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Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to the best of Coast to Coast podcasts.

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Speaker 1: Become a Coast Insider and you can hear this complete conversation,

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Speaker 1: as well as recent shows featuring guests discussing new cases

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Speaker 1: of the troubling cattle mutilation phenomenon, worries, some instances of

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Speaker 1: clandestine c I, a torture, and the evidence that the

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Speaker 1: Lost City of Atlantis may have really once existed. Check

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Speaker 1: out these programs and many other fascinating episodes waiting for

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Speaker 1: you and the Coast to Coast archive by heading over

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Speaker 1: to Coast to Coast a m dot com and signing

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Speaker 1: up for Coast Insider. Now here's a highlight from Coast

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Speaker 1: to Coast AM on iHeart Radio. For the next couple hours,

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Speaker 1: we are going to be talking with someone who I

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Speaker 1: will call an American hero. For some of you who

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Speaker 1: might be a little too young and you don't know,

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Speaker 1: we're going to tell you a story. But in nineteen

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Speaker 1: sixty one, Daniel Ellsberg, consultant to the Department of Defense

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Speaker 1: and the White House, drafted Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara's

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Speaker 1: plans for nuclear war. Later, he leaked the Pentagon papers.

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Speaker 1: He lectures and writes on the dangers of the nuclear

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Speaker 1: era in the Need for Whistleblowing. A senior fellow at

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Speaker 1: the Nuclear Age Piece Foundation, Daniel Ellsberg is the author

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Speaker 1: of Secrets and the subject of the Oscar nominated documentary

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Speaker 1: The Most Dangerous Man in America. He's also a key

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Speaker 1: figure and Steven Spielberg's film about the Pentagon Papers, The Post,

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Speaker 1: starring Tom Hanks, and his latest work is called The

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Speaker 1: Doomsday Machine. Daniel Ellsberg was with me almost ten years

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Speaker 1: ago on this program. Welcome back, Daniel. Good to have

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Speaker 1: you with us. Ten years. Wow. It goes by fast,

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Speaker 1: doesn't it. Well, it's not fast enough in a way.

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Speaker 1: I'll be glad for it to be over. And I

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Speaker 1: don't want the next ten years to be like the last. No.

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Speaker 1: I understand. I understand, and and I want to, at

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Speaker 1: least at this moment. Thank you for what you did many,

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Speaker 1: many years ago for a lot of people who might

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Speaker 1: not understand the significance of what you did in leasing

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Speaker 1: the Pentagon papers. But you went through a living hell,

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Speaker 1: and thank god you came out of it. Okay, But

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Speaker 1: we owe you as Americans are tremendous. Thanks well, Thank

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Speaker 1: you very much. I appreciate what you say, by the way,

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Speaker 1: Richard Nixon. President Nixon had in mind for me a

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Speaker 1: living hell. He was facing twelve selon accounts and a

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Speaker 1: possible hundred and fifteen years in prison. However I did

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Speaker 1: not actually have to experience that. Instead, President Nixon had

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Speaker 1: to resign, facing impeachment in consider a part for criminal

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Speaker 1: elections that he took to shut me up, to silence

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Speaker 1: me during my trial. Yeah, Watergate came up at the

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Speaker 1: wrong time for for them, didn't it. That's right. That

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Speaker 1: seems very possibly to be looming ahead now for very

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Speaker 1: similar reasons. Remember, critical to his downfall was the so

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Speaker 1: called Saturday massacre when he ordered his Attorney general to

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Speaker 1: fire the special prosecutor trying to get tapes from the

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Speaker 1: Oval office. And then when the Attorney General refused to

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Speaker 1: do that, Elliott Richardson, the next in line, also refused,

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Speaker 1: and they got down to Mr Boort, who did fire

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Speaker 1: the special prosecutor. But the outcry was so great at

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Speaker 1: that what they called the Saturday night massacre at these

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Speaker 1: two high officials being fired on the same night or

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Speaker 1: forced to resign, that the they had to uh assigned

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Speaker 1: a new special prosecutor, and in the end the tapes

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Speaker 1: did come out and brought Nixon down, But critical to

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Speaker 1: what Nixon was worried about was that he had taken

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Speaker 1: X in fear that I had documents beyond the Pentagon papers,

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Speaker 1: which I did, and that he that I had documents

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Speaker 1: from his own administration on Vietnam, which I did. It

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Speaker 1: so happens that I didn't have what he most feared,

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Speaker 1: documents that would back up what I was saying and

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Speaker 1: which turned out to be correct. That he was making

