Madam Nhu, Dragon Lady of South Viet Nam

Madame Nhu, Dragon Lady of South Vietnam

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Note: An edited version of this article appeared in Vietnam magazine, Vol. 22, No. 3, October, 2009, pp. 32-37.

Madame Ngo Dinh Nhu was the most famous and influential woman in the brief history of South Vietnam. As the sister-in-law of Vietnam’s bachelor President Ngo Dinh Diem, she considered herself the nation’s First Lady. No stranger to controversy, and thriving on publicity, Madame Nhu had the complete support of President Diem along with the complete loathing of President John Kennedy and the government of the United States, both at the same time. This is the story of the rise and fall of Madame Nhu, known as the Dragon Lady of South Vietnam.

Madame Nhu was born in1924 into one of the wealthiest and most aristocratic families in Vietnam. Her maiden name was Tran Le Xuan (“Beautiful Spring”). Her father was a lawyer, and the Tran family made its fortune serving the French colonial government. At her home in Hanoi she was attended by 20 servants. She was a mediocre student who never finished high school. She became fluent in French but never learned to write Vietnamese. Beautiful Spring felt unloved by her mother, against whom she rebelled. She had an unhappy childhood and was anxious to marry in order to escape her domestic circumstances.

At the same time Beautiful Spring was eager to marry, Ngo Dinh Nhu was employed as an archivist at the Indo-China Library in Hanoi. Nhu also came from an aristocratic family. The Ngo clan had converted to Catholicism in the seventeenth century. Nhu’s father served as counselor to the emperor of Vietnam. Nhu spent his twenties studying literature and librarianship in Paris. In Hanoi, in the early 1940s, he was an admirer of Beautiful Spring’s mother, who operated a local literary salon. While Nhu provided books and tutored her in Latin, Beautiful Spring developed a plan to get out of her oppressive home situation. Although fourteen years younger and not in love, she married Nhu and converted to Catholicism in 1943. Three years later war began between the Viet Minh and the French. [1]

Nhu and his brothers were strongly anti-Communist. One brother, Diem, was arrested and briefly held prisoner by the Viet Minh; another was killed. Nhu managed to avoided capture. Not so lucky, Madame Nhu and her infant daughter were taken by the Communists in December 1946 and held in a remote village for four months. She was reunited with Nhu when French forces liberated the area. The Nhus settled in the resort town of Da Lat in the Central Highlands. They ran a newspaper and worked to organize support for Diem, who was living in the United States.

Nhu moved to Saigon in 1953 where he organized demonstrations against the French and the Communists. Nhu also worked to undermine popular support for Emperor Bao Dai in order to increase the appeal of the nationalist movement headed by Diem, now living in France and in contact with the large Parisian Vietnamese exile community. In March 1954, word reached Saigon that the French army at Dien Bien Phu was threatened by a powerful Viet Minh force. Bao Dai, considered a puppet of the French by many Vietnamese, realized there was a possibility the French might soon depart Vietnam. Recognizing Diem’s popularity, in June 1954 he appointed him prime minister of Vietnam. The following year Nhu came up with a plan to allow Diem to win the power struggle with Bao Dai: hold a referendum asking the people to choose between them. Nhu controlled the secret police, who determined the outcome of the election. Diem won the October 25 election with a whopping 98.2 per cent of the vote. He ousted the emperor, proclaimed a republic, named himself President, and assumed dictatorial powers. Because he was strongly anti-Communist, Diem secured the support of the Eisenhower administration, which gave him hundreds of millions of dollars in aid. Diem, with Nhu’s help, spent the next few years defeating his political opponents and consolidating his powers.

Nhu and Madame Nhu lived in the Presidential Palace and controlled access to Diem. Their power was immense. According to journalist David Halberstam, had Diem been the President of the US, Nhu would have controlled all the nation’s newspapers; headed the CIA, FBI, and Congress; served as Attorney General and Secretary of State; and written all the reports seen by the President.[2] Both were elected to the National Assembly in 1956; both rarely bothered to attend its sessions.[3]

Madame Nhu served as her bachelor brother-in-law’s official First Lady. She insisted the Vietnamese press refer to her as Madame Ngo, although the proper usage was Madame Nhu.[4] In 1956 she began a campaign to make major changes in Vietnamese domestic relations. In 1958 her Family Code bill became law. It made illegal polygamy, divorce, and marital infidelity (including being seen in public with a member of another sex). Women were given equal rights with men in a variety of areas. Numerous male members of the Assembly disagreed with this legislation and its passage was contentious – during the deliberations, according to some reports, Madame Nhu called the Assembly majority leader “a pig.”[5]

Although continued government repression cemented Diem’s hold on power, in the long term it served to alienate the Vietnamese from the government. This alienation was exploited by the Communist Viet Cong (VC). By the late 1950s increased VC influence brought the country to the point of political crisis.

