Nguyễn Cao Kỳ (; 8 September 1930 – 23 July 2011) was a South Vietnamese military officer and politician who served as the chief of the Republic of Vietnam Air Force in the 1960s, before leading the nation as the prime minister of South Vietnam in a military junta from 1965 to 1967. Then, until his retirement from politics in 1971, he served as vice president to bitter rival General Nguyễn Văn Thiệu, in a nominally civilian administration.
Born in Northern Vietnam, Kỳ joined the Vietnamese National Army of the French-backed State of Vietnam and started as an infantry officer before the French sent him off for pilot training. After the French withdrew from Vietnam and the nation was partitioned, Kỳ moved up the ranks of the Republic of Vietnam Air Force to become its leader. In November 1963, Kỳ participated in the coup that deposed president Ngô Đình Diệm and resulted in Diệm's assassination.
In 1964, Kỳ became prominent in junta politics, and was part of a group of young, aggressive officers dubbed the "Young Turks". Over the next two years, there were numerous successful and failed coup attempts. In September 1964, he helped put down a coup attempt by Generals Lâm Văn Phát and Dương Văn Đức against Nguyễn Khánh, and the following February he thwarted another attempt by Phát and Phạm Ngọc Thảo. His favored tactic was to send fighter jets into the air and threaten large-scale air strikes to force his opponents to back down. After the latter attempt, he also forced the Khánh into exile and became the leading member of the junta in mid-1965 by becoming prime minister, while General Thiệu was a figurehead chief of state. He gained notoriety for his flamboyant manner, womanizing, and risky and brash behavior, which deeply concerned South Vietnam's American allies and angered the Vietnamese public, many of whom regarded him as a "cowboy" and "hooligan". He cared little for public relations, and publicly made numerous controversial statements and threats.
Nevertheless, Kỳ and Thiệu were able to end the cycle of coups, and the Americans backed their regime. In 1966 Kỳ decided to purge rival General Nguyễn Chánh Thi from a command role, which provoked major unrest in Da Nang and Huế. He publicly threatened to kill the mayor of Đà Nẵng. Three months of large-scale demonstrations and riots paralyzed parts of the country, and after much maneuvering and some military battles, Kỳ's forces finally put down the uprising, and Thi was exiled, entrenching the former's grip on power.
In 1967, a transition to an elected government was scheduled, and after a power struggle within the military, Thiệu ran for the presidency with Kỳ as his running mate. To allow the two to work together, their fellow officers had agreed to have a military body controlled by Kỳ shape policy behind the scenes. The election was rigged to ensure that Thiệu and Kỳ's military ticket would win, and strong executive powers meant that the junta, in effect, still ruled. Leadership tensions persisted, and Thiệu prevailed, sidelining Kỳ supporters from key positions. Thiệu then enacted legislation to restrict candidacy eligibility for the 1971 election, banning almost all would-be opponents; Kỳ and the rest withdrew as they expected the election to be fraudulent; Thiệu went on to win the election uncontested, while Kỳ retired. With the fall of Saigon, Kỳ fled to the United States. He continued to heavily criticize both the communists and Thiệu, and the former prevented him from returning. However, in 2004, he became the first South Vietnamese leader to return to Vietnam, calling for national reconciliation between communist government and overseas anti-communists.
Early years and rising up the ranks A northerner, Kỳ was born in Sơn Tây, a town west of Hanoi. After completing his secondary schooling in Chu Văn An High School, Hanoi, he enlisted in the French-backed Vietnamese National Army of the State of Vietnam in 1951 and was commissioned in the infantry after attending an officers training school. After a brief period in the field against the communist Viet Minh of Ho Chi Minh during the First Indochina War, the French military hierarchy sent Kỳ, then a lieutenant, to Marrakesh in Morocco to train as a pilot. Kỳ gained his wings on 15 September 1954. The French defeat at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu and the Geneva Conference ended the colonial presence in Indochina, and Kỳ came back to the new Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam). The commander of a transport squadron, Kỳ was put in charge of Tan Son Nhut Air Base, the main aerial facility in the capital, Saigon. Kỳ then went to the United States to study for six months at the Air Command and Staff College at Maxwell Field, Alabama, where he learned to speak English. He returned to Vietnam and continued to rise up the ranks.
Kỳ began his association with the American covert operations community in 1961. While still ranked as a major commanding Tân Sơn Nhứt Air Base, he became the first pilot for South Vietnam's presidential liaison officer, which was organizing to infiltrate military intelligence teams into North Vietnam. He recruited pilots from his command for this intelligence program of the Central Intelligence Agency, and flew some of the missions himself after being trained by an expert pilot from Air America. At one point, Kỳ took the CIA's Saigon station chief, William Colby, for a demonstration low-level flight. Kỳ's flight training graduation gift for himself and his pilots was a flight to Singapore, where he purchased black flight suits, silk scarfs, and cigarette lighters for all hands. Colby was amused by his flight but unhappy with the selection of flashy attire.
Under the regime of Dương Văn Minh, whose coup Kỳ had supported, he was made an air marshal, replacing Colonel Đỗ Khắc Mai as head of the Republic of Vietnam Air Force.Tang, p. 54.
