On Nixon's Madness by Zachary Jacobson

Author:Zachary Jacobson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
Published: 2022-06-15T00:00:00+00:00

6 Madness in Play The “Madman Theory” in Foreign Policy

THEY SAT IN THE CLUTTER of the national security advisor’s office in the basement of the White House as Henry Kissinger dispatched secret instructions to longtime Nixon counsel Leonard Garment. It was the summer of 1969, just months into Richard Nixon’s first term as president. As part of a cultural exchange, Garment would soon be headed for Moscow to attend an international film festival. Kissinger explained that the visit provided the administration an interesting opportunity. The U.S. press had depicted Garment as a Nixon confidant, as a man the president trusted with his word. No doubt the Soviets would test Garment’s knowledge as he made the round of delegations. They would be eagerly fishing for information on the newly installed American leader, his policy stances and his personality. Garment was to meet with Georgy Arbatov, a senior advisor to General-Secretary Leonid Brezhnev. “If the chance comes your way,” Kissinger told Garment, laying out a script, apologize to Arbatov for the president’s sometimes erratic behavior, but then tell the Soviets that Nixon had a “dramatically disjointed personality.” Understandably, the president was “more than a little paranoid because of years of bashing” by his myriad enemies. Kissinger tasked Garment with relaying that the American president was “when necessary, a cold-hearted butcher,” especially toward those who would challenge him to “tests of strength.” Garment should convey that Nixon was a “visionary,” but, the national security advisor added, he should also suggest that Nixon could get a bit out of control.1

Landing in Moscow in mid-July, Garment met first with the U.S. ambassador, Llewellyn Thompson. The high-level diplomat offered a pair of his best notetakers for Garment’s meeting with the senior Soviet adviser, yet Garment demurred. He preferred to be more informal, to go alone. That was not possible, the ambassador objected. It was against protocol. The Soviets were tricky. They would have five people in attendance. Would Garment not want to match their numbers? To have a safeguard? “I have my reasons,” Nixon’s counsel insisted. “I go alone or not at all.”2

Garment later expressed surprise at the scheme Kissinger had worked out for him, but he offered no misgivings, no questioning of the ruse as too dangerous, too far-fetched or screwball for Nixon’s liking. Indeed, he relished the chance to conspire. Garment met Arbatov and his coterie at the Moscow Institute for United States Studies. There were not five to the group but, by Garment’s count, “eight or ten chunky, impressive-looking professionals,” several of whom he judged to be KGB. Introducing himself, Garment quickly related his life story, touching on “my Russian father, the family’s struggle out of poverty, working in the dress factory, my religious awakening[,] . . . early interest in socialism, then music.” He sprinkled in some Nixon-like aphorisms: “All circles can be squared,” and “There is no such thing as contradiction, only a constrained grasp of complexity.” He spoke of his years of legal work with Nixon and their friendship. At

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