe in them. They have to believe in you."

Thus, mistakes are made in history, but hindsight is a wonderful thing. Especially if you're the opposition political party, having had none of the responsibility for making these decisions. The people with no responsibility are the ones who are the greatest critics of those who had to make the decision.

The Russians had cleaned up the remains of the fighting in Berlin. All you had to do was look around and see how fierce it was. There was tremendous destruction.

An armored division of our own was brought in from the Elbe for a review. This armored division looked good. They were lined up with their new Pershing tanks and artillery and all

[309]

the panoply of an armored division: vehicles, ammunition carriers, heaven knows what all. They were all lined up along the Autobahn. You would never have thought that they had been in battle. Knowing that they were going to be reviewed by the President, all of these vehicles were just as clean as a pin. They had been completely refurbished. They had been repainted. They had been sprayed with army green. The yellow star identified our armor and other vehicles. All of the troops and officers were in spanking clean new uniforms, even their helmets had been resprayed with paint. In other words, here was an armored division on parade as they would have looked at home, without a sign of the grime of battle.

The President, and I guess Byrnes was along with him, in an open car drove up and down past this armored division that was sprawled out really for miles along the Autobahn. That was his second day of waiting for Stalin to arrive.

[310]

When this was over with, back he went to Potsdam to his villa. I went back to my villa to write my dispatch to be sent back home.

It was the next day that Stalin arrived. The conference began in the former Crown Prince Wilhelm's villa, Sans Souci. Before the conferences began, there were protocol visits back and forth: Stalin to Truman, and Stalin to Churchill, Truman to Stalin, Truman to Churchill. My recollection is that while they were waiting for Stalin to get off of his pot and get there for the meeting, that Truman and Churchill had taken advantage of the delay in Stalin's arrival to get acquainted themselves.

As we know, the relationship between Churchill and Roosevelt was extremely intimate. They had met repeatedly during the war--with Churchill flying back and forth in the bombay of a British bomber in what he called his siren suit. But this was the first direct contact between Truman

[311]

and Churchill. Both were anxious to look the other over and get acquainted. While waiting for Stalin, they were having luncheons and dinners. Then Stalin arrived and the conferences started.

Stimson, who was Secretary of War, came over. It was while he was there that he received a message from Washington, which said: "Baby is born."

Stimson then went to Truman and said, "Mr. President, we have exploded an atomic bomb successfully at Alamogordo in the New Mexico desert."

This was the realization of the long, more than two billion dollar search, to bring this incredible explosive into being. After Roosevelt's death Truman was sworn in, in the Cabinet Room at 7:09 p.m. by the Chief Justice. Stimson, later in the evening, had come to Truman and related, very briefly, the facts about the

[312]

search to bring this atomic bomb into being.

In his role as head of this war investigating committee, Truman had, unknowingly, gotten on to this search for the atomic bomb. His investigators had found out about these enormous expenditures in Washington State and at Oak Ridge in Tennessee. Nobody knew what was going on. At least, nobody in Congress knew. This was one of the most carefully kept secrets of the war. It was kept from everybody but the Russians.

HESS: Had you, as a newsman here in Washington, heard anything about this?

NIXON: Only in a very indefinable way.

HESS: What had you heard?

NIXON: I knew that something big was going on. It had been suggested to me in the lobby of the White House one day in a conversation. I can't remember with whom. It was implied that there

[313]

might one day be a new powerful weapon created by fission--the splitting of the atom.

This, frankly, didn't mean anything to me. I had majored in chemical engineering at Georgia Tech. I was familiar with the Einstein theory, upon which the splitting of the atom was founded, which came into being, I believe, in 1922. Anybody in chemistry or physics knew about the Einstein theory. Remember it was a theory, not a fact. When I was in England, early in the war, I had known about the German search to split the atom with heavy water, and what was going on in Norway where there were sources of tremendous hydroelectric power which was needed for that type of thing. I knew why the British had carried off all of those hit and run raids into Norway. They raided Narvik and Tromso and heaven only knows what other cities. I knew about the bombing that was going on in Norway, and I knew they were after the heavy water

[314]

plants. In theory none of this was new to me at all.

