Word: buddhistically
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...nightmarish repetition of the immolations of 1963, when eight Buddhists burned themselves to death protesting President Ngo Dinh Diem's anti-Buddhist repressions. At that time the monks were playing on a religious chord that brought a dramatic response in the largely Buddhist nation. This time the immolations were naked political power plays, inspired if not condoned by militant Monk Thich Tri Quang in Hue. While the flames were still flickering over the nun's charred body, Tri Quang summoned the press to make clear his grievance: Premier Ky's successful suppression of the Buddhist-inspired rebellion...
Tragic & Unnecessary. It was the kind of demagoguery that Buddhist zealots understood. Only a few hours later in Saigon, Laywoman Ho Thi Thieu, 58, set herself afire as a protest against "the inhuman actions of Generals Thieu and Ky, henchmen of the Americans." A monk in the resort city of Dalat followed suit the next day. By week's end, nine men and women had died in fiery antigovernment, anti-American protests, leaving notes written in blood-even letters addressed to President Johnson. Replied the President in his Memorial Day address in Arlington (see THE NATION): "This quite unnecessary...
...would be ashamed of the President for this statement that the immolations are useless." But in point of fact, unlike 1963 the grisly suicides thus far have proved largely useless in advancing Tri Quang's campaign to topple the Ky government. The reason: the great majority of Vietnamese Buddhist laymen are clearly unconvinced that the immolations are either justified or necessary, and horror has given way to exasperation and even ennui in a nation accustomed to violent death. "The people look the other way," explained one Vietnamese last week, "because the monks do not have a just cause...
...that point, Ky balked. Tri Quang's response at week's end: threat of a complete Buddhist boycott of the September elections unless Ky quits now. Otherwise, he said, "the Americans and their servants would establish a militaristic national assembly." If Tri Quang's usually pear-shaped tones lost some of their resonance, it was because, for all the week's burnt offerings to the Buddhist cause, Premier Ky still had the upper hand in a nation beginning to weary of pointless civil strife amid a genuine, far more deadly battle for national survival against...
Among the rest of the corps, claims Fried, "you don't see enough digging, or balance." Too many reporters, he insists, still look upon Buddhist "politicians" as religious figures and take them at their word. To Fried, the immolations and amputations "are show biz," and it is a reporter's job to dig behind the pizazz...