6

The Death of a President and a Democracy

In the morning hours of November 2, 1963, South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother Ngo Dinh Nhu were assassinated as part of a coup d’état orchestrated the previous day by a number of ARVN generals. Three weeks later, on November 23, U.S. United States president John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas. Returning home from the funeral of President Kennedy, his successor, President Lyndon B. Johnson, arrived at the White House with vice-president Hubert Humphrey. He pointed at the picture of ex-president Ngo Dinh Diem, which was hanging on the wall of the house, and remarked to Humphrey: “We have had a hand that killed Diem. And now ‘this hand’ is showing up here.”¹ President Johnson’s statement is considered to be a confirmation of U.S. involvement in the November coup and assassination of President Diem and his brother, but the question remains as to who was responsible for the unjust deaths of the Ngo brothers. Which American hands, among Kennedy’s aides, assistants, and advisers, were involved?

In January of 1969, upon taking up residence in the Oval Office, President Richard Nixon immediately ordered the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Howard Hunt, to carry on an investigation of the death of President Diem in order to find out who in the Kennedy administration was involved. Nixon sought the orders from Washington that authorized the coup’s joint-conspirators in Saigon to kill Ngo Dinh Diem. No trace of such orders were ever found.²

THE BUDDHIST CRISIS

Relations between the Kennedy administration and Diem’s regime deteriorated after the Saigon press attacked U.S. secretary of state Dean Rusk and criticized U.S. policy in Vietnam. The Buddhist riots over alleged religious persecution and the events that followed during the summer of 1963 gave the United States the “necessary and sufficient” motives to eliminate Diem and Nhu. Nhu, especially, was accused of running the secret police force and directing the ARVN to kill Buddhist demonstrators and arrest Buddhist monks, nuns, and students, after the first spark of Buddhist opposition set up in Hue, the old capital of Vietnam.

In early May of 1963, government officials in Hue reportedly allowed Catholic churches to fly religious flags in celebration of the birthday of Archbishop Ngo Dinh Thuc, older brother of President Ngo Dinh Diem. However, on May 8, the government banned the traditional Buddhist flags at Tu-Dam pagoda marking the birth of the Buddha. The local Buddhist leaders complained the act was discriminatory. When city officials refused to remove the ban, thousands of Buddhists took to the streets in protest. Military units were used to disperse the demonstration and nine persons were killed. Riots then spread from Hue to Saigon. The crisis worsened after a 66-year-old Buddhist monk, Thich Quang Duc, set himself on fire in a busy Saigon street. Buddhist revolts were more intense in Saigon and Hue. On August 21, the government ordered a Special Force to stage raids against a number of Buddhist temples. Several hundred Buddhists, monks, nuns, and students were arrested. Meanwhile, Buddhist leaders took refuge in the U.S. embassy in Saigon and the U.S. consulate in Hue. Six more monks would sacrifice themselves before November.³ These events were summarized in the words of assistant secretary of state Roger Hilsman: “Here you had a country’s ninety-five percent Buddhist, led by French-speaking Vietnamese who were beating up pagodas, killing nuns, and killing priests. I would say certainly by the beginning of the Buddhist crisis he [Kennedy] was already discouraged; by the middle of it, I think he was totally discouraged.”⁴

Through Hilsman’s statement everyone knew that Diem’s regime would not last long. The primary reason was that President Kennedy finally inclined toward the camp that continuously opposed Diem and Nhu. This camp was composed of politicians who had a biased knowledge of the Vietnamese society, culture, and history. Thus, their advice to the president was superficial and incorrect. For two millennia, Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism were the three great philosophical systems underpinning Vietnamese culture and social life. In practicing these philosophies, the Vietnamese commonly used such material objects as altars, likenesses, figures, lamps and incense in their ceremonies. Most would pray while holding burning incense and kneeling down before the altar adorned of figures or statuettes, in the same way a Buddhist did before an alter in a pagoda. Therefore, looking from the outside, a foreign observer might mistakenly assume that ninety-five percent of Vietnamese are Buddhists. A truly conscientious intellectual would perceive more clearly, especially when deciding the fate of a people.

A careful observation of Vietnamese society would reveal that on the altars of the majority of Vietnamese families were pictures, figures or nominated tablets of their ancestors and parents, figures of upright and loyal generals—Chinese or Vietnamese—and great sages from ancient times. This type of ordained altar proved that the Vietnamese had adapted the “cult of ancestors” and the cult of “heroes and sages,” a social and ethical tradition rooted in Confucianism rather than Buddhism. A minority of Vietnamese families displayed Buddhas statuettes and other likenesses, or even figures of various fairies—symbols of the Taoist cult—on their altars, which were separated from their ancestors’ altars.

