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Pentagon Papers DOD Files, FBI Files, Nixon Tapes & Court Documents

Vietnam War Pentagon Papers DOD Files, FBI Files, Nixon Tapes & Court Documents
 
8,968 pages of Pentagon Papers, FBI files, court documents, Kissinger transcripts, grand jury testimony, summaries of press coverage, along with Nixon audio recordings and an audio recording of Supreme Court oral arguments in the case New York Times v United States, and more.

United States-Vietnam Relations, 1945-1967 

"Report of the Office of the Secretary of Defense Vietnam Task Force United States – Vietnam Relations 1945-1967" was written by the OSD (Office of the Secretary of Defense) Vietnam Task Force. In 1967, Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara ordered a full-scale evaluation of how the United States became involved in the Vietnam War. The formation of a study team of thirty-six persons was organized and one year later they completed a forty-seven volume report containing 4,000 pages of documentary evidence and 3,000 pages of analysis. 

The 47 volume study traces the role of the United States in Vietnam from the 1940's, but primarily focused on the evolution of war during the administrations of Presidents Kennedy and Johnson. The study showed that the Johnson Administration was secretly escalating the conflict in Vietnam while misleading Congress, the American public and U.S. allies. The disclosure solidified opposition to the war and in many increased mistrust of government.

Daniel Ellsberg, a RAND Corporation employee and former Defense Department economist who had grown disillusioned with the war, copied major portions of the study and then turned them over to the press. However, the publications of the report that resulted from these leaks were incomplete and suffered from many quality issues. A forerunner of the WikiLeaks document disclosures, publication of the Pentagon Papers started a national discussion on freedom of the press and government transparency. On June 13, 1971, the New York Times began publishing the papers, and the Nixon Administration immediately sought to stop further publication.

In addition to action in the courts, Nixon's plumbers, seeking to fix the leaks, broke into the office of Daniel Ellsberg's psychiatrist.

The Supreme Court ruled in favor of the New York Times and the Washington Post by affirming a lower court decision that the government had not met its "heavy burden" of showing a justification to block publication of the Pentagon Papers.


The collection contains:

Pentagon Papers

The complete 7,000 page report with no redactions. Includes all material that was not available before June 2011, approximately 2,400 pages. This copy of The Report is the exact study Leslie Gelb presented to then Secretary of Defense Clark Clifford on January 15, 1969. It includes all the supplemental background-documentation. This release includes the complete account of peace negotiations, significant portions of which were not previously available either in the House Armed Services Committee redacted copy of the Report or in the Gravel Edition. Contains the entire section Part VI. Ellsberg and Russo did not leak Part VI of the Report, which describes various negotiating initiatives.



FBI Files Cross-references

48 pages of FBI file extracts dealing with the release of the Pentagon Papers, and the break in of the office of Dr. Lewis J. Fielding, Daniel Ellsberg's psychiatrist. Files include a memo concerning Walter Cronkite's interview with Daniel Ellsberg while Ellsberg was in hiding, a November 19, 1975 memo on contacting Miami Cuban sources about rumors of a plot to assassinate newspaper reporter Jack Anderson and Daniel Ellsberg, and biographical sketches of subjects involved in the Fielding break-in.



J. Edgar Hoover Official & Confidential Pentagon Papers FBI File

The 18 page J. Edgar Hoover Official & Confidential Pentagon Papers File. FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover maintained in a safe in his private office a collection of FBI files he found to be special. These records were segregated from the regular FBI files, to prevent unauthorized access to the sensitive information contained in them. After Director Hoover's death, his personal secretary, Helen Gandy, destroyed many of his "secret" files. These files concerning the Pentagon Papers leak and Daniel Ellsberg were in a folder among the 15,000 pages of Hoover's "Official and Confidential" files that survived.



President Richard Nixon Secret White House Recordings

Three hours and thirty-seven minutes of Nixon secret recordings in which we hear the President discuss the release of the Pentagon Papers, Daniel Ellsberg, the New York Times, and legal proceedings of New York Times V United States, dating from June 13, to June 30, 1971. Includes conversations between Nixon and Henry Kissinger, H.R. Haldeman, John Ehrlichman, Alexander Haig, John Mitchell, Charles Colson and Secretary of State William Rogers.

In February 1971, President Nixon began secretly taping conversations and telephone calls in several locations, including the Oval Office, his office in the Old Executive Office Building, the Cabinet Room, and Camp David. 



Henry Kissinger Telephone and Meeting Transcripts

189 pages of Henry Kissinger Telephone and Meeting Transcripts containing conversations about the Pentagon Papers.

As national security adviser (1969-1975) and secretary of state (1973-1977), Henry Kissinger had staff members transcribe many of his phone conversations and exchanges during in person meetings. This collection contains approximately 70 phone conversations and meetings in which aspects of the Pentagon Papers leak was discussed.

