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derivative filename/jpeg
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363-04851.pdf
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Digital Object Identifier
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363-04851
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Title
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The Buddhists, a Crucial Third Force
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Description
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Article published in the New York Herald Tribune about the impact of Buddhists in South Vietnam, page 8
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Transcript
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8
New York Herald Tribune
Wednesday,
Viet Nam a Year Later
The Buddhists, a Crucial Third Force
By Beverly Deepe
Of The Herald Tribune Staff
SAIGON.
In the past year and a half, the Buddhist religion in
South Viet Nam has developed into a political third
force
which can and does break or shake the governments in
Saigon.
Buddhism entered the political arena under the leader-
ship of a frail, magnetic monk whose ideological leanings
have, at least in the past, been Marxist. And the
tactics
of the Buddhist political drive are based on opposition
to
the Saigon regime.
As a result, this small republic-at 65,000 square miles
smaller than Idaho-is divided into a state within
a state
within a state, governed by a government within a govern-
ment within a government. There is Saigon and its
govern-
ing apparatus, the Communist Viet Cong and
their ap-
paratus, the Buddhists and theirs.
Just as the Communists maintain a shadow government
which parallels that of the Saigon government, reaching
from the central level to the village, so the Buddhist
move-
ment is hastily, and efficiently, organizing a government to
correspond to that of both the Viet Cong government
and
the Saigon government.
BUDDHIST 'FAMILIES'
Like both rival governments, the Buddhist organization
runs from the provincial level down to Buddhist associa-
tions in the villages and the "All-Buddhist
Families" in the
hamlets. Individual Buddhist "families" are
being or-
ganized in each hamlet in the same manner that the gov-
ernment establishes "family and inter-family"
cells to
check Viet Cong movements and penetration.
The Buddhists are now issuing details of how to or-
ganize records and registration, not unlike a military
staff bureau.
There are many things clear about the Buddhist move
ment, and there are many unanswered questions.
These things are clear:
First, it is a political movement of significant dimen-
sions and it is growing.
Second, as a political movement, it can survive only
by being a movement of protest, and its immediate
enemy
is the Saigon government-any Saigon
government. The
Buddhists will oppose the government consistently
, though
not enough to make it collapse until
they are ready to
become the Saigon government themselves.
Third, by opposing and thus weakening the Saigon
government, the Buddhists are obviously aiding
the Com-
munists. The only question is whether or not
the Buddhists
are directed by the Communists.
The Buddhists seek to isolate the Saigon government
from the foundations of its support. One
tactie is to drive
a wedge between the Americans and the
Saigon regime-
and this is the significance of the Buddhists' anti-
American
propaganda. Like the Communists, the
Buddhists are clearly
anti-American and will remain so.
Another tactic is to drive a wedge between the Saigon
government and the Roman Catholics, as the
Buddhists
are doing under the disguise of ridding
the country of the
old Catholic-oriented Can Lao party set up
by the late
President Ngo Dinh Diem.
Like the Communists, the Buddhist leaders are anti-
Catholic-and will remain so.
PENETRATING THE ARMY
The Buddhists also seek to divide the Army from the
Saigon government-which is the significance of placing
three-man Buddhist committees in army companies and
battalions. Thus, the Buddhists penetrate the national army
on one side while Viet Cong secret agents perform subver-
sion on the other.
The Buddhist strategy requires that they refuse to be-
come a significant part of the government until they are
ready to become the government and have the
political
personalities to take it over. That time is not this year. A
representative of their movement declined to be considered
for the position of Chief of State, and the Buddhists also
did not seek the Premiership in this week's government
reorganization.
The time when the Buddhists decided to try to swallow
up the government may be when a permanent constitution
and permanent government replace the current transitional
ones in November, 1965.
Both the Communists and the government have been
seeking the support of the Buddhists. The Reds supported
Buddhist demonstrations against the government last sum-
mer. And the government, under Gen. Nguyen Khanh
who desperately needed Buddhist support, made major con-
cessions to the Buddhists before the latest reorganization.
POLITICAL BLOCKS
In effect, by attempting to ensure that he would main-
tain dominant political influence in Saigon, Gen. Khanh
gave up significant authority. The Buddhists were per-
mitted to block appointments of military corps commanders
and even Cabinet ministers.
The Buddhists successfully demanded the destruction
of police records on Buddhist leaders. In provincial capi-
tals, pro-Buddhist mobs have "arrested" Can Lao party
members and turned them over to the provincial govern-
ment for prosecution. The military careers of young dis-
trict and province chiefs are no longer broken by their
military superiors but by Buddhist bonzes (monks).
The Buddhists now can be expected to move into the
educational field to widen their influence over students and
into the social welfare and cultural fields to increase their
influence over labor unions and other organizations.
So far, little conflict has developed between the Bud-
dhists and the third Vietnamese "state"-the Communists.
Buddhist monks at the village level, the core of Com-
munist strength, coexist peacefully with Viet Cong cadres.
And at higher levels, a similar neutrality exists between
Buddhist and Red.
A RED FRONT?
This state of affairs raises a fundamental question:
Is the Buddhist movement actually just a front movement
for the Communists?
The man who knows the answer is an anemic-looking
monk named Thich (Rev.) Tri Quang.