So, my reaction to this little discussion was, well here's more theory. I didn't have any information that we were about to get it. It was a carefully kept secret. When these rumors got to Truman, as head of this committee, he talked to Stimson. In effect he said to Stimson, "What's going on? Here's all of the stuff that I get, and I don't know what it means. What's going on?"

Stimson said to him, "Senator, this is one thing that I'm going to have to call a halt on and not tell you. At the same time, I'm going to have to ask you to let it lay. Stop any investigation that you're making. Don't do anything further. I ask you to do this as a matter of complete national security.

Stimson, as I say, was there in Potsdam at the meeting. When he received this telegram

[315]

on July 16, he went to the President and told him that we had an atomic bomb and that it could be used against Japan. As it turned out after the war, when facts began to come out, we had only had two bombs, beyond the experimental one that was touched off in the top of that tower in the New Mexico desert. They were both subsequently used.

HESS: What is your personal opinion, do you think those bombs should have been dropped?

NIXON: Well, here again, no one is entitled to make snap judgments about these things, as to should it have or shouldn't it have. The answer has to come in knowing what the facts were., not in hindsight. We were engaged in a war against a double foe. We were fighting for our national life. The President had been told, he told me later, by his advisers (General George Marshall, the Army Chief of Staff,

[316]

and others), that if we had to invade Japan proper, the Island of Honshu, that we could expect to lose a million men. Now this was the military estimate.

It had been learned, in the fighting to take over that lower Japanese island, that the Japanese were fierce, and that they were going to make a last-ditch stand. As Truman was told, we could expect to lose another million American boys. Well, that's a pretty big loss isn't it?

Truman had to make the decision. But he asked the opinion of his top people. He told me coming back on the Augusta after the first bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, that every person that he had talked with had said, "Yes, drop the bomb." George Marshall, and every one of Truman's advisers had said, "Drop the bomb."

HBSS: Did he imply or state that there had been any serious discussion not to drop the bomb?

[317]

NIXON: No.

Truman said he was given this advice in order to end the war. As he said, "To save the lives of a million American boys" who would be lost if they had to invade the Island of Honshu. This was to compel the Japanese surrender before there was an invasion, which, incidentally, had already been wrapped up. I forget at the moment the date. But we had set the date for the invasion. I think it was around October 15.

HESS: The name of that proposed invasion was the Olympic Coronet.

NIXON: I never knew the code name.

Truman said the same thing for the reasons that the Russians were brought into the war against Japan. Afterwards there was a great deal of criticism. Many people said it wasn't necessary at all. Well, George Marshall thought it was necessary. Chester Nimitz thought it was necessary.

[318]

The military mind, of course, doesn't take anything for granted. Until the foe surrenders, if they are still fighting with all of their power, you don't have any guarantee of victory on your part. They may smash you. So, Truman told me that Marshall and others had said, "Yes, get the Russians into the war."

This couldn't be done until after the German surrender. The reason was very simple--military logistics. The Russian army was fighting in Western Europe. The Japanese Islands are half way around the world, thousand upon thousands of miles away. There was a one-track railroad running from Moscow to Vladivostok.

I never thought the Russians were needed. This gave Russia the right to increase their possessions in the Pacific area. But, why not? I felt we wouldn't have to ask the Russians to join us. When things were cleaned up with Germany, if it was to their national advantage

[319]

to join us in a war against Japan, they would. They didn't have to be asked. If they didn't, they wouldn't. So, there you are.

Anyway, this particularly came true after the atomic bomb was dropped. But who knew that that would happen? I understood, initially, that the agreement was made at Yalta that the Russians would come into the war against Japan three months after the surrender of Germany.

