Did Nixon save Israel in 1973?

President Nixon [left] with Henry Kissinger

Richard Nixon Saved Israel—but Got No Credit -Jason Maoz

Precise details of what transpired on October 6, 1973 in Washington during the first week of the Yom Kippur War, are hard to come by...

What is clear is that President Richard Nixon — overriding inter-administration objections and bureaucratic inertia — implemented a breathtaking transfer of arms, that over a four-week period involved hundreds of jumbo U.S. military aircraft delivering more than 22,000 tons of armaments.

“It was Nixon who did it,” recalled Nixon’s acting special counsel, Leonard Garment. “I was there. Nixon said, [to] Kissinger, “Get your ass out of here and tell those people to move.”

Later, informed of yet another delay — this one because of disagreements in the Pentagon over the type of planes to be used for the airlift — an incensed Nixon shouted at Kissinger, “[Expletive] it, use every one we have. Tell them to send everything that can fly.”

Some revisionists have taken to claiming Nixon's actions on behalf of Israel were prompted by Golda Meir, who supposedly threatened to go public with all manner of juicy political and personal information she had on the president. Another commonly cited blackmail scenario, popularized by the play Golda's Balcony, has Meir putting the squeeze on Nixon by threatening to use nuclear weapons.

Nixon biographer Stephen E. Ambrose wrote:

"Those were momentous events in world history. Had Nixon not acted so decisively, who can say what would have happened? The Arabs might have even destroyed Israel. But there is no doubt that Nixon . . . made it possible for Israel to win. He knew that his enemies . . . would never give him credit for saving Israel. He did it anyway."
[Commentary]
[Hat tip: MichaelW]
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