Nguyen Van Thieu is Elected President of South Vietnam

September 3, 1967

South Vietnamese President Nguyễn Văn Thiệu taking oath of office

Overview

Early in 1966, the Johnson administration decides to make a firmer commitment to the current government of South Vietnam. Diem’s overthrow in 1963 left the Saigon government in turmoil, without functioning administrative machinery. Since mid-1965, Vice Air Marshal Nguyen Cao Ky has been prime minister with General Nguyen Van Thieu as his chief of state.

Johnson holds a summit in Honolulu, Hawaii, in early 1966 to publically give his support to the Ky government. While there is still a great deal of dissent in South Vietnam, in accordance with the Honolulu agreements South Vietnam drafts a new constitution and plans to hold national elections. The constitution includes a bill of rights, but also provides for a strong executive with overwhelming power in a state of emergency, to be declared at the executive’s discretion.

The election is set for 1967, and the United States pressures Ky into running for vice president under General Thieu. Opposition candidates are disqualified from running and there is considerable fraud. The election has a large turnout, however, and the Thieu-Ky ticket is elected by a plurality with some 35 percent the vote.¹

¹Graham A. Cosmas, MACV: The Joint Command in the Years of Escalation, 1962–1967, United States Army in Vietnam (Washington, D.C.: Center of Military History, 2006), 105–106, 118–119; George C. Herring, America’s Longest War: The United States and Vietnam, 1950–1975, (4th edition; New York: McGraw-Hill, 2002), 146, 151–152, 162, 191–196; Edward J. Drea, McNamara, Clifford, and the Burdens of Vietnam, 1965–1969, Secretaries of Defense Historical Series Volume VI (Washington, D.C.: Historical Office, Office of the Secretary of Defense, 2011), 34; Jack Shulimson, Leonard A. Blasiol, Charles R. Smith, and David A. Dawson, The Defining Year, 1968, U.S. Marines in Vietnam (Washington, D.C.: History and Museums Division Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1997), 6. As Herring, America’s Longest War, 196 points out that the narrowness of Thieu’s victory, despite the prevalence of fraud and extent of executive power Ky held, underscored some of the regime’s weaknesses. Many South Vietnamese regarded this entire process as an American-directed farce.