Well, coming home on the Augusta, Truman told me this same thing: Stalin had agreed that Russia would come into the war against Japan approximately three months after the German surrender and this would be August 8. And the Russians did enter the war.

HESS: Exactly three months after V-E Day.

NIXON: Yes. That's right, May 8th to August 8th. So, they did carry out one of their agreements.

HESS: When it was to their benefit.

[320]

NIXON: That's the way a nation has to work. Self interest is a powerful thing.

But Truman said, "Bob you can't use it. When we get home, you mustn't write this until I give the official word on it." So, here I was, nursing a story in my bosom of tremendous magnitude. Because Russia coming into the war against Japan was important, but I kept the faith.

On the same day Stimson told Truman about the successful explosion, Truman, Stalin, and Churchill met around the conference table. (Truman told me this on the way home on the Augusta.) When the meeting broke up at the end of the day, Truman said, "I walked over to Stalin and said to him, 'Generalissimo, we have a new weapon. A very powerful weapon."'

Stalin didn't seem to be surprised at all. As we learned afterwards, the Russians knew what we were after, and everything about it, down to the complete blueprints.

[321]

Anyway, Truman said, "Stalin didn't seem surprised at all. He just asked, 'What are you going to do with it."'

Truman said, "I said, 'I'm going to win the war with it."' And that was it.

I have read other accounts that differ in some degree, but this is what Truman told me in his own words coming back aboard the Augusta.

HESS: What other events come to mind when thinking about Potsdam, and events in Germany? Have we pretty well covered the Potsdam Conference?

NIXON: All the problems that were covered, or partially covered, have all come out and have been discussed one way or another. There's no need for me to try to go over them because they've all been printed by others who attended these conferences. Mind you, I didn't attend any of these conferences. I was there to report what I could of the events around the conference.

[322]

No one outside of those attending the conference knew what was going on. My first information about it was from a very carefully worded joint communiqué put out by the three governments around midnight after the last session of the conference.

HESS: On the trip back, the President stopped in Plymouth, England. He visited King George, is that correct?

NIXON: Yes, that is right.

But first, during this conference, Stalin had an attack of diplomatic illness in the middle of the conference. He was piqued by something, or he had his own reasons for wanting to slow up the conference. It was on this occasion that we flew down to Frankfurt and went up into the hills for this luncheon and meeting with Eisenhower. It was at this luncheon that Truman, with his then adjulation of Eisenhower, had told Ike, "If you'd like to be President,

[323]

there's an election coming up in 1948, and I'll help."

HESS: Did Mr. Truman tell you about this?

NIXON: Yes, later.

I remember now what I wanted to say in connection with the way the conference operated. Truman came away from the Potsdam Conference a very frustrated man. They had spent days and days trying to get a postwar structure for peace. Truman said that the non controversial areas were easily covered, but any time anything came up about the future of Poland, Czechoslovakia, Austria, or reparations, Stalin would stall and suggest that it be referred to the Foreign Ministers.

Here were three heads of state sitting around a table, when one objected to a settlement it could either die or be referred to the Foreign Ministers. The only way to keep it alive, as

[324]

Truman said, was to "refer it to the Foreign Ministers."

The net result was that Stalin was exercising his right of veto on almost everything of importance, and they were getting nowhere. So, Truman came away from Potsdam in complete frustration. Some of the things that he said about Stalin on the Augusta coming back, were not too polite.

HESS: What did he say?

NIXON: The upshot of it was, that Stalin was a stubborn, obstinate man. You just could not get anywhere with him. You could tell from what Truman was saying that he didn't like the way Stalin had acted.

Mind you, Truman was put in an untenable position with all this vetoing going on. Here were two strong-willed people (Stalin and Churchill) pulling and tugging at each other for

[325]

years of war. They had made Roosevelt the chairman of these past round table meetings, and at the first meeting at Potsdam, they agreed that Truman should be the chairman of the conference.

You know what a chairman does. His job was to introduce subjects. So, apparently, almost every time Truman would try to do something, Stalin would politely, but firmly, oppose it. They just were getting absolutely nowhere.