Other studies also demonstrated that the majority of the Vietnamese were not Buddhists, but adopters of Confucianism. An observation of Vietnamese daily social life revealed that almost all Vietnamese practiced Confucian teachings, including the “three relations,” or “Tam cương” in Vietnamese (relation between king and subject, father and son, and husband and wife); the “five virtues,” or “Ngũ thường” (benevolence, righteousness, civility, knowledge, and loyalty) applicable for men; the “three followings,” or “Tam tùng” (follow father, husband, and son’s advice) and the “four virtues,” or “Tứ đứć” (proper employment, proper demeanor, proper speech, and proper behavior) applicable for women. Only a minority of Vietnamese practiced the Buddha’s teachings such as Buddhist prayers, or “Kinh Phâ.t” and Buddhist laws, or “Phâ.t-pháp,” which were high, deep, and transcendent, but were too difficult for the masses. Confucian teachings were taught in every national and private school for thousands of years under every regime including the Chinese domination, the Vietnamese consecutive monarchies, the French colonial rule, and the democracy of South Vietnam (except the communist regime of North Vietnam). Buddhist teachings, on the other hand were taught only in Buddhist pagodas or in few Buddhist institutes. Taoist teachings also played an important role in Vietnamese culture, helping the masses harmonize humans and nature, reveries and realities, metaphysics and Buddhism. Overall, in North Vietnam before 1955, and in South Vietnam before 1963, an estimated 95 percent of the Vietnamese population followed Confucianism. This percentage included about 25 percent of Buddhists who were also Confucian pragmatists, and five to six percent of Catholics and Protestants. The percentage of Taoists was difficult to estimate because the Taoists mingled within Confucians and Buddhists. The rest of the population, about four to five percent, was either atheist or communist.

In Vietnamese history during the Ly dynasty, there was a period during which Buddhism seemed to be the national religion. The first emperor of the Ly, Ly Cong Uan, had been the student of a Buddhist monk, before dethroning the last king of the Le (the First Le, or Tien-Le). He had intended to establish Buddhism as the primary faith for his subjects by building up many Buddhist temples and pagodas around the country and creating several institutes to teach Buddhist laws and prayers. But after a short period of time, Buddhism was overcome again by Confucianism for almost the next nine hundred years. The conclusion could be drawn that Vietnam was different from Tibet: 95 percent of Vietnam’s population adopted Confucianism but not Buddhism. The “coming” of the American troops to South Vietnam in 1962–1963 profoundly changed the social life and social orders of South Vietnam. For hundreds of years the Vietnamese social order consisted of, from upper to lower class, scholars, farmers, craftsmen, merchants, and soldiers. Vietnamese scholars, despite their French education under French colonial rule, mostly kept the performance of Confucian traditions in their familial and social relations. From the beginning of the 1960s, when the United States started pouring “green dollars” into South Vietnam, Vietnamese intellectuals witnessed the decadent changes in their society. To maintain their composure and dignity, and to evade political and economical pressures, some withdrew into “ivory shells.” Others transposed their social position to the new classes.

Some Vietnamese historians recognized that the Kennedy administration had the perfect vision regarding the leadership of the Vietnamese Buddhist monks of the time. They were seen as capable of leading the people in a political struggle against Diem and his brothers. The populace, especially the Buddhists, believed that Diem’s regime was anti–Buddhism. A scrutiny of the religious and spiritual practices of Vietnamese society demonstrates that those Kennedy advisers that belonged to the anti–Diem camp were badly mistaken in suggesting their young and brilliant president allow the 1963 coup against South Vietnam President Ngo Dinh Diem. Worse yet was allowing their local henchmen to assassinate Diem and his brother Nhu, and later execute his youngest brother, Ngo Dinh Can.

The three days in Hue on the Birthday of the Buddha (May 8–10, 1963) represented the bloodstained start of the 1963 Buddhist crisis. The self-sacrifice of Reverend Thich Quang Duc on June 11, 1963, in the heart of Saigon was the apex of the Buddhist “suicide policy” designed by the exalted Vietnamese Buddhist leadership. Ngo Dinh Diem and his brothers were caught in the Buddhist trap. Madame Ngo Dinh Nhu, President Diem’s sister-in-law, publicly accused American authorities of manipulating the Buddhists into this scheme. U.S. ambassador to Saigon Frederic E. Nolting supported President Dien’s opinion that the “Buddhist crisis” was a political rather than religious outbreak. The ambassador was abruptly relieved from his post by President Kennedy. Powerful people in the U.S. State Department, like Averell Harriman and Roger Hilsman, and others in the White House, wanted Nolting out of Vietnam for an easier handling of their plot against President Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother Ngo Dinh Nhu.

