Word: quang
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...most extraordinary men. As a result of the power and discipline he displayed in last week's events, one thing became eminently clear: South Viet Nam's political future for some time to come will be very much influenced by a servant of Buddha, the Venerable Tri Quang...
Lean, well-muscled, with a sensual electricity, in every gesture and blazing eyes that can mesmerize a mob, Thich Tri Quang, 42, has long been South Viet Nam's mysterious High Priest of Disorder. (Thich, pronounced tick, is a title meaning "venerable"; Tri Quang is pronounced tree kwong.) Wily and ruthless, Delphic and adept, he is the best of breed of a new kind of back room bonze. In the murky world of Oriental mysticism and Saigon's immemorial intrigue, these robed and shaven men have emerged as the new Machiavellis of the Vietnamese political scene. Tri Quang is unquestionably...
Like the legendary crane of Chinese mythology, Tri Quang throughout his career has largely managed to shroud himself from mortal view, appearing only now and then as an exclamation point to specific events. A master of means whose ends are obscure, he is, in maddening succession, devious, enigmatic, contradictory and blandly opaque. The only thing self-evident about him is his burning desire for power, his urgent ambition not only for himself but, presumably, for his people ?the Buddhists of South Viet...
Saint or Seer? To his mission, Tri Quang brings an intelligence and a toughness that have not been seen in a South Vietnamese leader since Ngo Dinh Diem, whose downfall the ascetic bonze triggered in 1963. Since then he has added the scalps of three more governments. Last week he scored another triumph, this time over the Directory of generals headed by Premier Nguyen Cao Ky. It was no small feat, since the generals comprise the combined armed might of South Viet Nam, but Tri Quang is armed with his own powerful weapons: an unerring instinct for politics, a perfect...
Perhaps the most important thing about Thich Tri Quang at this juncture in Vietnamese affairs is that he is a genuine political animal of the true native species. Unlike any of his rivals or predecessors in independent Viet Nam, he is untouched by Western tradition or training, proudly parochial, untainted by the embrace of the lycée mandarins. Fiercely nationalistic and xenophobic, he dreams of a return to the golden age of the Ly dynasty (1009-1225), composed of those ardent Buddhists who formed Viet Nam's first stable government and, by pushing out Chinese influence, created a Viet...