As I've said before, the Potsdam Conference was just more or less a continuation of the Yalta Conference. So, Truman was a very frustrated man when he was coming back across the Atlantic. He had had great and high hopes of something really getting accomplished at Potsdam.

HESS: What did he have to say about his impressions of Mr. Churchill and Mr. Clement Attlee?

NIXON: Well, frankly, that's just a blank to me.

He was a great admirer of Churchill. There

[326]

was a British war leader of such great stature and strength, and Truman looked up to him.

I don't recall what he said about Clement Attlee, except that in the middle of the conference Churchill left, and Attlee took over.

HESS: Do you recall anything in particular about the stop in England and the visit between Mr. Truman and King George?

NIXON: Yes. When the conference broke up, Truman flew directly to Plymouth.

The plane I was on flew to London and stopped there briefly before going on to Plymouth. We were then taken in RAF jeeps, or sedans, over to Plymouth where the President was aboard the Augusta. King George VI, a tall fine looking man in middle life, was aboard the British battleship King George V. King George came over in a launch to call on the President, and the President presented him

[327]

an autographed photograph of himself. King George had also brought along an autographed photograph of himself for Truman.

Truman took King George for a tour of the Augusta. I remember I was standing along the side and as Truman passed me with the King, he punched me in the ribs and grinned. You don't get to see kings every day, especially if you are a farm boy from Missouri.

Then Truman and the King went over for a visit to the King George, the battleship. This was an exchange of visits. They visited with each other and talked and chatted. Then Truman came back to the Augusta, and we started home.

That about wraps up the Potsdam phase of it, but not the troubles that were to come later.

HESS: That's right. The Augusta got back on August the 7th. What comes to mind when you look back on V-J Day?

[328]

NIXON: Well, by this time it was becoming increasingly apparent that the war was over. Truman announced that the first bomb had been dropped while we were aboard the Augusta. As a matter of fact, he went into the enlisted men's mess to make this announcement. (I was having lunch in the officer's ward room.) It was only after he went to the enlisted men that he came into the officer's ward room and made this same announcement in a rather prim fashion, it seemed to me.

It was so obvious that he was dealing with something that he didn't know very much about. Who did? But he was using phraseology that was completely strange and new to him, as it was to everybody else. They had prepared ahead of time a lengthy press release from which he read. I remember, that he said: "We have chained the power of the sun," and "we have made an atomic bomb, and it has been dropped on the

[329]

city of Hiroshima in Japan. One bomb, with the power of 20,000 tons of TNT has destroyed an entire city." The phraseology sounded like clichés, which he had no part in putting together, but from which he was taking his announcement.

With the mention of the atomic bomb having the power of 20,000 tons of TNT, a number of these young lieutenants and ensigns later jumped from the table, went to their quarters, and came racing back with slide rules so they could mathematically figure out what this really was.

HESS: How big of a blast it was.

NIXON: I remember any number of them said, "This means the surrender of Japan. It just has to be all over." No one, of course, except those who had built this bomb, knew that there were only two of them. And that, I might add, included the Japanese. They didn't have any

[330]

idea whether we had one or one thousand.

HESS: That's why the secret was so well-kept.

NIXON: If we could drop two of them, they had to assume that we could destroy every city they had. It became obvious they had to surrender. Like Churchill had said a long time earlier: "If Hitler is able to split the atom, it's all over." That's the only thing that would have made the British surrender. Hitler would not have hesitated to destroy London, completely, and everything else in England. Except he would have saved the industrial centers for his own use. Wherever the civilians were concerned, he would have had no hesitancy. As a matter of fact, in some of the speeches that he made during the war, both he and Goering hinted at new, devastating weapons that were in the making. As it turned out, these were the V-1s and the V-2s. But they were trying to split the atom

[331]

to make atomic warheads for their rockets.