With the departure of Frederic E. Nolting, South Vietnam’s president Ngo Dinh Diem lost his last lifeboat to save his regime and himself when he was in the middle of the politically dangerous waves that would engulf him. Indeed, Henry Cabot Lodge, the new U.S. ambassador to Saigon, just two days coming to his post—on August 24, 1963—sent an urgent cable to his established chain of command in U.S. State Department, Roger Hilsman, reporting that the U.S. embassy in Saigon had been approached by several of RVNAF generals and that Lodge believed that the generals might take matters into “their own hands” and pull a coup against President Diem.

PLOTTING WITH THE GENERALS

Many sources recently have revisited the 1963 coup d’état in South Vietnam. Retired U.S. Army colonel William Wilson wrote in Vietnam Magazine of April 1997 that: “The United States gave its support to a cabal of army generals bent on removing the controversial Diem, whose rise to power Kennedy had backed and who had been the anchor of American policy in Vietnam for nine years. For weeks, with the president informed every step of the way, the American mission in Saigon maintained secret contacts with the plotting generals through one of the Central Intelligence Agency’s most experienced and versatile operatives, Lt. Col. Lucien “Lulu” Conein.”⁵

Lieutenant Colonel Lucien Conein was born in Paris, enlisted in the French Army, and deserted when France surrendered to Germany in 1940. The United States’ OSS recruited him for its secret operations in France during World War II. In 1945, Conein was one of the OSS Deer Team officers under the command of Major Archimedes Patti, who had worked with Ho Chi Minh. Conein himself entered Hanoi in 1945 with the OSS team, and returned in 1954 on a mission to sabotage the communist transportation system. Reassigned to Vietnam in 1962, Conein played a shadowy role as adviser to the Saigon Ministry of the Interior, which commanded all South Vietnamese police and secret police forces. When Cabot Lodge came to Saigon, Conein was immediately chosen for the “American mission” to set up contacts with South Vietnamese generals for the coming coup d’état. Through Lucien Conein, Lodge’s American mission maintained secret and close contacts with General Duong van Minh and General Tran van Don for almost three months before the coup. General Duong van Minh, alias “Big Minh,” was the commanding general of the ARVN’s Operations Command Headquarters, and General Tran van Don was the ARVN’s chief of staff. Lodge stressed that Conein had been a friend of General Don, whom Conein held in high esteem, but General “Big Minh” was chosen to be the leader of the plot.

Although details of these contacts were not released, there was enough proof to substantiate that Lodge mastered-minded the coup against President Diem. A sensitive cablegram dated October 5, 1963, from Lodge to the State Department described a meeting with Lt. Colonel Conein and General Big Minh, in which Minh expressed that “he did not expect any American support, but he needed assurances that the United States would not attempt to thwart the plan, and that it would continue to provide military and economic aid.”⁶ At first, the American National Security Council was reluctant to lend their support, fearing the coup was unlikely to succeed. Indeed, in 1960, a coup d’état against Diem was conducted by the ARVN’s Airborne Brigade, but it lasted only two days. Diem’s regime was saved by some generals such as Nguyen Khanh, Tran Thien Khiem, Ton That Dinh, and Colonel Lam Quang Tho. On August 26, while in Saigon, Ambassador Lodge presented his credentials to President Diem and demanded Nhu’s removal as senior political adviser. In Washington, the National Security Council convened at the White House and President Kennedy expressed his second thoughts after the green-light cable of October 24 had been sent to Lodge. There was a consensus between the president and members of the National Security Council that the situation in Saigon was changing too fast; Washington needed more accurate information about which generals were involved, precisely what they planned, and the possibilities of President Diem conforming. Ambassador Lodge was to be asked for more details on these problems.

