Bob Woodward and Ben Bradlee at the Nixon Library, part I

mr. Bradley and mr. Woodward were visiting with our other guests in the overflow area the theater my name is Tim Naftali I'm director of the Richard Nixon Presidential Library Museum on behalf of the National Archives and want to welcome all of you and now please join me in welcoming mr. ben bradlee and mr. Bob Oh you're right we we are going to have a conversation tonight before we begin I first of all I would introduce people who don't need an introduction tell you something about them you might not know mr. Bradley although he doesn't look is the World War two veteran sir he served in the Pacific Theater on the USS Essex it's important to keep Phillip Phillip Phillip it's important it's important to keep in mind was in the Navy that connection will matter mr. mr. Bradley covered the 1960 campaign work for Newsweek he got to know a young senator named John F Kennedy produced one of the more interesting books about President Kennedy called conversations with Kennedy then found his way to the Washington Post and you're going to hear a lot more about that soon and found himself in a position of authority and importance during two key moments in the history of the post both of which we'll talk about tonight one of course is the Pentagon Papers story and the other is Watergate we are truly truly fortunate to have such a pioneer legendary figure of American journalism the man next to him worked for a small newspaper in Maryland very hard after having spent five years in the Navy during part of that time it's a non-combat role but he was off the coast of Vietnam Bob Woodward has written 16 books and you've made 12 of them New York Times number-one bestseller Bob I'm even do both of these gentlemen for the library and Bob Woodward was very keen to come and visit and I cannot tell you how delighted I am to see how keen you are see him and mr. Bradley then sir it's June 1972 and you've got these two young guys covering a crime story how is it that the post put mr. Bernstein and mr. Woodward together to cover a breaking well it was a total accident hey be the assignment was not big by me because I was not working that day that was a Saturday I mean I gotta be I can't take credit I hope I get enough credit before the evenings out but I can't when the deputy and managing at it no one even that was the third or fourth mad deputy got down a sign it came time to assign the story was on a Saturday I was not working it was one of the greatest days in June ever in Washington DC you weren't working most of the people who mattered were working not apologizing to that I hope to get a lot of credit before the night's through but I don't want any credit than that but the city editor looked around and there was this strange burglary and said it's so nice out who would be dumb enough to come to work on a day like this and immediately my name sprung to his mind and then I got called in why were you dumb enough to come to work that well because money no curiosity and it was a truly that as we now look back on at the golden age of newspaper this Ben Bradley was already a legend and you wanted to work for him and it was an atmosphere in which there were no stops there was a sense of you can go and do anything the day I started working for The Washington Post this city editor took me out to lunch and said you have an unlimited expense account you can take anyone out and go to the jockey club every day but make sure you get good stories I want to use for money but so when if we can take you back fan when did this crime story begin to matter for you this one that you were away and join us today well it I think was a Saturday that's the gun but the next day that I came to work and I was quite well known for working a lot I I saw who'd gotten the story would return steam two guys that I didn't know very well we had tried to hire Bob once and we had no place can you believe that and send him out to Prince George's County one of the counties around Montgomery Montgomery Montgomery County and said come back in a year and and if he didn't to the day which is not unlike would work and we had a slot open at that time and I and he and Bernstein was it was a kind of a different cat all together was it had worked for the star which was the other evening paper in Washington and weird hide him because he was he he had shown I thought a special talent for writing I was more interested in his writing that is reporting his writing not that either was bad at the other I'm good at him and we got your attention with the story when we did the $25,000 Dahlberg check story oh here was a check that had been given to the Nixon campaign it gone to Maurice Stan's who is the chief fundraiser and somehow it wound up in the bank account of one of the Watergate burglars if that was started its point you're always interested in money in these stories you know where who got the money and to have a $25,000 check show up Miami Bank deposited by some guy hey what no what the hell was his name Bernard Berger yeah well I know I never heard before and it was just a Paulus everything came together and we head to the two white guys waiting and find out there it was to screw from their 400 stories in the next two and a half years that's a lot of story in newspapers you know we were famous for abandoning stories and no women no sex no nothing