(3 of 4)
The Alternative. In a country where intrigue and double-dealing are endemic, the army officers are far from united. But one top Vietnamese official secretly in contact with army dissidents maintains that a coup can and will be staged, that both the marines and the air force would join in any uprising, and that there are enough disaffected army units in Saigon itself to neutralize Tung's Special Forces. At week's end there were muffled reports that, meeting in twos and threes, officers had agreed on a leader who would be willing to keep Diem as titular head of state if Nhu, his wife, and Brother Thuc, Archbishop of Hué, were eliminated.
No matter how real the opposition to Diem, the dissidents are obviously afraid that the U.S. might not fully back them in a coup. As a first sign of U.S. support, they want Washington to announce cessation of aid to the Diem regime. This the U.S. is not prepared to do because it would only slash whatever influence the U.S. has in South Viet Nam. Besides, the U.S. believes that the Diem regime can keep going for perhaps a year even without U.S. aid.
If the opposition seems to believe that the U.S. cannot be counted on, the U.S. reciprocates the feeling. As of last week, at least one major policymaker in the State Department felt that the solution was not to try to force out Diem but to force him into more acceptable behavior—possibly curbing Brother Nhu and taking other measures to redeem himself with the Buddhists. Critics of this policy point out that "controlling" Diem has been a U.S. aim for years, and that no one has yet managed to do it successfully; they also believe that Diem will never really break with Nhu or any other member of his family. In their view, Diem is now hopelessly discredited, and they urge a different civilian ruler—possibly Vice President Nguyen Ngoe Tho, who has openly disagreed with Diem—backed by some efficient officers. Just how this can be accomplished is another question.
The War. As if the situation in Saigon were not complicated enough, France's Charles de Gaulle chose to enter it with an oracular statement that France sympathized with "the tribulations of the Vietnamese people," and pledged "cordial cooperation" with "all Viet Nam" in rooting out "foreign influence." He conveniently overlooked the fact that, had it not been for France's own disastrous defeat in its nine-year Vietnamese war, the country would not be in its present mess. Apart from deliberately antagonizing the U.S. at a moment when it was caught in an extremely difficult situation, De Gaulle sounded as if he were trying to encourage a united Viet Nam, with North and South together again but neutralized.
The idea seemed to be supported by none other than North Viet Nam's Ho Chi Minh, who last week glowingly predicted Diem's fall, but hinted that he might be followed by a neutralized, Laos-type government. By contrast, China's Mao Tse-tung, who also commented on the South Viet Nam situation, seemed to oppose neutralization, and predicted that Diem would be followed by just another "U.S. lackey."