President Diem’s propensity for one-man rule was tempered only by reliance on his family to govern Vietnam. His four brothers all had important roles in South Vietnamese affairs. Despite their strong influence, neither Nhu nor Madame Nhu held high positions within the Diem government. Nhu’s official title was Advisor to the President. Madame Nhu was head of the Women’s Solidarity Movement and in charge of women’s affairs generally. Over time the power and influence of the Nhu’s increased, to the point where some observers claimed Nhu was more powerful even than Diem, due to Nhu’s strong influence over his brother’s thinking. Other observers felt it was Madame Nhu who had become the dominant member of the family. She increasingly concerned herself with matters outside the domain of women’s affairs, and sought a position for herself of equality with the President.[6]

John Mecklin served in Vietnam with the U.S. Information Agency. He knew Diem, Nhu, and Madame Nhu personally. He found it conceivable the entire family was clinically mad; indeed, some of their actions were so bizarre as to suggest a death wish. According to Mecklin, “the Nhus were the poison that ultimately destroyed the regime.” Madame Nhu was a “hair-triggered spitfire” willing to force a resolution to political issues but almost always in the most damaging directions. She was greatly stirred by the crisis affecting her country, but her reactions served to worsen it. She was striking in appearance but not beautiful, very energetic, and had extravagant tastes. She was extroverted, had a good sense of humor, and was a captivating conversationalist, capable of talking “like a machine gun in either French or English.” [7]

As the influence of the Nhus increased, so too did resentment against the government. Seeing no alternative to Diem, the White House urged reform in order to broaden his base of support. In 1959 Ambassador Elbridge Durbrow tried to persuade Diem to get rid of Nhu and bring new people into the government.[8] In November 1960 there was a coup attempt by South Vietnamese paratroopers with the same goal. One of their first demands was that Madame Nhu be removed from the Presidential palace. According to an article in Time magazine, she was flattered by the attention.[9] In the first moments of the coup the paratroopers accomplished their goals – Diem and most everyone inside the palace favored accepting the demands to form a new government. Alone, Madame Nhu rejected any notion of compromise, insisting instead on fighting to the end. Diem finally brought in loyal troops and forced an end to the rebellion. To the dismay of her enemies, her influence increased dramatically. As she described it, “Up until then, they had not taken me seriously. But then they began to notice me, and began to worry when I said things.”

During the coup Ambassador Durbrow offered Madame Nhu safe conduct to the US embassy. Although the Americans did not sponsor the coup, Durbrow’s offer convinced Madame of US complicity. As Diem and the Nhus became more suspicious, the regime adopted a siege mentality and became increasingly less popular. According to New York Times reporter Halberstam, “Everything that went wrong in Vietnam was blamed on the Nhus,” while Madame Nhu “became the target of even more intense hatred.”[10] According to historian Joseph Buttinger, “Nhu and his wife became the two most hated people in South Vietnam.”[11]

Her 1958 Family Code law notwithstanding, Madame Nhu decided Vietnamese morals needed further regulation. Her 1962 Law for the Protection of Morality sought to make illegal a wide range of activities, including birth control, beauty contests, gambling, dancing, boxing, cockfights, and fighting by male Siamese fighting fish. Minors could not attend unsuitable movies and plays; sorcerers and mediums were outlawed; prostitution was prohibited.[12] This legislation increased dislike of Madame Nhu in proportion to the popularity of the activities banned. According to Associated Press reporter Malcolm Browne, who was stationed in Saigon, Madame Nhu also declared war on her own family. In 1962 she caused her sister to attempt suicide; in 1963 she disowned her parents.[13]

Although she may have been flattered to be a focus of the 1960 coup attempt, Madame Nhu was likely furious when she and her husband became the targets of the next one. On February 27 1962, two Vietnamese Air Force pilots, trained in the U.S., took off in their American-built AD-6 attack aircraft from the Bien Hoa Airbase, a few miles from Saigon. Lt. Nguyen Van Cu successfully bombed the wing of the presidential palace inhabited by Nhu and Madame Nhu. An accomplice, Lt. Nguyen Phu Quoc, was shot down when antiaircraft fire struck his plane. Quoc was taken prisoner. Diem was walking down a hallway when the bombs struck, and was nearly bowled over by the blast. Nhu was unhurt, and Madame Nhu was slightly injured when she fell down a flight of stairs.

