New York Times publisher Arthur “Pinch” Sulzberger Jr. says he fired Jill Abramson because he feared losing managing editor Dean Baquet, which could have led to a disaster in the newsroom.

In his first interview since sacking Abramson as executive editor and replacing her with Baquet, Sulzberger told Vanity Fair that she had lost the support of her colleagues and that her attempt to recruit Janine Gibson, the US editor of The Guardian, upsetting Baquet, was the last straw.

“At that point, we risked losing Dean, and we risked losing more than Dean,” Sulzberger said. “It would have been a flood, and a flood of some of our best digital people.”

Sulzberger said that Baquet was blindsided by Abramson’s decision to woo Gibson as co-managing editor, a post equal to Baquet’s.

Then, after meeting with Baquet, Sulzberger said, he was forced to choose between the executive editor and the managing editor.

The other figures in the newsroom had told him “The one person we cannot lose is Dean Baquet,” he said.

Sulzberger also rebutted claims that Abramson’s salary had been less than her male predecessor’s, arguing that executive compensation includes bonuses.

“There is no truth to the charge,” he said about the claim that she was paid less than former top editor Bill Keller.

He also said that if he knew then what he knows now, he would not have elevated Abramson to No. 1.

“Of course, I would have done it differently,” he said about that 2011 decision.