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Speaker 1: nuclear threats to North Vietnam, and he've done that as

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Speaker 1: early as nineteen sixty nine. He continued to do it

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Speaker 1: even while I was in trial, and UH considered nuclear

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Speaker 1: weapons seriously in nineteen seventy two. So he didn't think

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Speaker 1: that would play well with the American public and was

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Speaker 1: very anxious that I not put out anything beyond the

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Speaker 1: Pentagon Papers, which that was a study of Vietnam decision

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Speaker 1: making that ended in before Nixon got into office, So

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Speaker 1: it didn't incriminate Nixon, but he was afraid that I

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Speaker 1: had documents that would prove that he had in fact

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Speaker 1: been making nuclear threats and nuclear plans for an attack

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Speaker 1: on North Vietnam and other other threats including mining and

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Speaker 1: fifty two raids on North Vietnam, a major escalation of

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Speaker 1: the war in order to win in a way that

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Speaker 1: he really had no prospect of doing well. Of course,

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Speaker 1: what I say, we're almost reliving that again. I'm seeing

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Speaker 1: in tonight's emails a lot of speculation about efforts by

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Speaker 1: this president, Donald Trump to fire the acting the Deputy

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Speaker 1: Attorney General, referencing who in turn was in charge of

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Speaker 1: a special prosecutor that Trump wants to get rid of,

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Speaker 1: just as Nixon wanted to get rid of Archibald Cux.

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Speaker 1: And if indeed he fires some of these people, others

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Speaker 1: may resign before they carry out his wishes, we may

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Speaker 1: have another massacre again, whether it's on Saturday night or not.

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Speaker 1: Let's hope we don't have to go through that again

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Speaker 1: for for a lot of people, Daniel, who may be

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Speaker 1: too young to even know what the Pentagon papers are

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Speaker 1: or war. What was it that made you release those

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Speaker 1: What did you see that made you say I got

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Speaker 1: to get this out into the public, and it went

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Speaker 1: to the New York Times. I believe right well, I

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Speaker 1: wouldn't have done that, uh face, knowing that it would

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Speaker 1: face me with life in prison or an indictment to

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Speaker 1: that effect. I wouldn't have done that just to release history,

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Speaker 1: which ended in nineteen sixty eight. We're talking about nineteen

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Speaker 1: sixty nine, seventy seventy one here now, when they finally

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Speaker 1: came out in the newspapers. And I must say The Post,

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Speaker 1: which is the movie, The Post, which is a very

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Speaker 1: good movie and very timely now, but it does give

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Speaker 1: the impression that it was just the lies that were

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Speaker 1: revealed in that historic study. You asked what the papers

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Speaker 1: were for the benefit probably most of your listeners. It

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Speaker 1: was a seven thousand page volumes study called you at

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Speaker 1: various names, but US decision making in Vietnam from nine

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Speaker 1: to nineteen sixty eight, twenty three years there, and now

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Speaker 1: we're talking about when I actually copied it in sixty

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Speaker 1: nine and seventy and it came out in seventy one.

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Speaker 1: This is history. We had a new president who was

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Speaker 1: claiming to be a new Nixon in fact, and was

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Speaker 1: claiming that he had an entirely new strategy, which was

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Speaker 1: quite misleading because he was making threats very similar to

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Speaker 1: those that had failed against Vietnam in previous years, and

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Speaker 1: they failed again as I expected. So my concern was

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Speaker 1: that I knew from having worked for the new administration

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Speaker 1: as a consultant from the Rand Corporation on Vietnam options

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Speaker 1: and some studies that Henry Kissinger what had done for

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Speaker 1: the White House, and I summarized those studies for President Nixon.

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Speaker 1: That was early in sixty nine, and I knew from

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Speaker 1: my contacts there and specifically from my friend mort Halpern,

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Speaker 1: who was a deputy Kissinger at that point, that Nixon

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Speaker 1: was not getting out. He was not ending the war.

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Speaker 1: He I think, expected to end the war favorably, but

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Speaker 1: he was doing so by threats of escally and I

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Speaker 1: was sure, as was helpering for that letter, that these

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Speaker 1: threats would not succeed. And they didn't. And the next

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Speaker 1: question was would he carry them out? The Pentagon papers

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Speaker 1: showed me twenty three years of previous history the presidents

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Speaker 1: who drew a line like that were very likely to

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Speaker 1: carry them out, even for their own prestige and their

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Speaker 1: own status, their credibility. So even though carrying them out

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Speaker 1: was virtually hopeless in terms of achieving anything of benefit

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Speaker 1: to the U S or anybody else, I thought, in

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Speaker 1: other words, that he was likely to in large the

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Speaker 1: war in the air as he did do. And I

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Speaker 1: knew this then from secret information and given to me.