For 64 days last year, while the soon-to-be ousted
Diem regime was cracking down on the Buddhists, Thich
Tri Quang took refuge in the air-conditioned, third-floor
conference room of the United States Embassy, where
Marine guards served him vegetarian meals prepared by an
expert Chinese chef.
The major-if not the sole-American influence he
took from the Embassy was a yen for air-conditioning.
He installed a unit in his small room at his cream-colored,
curve-roofed Buddhist Institute "So I can work better."
Now, a year later, Thich Tri Quang is openly labeled
a Communist. Police sources report that he has met mem-
bers of the National Liberation Front for South Viet Nam,
the political arm of the Viet Cong guerrillas.
Even last year-as the politico-priest directed the
celebrated Buddhist crisis in which seven Buddhist clergy
burned themselves alive-a handful of Western officials in
Saigon said he was a Communist. But they were hooted
down in the chorus of criticism against President Ngo
Dinh Diem and his family.
Now since Thich Tri Quang directed his "demi-coup"
by student demonstrators which forced Gen. Khanh from
the office of President last August-an increasing number
of Saigonese, including fervent Buddhist believers, accuse
the graceful monk of being a Communist cadre. Others
say that while he himself may not be a Communist, his
policies and tactics are openly aiding the Communists.
Thich Tri Quang has yet to answer publicly these
charges. He refused an interview request by this correspond-
ent. He has yet to make a clear-cut public anti-Com-
munist statement.
With one and a half coups behind him, he is a dominant
political figure in Viet Nam and may almost singly decide
the future of the country.
The little monk radiates a magnetic spell over those
who have met and talked with him.
"I've met Ho Chi Minh," one former Communist ex-
Henry Cabot Lodge, former United States
Nam,
Ambassador to South Viet
told a
gathering at New York's Midtown Inter-
national Center for foreign students last night
that "although we are not yet victorious,
much has been accomplished" in the Viet Nam
war. He cited the "impressive ability" of
outgoing Premier Nguyen Khanh and "vivid
recognition that the war is above all a political
matter, in which the adherence of the people
to the government is the crucial factor." That
adherence is being challenged, however, by
two competing political systems-the Commu
nist network and the murkily-motivated Bud-
dhist movement which Herald Tribune corre-
spondent Beverly Deepe analyzes below in
the fourth report of a series.
plained. "I've met Gen. Vo Nguyon Giap" (head of the
North Vietnamese Army who defeated the French). "But
I think Tri Quang is tougher than both."
Another described Thich Tri Quang this way:
"His face is pale-without blood-you might say cold-
blooded. He has very intense eyes which pierced through
me as I talked to him. Even before I had spoken a sen-
tence, I felt he already knew what I would say.
"He's very logical and talks better than a Communist
cadre. He mixes his language with Communist and Bud-
dhist terminology."
One official who met him explained, "Tri Quang was
born a prince-he was born to have authority-he was
born to give orders."
Actually, Tri Quang was born in the early 1920s of
peasant stock in the province of Ha Tinh, one of the
poorest provinces in the country, near the birthplace of
such revolutionaries as Ho Chi Minh and Gen. Giap. He
was named Pham Van Bong, but was ter to adopt a
number of aliases. His father became a Buddhist priest
late in life. His mother died a natural death in 1945.
One of Tri Quang's elder brothers is an important
personality in Communist North Viet Nam, reportedly a
political cadre of a regiment or division. And a younger
brother, Pham Van Thang, now in his early 30s, is re-
ported to have come to South Viet Nam early this year as
political cadre of a Viet Cong guerrilla battalion. Three
months ago, he was reported to have come to Saigon to
meet Tri Quang.
VISIT TO HANOI
Tri Quang reportedly studied for the Buddhist priest-
hood in Tu Dam pagoda, still his headquarters, in the old
imperial capital of Hue, 400 miles north of Saigon. In
August, 1945, after the Viet Minh guerrillas temporarily
seized power there, he went to Hanoi, where he later told
a friend, "I studied Marxism." At the outbreak of the
Indochina war against the French, he reportedly fled to a
Communist stronghold where he made two close friends,
Hoang Trong Ba and Nguyen Dang.
On May 8, 1963, Hoang Trong Ba was the closest
adviser to President Diem's brother in Hue, and Nguyen
Dang, as chief of province, reportedly ordered government
troops to fire on Buddhist demonstrators on Buddha's birth-
day. The May 8 incident touched off the crisis that
toppled President Diem a year ago.
The 20-year-old friendship between Tri Quang, Ba
and Dang and the presence of all three in Hue at the start
of the Buddhist affair has led some to believe that there
was a plot between them to provoke the incident.
Another article in this series will appear tomorrow.
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Date
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1964, Oct. 28
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Subject
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Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Religious aspects--Buddhism; Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Protest movements--Vietnam (Republic); Vietnam (Republic)--Politics and government
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Location
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Saigon, South Vietnam
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Coordinates
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10.8231; 106.6311
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Container
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B4, F6
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Format
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newspaper clippings
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Collection Number
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MS 363
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Collection Title
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Beverly Deepe Keever, Journalism Papers
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Creator
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Keever, Beverly Deepe
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Copyright Information
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These images are for educational use only. To inquire about usage or publication, please contact Archives & Special Collections.
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Publisher
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Archives & Special Collections, University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries
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Language
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English