The following day the Russians came into the war against Japan, dead on schedule. This to me was the finale. Japan had to surrender. Two of its cities had been destroyed by atomic bombs, and now the Russian hoards were turned loose on them.

HESS: Just one on that day, because the second bomb was the following day on the 9th.

NIXON: Well, yes. Thanks for reminding me.

The accumulation of the two bombs and the Russians in the war all within three or four days, made it obvious. They did surrender on the 14th.

HESS: What do you recall of Mr. Truman's announcement of the surrender?

NIXON: It seemed to be becoming increasingly obvious that it was all over. The Japanese would have

[332]

to surrender. But they did not have to surrender. Remember we were planning an invasion of Japan, and this was what Truman was trying to avoid. The Japanese had proved themselves to be a very obstinate foe. So, as far as we knew, they could have gone right on down to the end with our having to invade the main island of Japan. However, the events seemed to indicate an early end.

On the afternoon of the 14th, I was keeping very close watch on the White House lobby. (It's been changed since. It's been closed off.) But at that time I saw Admiral Leahy come in from the downstairs steps and go into the President's office. Other high brass also showed up. Things were beginning to stir and bustle. Normally the White House lobby, is a quiet place, not much coming and going. So, when I saw these characters heading unobtrusively for the President's office, I went to my telephone in the White House press room. Since then, they have put in a partition there at the end of the lobby so you can't see

[333]

people go back and forth. It wasn't Eisenhower, but I would guess it was Kennedy who had the partition put in.

I went to my phone, and asked for Bill Hutchison, our bureau chief. I said, "Well, Bill, you can expect the surrender of Japan any time now. You might as well get set for it. I'll be on the phone flashing the story."

About an hour later, I guess it was, a press conference was called. The small group (and it was a very small group), of newsmen who were there, went into the President's office and stood before his desk. He was surrounded on both sides by almost every important top person in the Government.

The President announced that the Japanese had surrendered. It was very brief. We burst out of the side door of his office, racing for our telephones to flash the story around the Nation. I suppose there was a communiqué with it; there always was, but that's a little detail that I

[334]

don't even recall, because it was minor. The important thing to remember was the President's announcement of the surrender of Japan. That was a stupendous thing because that was the end of the war. The fighting was over. It had been going on for three months after the Germans surrendered.

HESS: What seemed to be the atmosphere in Washington when the news reached the general public?

NIXON: It's hard for me to recall. My recollection is that when the President announced the surrender of Germany on May 8th, there was this tremendous gathering of people outside the White House fence on Pennsylvania Avenue and in Lafayette Park, and everybody went crazy. They were acting almost like they were drunk. They were so happy and overcome. There was just tremendous public acclamation. It seems to me Truman even went out on the White House lawn and waved to

[335]

the people, but I just don't recall.

When the Japanese surrendered, I have no recollection of this same thing going on or not. It may have, but it must be remembered that I was a pretty busy fellow. I was in a telephone booth in the White House press room churning out, as fast as I could dictate, literally thousands of words, which takes time. If there was a celebration, by the time I was able to leave the White House that evening, it had subsided. Apparently the reason I don't have any recollection of it, was because I was indoors getting an important piece of work done which required some time.

I couldn't leave the White House until Charlie Ross put "the lid" on. That meant the business of the day was done. After the President had gone to his private quarters in the White House, and the events of the day ended, I could leave.

[336]

Regardless of the hour of the evening, I never left the White House until I had the assurance from Charlie Ross that it was safe to do so until the following morning. If anything untoward happened, and there was any reason for my being there, I would be telephoned by the White House switchboard at my residence.

It's a confining way to live. It meant that you spent your evenings in your own home without daring to go out like normal human beings do. You spent your days in the White House. But you have to do this. They have to have access to you.

Actually, the scene in the President's office, was quite similar to the scene on May 8th when he announced the surrender of Germany.

