总统发表的每一个评论或发布的每一个命令都不是要按字面意思来解释或执行的。

 季辛吉对水门事件为尼克森辩解

担任尼克松的助理需要了解这种工作方式：

总统发表的每一个评论或发布的每一个命令都不是要按字面意思来解释或执行的。

在我们的第一次会议结束时，他指示霍尔德曼为我的办公室安装一条直接的电话线就是一个例子：

他想向他的工作人员传达他将寻求将我加入他的团队，但他还没有准备好在我可能在别人面前拒绝的情况下向我提供这个职位。

 

Serving as an assistant to Nixon required an awareness of this modus operandi: Not every comment made or order issued by the president was intended to be interpreted or carried out literally. The instruction to Haldeman to install a direct phone line to my office at the end of our first meeting is one example: he wanted to convey to his staff that he was going to seek to add me to his team, but he was not yet ready to offer me the position in circumstances in which I might refuse it in the hearing of others.

 

另一个更重要的例子：

1969年8月，一架从罗马飞往以色列的美国客机被巴勒斯坦恐怖分子劫持并飞往大马士革。

当我把这个消息告诉尼克松时，他正在佛罗里达州与老朋友享受周六晚上的晚餐，他回答说：

”轰炸大马士革机场。

这句话不是作为一个官方指令，而是为了给他的顾问和他的用餐伙伴留下印象，让他们知道他有决心结束劫机行为。

 

Another more consequential example: in August 1969, an American airliner en route from Rome to Israel was hijacked by Palestinian terrorists and flown to Damascus. When I communicated the news to Nixon, who was enjoying a Saturday-evening dinner with old friends in Florida, he replied, ‘Bomb the airport of Damascus.’ Rather than serving as an official directive, this statement was intended to impress both his advisors and his dining companions with his determination to put an end to hijackings.

 

然而，正如尼克松所知道的，发起任何此类军事行动需要的不仅仅是总统的一个简单命令。

需要有一个后续指令，包含对执行部门的行动指示。

由于预计会有这样一个后续决定，国防部长梅尔文-莱尔德、参谋长联席会议主席厄尔-惠勒将军和我在晚上花了很多时间来确保采取这样一个打击的初步步骤--具体而言，将第六舰队的一艘航空母舰移向塞浦路斯，使其能够执行命令。

尽管总统的参谋部承诺执行他的命令，但也有义务给他充分的机会来思考其行动的影响。

 

As Nixon well knew, however, initiating any such military action requires more than a simple order from the president. There needs to be a follow-up directive containing operational instructions to the implementing departments. In anticipation of such a follow-up decision, Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Earle Wheeler and I spent much of the evening ensuring that preliminary steps for such a strike were taken – specifically, moving a Sixth Fleet aircraft carrier toward Cyprus to position it to carry out the order. Although a president’s staff is pledged to execute his orders, it is also obliged to give him the full opportunity to reflect on the implications of his actions.

 

在这种情况下，尼克松在第二天早上解决了这个问题。

作为他上午简报的一部分，我向他介绍了大马士革机场人质事件的最新情况，并传达了第六舰队的舰艇现在正在塞浦路斯附近。

他问：

”还发生了什么事吗？

当我回答说没有，他只回答了一个词--'好'--面部肌肉都没动。

关于这次空袭，他没有再说什么，也没有做什么。

 

In this case, Nixon settled the issue the following morning. As part of his morning briefing, I updated him on the Damascus airport hostage situation, conveying that the Sixth Fleet’s ships were now near Cyprus. ‘Did anything else happen?’ he asked. When I replied that nothing had, he responded with a single word – ‘Good’ – delivered without moving a facial muscle. Nothing further was said or done about the airstrike.[2]

 

因此，尼克松的随行人员了解到，概括性的声明不一定是为了导致明确的行动。

通常情况下，它们传达了一种情绪，或者用来评估对话者的观点。

为了推迟不可逆转的行动，直到总统能够做出深思熟虑的决定，霍尔德曼建立了一个工作人员制度，确保尼克松的椭圆形办公室会议在总统助理在场的情况下进行。

而高级顾问则有义务通过白宫幕僚长传递指令。

当那些与总统没有经常接触的人发现自己与他在一起时，他与自己辩论关于某个问题的选择时，就会产生麻烦。

艾森豪威尔的前助手和尼克松的朋友布莱斯-哈洛（Bryce Harlow）对水门事件的解释很精辟：

”一些该死的傻瓜进入了椭圆形办公室，并按他的要求行事。

 

Thus Nixon’s immediate entourage learned that sweeping statements were not necessarily intended to result in explicit actions. Often, they conveyed a mood or were used to assess an interlocutor’s views. To postpone irreversible actions until the president could make a considered decision, Haldeman set up a staff system seeing to it that Nixon’s Oval Office meetings took place in the presence of a presidential assistant. The senior advisors, in turn, were obliged to pass on directives through the White House chief of staff. Trouble could arise when those with no regular contact with the president found themselves in his company as he debated his options on an issue with himself. Illustrative here is former Eisenhower aide – and friend of Nixon – Bryce Harlow’s pithy explanation for the Watergate debacle: ‘Some damn fool got into the Oval Office and did what he was told.’