we're out of there do you think your experience with the Pentagon Papers publication shaped how you dealt with their stories well there's no question about it I know some of you probably don't know about the Pentagon Papers but the Pentagon Papers was a story that a the Washington Post was beating on the New York Times had uncovered this grand study of what was going on in the Pentagon and it was a devastating indictment of American government and we didn't have it but when we got it we went to work on it and that formed a confidence in ourselves I think and especially in Katharine Graham who was the owner of the post she her husband was was actually the owner but he was a manic depressive and a state where he was not often around and so that's how we got it and then you know we even though we were second on the story we would we did very well we started breaking stories and the significance was that you were publishing with the government saying don't you dare publish and actually going to the Supreme Court and saying we have we the government have a claim that this should not be published a sacred national security security is involved as if some of us didn't know a little about national security having spent four years in the war and had I had a lot of top-secret clearances and the time the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the press and what that did is said in stone final ruling that there is no pre-publication censorship there's no ability the government has they do not have the power to come in and stop and you look not like something before you they can come after they can put you in the slammer but these bombs now I'd like you to break us to the courtroom recount for us that that moment I think also captured in film when you're the portable what do you hear well what rich interesting on this wonderful Saturday they sent me down to the routine arraignment hearing that the five burglars now these were not your average DC burglars they were all all had suits hundred-dollar bills and their pocket very sophisticated electronic equipment and so it was a mystery and the five guys are paraded in in the judge it starts asking them what they did in the lead burglar who was named James McCord when asked when and the judge said Speak Up mr. McCarney wins and he said speak up and he finally said c.i.a now those are electric words and that and I'll do one of the burglars believe it or not are you it and how the helpmate Italian guy never told the selected theory they'd be the challahs what Gonzalez so neat right areola right they fear remaining frank fury how the hell I don't know oh no you can't say that okay yeah I'm going to let it okay now yeah so but but so that gave of momentum to the story how is it that the lead burglar who was head of security at the CIA and head of security for the Nixon re-election committee was involved in this it took him then Carla and I wrote subsequent stories on it and there was a be you look back on it and it seems like the trail is obvious but at the time it was not clear and the big break in the next couple of days was the simple entry in the address books of two of the burglars Jim machine ski one of the real bedrock police reporters got this information from his police sources and the Empress seized it from from the permit from the burglars took all of their you know everything in their pockets and it said Howard hunt - W house and of course Carl Bernstein who had much more imagination than I would eat Howard hunt - W house W house could only be one of two things and so he called the whorehouse and I called the way and it was a time when you could get through and Howard cut got on the phone and I said mr. hunter out come your name's in the address book to these burglars we didn't call it the Watergate within the Democratic headquarters that in he paused and said good god slam down the phone and when we knew he had a together there was a certain I am packing my bags quality then this like CIA got your attention and now your exhibit here you see that Haldeman and Nixon that day or the next day are talking about Howard hunt Haldeman said he disappeared we disappeared him and we could undisciplined there is this hair falls where it was your palm so I was there did your senior colleagues at the post show any jealousy as these stories were starting or did they actually do the opposite air go ahead they ignored the story for one day or two days and as it grew they started shuffling as only a senior reporter who is being lapped by a junior reporter and sort of started whispering to me that I think it was about time they took over the story you know which I mean oh no credit to me these guys had the goods and they were delivering the goods and why would that hell would I go to some big shot just because he was an expert in yet ma'am or some farm affairs thing we never gave a thought where's the beginning of it all but it is a hundred shipping taboo yeah but but we've if you look back on it it is rather amazing that you let us stay on the story well I always thought so but now doesn't did you did you let them go with every story that they wanted to go with what did you stop a few stories did you tell them not to do a few stories or did you let them go home once week once the way the system works is that once the first story or the first two stories are in and they hold up and nobody