Reagan, Nixon Conferred on Summit Talks
President Reagan said today that he has frequently spoken to former President Richard M. Nixon in preparing for his November summit meeting with Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev.
Reagan quoted Nixon, who resigned in disgrace more than a decade ago, as saying, “We want peace. The Soviet Union needs peace.”
Reagan was asked during a question-and-answer session with regional editors and broadcasters invited to the White House whether he has taken or sought Nixon’s advice in preparing for the Geneva summit scheduled for Nov. 19 and 20.
“I have frequently talked to President Nixon,” Reagan replied. “He had great experience and is most knowledgeable on international affairs.”
Reagan said Nixon “had a number of meetings both in this country and there” with his Soviet counterpart, the late Leonid I. Brezhnev.
“My problem for the first few years was they kept dying on me,” Reagan quipped, referring to the deaths of three Soviet leaders in four years.
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