Word: minh
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...issue was raised by the man who led the Diem coup: Duong Van ("Big") Minh, a former general and one of the chief rivals of President Nguyen Van Thieu, who last week formally declared his candidacy. Two weeks ago, Minh told some reporters that Thieu was at least partially responsible for the killing of the brothers. As Minh told it, Thieu, then a colonel in command of the South Vietnamese 5th Division, was to surround Saigon's cream-colored Gia Long Palace and "protect the life of President Diem" by taking him into custody. But Thieu...
...Although Ky has already declared, neither he nor Minh is an official candidate yet. Under a new, Thieu-sponsored election law, ostensibly designed to cut down on the number of frivolous candidates, presidential hopefuls must collect endorsements from 40 of the 190 or so National Assembly members, or from 100 of the country's some 550 provincial councilmen. There were reports that Minh had collected at least 40 signatures from Assembly members by early last week, but was planning to wait until just before the Aug. 4 deadline before declaring his candidacy...
...having much more difficulty rounding up his endorsements because he is going after the provincial councilmen, all of whom are beholden to Thieu-appointed province chiefs. If Ky is shut out of the race, the current Saigon speculation goes, he will throw his support to Minh just before the election. Another possibility is that both Ky and Minh will pull out at the last minute, leaving Thieu a hollow victory...
...Oblique Endorsement. At the moment, Thieu's most serious rival is Big Minh. The hefty (200 Ibs., almost 6 ft.) ex-general is popular, a Buddhist, a Southerner-and a bit of a question mark. In 1963, after Minh led the generals' coup that toppled the Diem regime, Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge wondered in a cable to Washington: "Will he be strong enough to get on top of things?" He was not, and by 1964 he was ousted in another coup and subsequently exiled to Bangkok for nearly four years by a more forceful rival for power, General...
...Though a professed antiCommunist, Minh has long tried to present himself as a moderate who could lead a future government of national reconciliation. His prospects-and Ky's, too, perhaps -may well have been strengthened by the stunning announcement of Richard Nixon's planned trip to Peking, which enhances the plausibility of Minh's conciliatory position. Moreover, many observers see in the latest Communist signals in Paris an oblique endorsement of Minh as a man whom both Hanoi and the National Liberation Front would be willing to live with, at least for a while. As yet, Minh...