Who assassinated Ngo Dinh Diem?
Arrest and assassination of Ngo Dinh Diem
The arrest and assassination of Ngô Đình Diệm, the president of South Vietnam, marked the culmination of a successful CIA-backed coup d'état led by General Dương Văn Minh in November 1963. On 2 November 1963, Diệm and his adviser, his younger brother Ngô Đình Nhu, were arrested after the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) had been successful in a bloody overnight siege on Gia Long Palace in Saigon. The coup was the culmination of nine years of autocratic and nepotistic family rule in South Vietnam. Discontent with the Diệm regime had been simmering below the surface, and exploded with mass Buddhist protests against long-standing religious discrimination after the government shooting of protesters who defied a ban on the flying of the Buddhist flag.
Arrest and assassination of Ngo Dinh Diem
Minh instead arrived to find that the brothers were not in the palace. In anticipation of a coup, they had ordered the construction of three separate tunnels leading from Gia Long to remote areas outside the palace. Around 20:00 on the night of the coup, with only the Presidential Guard to defend them against mutinous infantry and armor units, Diệm and Nhu hurriedly packed American banknotes into a briefcase. They escaped through one of the tunnels with two loyalists: Air Force Lieutenant Ðỗ Thơ, Diệm's aide-de-camp, who happened to be a nephew of Colonel Đỗ Mậu, the director of military security and a participant in the coup plot, and Xuân Vy, head of Nhu's Republican Youth.[20] After the coup, General Paul Harkins, the head of the US presence in Vietnam, inspected the tunnel and noted that it "was so far down that I didn't want to go down to walk up the thing".[19] The brothers emerged in a wooded area in a park near the Cercle Sportif, the city's upper class sporting club, where they were picked up by a waiting Land Rover. Ellen Hammer disputes the tunnel escape, asserting that the Ngo brothers simply walked out of the building, which was not yet under siege.[20] Hammer asserts that they walked past the tennis courts and left the palace grounds through a small gate at Le Thanh Ton Street and entered the car. The loyalists traveled through narrow back streets in order to evade rebel checkpoints and changed vehicles to a black Citroën sedan.[21] After leaving the palace, Nhu was reported to have suggested to Diệm that the brothers split up, arguing that this would enhance their chances of survival. Nhu proposed that one of them travel to the Mekong Delta to join Cao's IV Corps, while the other would travel to the II Corps of General Nguyễn Khánh in the Central Highlands. Nhu felt the rebel generals would not dare to kill one of them while the other was free, in case the surviving brother were to regain power. According to one account, Diệm was reported to have turned down Nhu, reasoning that "You cannot leave alone. They hate you too much; they will kill you. Stay with me and I will protect you." Another story holds that Diệm said "We have always been together during these last years. How could we separate during these last years? How could we separate in this critical hour?" Nhu agreed to remain with his brother.[20]