Cauldron of Resistance: Ngo Dinh Diem, the United States, and 1950s Southern Vietnam

5. Destroying the Sources of Demoralization: Ngo Dinh Diem’s National Revolution

Chapter 5 Destroying the Sources of Demoralization Ngo Dinh Diem’s National Revolution In the aftermath of Ngo Dinh Diem’s dramatic and unexpected victory in the sect crisis, American observers celebrated his leadership as nothing less than a miracle.1 Pressmen and politicians alike were awed by his unlikely triumph over what they viewed as forces of chaos,greed,and depravity.Any doubt Eisenhower’s administration might have entertained about whether Ngo Dinh Diem should be Washington’s man inVietnam was put to rest. Above all, the outcome of the sect crisis reassured Americans that Ngo Dinh Diem had what it took to maintain order in the face of major political and military challenges to his government, an ability that boded well for his capacity to fend off what they saw as the even more dire looming threat of communist subversion. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles and the U.S. State Department hoped to see some semblance of order and the trappings of democracy emerge within SouthVietnam sooner rather than later, but Washington’s primary concern was to secure the country’s position as a noncommunist power within the region. On May 5, 1955, Dulles wrote to Collins: I am somewhat concerned lest our position become too rigid on fundamental political questions regarding the future of Vietnam.The ultimate Destroying the Sources of Demoralization 117 form and organization of the state and the government must be left to the Vietnamese to decide in an orderly manner....It strikes me that this is not the time to declare for or against any particular form of the state. . . . Of course we would like to preserve basis of legitimacy of the government by some orderly process rather than by revolutionary action. . . .We are primarily concerned with whether government effectively controls country and has genuine anti-communist and nationalist support.2 Following the Battle of Saigon,the United States committed substantial economic aid and advisory support to assist Ngo Dinh Diem in the process of establishing both control over and legitimacy among his constituents. Washington focused on the need to restructure and retrain the SouthVietnamese military, to complete the process of establishing a fully functioning, nominally democratic government, and to modernize civil administration throughout the country. Ngo Dinh Diem’s American advisors wanted him to move past the struggles with politico-religious leaders that had defined his first year in office and begin building a state that could repel more persistent , coordinated communist attacks that they expected might emerge down the line. Ngo Dinh Diem, however, had his own agenda. He was determined to make sure all of his challengers—chief among them the remaining antigovernment Hoa Hao, Cao Dai, and Binh Xuyen forces—were fully annihilated before he could commit himself to the nation-building projects his American patrons envisioned. He perceived the south to be in a state of chaos and moral decay after years of colonialism and war, and strove to restore not only political and military stability, but also moral order.To this end, he launched a military campaign to root out and destroy politicoreligious rebels that was accompanied closely by a propaganda campaign designed to discredit them. He would manipulate the lives and reputations of his most prominent noncommunist foes, and in one notable case a noncommunist ally, in a deliberate effort to neutralize his enemies’ appeal, legitimize his leadership, and spread the basic principles of his governing philosophy. The prime minister maintained that eradicating despicable politicoreligious leaders and their corrupting effects on SouthVietnamese society was an essential first step toward the establishment of a stable government and a functioning polity. “In order to meet the external threat,” he believed, “Viet-Nam must first be strong internally.”3 According to his administration ’s information agents, his goal was to give “Vietnam a strong moral 118 Chapter 5 basis [with] which to rebuild a strong,healthy,democratic State.”Ngo Dinh Diem’s officials warned,“To think of the form before the substance is certainly to run into failure.” His main concern was “to destroy the sources of demoralization, however powerful, before getting down to the problem of endowingVietnam with a democratic apparatus in the Western sense of the word.”4 Ngo Dinh Diem would thenceforth conflate communists, colonialists, and feudalists—by which he meant politico-religious rebels—as “sources of demoralization” and enemies of the people. He attempted to convey to the citizens of SouthVietnam a...