Editing Jesse Helms (section)

===Foreign policy===
From the start, Helms identified as a prominent anti-communist. He proposed an act in 1974 that authorized the President to grant [[Honorary Citizen of the United States|honorary citizenship]] to [[Soviet Union|Soviet]] dissident [[Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn]].<ref>{{cite news |title=Honorary Citizenship Voted for Solzhenitsyn |work=[[The New York Times]] |date=October 5, 1974 |page=19 }}</ref> He remained close to Solzhenitsyn's cause, and linked his fight to that of freedom throughout the world.<ref>{{cite news |first=Fred M. |last=Hechinger |title=Suspension of Reality |work=[[The New York Times]] |date=August 24, 1976 |page=29 }}</ref> In 1975, as [[North Vietnam]]ese forces [[Fall of Saigon|approached Saigon]], Helms was foremost among those urging the US to evacuate all Vietnamese demanding this, which he believed could be "two million or more within seven days".<ref>{{cite news |title=Seventh Fleet should rescue all who wish to leave, senator says |work=[[The Times]] |page=1 |date=April 4, 1975 }}</ref> When the [[United States Senate Committee on Armed Services|Senate Armed Services Committee]] voted to suppress a report critical of the US's strategic position in the [[arms race]], Helms read the entire report out, requiring it to be published in full in the ''[[Congressional Record]]''.<ref>{{cite news |first=Patrick |last=Cosgrave |title=The arms report Congress tried to suppress |work=[[The Times]] |page=16 |date=June 21, 1978 }}</ref>

Helms was not at first a strong supporter of Israel; for instance, in 1973 he proposed a resolution demanding Israel return the [[West Bank]] to [[Jordan]], and, in 1975, demanding that the Palestinian Arabs receive a "just settlement of their grievances".<ref name="Link 318">Link (2007), p. 318</ref> In 1977, Helms was the sole senator to vote against prohibiting American companies from joining the [[Arab League boycott of Israel]],<ref>{{cite news |title=US Senate votes for anti-boycott Bill |work=[[The Times]] |page=4 |date=May 7, 1977 }}</ref> but that was primarily because the bill also relaxed discrimination against Communist countries.<ref>{{cite news |title=Arab boycott; Morality with a loophole |newspaper=[[The Economist]] |page=47 |date=May 14, 1977 }}</ref> In 1982, Helms called for the US to break diplomatic relations with Israel during the [[1982 Lebanon War]].<ref>{{cite news |title=It gets less easy to support Israel |newspaper=[[The Economist]] |page=35 |date=August 14, 1982 }}</ref> He favored prohibiting foreign aid to countries that had recently detonated nuclear weapons: this was aimed squarely at India, but it also affected Israel should it conduct a [[Nuclear weapons testing|nuclear test]].<ref>{{cite news |title=Foreign aid; little largess |newspaper=[[The Economist]] |page=70 |date=November 15, 1975 }}</ref> He worked to support the supply of arms to the United States' Arab allies under presidents Carter and Reagan, until his views on Israel shifted significantly in 1984.<ref name="Link 318" />

Helms and [[Bob Dole]] offered an amendment in 1973 that would have delayed cutting off funding for bombing in [[Cambodia]] if the President informed Congress that North Vietnam was not making an accounting "to the best of its ability" of US servicemen missing in [[Southeast Asia]]. The amendment was defeated by a vote of 56 to 25.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1973/06/01/archives/house-must-act-its-version-is-milderdelay-in-sending-bill-to-nixon.html|title=House Must Act |first=Richard L.|last=Madden|newspaper=The New York Times|date=June 1973 }}</ref>