On August 29, 1963, Henry Cabot Lodge advanced another step by sending a cable to Washington demanding decisive measures: “We are launched on a course from which there is no respectable turning back: the overthrow of the Diem government. There is no turning back because U.S. prestige is already publicly committed to this end in large measure, and will become more so as the facts leak out. In a more fundamental sense, there is no turning back because there is no possibility, in my view, that the war can be won under the Diem administration.”⁷

In Washington the National Security Council immediately convened, and after a long day of debate, in the end decided to give Ambassador Lodge complete discretion to suspend U.S. aid to Diem. This gave him a mandate to determine American policy in South Vietnam. The same day, President Kennedy cabled Lodge as follows:

I have approved all the messages you are receiving from others today, and I emphasize that everything in these messages has my full support. We will do all we can do to help you conclude this operation successfully. Until the very moment of the go signal for the operation by the generals, I must reserve a contingent to change course and reverse previous instructions. While fully aware of your assessment of the consequences of such a reversal, I know from experience that failure was more destructive than an appearance of indecision. I would, of course accept full responsibility for any such change as I must bear the full responsibility for this operation and its consequences.⁸

With the administration endorsing the coup and the president himself accepting any consequences, Lodge had absolute confidence to proceed with the American mission, involving Conein and the Vietnamese generals in the coup against Diem. But in the course of the proceedings, Lodge played games with the generals, with Diem, and even with the commander of U.S. MACV, General Paul Harkins, like an artful magician who was “throwing stones to someone’s head, but hiding his hands.” In particular, he had Lieutenant Colonel Conein secretly discuss the coup with General Big Minh.

On their side, the Vietnamese generals, without the credible endorsement of the U.S. embassy in Saigon, hesitated to go through with the plot. This lasted more than a month until the first “signal” appeared on October 3, 1963, when Washington removed Saigon CIA Station Chief Richardson, who was very close to President Diem and Adviser Nhu. On the same day, General Duong van Minh summoned Conein and informed him that a coup was being planned. It was the first time in which Big Minh outlined various possible courses of action, including plans to assassinate Diem’s brothers Ngo Dinh Nhu and Ngo Dinh Can. Lodge reported the content of this meeting to Washington in a cablegram dated the same day. In Washington, CIA Director McCone came to meet President Kennedy and argued that Diem’s removal would merely lead to a succession of coups. He argued to the president that the hint of “assassination” proposed by Big Minh in the coming coup would create serious consequences for Washington. Certainly, Ambassador Lodge knew all of this. He knew that Big Minh would kill Diem and his brothers Nhu and Can in the coming coup. On November 2, 1963, the second day of the coup, he delayed offering a plane to Diem and Nhu in order to leave the country, suggesting that he had the same intention as Minh: Kill Diem and Nhu, not out of hatred, but because politically they were afraid of them or, more specifically, they were afraid of their reputation that would motivate other Vietnamese commanders to wreck the coup. Lodge demonstrated more cunning than Minh by letting Minh do it himself, and purposely ignoring McCone’s admonition. This was the trickery of a crafty political gambler.

Another important “signal” for the conspiratorial generals occurred on October 17 when the United States informed Saigon that military aid for Ngo Dinh Nhu’s Special Forces, which was commanded by a confidant of Nhu, Colonel Le Quang Tung, would only continue if channeled through the ARVN Command. On October 25, General Tran van Don had the confirmation of Lieutenant Colonel Lucien Conein that he had been authorized by Ambassador Lodge to discuss the coup with him. On the next day, October 26, Don met Lodge at the airport; Lodge confirmed that Conein was his representative. Thus, confident that he had direct access to U.S. Ambassador Lodge, General Don planned the plot in details with General Minh and others. On October 28, Don informed Conein that the exact time of the coup would be made known to the U.S. embassy only hours before it happened. All in all, the meeting of October 26, 1963, between General Tran van Don and Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge was the main catalyst of the November coup d’état in South Vietnam, even if the details of their discussion are not known. Neither of them ever disclosed their secret talks, but rather either conveyed the “truth” in paradoxical terms or lied. Without that meeting, the coup might may not have occurred.

As the countdown to the coup proceeded, these tacit arrangements infuriated General Paul Harkins. He sent an angry cable to the Defense Department suggesting that he trusted neither General Don nor Ambassador Lodge. Indeed, General Don and Lodge both lied, even to General Harkins, because they considered Harkins to be the last American in Saigon who opposed the coup against Diem. The White House was concerned over the rift between these highest American civilian and military authorities in Saigon. But it was too late, and Lodge prevailed over Harkins, despite the suspicions Harkins expressed in his cable about the leadership of the Vietnamese plotting generals, which had made the National Security Council, once again, think over the coup against Diem: “in my contacts here I have seen no one with the strength of character of Diem, at least in fighting communists. After all, rightly or wrongly, we have backed Diem for eight long years. To me it seems incongruous now to get him down, kick him around, and get rid of him…. Leaders of other underdeveloped countries will take dim view of our assistance if they too were led to believe the same fate lies in store for them.”⁹