is suing you and nobody is saying what the hell are you doing are you just let them go and they knew the story but there they found in check that's the money check for 25,000 bucks but the interesting thing is there were lines there were times when you would look at the weGrow stories on things called typewriters remember those are and there would be six quad paper where you would have an original by eMpAtHy's congressman between each of six right and family-room would get a carbon copy and the other editors and you would look at it and and very frequently you would say I want to know more about this hold this story and you've held us back and you know this is now your chance to apologize no but but I've often said this without you in the room but let me say you were a great editor or not just because of what you published but what you didn't publish and you never said we're not going to run this story ever you said I'm then not yet convinced we need more information we need more sources we need more details and so you know we would we would then you know kind of curse you and say you know that you know Bradley you know he he thinks he knows everything and then we'd go to work and the sources and information were available and you were always willing to say ok now the story is ready and that limiting role of an editor I mean so relevant now in journalism where there are no if nobody says no in a sense everything gets published anyone can say anything about anyone now and I look back on it and I cherish those moments when you said not yet tell us a little bit about the source that most people know about tell us about when Mark felt deep throat becomes important to you reporting please but he becomes very important in the first days when we had this Howard hunt who was a consultant who worked in the White House for Chuck Colson who was really one Dixon special counsel and his hatchet man to a certain extent and so the connection between hot and cold son was really important but I can have your name in my address book and if your if then I'm arrested for burglary or something doesn't mean you put me up to it and I called mark felt who was not identified to anyone at the post at that point and said it turns out he was really the guy getting all the Watergate information from the Washington field office and I said what's this Cohn connection and he said any and he said a very important way because I was worried is this a linkage without substance and he said don't worry you cannot say something unkind about Howard Carter Chuck Colson that doesn't have hair and that was very important because as we now go back and construct the FBI investigation they had established on scroll in fact he was not one of the burglars but he was outside that night and so forth and was the operational director of this burglary team so mark felt becomes important right away but you don't tell mr. Bradley about markup you just tell him what there's a senior source and the Justice Department who is verifying details were getting elsewhere was I that surprises me about me I mean I wouldn't I've never done it again but it was so hard to quibble with success it was right and it was a check always if this money the money shows up but it's what it's what you would heard it was going to be it was where it should be you know you've got a tiger by the tail and why not leave well enough alone that's what I wasn't I wouldn't do it again yo and that was I was going to say was it unusual for you to have reporter come to you with the major story and say I can't can't tell you the source of the story but I trust this so Wow yes it was unusual but not unheard of to say that I've got a source and you know in the beginning you know who gives a damn about the sources so long as he's right got to be right and I don't think how many corrections did we run and we went one in that the whole time we had some and that was it idiotic we said that something had happened in front of a grand jury that had you taken it to the grand jury it was in front of the United States Attorney it was some substance but in a story that's moving fast like that if you've taken me aside as you know ever called me into your office since that I need to know who this source is of course I would have told you and it was and this was the dumb luck factor in all of this we always had multiple sources we always had something from you know as you say a check or a secret fund who controls these disbursements or dirty tricks or sabotage them and getting it from people mostly in the Nixon committee or investigators and so there was never a moment where I guess you felt gee I don't need to know who well I know he worked in the Justice Department and I knew it was right and then right right right right right and not not wrong you didn't have to ever take anything back and then suddenly I don't know what that was it was after Watergate wasn't it was after I after Nixon resigned yeah somebody said to me do you know somebody who why would it not Locke would not lie to it but not and said you do you actually know his name and I said no I don't and it occurred to me that that was so Bob and I walked it into the neighborhood great layering park one day and we sat down and we had a little chat and I got his name we never used it but at least I had it and Katherine Graham god rest her soul never a pair you you don't