Word: diem
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Long before the recent demonstrations by Buddhists and students in South Vietnam dramatized the brutal nature of President Ngo Dinh Diem's dictatorship, Western news correspondents in Saigon had been filing reports of government police terror, concentration camps, and general political suppression in the Vietnamese corner of the free world...
...threats of reduced aid fail, the United States should not stay in South Vietnam unless Diem and entourage depart. The palace occupants have not indicated any desire to join the previous resident, Emperor Bao Dai, on the Riviera, and there seems to be no easy way of getting them to go. No elections they conduct would turn them out of office. Free elections will have to wait at least removal of the Ngos. However, after the attempted coups in 1960 and 1962, which the U.S. failed to support, and the wild vacillation of Americans policy on a coup in recent...
...somehow, President Diem and his relatives were neatly deposed, military operations would not suffer and might well improve under a new government. More able officers might replace some of the politically appointed generals. Without Diem's objections to casualties and his fears of successful officers, the war might be more purposefully prosecuted...
...serious of unsuccessful coups, however, could divert effort and attention entirely away from the war against the Vietcong, argue those in the U.S. government who oppose the removal of Diem. They also argue that it might be impossible to find a successor able to unite the country in the fight against the Vietcong. This argument unintentionally constitutes a strong case against any American military commitments in South Vietnam, for it says that the people there are not determined to eradicate the Vietcong. If this is true, the United States will soon be the main opponent of the insurgents. Already...
Senators and Representatives who are currently less vulnerable than the President should be saying the things that might make a more adaptable policy possible. They should point out the foibles of the Diem government, explain that Communism is not a monolithic movement, demonstrate that the domino theory-our only justification for consorting with the Ngos - does not apply if Vietnamese Communists differ from Chinese Communists...