Cu, who bombed with napalm and high explosives, later said the attack was inspired by hatred of the Diem regime, hatred directed less at Diem personally than toward his family. Cu flew his plane to Cambodia, where he was granted political asylum. Quoc was imprisoned until the next coup, and then released. Both eventually returned to their duties as air force pilots.[14]

South Vietnam was a US client state. Diem realized he needed American aid to maintain his position. He and the Nhus wanted that aid to come with no strings attached. They disliked the increasing American presence in their country. Madame Nhu referred to this as “creeping Americanism” and was willing to take drastic steps to minimize it. For example, for a time she ordered the police to pick up all Vietnamese women found walking with Americans.[15] The Americans were funding the Vietnamese government and training its police and military forces. American soldiers were dying in combat in support of the regime. They felt this gave them the right to advise the Diem regime and expected that advice be taken. According to reporter Halberstam, Madame Nhu’s political philosophy was simple: The Ngo family was always right; the family should never compromise; and it should ignore criticism.[16]

The US supported South Vietnam in order to prevent its fall to communism. Thanks to this aid the size of its armed forces was growing. Yet at the same time so too was the size and effectiveness of the Viet Cong.[17] Twice elements of the South Vietnamese armed forces had attacked Diem in the presidential palace. He was fearful of their loyalty, deploying them more to minimize their ability to stage coups than to effectively fight the Viet Cong. The relationship with senior army commanders was further strained by Madame Nhu, who ordered them around the presidential palace like “house servants” and treated them generally like lackeys under her personal control.[18]

Diem and the Nhus were Catholic. Most Vietnamese were Buddhists. No political opposition parties were allowed in South Vietnam. As opposition to the government increased, more Vietnamese became attracted to Buddhism. Ngo Dinh Thuc, brother of President Diem, was the Catholic Archbishop of Hue, the center of Buddhism in Vietnam. In early 1963 there was a celebration in Hue to commemorate Thuc’s twenty-five years as bishop. Both Vietnamese and Roman Catholic flags were flown, which violated a law which permitted only the Vietnamese flag be flown in public. This event was followed by Buddha’s 2,587^th birthday, and the Buddhists in Hue wanted to fly their flag. When the Diem government prohibited this, thousands of Buddhists demonstrated in protest. Nine were killed when government troops fired into the demonstrators. U. S. Ambassador William Trueheart urged Diem to make peace with the Buddhists by admitting fault, paying indemnity, and issuing a public apology for the incident. Instead the government blamed the Buddhists’ death on the Viet Cong. When the Buddhists continued to demonstrate, the government banned demonstrations. The Buddhist crisis had begun, and escalated.

When the government response to their grievances proved unsatisfactory, Buddhist monks and nuns began a series of hunger strikes. Rioting in Hue turned violent and government troops fought back. Anti-government demonstrations by the Buddhists spread throughout the country. In Saigon, on June 11 1963, an old Buddhist monk squatted on the street near the Xa Loi pagoda. Gasoline was poured over his head. The monk lit a match and set himself aflame. Thich Quang Duc was the first of seven Buddhists to protest the Diem regime with suicide by immolation.

The US was stunned by the Buddhist suicides, and urged Diem to make some sort of settlement. Showing she was made of sterner stuff, Madame Nhu called for beating the monks “ten times over” and referred to the suicides as a “monk barbecue show.”[19] Not to be outdone, Nhu commented “If the Buddhists wish to have another barbecue I will be glad to supply the gasoline and a match.”[20] Pressured by the Americans, Diem finally met with Buddhist leaders. A communiqué was issued and signed by Diem. When Madame Nhu learned of this she accused Diem of cowardice and called him a jellyfish for even negotiating.[21]

Positions hardened. The Buddhist protests, originally religious, became overtly political. Their support increased. Nhu claimed the Buddhists were rebels and their movement was communist infiltrated. Diem and the Nhus wanted to crush the Buddhists but were restrained by the Americans, who professed a belief in religious freedom and urged the government to reform. The crisis extended into the fall, and worsened. The Nhus complained Diem was too soft on the Buddhists. There were rumors both the military and Nhu were planning anti-Diem coups.

