He was meant to say to be precise. He did not come up with the phrase, there was a whole "marketing" team around it. Which makes sense given the budget and the aim - winning the world image war.

The marketing behind this phrase has been quite successful. Even 45 yrs later, a paraphrase of Armstrong's quote is splashed in about a million locations on the most lucrative advertising real estate all across China: “向前一小步，文明一大步。”

He's quoted as saying he said the A. Anything else is just us making up some rationalization to fit what we think it is.

And the whole time, there's this guy who was the FIRST GUY ON THE FUCKING MOON and we're not going to believe HIM? I mean, who can you believe if you can't believe him?

> "I mean, who can you believe if you can't believe him?"

Well since we have a recording, I think that believing our own ears is a reasonable option.

I think that most of us have misspoken in the past without realizing it. It's similar to botching a sentence on paper, but reading it back to yourself correctly while proofreading it. It happens. As such, I think it is more than possible that Armstrong meant to say "a", thought he said "a", but did not say "a".

Or maybe he said the "a" and the recording equipment didn't pick it up.

The billions who have heard the tapes and didn't hear the A?

People misspeak all the time.