History of modern Egypt of Muhammad Anwar al-Sadat, the eleven-year period of Egyptian history spanning from the death of president Gamal Abdel Nasser in 1970, through Sadat's assassination by fundamentalist army officers on 6 October 1981. Sadat's presidency saw many changes in Egypt's direction, reversing some of the economic and political principles of Nasserism by breaking with Soviet Union to make Egypt an ally of the United States, initiated the peace process with Israel, re-instituting the multi-party system and abandoning socialism by launching the Infitah economic policy. After Nasser's death, another of the original revolutionary "free officers," Vice President Anwar el-Sadat, was elected President
Anwar Sadat in the regime, Vice President Ali Sabri, who had close ties with Soviet officials, and Sharawy Gomaa, the Interior Minister, who controlled the secret police. Sadat's rising popularity would accelerate after he cut back the powers of the hated secret police, expelled Soviet military from the country and reformed the Egyptian army for a renewed confrontation with Israel. On 6 October 1973, in conjunction with Hafez al-Assad of Syria, Sadat launched the October War, also known as the Yom Kippur War (and less commonly as the Ramadan War), a surprise attack against the Israeli forces occupying the Egyptian Sinai Peninsula,