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Speaker 1: I still let a top secret clearance here at the

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Speaker 1: Round Corporation, and I was a consultant for that matter

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Speaker 1: to the White House in the beginning of the year.

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Speaker 1: So I had this information. The public didn't have it,

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Speaker 1: didn't believe it, but I didn't have documents on it.

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Speaker 1: The Pentagon Papers, however, did document twenty three years by

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Speaker 1: both four presidents, ring in a very similar way, one

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Speaker 1: after another, about what they were planning to do, why

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Speaker 1: they were doing it, what they expected to come from it,

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Speaker 1: and what was likely to happen. All of that was

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Speaker 1: deceived by one president after another, and I hoped that

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Speaker 1: that documentary proof would convince people in the Congress and

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Speaker 1: the public that at least it was possible. As I

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Speaker 1: was saying that a fifth president, Nixon was carrying on

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Speaker 1: much the same policy. Rather than lose in Vietnam or

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Speaker 1: rather than get out, rather than be accused of having

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Speaker 1: lost a country and suffered a defeat in Vietnam, he

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Speaker 1: did what the others had done. He was planning to

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Speaker 1: escalate the war and keep it going. He did hope

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Speaker 1: to end it with a victory, but I felt that

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Speaker 1: was futile as it proved to be. As it proved

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Speaker 1: to be, it can costing what plus American lives and

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Speaker 1: countless numbers of Vietnamese. That's right. He President Nixon is

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Speaker 1: widely credited at his funeral and ever since with having

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Speaker 1: ended the war in Vietnam. Actually it didn't end while

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Speaker 1: he was in office. He was removed before it ended

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Speaker 1: in nine facing impeachment. But he did, in fact add

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Speaker 1: more than twenty thousand names to that ominous Vietnam Memorial

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Speaker 1: in Washington, just eight thousand plus American names on that

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Speaker 1: about thirty thousand before him, actually under the several administrations,

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Speaker 1: but mainly Lyndon Johnson's administration. How were you treated, Daniel?

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Speaker 1: How were you treated during that time period by the

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Speaker 1: American public at the time? You mean right after I

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Speaker 1: was indicted? Yeah? When? When? When? When that was publicized

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Speaker 1: that you were the one that released the Pentagon papers?

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Speaker 1: I mean, were you were you treated? Were you treated

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Speaker 1: with respecting? There was the president and the Vice president

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Speaker 1: ag Knew both well? Agnew said it openly that I

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Speaker 1: was a traitor. Nixon said that later. Essentially, they didn't

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Speaker 1: charge me with treason, by the way, because our constitution

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Speaker 1: is to find treason very narrowly in a way they

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Speaker 1: couldn't apply to somebody told the truth to the American

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Speaker 1: public abtinquently to a foreign power, a spy. So I

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Speaker 1: wasn't I had pro felony comes, but treason was not

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Speaker 1: one of them, nor was perjury. So I was treated

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Speaker 1: with these as having revealed documents that the public could

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Speaker 1: actually read and see that this was information they should

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Speaker 1: have had much earlier. So really I was treated pretty favorably,

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Speaker 1: pretty possiively. There were many people who were very opposed

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Speaker 1: to me. I got letters from them, and later when

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Speaker 1: Nixon lost office, largely as a result of his actions

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Speaker 1: against me, a lot of people held that against me,

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Speaker 1: who were supports of Nixon, and then I got a

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Speaker 1: lot of abet in the mail. But having almost miraculously

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Speaker 1: escaped prison in this unprecedented way, by the by the

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Speaker 1: revelation of administration crimes against me, but it was a

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Speaker 1: polarizing thing there, I was called rather widely, just as

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Speaker 1: Chelsea Manning and Ed Snowden have been called traders. That's

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Speaker 1: a very very unpleasant thing for for a patriot have

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Speaker 1: to hear. But in a way you never get used

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Speaker 1: to that that's going on for a long time. I

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Speaker 1: got another way, the same kind of abuse that they got,

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Speaker 1: but over time, and really pretty much at the time,

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Speaker 1: it was so clear that this is information that deserved

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Speaker 1: to be out, that the public deserved to know, to

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Speaker 1: know that I really got credit for it on the whole.

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Speaker 1: Listen to more Coast to Coast AM every weeknight at

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Speaker 1: one am Eastern, and go to Coast to Coast am

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Speaker 1: dot com for more