Nhu considered the Vietnamese Special Forces his private army. On August 21 1963, he ordered hundreds of them to attack the Xa Loi pagoda with guns, tear gas, and grenades. The Buddhists barricaded themselves inside. After two hours of fighting over 100 monks were arrested and taken away. Madame Nhu grated an interview the day after the pagoda raid. She “was in a state of euphoria, chattering like a schoolgirl after a prom.” She told the reporter the government had crushed “the Communist-Buddhists” and referred to the event as “the happiest day of my life since we crushed the Binh Xugen in 1955.”[22]

It wasn’t a happy day for the Americans, who, having financed and trained the Vietnamese Special Forces, wanted them used for counterinsurgency instead of attacking pagodas. American officials began discussing the possibility of a coup with dissident Vietnamese generals.

On September 10, Madame Nhu embarked on an extended trip to Europe and the US to explain “the monstrous plot of the Communists to stifle Vietnam.” She also scoffed at reports the US might reduce its aid to protest government repression.[23] When the US did cut $3 million in funding for the Vietnamese Special Forces until they returned to combat, Madame Nhu called it a “betrayal.”[24] On September 22, while in Rome, she ridiculed junior officers of the US military mission in Vietnam, calling them “little soldiers of fortune.”[25] On October 7 she arrived in New York. Official welcomers – federal, state, and city – were conspicuously absent. On October 18, in Washington DC, Madame Nhu accused Kennedy administration officials of committing treason by reducing aid to South Vietnam.[26] On November 1, in Saigon, Vietnamese generals launched the third military coup against the government, resulting in the deaths of Diem and Nhu. Upon hearing the news the citizens of Saigon exploded in jubilation. A few of them used a power winch from a ship in the harbor to pull down a statue of Madame Nhu.[27] According to David Halberstam, had Madame Nhu been in Saigon, the new junta would have had a terrible problem trying to keep howling mobs from lynching her.[28]

In Beverly Hills, Madame Nhu bitterly accused the US government of inciting and backing the coup. When asked if she might seek political asylum in the US, Madame Nhu replied, “Never! I cannot stay in a country with people who have stabbed my Government.” [29] She flew to Rome with her children. Upon arrival she secluded herself in a convent. She left a trail of unpaid bills amounting to thousands of dollars in the wake of her five-week long visit to the United States.[30]

In Saigon, on November 15, the new government revoked Madame Nhu’s diplomatic passport. On December 18 it rescinded Madame Nhu’s unpopular morality and family laws.[31]

Apparently not finding seclusion to her liking, Madame Nhu quickly sold the exclusive screen, television, and press rights to her memoirs to a French publishing house.[32] She continued her attacks on the United States, calling Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge a “bewildered nanny” who wanted to become the “governor general” of South Vietnam.[33] On January 13, she called for a United Nations investigation of the November coup and bizarrely expressed doubt her husband and Diem were even dead.[34] The following month the Saigon government declared her an outlaw and issued an order for her arrest.[35] In March Madame Nhu issued a 16,000 word statement in which she attacked President Kennedy and accused the US of fascism and communism.

In June 1964, Madame Nhu applied for a visa to visit the US. At the urging of Ambassador Lodge, the State Department denied her request. In Rome she moved in with her brother-in-law, Archbishop Ngo Dinh Thuc. While detesting the American press, she offered to receive journalists under certain conditions: If the newspaper wanted a photograph, she would pose for $1,000. For an interview plus photograph, the charge was $1,500. Interviews would not be granted without photographs. [36]

The war in Vietnam dragged on, and finally ended. The press and public lost interest in Madame Nhu. Her fortunes continued to deteriorate. Her daughter, Ngo Dinh Le Thuy, died in 1967 of injuries in suffered in an automobile accident. Twenty years later her brother was charged with first-degree murder in the slayings of her elderly parents.[37] Although born into one of the most important families in all of Vietnam, by the 1970s she was living in a villa in Rome, a place described as “somewhat rundown.” Her home was repeatedly struck by robbers.[38] She spent her time gardening and writing. In 1978 she was well into a history of South Vietnam “from an insider’s viewpoint.” No one alive had a better view of the rise and fall of the Diem regime and America’s involvement in what became its longest and most controversial war than Madame Nhu. No Vietnamese woman was more powerful, controversial, and disliked. Unfortunately, the book has never been published.

At the time of this writing Madame Nhu was living in Rome.

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