Reagan Brought Nixon to White House for Arms Talk

President Reagan flew former President Richard M. Nixon to the White House last week and spent more than an hour discussing arms control with him, two days after Nixon publicly warned Reagan about achieving a deal too favorable to the Soviets, the White House said today.

Nixon and former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger wrote an article, which appeared in April 26 editions of the Los Angeles Times, critical of a proposed medium-range missile agreement.

After the article was published, Chief of Staff Howard H. Baker Jr. phoned Nixon and invited him to the White House, Reagan spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said.

A government airplane flew Nixon from his New Jersey home on April 28, and he was driven into a back entrance of the White House out of view of reporters for the session in Reagan’s private study, Fitzwater said.

“The discussion focused primarily on arms control,” Fitzwater said. “The President brought (Nixon) up to date on the status of negotiations” but the articles “comprised only a few minutes of the discussion.”

While praising Reagan’s restoration of U.S. military strength as the main reason for Soviet willingness to talk about eliminating medium-range missiles from Europe, Nixon in The Times article warned the President in print not to accept the nuclear arms reductions without requiring the Soviets to eliminate their conventional warfare superiority in Europe.

He also said Reagan must insist that the Russians remove any medium-range missiles from Asia.

Fitzwater said Reagan wanted to “have a discussion of President Nixon’s views and explain his own thinking.”

It was believed to be the first time Nixon was at the White House since he joined former Presidents Gerald R. Ford and Jimmy Carter there to begin a joint mission to the 1981 funeral of slain Egyptian President Anwar Sadat.

Fitzwater announced the meeting after the question was raised at the daily news briefing Tuesday, saying he had asked Reagan about it. He declined to say whether Reagan tried to persuade Nixon of the correctness of his negotiating policy or whether they discussed the Iran- contra scandal.