The participants in the conversations include: National Security Advisor and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger; President Richard Nixon; President Lyndon Johnson; White House Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman; Secretary of State William P. Rogers; Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird; Former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara; White House counsel and Assistant to the President for Domestic Affairs John Ehrlichman; Journalist Jack Anderson; White House Press Secretary Ronald Ziegler; Soviet Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Dobrynin; New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller; HUD Secretary George Romney; Special Assistant to President Johnson, Joseph Califano; and President Johnson's National Security Advisor Walt Rostow.

Highlight among the transcripts include:

June 14, 1971 - Memorandum of Telephone Conversation - Henry Kissinger tells Secretary of State William P. Rogers that he never received a copy of, nor did he know of the existence of the secret Defense Department history of the Vietnam War, later to be commonly referred to as the "Pentagon Papers."

June 14, 1971 - Memorandum of Telephone Conversation - President Nixon and Henry Kissinger hold a brief conversation concerning the leak of the Pentagon Papers.

June 15, 1971, 8:15 AM - Memorandum of Telephone Conversation - Henry Kissinger and Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird discuss the Pentagon Papers leak.

June 15, 1971, 7:20 PM - President Nixon and Henry Kissinger discuss asking members of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board to make public statements against the leaking of the Pentagon Papers.

June 16, 1971, 12:55 PM - RAND president Henry Rowen tells Kissinger that he believes Daniel Ellsberg is responsible for leaking the Pentagon Papers.

June 16, 1971, 3:04 PM - William Jorden, former assistant to Walt W. Rostow who was President Lyndon B. Johnson's national security adviser, Jorden at the time of the phone conversation was aiding Johnson with writing his memoirs, he informed Henry Kissinger that Lyndon Johnson did not want to be involved publicly in denouncing the Pentagon leak of secret Defense Department history, but suggested other courses of action.

June 17, 1971, 7:40 PM - Memorandum of Telephone Conversation - Kissinger tells President Nixon that he should not push former President Johnson to conduct a press conference regarding the release of the Pentagon Papers. Nixon responds by telling Kissinger to discuss the issue with Walt Rostow, who was President Johnson's national security advisor.

June 18, 1971, 1:50 PM - Memorandum of Telephone Conversation - Henry Kissinger and H.R. Haldeman discuss whether Lyndon Johnson should make public statement about the Pentagon Papers leak.

June 21, 1971, 1:56 PM - Memorandum of Telephone Conversation - John Ehrlichman speaks with Kissinger on developments regarding pursuing a restraining order to prevent publication of the leaked Pentagon Papers.

June 23, 1971, 11:25 AM - Memorandum of Telephone Conversation - Former President Lyndon Johnson tells Kissinger that he is concerned that his (Johnson's) book could contain classified information and that it should be reviewed so any such material could be removed.

June 28, 1971, 3:42 PM - Memorandum of Telephone Conversation - Time magazine correspondent Jerry Schecter is told by Kissinger that a quote used by Time from Daniel Ellsberg alluding to Kissinger's "racist" comment is false and threatens to deny Schecter information in the future.

August 6, 1971, 6:00 PM - Washington Post White House correspondent Don Oberdorfer asks Henry Kissinger to clarify the impact of the Pentagon Papers on Kissinger's July 1971 visit to China.

September 21, 1971 10:50 AM - Memorandum of Telephone Conversation - Henry Kissinger complains to John Ehrlichman about publication of Pentagon Papers by Congress.

May 15, 1973, 9:23 AM - Memorandum of Telephone Conversation - Theodore White and Henry Kissinger discuss portions of White's book on Richard Nixon related to Watergate scandal, Daniel Ellsberg, Kissinger's opinion of Nguyen Van Thieu, and Kennedy administration; they also discuss impact of Watergate on public opinion of President Nixon and on devaluation of U.S. currency overseas, and Kissinger notes W.W. Norton & Company's censorship of Marvin and Bernard Kalb's book about Kissinger.

June 5, 1973, 9:08 AM - Henry Kissinger briefs Jack Anderson on timeline of leak of Pentagon Papers, Kissinger's secret trip to China, and meetings held to plan wiretappings; Kissinger asserts he was not aware of wiretapping plans.



Transcript of President Nixon's Grand Jury Testimony Taken on June 24, 1975

On June 24, 1975 Watergate Special Prosecution Force (WSPF) lawyers questioned former President Nixon. The subjects covered and record in these 132 pages of transcripts include the leak of the Pentagon Papers and Daniel Ellsberg.

In May 1975, the Watergate Special Prosecution Force (WSPF) decided that it was necessary to question former President Richard M. Nixon in connection with various investigations being conducted by the WSPF. Former President Nixon was questioned over the period of two days, June 23 and June 24, 1975, and the testimony was taken as part of various investigations being conducted by the January 7, 1974, Grand Jury for the District of Columbia (the third Watergate Grand Jury). Chief Judge George Hart signed an order authorizing that the sworn deposition of Mr. Nixon be taken at the Coast Guard Station in San Mateo, California with two members of the grand jury present. The deposition was taken in California because Mr. Nixon's doctor had determined that Mr. Nixon was unable to travel to Washington DC for health reasons.