Similarly, in a meeting with the president and members of the National Security Council on the afternoon of October 29, Robert Kennedy had the same reservations. American biographer Richard Reeves, in his book President Kennedy, relates: “He stated that he could not see any difference between the situation now and back in July and August, when these same generals had proved incapable of organizing a coup. ‘Supporting the coup,’ he said, ‘meant putting Vietnam, or even all of South-East Asia, in the hands of one man unknown to all of them. This risks so much,’ he said. ‘If it falls, Diem throws us out.’”¹⁰ In another meeting on the same day, the president himself said, “If we miscalculate, we could lose our entire position in South-East Asia.”¹¹

In the end, President Kennedy was persuaded to let the coup happen. He was persuaded not only by his anti–Diems’ advisers but also by his own pretensions of maintaining the U.S. position in Southeast Asia and especially in South Vietnam, when he knew that Diem was essentially in a struggle with him over which one would run South Vietnam. In addition, by early summer, the CIA had reported unconfirmed information that Diem and Nhu were trying to open secret negotiations with Hanoi about the possibility of a united Vietnam without any foreign advisers. He said in April 1963, “We don’t have a prayer of staying in Vietnam. Those people hate us. They are going to throw our ass out of there at almost any point. But I can’t give up a piece of territory like that to the communists and then get the American people to reelect me.”¹² President Kennedy would also never forget words of Mike Mansfield, the Senate majority leader: “if these remedies do not work, it is difficult to conceive of alternatives, with the possible exception of a truly massive commitment of American military personnel and other resources—in short, going to war fully ourselves against the guerrillas—and the establishment of some form of neocolonial rule in South Vietnam.”¹³ The United States had troops in South Vietnam and a new type of neocolonial governor in the land—Henry Cabot Lodge—but the situation had not been remediable because the “barriers of U.S. policy in Vietnam, Diem and Nhu,” existed. The coup to eliminate these political barriers was inevitable.

THE COUP D’ÉTAT KILLING PRESIDENT NGO DINH DIEM AND THE FIRST REPUBLIC OF VIETNAM

In November of 1963, the coup proceeded as scheduled. Ambassador Lodge himself played a role in the coup. He delayed his departure to Washington scheduled for 31 October. At 10:00 A.M. on November 1, Lodge called on President Diem with General Paul Harkins and U.S. Pacific commander Admiral Harry D. Felt. Later, President Diem’s press secretary, Ton That Thien, recalled:

Lodge kept President Diem busy until past twelve. Each time Admiral Felt goes to leave, Lodge asks another question and we know now from the ‘Pentagon Papers’ that Lodge knew all along that the coup would be staged and he was simply pinning down President Diem to deny him access to his staff. Downstairs, Mr. Nhu—this was a coincidence, a strange coincidence—was being asked all sorts of questions by [Colonel] Thieu. Afterwards I talked to people who wanted to get in touch with either Nhu or the President to tell him that there was something going on. And they couldn’t get to him or any orders from the palace at all until the rebellious troops were on the outskirts of Saigon. You cannot say that this is sheer coincidence.”¹⁴

It was very clear:

the first stage of the coup—to pin down President Diem and his brother Nhu in order to deploy the coup plotting forces—was well played by the two most important players, ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge and Colonel Nguyen van Thieu. After the coup Colonel Nguyen was promoted to general, and in 1967, became the second president of South Vietnam. But their roles in this stage were dim in comparison with the following coup events which were timely recorded by most historians:

At 1:30 P.M., on Friday, November 1, in Saigon, coup forces surrounded key installations in the capital, such as the Defense Ministry, the headquarters of the Vietnamese Navy (VNN), the headquarters of the National Police, Tan Son Nhut Airport, and the Central Post Office; first, they seized the Central Radio Broadcasting Station and broadcast announcements about the “Revolution of the Armed Forces of Vietnam against the nepotistical regime of Ngo dinh Diem,” while an infantry division, under the command of Colonel Thieu, surrounded the Presidential Palace.

An hour before, at 12:30 P.M., key generals of the ARVN such as Duong van Minh, Tran van Don, Tran Thien Khiem, and Le van Kim had summoned all other generals and senior officers to Tran Hung Dao Camp, the headquarters of the Joint General Staff of the Republic of Vietnam Armed Forces (JGS-RVNAF), to ask them or force them into pledging and supporting the coup d’etat. With the guns of a group of Minh’s military policemen aiming at them, both the plotters and the few commanders still loyal to Diem let their voices be recorded declaring their support of the coup.