usually come down four times a day in the city room and said what does deep throat say today but never you know didn't ask her and we kept that secret for more than 30 years you know who would it's I didn't tell my wife yeah good decision but isn't it one of the Russian novelist who says the three people the only way three people can keep a secret is if two of them are there and we were all very much alive but we it was in our interest to keep her as it is a working reporter up to this day it helps me immensely when I go talk to people and say look this is in confidence I'm not going to say where it came from they say ah okay there's a history of keeping your word on this this is a serious commitment and Katherine Graham with her with her life on the line certain business life didn't ask by that today was there a point in the Watergate investigation we got scared yeah tell us so more or less customer well there was a moment he was particularly yeah well it was in the spring of 73 when Merck felt in laying out and I think this was somewhat my paranoia but it was his literal language and he said the stakes are so high that if people's lives could be in danger and that there's electronic surveillance going on the entire intelligence community is involved in shenanigans as we later learn about which he had some glimpse of his his position in the FBI is when you came out yes yeah this is what having me tell them what happened you're asleep sound asleep free o'clock in the damn morning the Woodward calls and says we've got to see you now I say all right and they came out to I think I had a little house and Wesley hi Wesley nice we knock on the door Carol and I and he comes out in his jammies we stand which weren't very pretty Bible and we stand out in the cold and they tell me this story I couldn't believe it I mean it was so hard and the we set out because I thought what would set the house is tapped obviously and which we later tested all our houses would test it every few months and they never were the Farmington and but we were also telling you what Mark felt said that this story is unspooling that everyone's involved that Nixon is involved it's got a forward momentum to it which you can't really comprehend and I remember laying that out to you and you're kind of listening and within you know kind of should I you know called the guys in white jackets because we're telling you this on your lawn and it was cold three o'clock three o'clock another and in the movie version of this Jason Robards who plays Ben in the movie person at the end says now ok guys got a lot of work to do go home and take a bath and then get back on the beat and not much as it's take just the First Amendment in the future of the country now that's not what Ben said that's the Hollywood version that's what the people who made the movie wanted it to be but it wasn't in here after all of this is told to Ben he turned to us and this is precisely what you said what the hell do we do no but it's I love that story because you said exactly the right thing we were going into totally uncharted territory none of us even you had the experience dealing with something like this and instead of kind of you know taking your stick out kind of showing you're the boss and in charge you honestly said I don't know what to do and we what we did is we kept reporting we met we maintained our whole approach multiple sources let's make sure this is a time when I was going over to the Nixon White House and pleading with them saying we know that this is going to reach many new levels there more tentacles of Watergate and we want to talk to President Nixon about this and there now are tapes of Nixon and Ziegler and Haldeman talking about my request to talk to Nixon which was not necessarily well-received how could you got to also remember newspapers is a very competitive business and there was no other newspaper that had this story that wrote this story finally you know a couple of months six weeks in size Seymour Hersh was working for the New York Times you know dime sense and and someone LA times if some belly x had one but it was just not a mass acceptance by the rest of the press it helped you didn't it when Walter Cronkite did this story the great white father I did he you won't believe it but that when he went on television with a to night to night second he said I can't get it all in one night the 15 minutes and then one was 7 or 8-minute yeah well they were both supposed to be 15 but after it hit the fan the who was head of CBS Frank's right he's dead they got a lot of pressure no thanks you know till they come to second down to 6 minutes and 7 minutes but that was enough at Cronkite he really was the great white father at that time if Walter Cronkite said there's no reason people with what those segments did is well Walter Cronkite said and this was right before the 72 election maybe ten days before said it looks like Nixon's going to be a real ected but there's these questions about Watergate and then the stories were all about our report and said The Washington Post says this and the White House denies it and the Washington Post has you know God says their checks and there's money there's a secret fund that they're sabotage and espionage and so forth and for CBS and Walter Cronkite to do that was quite gutsy now you've got to tell people a story of your coffee machine conversation