A Death in November

[franksolich]

The other week, at a used bookstore, I picked up A Death in November: America in Vietnam, 1963 (Ellen Hammer, 1987, E.P. Dutton), and was greatly illuminated about things I had never known before.

The book deals with the coups against Ngo Dinh Diem, president of South Vietnam, 1955-1963, the last which of course succeeded.

The writer was a reporter who was on the spot, right there in Vietnam in 1963, and knew many of the personages involved.  I have no idea her political leanings, other than that she was (is) no Harrison Salisbury or Seymour Hersch.

Of course, I never had any respect at all for the late Robert Kennedy, who was attorney general at the time, and alas I had to downgrade my respect for Henry Cabot Lodge, who was U.S. ambassador to South Vietnam.

The biggest lesson to be learned from this book is that desk-sitting bureaucrats in the U.S. Department of State should never be allowed to make "policy" (instead, only to implement it); the biggest bad guy apparently was Roger Hilsman, one of those.

The first official act of Lyndon Johnson, once assuming the presidency after the assassination of John Kennedy in November 1963, was to set into motion the firing of Hilsman, which should've been done a long time before.  The guy wasn't even good enough to mop hallways, much less determine American policy in Vietnam.

In general, the villains, other than the bureaucrat Hilsman, seem to have been Robert Kennedy and Henry Cabot Lodge.  John Kennedy was unsure what to do about South Vietnam, although he tended to be in favor of expanding American involvement there.

It was Robert Kennedy who decided America should run the war, and that Diem as president of South Vietnam was obstacling it.  So Diem had to go.

And it was Henry Cabot Lodge who put into play Robert Kennedy's wishes.

And thus the dirty foul deed.

[franksolich]

Okay, I checked out the writer of the book.

It's an excellent book.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellen_Hammer

Ellen Joy Hammer (September 17, 1921 – January 28, 2001) was an American historian who specialized in 20th-century Vietnamese history. She is best known for writing the two history texts The Struggle for Indochina and A Death in November.

The Struggle for Indochina follows the history of French Indochina from 1940 to 1955, documenting the Japanese takeover of the French colony during the Second World War and the subsequent struggle between the communist Vietminh and the French Union between 1946 and 1954, which resulted in the independence and partition of Vietnam at the 17th parallel as a result of the Geneva Conference.

A Death in November documents the events leading up to the 1963 South Vietnamese coup in November, which saw the arrest and assassination of Ngo Dinh Diem, the first President of South Vietnam. It follows the downfall of the Diem regime amid mass protests following the Hue Vesak shootings, in which nine Buddhists were shot dead by government forces while protesting a ban on the Buddhist flag. The book documents the unfolding Buddhist crisis, covering events such as the self-immolation of Thich Quang Duc, the Xa Loi Pagoda raids and the United States' maneuvering amidst the crisis.

Hammer received a bachelor's degree from Barnard College in 1941 and worked for a few years on the research staff of the Council on Foreign Relations in Manhattan. She earned a doctorate in public law and government from Columbia University, where she specialized in international relations. She became known in the early 1950s for her work on colonial rule in French Indochina. She was regarded as one of first Americans to become scholars of Vietnamese history, often traveling to the Asian country for extended periods.

Her first book, The Struggle for Indochina, published in 1954, was regarded as a pioneering text for that period of history. Douglas Pike, a historian and director of research at the Vietnam Center at Texas Tech University, said that as a scholar Hammer was "one of the few Americans that got into Vietnam before the American buildup there" in the mid-1960s.

A Death in November: America in Vietnam, 1963 was published in 1987, and Thomas Omestad wrote in a New York Times Book Review that "The title of this carefully researched book refers to the death of Ngo Dinh Diem, president of South Vietnam from 1955 to 1963, and that of his brother and adviser, Ngo Dinh Nhu." The book incorporated a variety of classified American government cables detailing the American involvement in the downfall of Diem.

Hammer was regarded by Pike as being "very loyal personally to Diem" and being "bitter" about his demise. After the fall of Diem, she moved to France and vowed to stay away from the subject. Despite this, she still wrote A Death in November. She died of lymphoma in 2001.

By the way, is anyone old enough to remember all those burning Buddhists?

The news media at the time made it seem as if it were an anti-American, anti-Diem, fad.

Actually, it's an ancient Buddhist tradition, and was used in Red China and North Vietnam too.....the only problem being, the "mainstream" news media never bothered covering those events.

As unattractive a person Madame Nhu was, Madame Nhu was right.

[vesta111]

Okay, I checked out the writer of the book.

It's an excellent book.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellen_Hammer

By the way, is anyone old enough to remember all those burning Buddhists?

The news media at the time made it seem as if it were an anti-American, anti-Diem, fad.

Actually, it's an ancient Buddhist tradition, and was used in Red China and North Vietnam too.....the only problem being, the "mainstream" news media never bothered covering those events.

As unattractive a person Madame Nhu was, Madame Nhu was right.

I remember the burning monks on the news. Can anyone who has seen such a thing even half a world away ever forget that sight.?

Bobby Kenedy I believe had more of his grandfather in him then his brothers. Ruthless, corrupt, and in some power struggle within his family to eventually over shadow Jack.

I never had a chance to read up on his handling of the Cuba situation that went disastrous.