New York Times V United States Documents

323 pages of documents from the court case New York Times v United States. This case is considered a landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court on the First Amendment. The ruling made it possible for the New York Times and Washington Post newspapers to publish the then-classified Pentagon Papers without risk of government censorship or punishment. In a 6-3 decision the court held that in order to exercise prior restraint (pre-publication censorship), the Government must show sufficient evidence that the publication of the papers would cause a "grave and irreparable" danger.

The material includes the Griswold secret brief. This was a secret brief filled with the Supreme Court and classified as Top Secret. General Erwin Solicitor General of the United States submitted this report that identified 11 drop-dead secrets that if released the brief contended would cause irreparable damage to U.S. national security.

Special Appendix Relating to In Camera Proceedings and Sealed Exhibits Submitted by Appellant United States, June 21, 1971. This "Special Appendix," submitted on June 21, 1971 to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit by the U.S. government, makes a set of allegations regarding evidence drawn from the testimony of several U.S. officials who appeared in New York court hearings, followed by claims about the impact on current military operations that would result due to publication of the Pentagon Papers.

Court documents include: The Court's decision and opinions by each of the Justices, Brief for the United States, Brief for the New York Times, Brief for the Washington Post and Amicus brief of 27 members of Congress.



New York Times V United States Supreme Court Audio & Transcript

A copy of the audio recording made by the Supreme Court of the complete oral arguments in New York Times V United States 1971 (N0. 1873) and a transcript of the arguments.



The Pentagon Papers as Described by the American Press Summaries of Major Newspaper Articles

A 274 page report on newspaper coverage of the Pentagon Papers. On August 6, 1971, the Foreign Affairs Division of the Congressional Research Service published summaries of articles which appeared in major newspapers interpreting or analyzing the substance of the Pentagon Papers, and including overall summaries of each newspaper series. This volume deals only with the articles that analyzed and interpreted the Pentagon Papers. It did not cover the texts of the Pentagon papers documents which were published by several of the newspapers.

The report covers approximately 50 articles, varying greatly in length, and approximately 150 documents, in full or partial text, as published by eight different newspapers. The newspapers include the New York Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe, Chicago Sun-Times, Christian Science Monitor, Los Angeles Times, Philadelphia Inquirer and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

The summaries were designed to assist members of Congress, Congressional staffs and members' constituents in becoming acquainted with the principal facts and interpretations by the newspapers of the Pentagon papers.

The Congressional Research Service (CRS) operates as Congress's think tank and works exclusively for the United States Congress. The CRS is the public policy research arm of the Congress, providing policy and legal analysis directly to Members of Congress, their Committees and staff on a confidential, nonpartisan basis.



Summaries of Documents Published in the American Press

A 94 page report from the Foreign Affairs Division of the Congressional Research Service, containing a list of the "Pentagon Papers" documents printed in the American press with short annotations describing their contents.



Rockefeller Commission Report

U.S. President's Commission on CIA Activities within the United States Chapter 14, 33 pages - President Gerald R. Ford created the Commission on CIA Activities within the United States on January 4, 1975.  He directed the Commission to determine whether or not any domestic CIA activities exceeded the Agency's statutory authority and to make appropriate recommendations.  He appointed Vice President Nelson A. Rockefeller chairman of the Commission.  The Commission is often referred to as the "Rockefeller Commission." Chapter 14 is titled. "Involvement of the CIA in Improper Activities for the White House." The report found that in 1971 the CIA, at the request of members of the White House staff provided alias documents and disguise materials, a tape recorder, camera, film and film processing, to E. Howard Hunt. It also complied with a request to prepare a psychological profile of Daniel Ellsberg.



Leslie H. Gelb LBJ Library Oral History Interview Transcript

Defense Secretary Robert McNamara appointed Leslie Gelb to lead the task force, which ultimately employed 36 staff members and took eighteen months to complete the document known as the Report of the OSD (Office of Secretary of Defense) Vietnam Task Force and given the title United States-Vietnam Relations 1945-1967, also known as the Pentagon Papers.



CIA - FBIS Foreign Press Monitoring

55 pages of foreign press translation reports. The reports are mostly of broadcasts originating in North Vietnam. The reports are of broadcasts that contain some usage of the Pentagon Papers for propaganda use against the United States. Includes reports on broadcasts made by Radio Hanoi, the North Vietnamese domestic wire service Viet-Nam News Agency, and Vietnamese Communist broadcasts aimed at U.S. service personnel.

The Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) was an open source intelligence component of the Central Intelligence Agency's Directorate of Science and Technology. It monitored, translated, and disseminated within the U.S. government openly available news and information from media sources outside the United States.



 
FBI File concerning status of investigation of NY Times personnel involved in Pentagon Papers leak


 


Top Secret Griswold brief submitted to the Supreme Court



Commission on CIA Activities within the United States page on CIA and E H Hunt



Leslie H. Gelb LBJ Library Oral History Interview covering Pentagon Papers



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