Rise to prominence in the junta
In January 1964, General Nguyễn Khánh deposed Minh,Shaplen, pp. 228–40. and it was under Khánh's one-year rule that Kỳ rose to become one of the leading powers in the junta. Having been demoted, disgruntled Generals Lâm Văn Phát and Dương Văn Đức launched a coup attempt against Khánh before dawn on 13 September, using ten Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) battalions that they had recruited.Moyar (2006), p. 326. Their faction consisted mainly of Catholic elements.Kahin, pp. 228–32. They took over the city without any firing, and used the national radio station to proclaim the deposal of Khánh's junta. There was little reaction from most of the military commanders.Moyar (2006), p. 327. Kỳ had two weeks earlier promised to use his planes against any coup attempt, but there was no reaction to begin with.
Some time after the plotters had made their broadcast, Kỳ consolidated the troops on Saigon's outskirts at Tân Sơn Nhứt Air Base, the largest in the country and where the military was headquartered. He barricaded the soldiers into defensive positions and vowed a "massacre" if the rebels attacked the base. A stand-off of tanks and troops around the perimeter of the base occurred, but it petered away without any violence as the rebels were withdrawn. Kỳ had apparently been angered by comments made by a rebel source who claimed that he was part of the coup attempt. At the same time, Kỳ was known for his hawkish attitude and close relations with the US military establishment in Vietnam, and American opposition to the coup was thought to have been conveyed to him efficiently. Đức mistakenly thought that Kỳ and his subordinates would be joining the coup, but was wrong.
The announcement of US support for the incumbent helped to deter ARVN officers from joining Lâm and Đức. Khánh returned to Saigon and put down the putsch, aided mainly by Kỳ and the Air Force. Kỳ decided to make a show of force as Phát and Đức began to wilt, and he sent jets to fly low over Saigon and finish off the rebel stand. He also sent two C-47s to Vũng Tàu to pick up two companies of South Vietnamese marines who remained loyal to Khánh. Several more battalions of loyal infantry were transported into Saigon. Kỳ's political star began to rise.Karnow, p. 396.
As the coup collapsed, Kỳ and Đức appeared with other senior officers at a news conference where they proclaimed that the South Vietnamese military was united, and announced a resolution by the armed forces, signed by them and seven other leading commanders, claiming a united front against corruption. The officers contended that the events in the capital were misinterpreted by observers, as "there was no coup." Kỳ claimed that Khánh was in complete control and that the senior officers involved in the standoff "have agreed to rejoin their units to fight the Communists", and that no further action would be taken against those who were involved with Đức and Phát's activities, but Khánh arrested them two days later.
Kỳ and Nguyễn Chánh Thi's role in putting down the attempted coup gave them more leverage in Saigon's military politics. Indebted to Kỳ, Thi, and other young officers for maintaining his hold on power, Khánh was now weaker. Kỳ's group called on Khánh to remove "corrupt, dishonest, and counterrevolutionary" officers, civil servants, and exploitationists, and threatened to remove him if he did not enact their proposed reforms. Some observers accused Kỳ and Thi of deliberately orchestrating or allowing the plot to develop before putting it down in order to embarrass Khánh and allow himself to gain prominence on the political stage.Kahin, p. 232. In later years, Cao Huy Thuần, a professor and Buddhist activist based in Đà Nẵng, claimed that during a meeting with Kỳ and Thi a few days before the coup, the officers had discussed their plans for joining a coup against Khánh.Kahin, p. 498.
December 1964 South Vietnamese coup
Kỳ was part of a group of younger officers called the Young Turks. The most prominent members, apart from himself, included IV Corps commander General Nguyễn Văn Thiệu, commander of I Corps Thi and Admiral Chung Tấn Cang, the head of the Republic of Vietnam Navy. They, and Khánh, wanted to forcibly retire officers with more than 25 years of service as they thought them to be lethargic, out of touch, and ineffective. The unspoken and most important reason, however, was that they viewed the older generals as rivals for power and wanted to conceal this real motive. Specific targets of this proposed policy were Generals Minh, Trần Văn Đôn, Lê Văn Kim and Mai Hữu Xuân.
The signature of Chief of State Phan Khắc Sửu was required to pass the ruling, but he referred the matter to the High National Council (HNC), a junta-appointed civilian advisory body, to get their opinion. The HNC turned down the request.Moyar (2006), p. 344. On 19 December, the generals dissolved the HNC and arrested some of the members as well as other civilian politicians,Moyar (2004), p. 769. and the older generals, who were removed from the military.Karnow, p. 398. The actual arrests were made by a small force commanded by Thi and Kỳ. The deposal prompted US Ambassador Maxwell D. Taylor to angrily berate Thiệu, Thi, Kỳ, and Cang in a private meeting and threaten to cut off aid if they did not reverse their decision. Kỳ later admitted to being stung by Taylor's comments.Karnow, p. 399. However, this galvanized the officers around the embattled Khánh for a time, and they ignored Taylor's threats without repercussions as the Americans were too intent on defeating the communists to cut funding.Karnow, pp. 398–99.