Important commanders loyal to Diem and Nhu were assassinated or detained. Navy Captain Ho Tan Quyen, commander of the Vietnamese Navy (VNN), was murdered just an hour before the coup started; Colonel Le Quang Tung, commander of ARVN’s Special Forces, and his brother, Major Le Quang Trieu, were arrested by Big Minh’s special group; the commanders of the Vietnamese Air Force (VNAF), the Airborne Brigade, and the Marine Forces were detained at Tran Hung Dao Camp, after pledging to transfer their units to General Minh’s new assigned commanders. There were several key positions generals that could not be present at the camp, such as the III Corps commander, General Ton That Dinh, who was at Bien Hoa commanding all coup units around Saigon; the I Corps commander, General Do Cao Tri, who was at Danang; the II Corps commander, General Nguyen Khanh, who was at Pleiku; and the IV Corps commander, General Huynh van Cao, who was at Can-Tho. General Khanh and General Cao were considered the large unit commanders most loyal to President Diem. Until then, they kept their total silence toward the coup.

Colonel Lucien Conein, wearing his U.S. Army uniform and a revolver, was the only American officer who participated in the coup from its beginning at the headquarters of the Vietnamese generals. Conein used a special radio and a telephone line to maintain permanent liaison with the Vietnamese generals and U.S. embassy. Thus, Lodge was well aware of all details of the coup and he assuredly reported important coup events to Washington.

Important events unfolded in top-secret cables between the U.S. embassy in Saigon and the White House. The first cable concerning the coup in Saigon was received in the White House Situation Room at 2:34 A.M., on October 31 (or 3:34 P.M., November 1, in Saigon, which is thirteen hours ahead of Washington). It was the report from Colonel Conein to the U.S. embassy in Saigon, then conveyed to Washington: “Generals attempting contact Palace by telephone but unable to do so. Their position as follows: If the President will resign immediately, they will guarantee his safety and the safe departure of the President and Ngo Dinh Nhu. If the President refuses these terms, the Palace will be attacked within the hour by Air Force and Armor.”¹⁵ The concordance was that at 3:00 P.M. in Saigon, General Don had called the president, suggested he resign and surrender, and assured him that a plane was ready for him and his family to exit the country. Diem, however, refused to resign or surrender.

A second cable was received at 3:40, from Lodge: “Conein reports from JGS. Generals firmly decided there to be no discussion with the President. He will either say yes or no. Observed four AD-6 fighter bombers with munitions aboard at approx 10,000 feet over Saigon…. JGS Gens have monitored radio broadcast from Palace to First and Second Corps and 21st Division. Can hear fighting from Embassy. Can confirm insurgents not arrested. As of 15:35, fire reported Palace vicinity.”¹⁶ This cable was followed by another, received at 4:11 A.M., also from the U.S. embassy in Saigon: “Conein at JGS reports Big Minh called President on telephone but President allegedly not present and Big Minh spoke to Nhu. Col Tung was forced at gunpoint to announce he’s a prisoner. Air Force Commander did not speak. Conein believes he has been eliminated…. Big Minh stated to Nhu if the President and Nhu did not resign, turn themselves over the coup forces within five minutes, the Palace would sustain a massive airborne bombardment. At this, Gen Minh hung up … at 17:15 Gen Minh once more called Diem and Diem hung up.”¹⁷

The last cable that McGeorge Bundy of the National Security Council brought to Kennedy’s bedroom on the morning of November 1, 1963, came at 6:00 A.M. Washington, was the content of the final telephone conversation between Diem and Lodge at 4:30 P.M., November 1, in Saigon. It read:

DIEM: Some units have made a rebellion and I want to know: What is the attitude of the U.S.?

LODGE: I do not feel enough informed to be able to tell you. I have heard shooting, but am not acquainted with all the facts. Also it is 4:30 A.M. in Washington and the US Government cannot possibly have a view.

DIEM: But you must have some general ideas. After all, I am a Chief of State. I have tried to do my duty. I want to do now what duty and good sense require. I believe in duty above all.

LODGE: You have certainly done your duty. As I told you only this morning, I admire your courage and your great contributions to your country. No one can take away from you the credit for all you have done. Now I am worried about your personal safety. I have a report that those in charge of the current activity offer you and your brother safe conduct out of the country if you resign. Had you heard that?

