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The Smoking Gun

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  • Bob Haldeman June 23, 1972

    —on the investigation, you know, the Democratic break-in thing, we’re back in the problem area because the FBI is not under control because [L. Patrick] Gray doesn’t exactly know how to control them. And they have—their investigation is now leading into some productive areas, because they’ve been able to trace the money, not through the money itself, but through the bank, you know, sources—the banker himself. And it goes in some directions we don’t want it to go. Also, there have been some things, like an informant came in off the street to the FBI in Miami with—who is a photographer or has a friend who’s a photographer, who developed some films through this guy, [Bernard] Barker, and the films had pictures of Democratic National Committee letterhead documents and things. So he’s got . . . there’s things like that that are going to, that are filtering in. [John] Mitchell came up with yesterday, and John Dean analyzed very carefully last night and concludes—concurs now with Mitchell’s recommendation that the only way to solve this—and we’re set up beautifully to do it, in that the only network that paid any attention to it last night was NBC, who did a massive story on the Cuban—

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  • Richard Nixon

    That’s right.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    —thing. But the way to handle this now is for us to have [Vernon] Walters call Pat Gray and just say, “Stay the hell out of this. This is—there’s some business here we don’t want you going any further on.” That’s not an unusual development.

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  • Richard Nixon

    Mm-hmm.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    And that would take care of it.

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  • Richard Nixon

    What’s the matter with Pat Gray. You mean he doesn’t want to?

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  • Bob Haldeman

    Pat does want to. He doesn’t know how to, and he doesn’t have any basis for doing it. Given this, he will then have the basis. He’ll call Mark Felt in, and the two of them—and Mark Felt wants to cooperate because he’s ambitious.

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  • Richard Nixon

    Yeah. Yeah.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    He’ll call them in and say, “We’ve gotten a signal from across the river to put the hold on this.” And that’ll fit rather well because the FBI agents who are working the case, at this point, feel that’s what it is: [that] this is CIA.

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  • Richard Nixon

    But they’re tracing the money to whom?

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  • Bob Haldeman

    Well they have—they’ve traced to a name, but they haven’t gotten to the guy yet.

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  • Richard Nixon

    Who is it? Is it somebody here?

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  • Bob Haldeman

    Ken Dahlberg.

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  • Richard Nixon

    Who the hell is Ken Dahlberg?

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  • Bob Haldeman

    He’s a—he gave $25,000 in Minnesota and the check went directly in to this guy Barker.

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  • Richard Nixon

    Well, maybe he’s a . . . He didn’t—I mean, this isn’t from the Committee, though; this is from [Maurice] Stans. Committee to Re-elect the President, or CREEP. Maurice Stans was the finance chairman of CREEP.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    Yeah. It is. It was . . . It’s directly traceable and there’s some more through some Texas people in—that went to the Mexican bank which they can also trace through the Mexican bank. They’ll get their names today. And—

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  • Richard Nixon

    Well, I mean, there’s no way that—I’m just thinking if they don’t cooperate, what do they say? That they were approached by the Cubans? That’s what Dahlberg has to say, and the Texans too. [Unclear.]

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  • Bob Haldeman

    Well, if they will. But then we’re relying on more and more people all the time. That’s the problem. And it does stop if we could, if we take this other step.

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  • Richard Nixon

    All right. Fine.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    And they seem to feel the thing to do is to get them to stop.

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  • Richard Nixon

    All right, fine.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    And they say the only way to do that is a White House instruction, and that it’s got to be to [Richard] Helms and, what’s his name? Walters.

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  • Richard Nixon

    Walters.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    And the proposal would be that Ehrlichman [clears throat] and I call them in—

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  • Richard Nixon

    All right, fine.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    And say—

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  • Richard Nixon

    How do you call them in? I mean you just—well, we protected Helms from one hell of a lot of things.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    That’s what Ehrlichman says.

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  • Richard Nixon

    Of course, this is a—[E. Howard] Hunt will—that will uncover a lot of—he had a lot of [unclear] when you open that scab there’s a hell of a lot of things and then “we just feel that this would be very detrimental to have this thing go any further, that this involves these Cubans, and Hunt, and a lot of hanky-panky that we have nothing to do with ourselves.” Well, what the hell, did Mitchell know about this thing [unclear]?

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  • Bob Haldeman

    I think so. I don’t think he knew the details, but I think he knew.

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  • Richard Nixon

    He didn’t know how it was going to be handled though, with Dahlberg and the Texans and so forth? Well, who was the asshole that did [unclear]? Is it [Gordon] Liddy? If that the fellow? He must be a little nuts.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    He is.

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  • Richard Nixon

    I mean, he just isn’t well screwed on is he? Isn’t that the problem?

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  • Bob Haldeman

    No, but he was under pressure, apparently, to get more information, and as he got more pressure, he pushed the people harder to move harder on—

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  • Richard Nixon

    Pressure from Mitchell?

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  • Bob Haldeman

    Apparently.

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  • Richard Nixon

    Oh, Mitchell, Mitchell—is that the point that you made? [Unclear.]

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  • Bob Haldeman

    [Unclear.] Yeah.

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  • Richard Nixon

    All right, fine. I understand it all. We won’t second-guess Mitchell and the rest. Thank God it wasn’t [Charles] Colson.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    The FBI interviewed Colson yesterday. They determined that that would be a good thing to do.

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  • Richard Nixon

    Mm-hmm.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    To have him take a—

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  • Richard Nixon

    Good.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    —an interrogation, which he did, and that—the FBI guys working the case had concluded that there were one or two possibilities: One, that this was a White House . . . They don’t think that there’s anything about the Election Committee. They think it was either a White House operation that had some obscure reasons for it, non-political—

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  • Richard Nixon

    Mm-hmm.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    Or it was a—

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  • Richard Nixon

    Cuban—

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  • Bob Haldeman

    The Cubans and the CIA. And after their interrogation of—

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  • Richard Nixon

    Colson.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    Colson, yesterday, they concluded it was not White House, so they are now convinced it is a CIA thing. So the CIA turnoff would—

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  • Richard Nixon

    Well, I [unclear] Helms [unclear] get that closely involved.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    No, sir. We don’t want you to.

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  • Richard Nixon

    You call him. Good. Good deal. Play it tough. That’s the way they play it, and that’s the way we’re going to play it.

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  • Bob Haldeman

    OK.

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