Word: diem
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...people of South Vietnam, who have known little peace since the Japanese attacked them in the Second World War, would benefit and so would the United States. The mere removal of President Diem and his family has rasped some of the tarnish from the American image, but genuine reforms would wipe off even more. A shiny image is exceedingly important in a largely ideological world-wide contest that presents the U.S. as the champion of a system claiming democratic advantages over the more authoritarian alternatives...
...than later, when both sides will have settled again into the old molds. A prompt re-evaluation is all the more imperative, since the U.S. will now be collaborating with a more respectable regime, which would be much more difficult to abandon honorably than the Ngos. As long as Diem and his friends lorded over the country, the White House could always have asserted, if a military withdrawal became necessary, that America had not capitulated to the Communists but rather that the Ngos had not cooperated very well in keeping the wolves from the door...
This proposal might appear too rigid, except that it holds less prospect for disaster than the present policy. Until the last few weeks, support for the Diem government remained dangerously open-ended. United States personnel in South Vietnam could always plead for just a little more time to corral the Vietcong. The more often this plea was granted, American involvement increased, and the more difficult it became for Washington not to grant the plea the next time. The danger lay in the possibility of having finally to withdraw in great ignominy, to hang on embarrassingly and expensively, or to expand...
...visitors have met only government-approved monks, and none of those in jail. Facing a ticklish diplomatic problem, U.S. Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge decided that the fact finders could interview Buddhist Leader Thich Tri Quang, one of three monks who took refuge in the embassy-if the Diem government had no objection...
Meanwhile Buddhists from eleven Asian nations-some fellow travelers, but others apparently sincere monks-turned up in Peking for a three-day rally, listened to a Viet Cong delegate denounce South Viet Nam as "a hell on earth created by United States imperialism and its lackey, the Ngo Dinh Diem clique." Ignoring Red China's own subjugation of Buddhism, the meeting unanimously adopted a resolution accusing Diem of "atrocities." By serving as a vehicle for Red Chinese propaganda, the Buddhists hardly strengthened their case...