DIEM: No. (and then after a pause) You have my telephone number?

LODGE: Yes. If I can do anything for your physical safety, please call me.

DIEM: I am trying to reestablish order.¹⁸

Ambassador Lodge lied to Diem in saying: “it is 4:30 A.M. in Washington and US Government cannot possibly have a view.” In reality, when the first cable from Saigon came to the White House, McGeorge Bundy and his assistant, Michael Forrestal of the National Security Council, were immediately informed by the Situation Room’s duty officer. They came to the White House before 2:00 A.M. that night with other cables from CIA Saigon Station and MACV. They waited until past three to awaken the president.¹⁹ If the United States had “a view” regarding President Diem’s situation and the “physical safety” of him and his brother Nhu, it had already been formed. In contrast, Lodge surely did not want to create more problems when everything, until then, was going so well for the supported plotters and for the United States’ interests. Thus, the last act of the first scene of the coup d’état in Saigon fell in the darkness of night that Friday, November 1, 1963, with the empty promises of the generals and of Lodge to guarantee the physical safety and safe exit of Diem and Nhu if they surrendered. On the other side, Diem and Nhu believed that they could reestablish order.

The first act of the second scene continued in the darkness when Diem, Nhu, and some aides escaped from the Presidential Palace by a secret exit and fled to the house of their Chinese confidant, Ma Tuyen, in Cholon. From there, President Diem remained in touch with the Generals and called on them to surrender. Diem’s last hope lay with the forces of the Central Highlands and the Mekong Delta. But General Khanh of the II Corps and General Cao of the IV Corps could not come to save him and his regime. The final scene would be as follows: At 5:30 A.M., Saturday, November 2, in Saigon, President Diem and Adviser Nhu moved to hide in a Catholic church, the Saint Francis Xavier Church in Cholon, located in the 6th Administrative District and the 7th Military Sub-Sector of the Capital Military Special Zone.

By the evening of November 2, everybody knew that President Diem and Adviser Nhu had been killed by one of Big Minh’s aides inside a U.S. M-113 armored personnel carrier sent to escort them from Saint Francis Church to the JGS.

After the sad dawn of November 2, 1963, the coup’s secrecies, particularly the assassination of Diem and Nhu, were discovered both in Saigon and in Washington. In Washington, at 6:05 P.M., Friday evening, November 1 (7:05 A.M., Saturday, November 2, Saigon time), the White House received a cable from Ambassador Lodge emphasizing that Diem had telephoned the generals at 5:30 A.M. (Saigon time) to offer his surrender, asking only safe passage out of Vietnam for himself and his brother Nhu. Lodge said that he did not know where the Diem call had come from, because the brothers had escaped the palace during the night and disappeared into the city. “General Minh had accepted this,” Lodge reported.²⁰

However, at midnight, November 1, the White House received a cable from CIA Saigon that read: “Best estimate this time is that Diem and Nhu dead. Radio announcement reports they committed suicide by poison. Bodies reported to be in JGS in armored personnel carrier or inside building. Feel with reasonable certain that they are dead and continuing to check by what means and where now located.”²¹

At 9:00 A.M., Saturday, November 2, when President Kennedy came to the Cabinet Room, where the National Security Council members were waiting for him, he nodded to them and sat down. Michael Forrestal presented to him a cable from Lodge reporting the death of Diem and Nhu. “He handed it to the President, who look at it, stood up, and rushed from the room without a word, looking pale and shaken.”²² When he re-entered the room, Kennedy told his aides, who were in total silence, that Diem had fought the communists for nine years and he deserved a better end than assassination. William Colby, who was in the room, observed: “President Kennedy was obviously upset, distraught. I think that he felt a sense of personal responsibility for it. Certainly he hadn’t anticipated it—whether he should have or not is another question.”²³

That evening, the White House received a more detailed and precise cablegram from CIA Saigon; it read: “Young Vietnamese Saigon businessman … casual source exhibited set of snapshots morning 3 November which showed Ngo Dinh Diem and Ngo Dinh Nhu covered with blood, apparently bullet-riddled, lying dead on floor of armored vehicle with hands tied behind them. Photos appear authentic. Source states pictures taken approximately 10:00 o’clock on November 2. Pictures now being offered for sale to international press in Saigon.”²⁴ That night, November 2, Roger Hilsman, then assistant secretary of State for the Far East, was asked by journalist Marguerite Higgins, who was present at the White House: “Which American hand was blood-stained?”²⁵ There was no answer for this question.