I remember on that afternoon, I came racing out of the President's office, and through the lobby, and I slipped and flipped completely over, landing on my left shoulder,

[337]

fortunately with my head under me out of the way. I tore an enormous rip in my jacket, but I had enough momentum behind me that I just rolled right over, got up on my feet, and got on into the press room to my telephone booth.

It's interesting to speculate on this atomic bomb thing. What would have happened had the initial bomb been exploded in New Mexico, not on July 16th, but several months earlier. Would it have been used against Germany?

HESS: What's your opinion? Many people from Asia do not think so. They think that we would not have used it on a white European nation, but we would use it on a yellow Oriental nation.

NIXON: I am confident that they are entirely in error. I'm not just guessing at this either. You have to base your judgments on your knowledge of what had been recommended to the President, the way the minds of the military worked, what

[338]

George Marshall thought and believed was necessary.

Both Roosevelt and Churchill regarded the defeat of Germany as the primary objective of the war. Had this atomic bomb come into being earlier, I have complete confidence that the bomb would have been used. Let us remember that there was no diminution of the German fighting until they were in effect destroyed. A few months before the May 8th surrender, nobody was predicting that the war was going to be over that soon.

HESS: As I recall, didn't the Germans have jet aircraft that were almost ready for flying?

NIXON: They were not just almost ready. They were ready and were used. Our Air Force bombers in England came back from bombing Hamburg or someplace one day and said, "My god, airplanes without propellers." They had only a few of them. They had not entered mass production,

[339]

but these tremendously high speed jet fighters were knocking down our Flying Fortresses all over the place and not being touched themselves because of the speed.

HESS: I seem to recall a photograph in Life magazine just showing the interior of a factory with jets. I believe Life estimated that they would have been ready to fly in two weeks. There were a number of jets that would have been in the air in two more weeks.

NIXON: It seems to me that I was told that these were underground factories, too. The German war machine was not smashed by any means. In December they had come out with what proved to be their final offensive, the Battle of the Bulge. They almost made it. They hoped to sweep up to Antwerp and split the British army on the north., and the American Army on the south. They almost made it. The weather

[340]

contributed and so forth. Very bitter weather and no air power.

Germany was the primary objective, and the attitude of the military was to use everything that we had to bring the Hitler forces to their knees. I have every confidence that we would have used the atomic bomb had it been available several months earlier. What it would have been used on, that's another matter. Somebody else would have had to decide that. We had wrought great destruction on Berlin, but really nothing like the destruction we saw in the end at Potsdam. A great deal of that was done by Russians in fighting into the city.

HESS: Their house-to-house fighting.

NIXON: Yes, and heavy artillery is a lot more effective than bombs because you know what you're going to hit with heavy artillery. Bombs just splatter. You're going to hit something.

[341]

It may not be what you're trying to hit, but it's going to cause a lot of destruction. So, I think the Asiatics who take that attitude, probably are very wrong. Mind you, Roosevelt would have been alive. Roosevelt would have been in command. There again, you have to guess at what he would do. But I have no doubt in my mind what the recommendation of the military would have been. Our Air Force and the British air force had wrought devastation all over Germany. But mind you there were still industrial cities largely intact. We didn't pick Tokyo for the two atomic bombs there. Tokyo was their capital. What we picked were industrial cities. The bomb was supposed to knock out their war machinery, not to kill civilians, but you can't do one without the other.

Roosevelt, before he died, was fully acquainted with the progress on the atomic bomb. He was the one who had authorized the expenditure of over two billion dollars. Churchill had sent all of his

[342]

atomic scientists over to this country to help to put it into being. This was really a British achievement as much, or maybe more, than an American achievement. We provided the wherewithal to do it, under conditions of complete safety. The British were being bombed. Not just London was bombed, but every industrial center. They had no area in this tiny little island of England where they could pursue this, nor did they have the wherewithal. Their economy was really shot. They had to live off of us. Had it not been for us, and for Roosevelt, they wouldn't have made it. That is why I was trying to point out the devastating blow that Truman's early ending of lend-lease was to these people.