Ngô Đình Nhu

Ngô Đình Nhu (7 October 19102 November 1963; baptismal name Jacob) was a Vietnamese archivist and politician.

He was the younger brother and chief political advisor of South Vietnam's first president, Ngô Đình Diệm.

Although he held no formal executive position, he wielded immense unofficial power, exercising personal command of both the ARVN Special Forces (a paramilitary unit which served as the Ngô family's de facto private army) and the Cần Lao political apparatus (also known as the Personalist Labor Party) which served as the regime's de facto secret police.

In his early age, Nhu was a quiet and bookish individual who showed little inclination towards the political path taken by his elder brothers.

While training as an archivist in France, Nhu adopted the Roman Catholic ideology of personalism, although critics claimed that he misused that philosophy.

Upon returning to Vietnam, he helped his brother in his quest for political power, and Nhu proved an astute and ruthless tactician and strategist, helping Diệm to gain more leverage and outwit rivals.

During this time, he formed and handpicked the members of the secret Cần Lao Party, which swore its personal allegiance to the Ngô family, provided their power base and eventually became their secret police force.

Nhu remained as its head until his own assassination.

Nhu was the fourth of six sons, born in 1910.

In his early years, Nhu was aloof from politics and was regarded as a bookish and quiet personality who preferred academic pursuits.

By the 1920s, his three elder brothers Ngô Đình Khôi, Ngô Đình Thục and Ngô Đình Diệm were becoming prominent figures in Vietnam.

It had been conceived in the 1930s by Catholic progressives such as Emmanuel Mounier.

Mounier's heirs in Paris, who edited the left wing Catholic review Esprit denounced Nhu as a fraud.

Personalism blamed liberal capitalism for the Great Depression and individualistic greed and exploitation, and disagreed with communism due to its opposition to spirituality.

In 1932, Diệm became the interior minister but resigned within a few months after realising that he would not be given any real power.

Nhu showed little interest in following in their footsteps.

Nhu completed a bachelor's degree in literature in Paris and then studied paleography and librarianship, graduating from the École Nationale des Chartes, an archivists' school in Paris.

He returned to Vietnam from France at the outbreak of World War II.

He was influenced by personalism, a concept he had acquired in the Latin Quarter.

Nhu worked at Hanoi's National Library and in 1943, he married Trần Lệ Xuân, later known as "Madame Nhu".

She was a Buddhist but converted to her husband's religion.

The French dismissed Nhu from his high-ranking post, due to Diệm's nationalist activities, and he moved to the Central Highlands resort town of Đà Lạt and lived comfortably, editing a newspaper.

He raised orchids during his time in Đà Lạt.

After the August Revolution of 1945, when Hồ Chí Minh's communist Viet Minh declared independence, various groups as well as the French colonialists jockeyed for political control.

In 1955, Nhu's supporters helped intimidate the public and rig the 1955 State of Vietnam referendum that ensconced his elder brother, Diệm, in power.

Nhu used the Cần Lao, which he organised into cells, to infiltrate every part of society to root out opposition to the Ngô family.

In 1959, he organized a failed assassination attempt via mail bomb on Prince Sihanouk, the prime minister of neighbouring Cambodia, with whom relations had become strained.

Nhu publicly extolled his own intellectual abilities.

He was known for making such public statements as promising to demolish the Xá Lợi Pagoda and vowing to kill his estranged father-in-law, Trần Văn Chương, who was the regime's ambassador to the United States, after the elder man condemned the Ngô family's behavior and disowned his daughter, Nhu's wife, Madame Nhu.

Thục became the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Huế in 1960.

In 1963, the Ngô family's grip on power became unstuck during the Buddhist crisis, during which the nation's Buddhist majority rose up against the pro-Catholic regime.

Nhu tried to break the Buddhists' opposition by using the Special Forces in raids on prominent Buddhist temples that left hundreds dead, and framing the regular army for it.

However, Nhu's plan was uncovered, which intensified plots by military officers, encouraged by the Americans, who turned against the Ngô family after the pagoda attacks.

Nhu was aware of the plots, but remained confident he could outmaneuver them, and began to plot a counter-coup, as well as the assassinations of US Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge Jr.. and other American and opposition figures.

Nhu was fooled by the loyalist General Tôn Thất Đính, who had turned against the Ngô family.

On 1 November 1963, the coup proceeded, and the Ngô brothers (Nhu and Diệm) were detained and assassinated the next day.

Nhu's family originated from the central Vietnamese village of Phú Cam.

His family had served as mandarins in the imperial court in Huế.

His father, Ngô Đình Khả, was a counselor to Emperor Thành Thái during the French colonisation.

After the French deposed the emperor on the pretext of insanity, Khả retired in protest and became a farmer.