Naturally, the Kennedy administration had no choice but to recognize the new authorities in Saigon: a military junta headed by Generals Big Minh, Don, Kim, Khiem, and Dinh. President Kennedy learned that at six or seven o’clock on the morning of November 2, General Don had asked the American embassy in Saigon to provide Diem and Nhu safe passage out the country and into exile. The Americans could have saved Diem and Nhu. Notwithstanding, one half-hour later, David Smith, the acting chief of the CIA Saigon Station, told Conein to tell Big Minh that it would take twenty-four hours to get a suitable plane from Guam to Tan Son Nhat Airport. Big Minh told Conein: “We can’t hold them that long,” as Richard Reeves retells it, and he comments, “it sounded like a death sentence.”²⁶

After the assassination of the South Vietnamese leaders, Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge sent a cable to President Kennedy congratulating all Americans that had helped the coup succeed, saying: “All this may be useful lesson in the use of US power for those who have similar situation in other places in the future. The President, the State Department, the military, the AID, the USIS, and the CIA deserve credit for this result. Without united action of the U.S. Government, it would not have been possible. My thanks to you and all those associated with you for comprehending and imaginative guidance and support.”²⁷ This message of Lodge would confirm that the United States had used its power to transform South Vietnam from an efficacious anti-communist government into an ineffective coalition that could not help the United States win the war; a docile junta ready to work for the U.S. government. The tacit methods of the United States to eliminate the self-willed leaders of its supported nations were also revealed. Because of these dangerous measures, on November 20, Prince Sihanouk of Cambodia announced that he was rejecting all U.S. aid, and the military junta in Saigon led by General Duong van Minh lasted only three months.

Perhaps President Kennedy was unaware of the tacit methods and measures plotted by his confident aides. Nevertheless, there were solid works on which historians could base their deliberations and viewpoints that these measures were used as efficacious tools to eliminate opponents, at least in the case of President Diem and his brother Nhu. Of course, the coup against Diem was thoroughly staged by Ambassador Lodge, who was backed by Averell Harriman, under-secretary of state; Roger Hilsman, assistant secretary of state for the Far East; and Michael Forrestal of the National Security Council. The November 1963 coup ended with the death of President Diem and his brother Nhu, and the death of the First Republic of Vietnam.

President Ngo Dinh Diem would be the last strong leader of South Vietnam. The November coup d’état in 1963 to eliminate him and his brother Nhu was a tragedy not only for South Vietnam but also for the United States. William Colby, then the CIA’s Far East director, hastened to Saigon after the coup and reported to Washington that the war would soon be over and lost. Looking back at the November-coup d’état sometime later, he said:

It really sounds incredible today that we made those decisions about getting rid of Diem without really careful consideration about what kind of government would replace him…. The chaos and anarchy, which infected the Vietnamese government at that time, caused everything to fall apart. The assessments were very clear that the situation was going downhill very fast during 1964, and our assessment was that the communists would probably win the war by about the end of 1965. They began to send their military units—not just infiltrators but military units—down the Ho Chi Minh Trail in the fall of 1964 to begin to build up the military force to administer the ‘coup de grace.’ Now President Johnson who was in charge of it at that time was of course a very tenacious Texan, a very tough fellow, and he wasn’t about to have that happen.²⁸

The United States would not let South Vietnam fall easily. However, its thirty-sixth president, Lyndon Baines Johnson, had inherited the painful results of the Kennedy administration’s foreign policy in Indochina and Vietnam in several domains: (l) the tacit war in Laos which resulted from the 1962 neutralization of the Geneva Accords; (2) the Harriman Line in Laos that allowed North Vietnam to exploit and develop the Ho Chi Minh Trail; (3) the chaotic political, economical, and social situations and the anarchy in South Vietnam that weakened the United States’ efforts to fight the communists in the country; (4) the concept of “escalation of U.S. engagement” in South Vietnam, which was proposed by the National Security Council in Action Memo 249 of June 19, 1963, and approved by President Kennedy; and (5) Kennedy’s circle of aides, who were generally talented policy-makers and military strategists, but were not suitable for directing the war in Indochina, and with their concept of “escalation” would push the Johnson administration to commit more combat troops in Vietnam. The war became more intense and irresolvable.

Ultimately, the coup d’état in South Vietnam in November 1963 that eliminated President Ngo Dinh Diem and established a militarist regime in Saigon was the third paradox for the United States that caused the first serious failure of its foreign policy in Indochina.