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(Thursday June 1, 1972, 9:40 p.m. EDT, during the Cold War) — U.S. President Richard Nixon returned to Washington tonight from his two-week tour of four nations and told a joint session of Congress that his trip to Moscow had laid the basis for “a new relationship between the two most powerful nations on earth.”

Less than a half-hour after returning from his journey, Nixon said he had achieved “solid progress” in his talks with Soviet leaders. He listed the various accords and laid particular stress on the strategic-arms limitation agreements, which he said were vital to “forestall a major spiraling of the arms race.”

He said at the start of his nationally televised 35-minute address that he did not plan to make any new announcements in this “dramatic setting.” But he unexpectedly suggested that he might have made some progress toward ending the Vietnam war during his Moscow talks.

“The problem of ending the Vietnam war, which engages the hopes of all Americans, was one of the most extensively discussed subjects of our agenda,” Nixon said. “It would only jeopardize the search for peace if I have to review here all that was said on that subject.”

“I will simply say this: Each side obviously has its own point of view and its own approach to this very difficult issue. But at the same time, both the United States and the Soviet Union share an overriding desire to achieve a more stable peace in the world,” he added.

The main theme of his speech was that he had begun a new relationship this year, not only with the Russians but also with the Chinese.

“Never has there been a time when hope was more justified or when complacency was more dangerous,” he said. “We have made a good beginning. And because we have begun, history now lays upon us a special obligation to see it through.”

To dramatize his return from the trip to Austria, the Soviet Union, Iran, and Poland, Nixon went by helicopter directly from Andrews Air Force Base in nearby Maryland to the Capitol shortly after he deplaned at about 9:05 p.m. EDT.

Only about half of the members of the Senate and the House of Representatives were present in the House chamber to hear the address. Many Congressmen were in their home states campaigning for re-election, and many apparently preferred to watch the speech on television.

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Nixon clearly sensed that the agreement on the limitation of strategic arms — a treaty limiting each side to 200 antiballistic missiles, plus a five-year executive agreement putting some limits on land and sea-based missiles — were the most controversial results of his Moscow talks.

He defended them by saying that the signing of those arms accords last Friday (May 26, 1972) in Moscow marked the “beginning of the end” of the tensions that have existed since 1945.

“We took the first step toward a new era of mutually agreed restraint and arms limitation between the two principal nuclear powers,” Nixon said, asserting that this “enhanced the security of both nations.

He said that the treaty on antiballistic missiles would be submitted promptly for Senate ratification and that the five-year accord would be sent to both houses for approval.

Nixon expressed confidence that “the fullest national scrutiny” of these accords would underscore what he said on Soviet television on Sunday —”that this is an agreement in the interest of both nations.” The President said that the arms, agreements came at a time when the Soviet Union was proceeding rapidly with its own arms program and the United States had halted production of strategic weapons. Failure to achieve an accord would have put the United States at a disadvantage, he said.

Denying assertions made by Senator Henry M. Jackson, Democrat of Washington, and others that the agreements endangered United States security, Nixon said that after intensive study he and his: top advisers could assure Congress and the nation that American strategic forces “are without question sufficient for the maintenance of our security and the protection of our vital interests.”

“No power on earth is stronger than the United States of America today. None will be stronger than the United States of America in the future,” he said to applause.

But even while defending the agreements on strategic arms, Nixon made a direct appeal for congressional approval of the administration’s defense requests.

He said that while the talks in Moscow were successful — and he indicated pleasure, at such symbolic gestures as the American flag flying over the Kremlin — “we must remember that Soviet ideology still proclaims hostility to some of America’s most basic values.”

Soviet leaders are and will continue to be “totally dedicated competitors of the United States,” he said.

Video: 'From the Archives: President Nixon Addresses Joint Session of Congress Upon Return from Moscow'

Because of this, he said, “We must maintain our defenses at an adequate level until there is mutual agreement to limit forces.”

“The time-tested policies of vigilance and firmness which brought us to the summit are the only ones that can safely carry us forward to further progress in reaching agreements to reduce the danger of war,” the President said.

In the Middle East, he indicated no change in the basic situation. He noted the agreement to move ahead with talks on a conference on European security and cooperation, which Will probably take place next year.

On bilateral matters. besides the strategic arms agreement, Nixon seemed most pleased with the possibility of expanded Soviet-American trade. He said that the newly created Soviet-American trade commission would complete work on a comprehensive trade agreement later this year.

“When the two largest economies in the world start trading with each other on a much larger scale, living standards in both nations will rise, and the stake which both have in peace will be increased,” he said.

Affirming the administration’s commitment to its alliances, Nixon said that as the United States seeks better relations with “those who have been our adversaries, we will not let our friends and allies down.”

Turning briefly to the domestic front, Nixon said that it was now vital to keep America’s economy “vigorous and competitive” and to maintain movement on the home front.

Throughout the speech, Nixon avoided saying that confrontation had been completely eliminated, but he came as close as any President to saying that the communist challenge had at least been sharply muted.

Tonight’s speech occurred four days after Nixon’s re-election campaign aides broke into the Democratic National Committee Headquarters at the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C. for the first time, bugging the telephones of staffers.

16 days after tonight’s speech, five men would be arrested after breaking back into the Democratic National Committee Headquarters. The botched June 17, 1972, burglary would mark the official beginning of the Watergate Scandal that would eventually lead to Nixon’s resignation as President of the United States.