The Wall Street Journal

In March 1973, members of the terrorist group Black September held a Belgian and two American diplomats hostage in Khartoum, Sudan, and demanded the release of various prisoners, including Sirhan Sirhan, the man convicted in Sen. Robert Kennedy’s murder. A reporter asked President Nixon how he planned to respond. With the nation’s memories of the late senator still fresh, Nixon couldn’t appear to entertain concessions that would free the assassin. “As far as the United States as a government giving in to blackmail demands, we cannot do so and we will not do so,” Nixon said. “We will do everything we can to get them released…