ustxtxb_obs_1979_08_24_50_00030-00000_000.pdf

The ’70s. . . from page 5 As elsewhere recited, Connally upheld the Vietnam War throughout Johnson’s tenure, often reflecting bitterly on the probity and patriotism of its opponents. In addition, he warmly supported Nixon’s aggressive prosecution of the war. When Nixon was considering mining the harbor at Haiphong he asked Haldeman and Kissinger to get Connally’s opinion. Haldeman reported back \(Nixon records cally said, ‘Most importantthe President must not lose the war! . . . Caution be damned. . . .” Connally boasted to a reporter that when Nixon had wanted to review the alternatives a last time before ordering the planes to mine the harbor, only Kissinger and he, Connally, were invited back to Nixon’s hideaway office for final, separate talks. In -1978, berating President Carter’s foreign policies, Connally said, “We retreated from Korea when no one asked us to retreat. We talked of withdrawing troops from NATO. Congress overruled sending arms to the aid of Angola. We are about to withdraw from the Panama Canal.” He said he would vote no on the canal treaty if a senator from Texas, though only as a representative of Texans, not necessarily from conviction. Congressman Charles Wilson of Lufkin is quoted, “I can easily imagine John Connally telling Castro, ‘If you want to send shiploads of Cuban troops to Africa, that’s your prerogative. But if I want to sink those ships, that’s my prerogative.” According to one source, while treasury secretary Connally directed the Nixon administration’s economic warfare against Chile, warfare that was designed to bring down the government of parliamentary Marxist Salvador Allende. At the Treasury Connally presided over the devaluation of the dollar; in trade negotiations he was an unabashed negotiator for American trade interests, bad-mouthing protectionism while threatening retaliation against protectionism by other nations. He wants the U.S. to take part in an Asian common market; he advocates increasing by sixfold U.S. purchases of surplus agricultural commodities and their use for international political leverage. Implicit in his party switch is a general political position that ramifies into specific issues. Archer Fullingim wrote in 1973, in the Kountze News, that Connally “says he’s quitting the Democratic Party because it is too liberal. He’s talking about the party of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who gave us social security. He’s talking about the party of Lyndon Johnson, who gave us true civil rights and medicare.” Taking on McGovern in 1972, Connally said, “. . . in any free society there has to be an establishment. There is an establishment that runs our road system and our school system and . . . our governmental system. Everything has to be a part of a system, and you can’t just tear it asunder. . . .” He called McGovern isolationist and radical, smeared him by an inaccurate reference to McGovern’s temporary support of Henry Wallace in 1948, and in effect accused him of policy cowardice and of leaving the U.S. defenseless against the communists. As head of “Texans for Ford” against Carter in ’76, Connally signed an ad saying Carter’s proposals would weaken U.S. security, cost “at least $100 billion” and raise taxes on one out of every two Americans, break up the oil companies, and “allow union organizers to trespass on our farms and ranches.” Running for president now, he is for cutting taxes and total federal spending at the same time while also increasing defense spending by 10 percent. How? His answer refers to an increase of $250 billion he says Carter foretells in net federal revenues over the next four years. He is noncommital, if skeptical, on the pending SALT II treaty. U.S. arms superiority is justified, he says, because “We’re not going to launch a preemptive strike” \(that is, we are not going would not give up a pre-emptive strike as an option if he were president. R.D. 30 AUGUST 24, 1979