>>17795546
>I unironically defend Diem *not* because I think he could have saved the war effort so much as he at least *tried* to, and at least presented the facade of giving a shit about his countrymen.
Agreed, he was a Cold War dictator whose heavy hand was necessary given the fragile and unstable area he governed, similar to SK or Thailand's dictators. I'd say with Diem it was a case of the CIA learning all the wrong lessons from their experience with Synghman Rhee in SK and deciding to just take direct control of the country itself and remove the middle man, which had far more disastrous results.
>Thieu should have been given the Mussolini treatment for selling out his country, but then this is SEA we're talking about where people just wanna grow their rice or whatever
He was ran out on a rail and lived the rest of his life working at a liquor store in Orange County kek, literally got the "London-educated optometrist moves to Moscow" treatment.
https://www.warhistoryonline.com/featured/nguyen-cao-ky-liquor-store.html