with Carl which is about at this time that's right this is something you did not write about in all the presidents please tell us the story this is the fall of 72 story yeah probably not making justice issues I know I know I hit it with your stick too hard this is the fall of 72 when we've written a lot of these stories and one of them was that he's on Mitchell the former attorney general had been in charge of this secret fund that had financed water gave lots of the other undercover activities and you and said in the meeting before publishing the story that you know we better be real careful were accusing the former chief law enforcement officer of the United States of being a crook and as we were going through this Carla and I in one of our morning sessions in the post kind of little corner room where they had the worst cup of coffee you could buy for 15 cents and Carl puts his money in and turns around and said to me you know this guy Andy Nixon is going to be impeached and I just thought for a moment and it's in I think you're right but we can never use that word around this newsroom and we can never think in those terms because we have to stick to the story which is what we attempted to do but that was Carl having a connecting the dots and realizing that you can't have somebody like John Mitchell is Attorney General campaign manager so close to Nixon so deeply involved in this and that it's not going to spread to Mixon okay you have the election in November 1972 the president is overwhelming maybe a leg and things start to dry out before how do what happens in the story at one point I think Ben gave an interview saying he wanted to hold our heads in a bucket of water they did dry out they did dry up and he didn't have stories for a long time and it was agony that's just a loose that's right that was it you know let me tell this story because bed as mentioned Katherine Graham who is the publisher or an owner and Ben's boss during that period after the election that our story's dried up sources dried up but at that moment and Behnken I think verify this most people in the post newsroom didn't believe what we'd written don't you think Ben they did not think we were right but what she literally did yeah particularly on the national stage yeah and the Pope one of we learned later concept is is the 18-day the 18 you strive to get on the national staff yeah we were out to a kid's seat boot camp and we later learned one of the secret Mason strategies was to challenge the FCC TV licenses that the post company owned so the stock was in the toilet our journalistic reputation was at least on the rim of the toilet and Katharine Graham asked me for lunch and so this is January 73 and I remember going up to lunch with Howard Simons who's your managing editor and sat down and she started asking me questions about water and it my mind how much he knew about the details she was really she knew Henry Kissinger well I mean at one point she even said I read something about Watergate in the Chicago Tribune and I remember thinking what she reading the damn Chicago Trivium no one in Chicago does TV shot I it's even more of a case now and empty but she was scooping up all the information and later have described this management style she had a bind on hands off didn't tell you how to hand it didn't tell me how to report or Karl how to report but she was intellectually engaged her mind was totally active on it and it was comforting and it also meant the rotary press tremendously motivated you wouldn't not to let someone like that down exactly and so at the end of the lunch she asks the killer CEO question which is when are we going to find out the whole truth about what are you and I said Karl and Ben and I all felt because it's a criminal conspiracy everything is compartmentalized because they're paying people for silence because we go visit people and they slam doors in our face they're frightened that the answer what are we going to find out the whole truth of Watergate is never and I remember looking across that lunch table and she had this pain wounded look on her face and she said never don't tell me never I left the lunch a motivated employee but what she said was not and this is so important was not a threat but it was a statement of purpose what she said was use all the resources of that you had young girl have all the resources of this newspaper we have an obligation to get to the bottom of this story not just because we're out on a limb on it but because of implications go beyond journalism if as we believe this is true and it is proven something is going on that is a attend on the Richter scale and you know you you see it from your chair from my chair reporter having the publishers say look go after it there use everything we are going to get to the bottom of that this is incredibly liberating someday we're going to put a plaque in the lobby of The Washington Post we're going to bolt it to the wall so no one can take it down and it's simply going to be quote learned never don't tell me never end quote Katharine Graham January 1973

Channel: Richard Nixon Presidential Library

Views: 24,427

Rating: 4.5339804 out of 5

Keywords: Bob Woodward, Ben Bradlee, Richard Nixon, Nixon Presidential Library, All the Presidents Men, Government

Id: eKrcxd7I3qw

Length: 43min 8sec (2588 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 26 2011