1962 South Vietnamese Independence Palace bombing

Cử was the second son of Nguyễn Văn Lực, a leader of the VNQDD (), which opposed the Diệm regime. In 1960, Diệm had jailed Lực for one month for engaging in "anti-government activities". The VNQDD planned that Cử and Quốc, another pilot from the same squadron, would attack the Independence Palace on 27 February. Quốc had more subordinates but was unsure of their loyalty, so he did not try to recruit them for the attack on the palace. Years later, Cử blamed Diệm's treatment of opposition parties as the motivation for his attack. He believed that Diệm had prioritized remaining in power over fighting the Vietcong and that, for six years, Cử had been denied promotion because of Diệm's obsession with hindering political opponents. Cử criticized the Americans for having supported Diệm, saying: "the Americans had slammed the door on those of us who really wanted the fight against the communists". ==Attack==

of the Vietnamese air force similar to the one used in the attack Quốc and Cử, who were trained in France and the United States, respectively, were given orders to fly their A-1H/AD-6 Skyraider ground attack planes from Bien Hoa Air Base outside Saigon to the Mekong Delta in an early morning mission against the VC. .|alt=A middle-aged lady wearing a light-colored dress and with short hair, fluffy at the front, sits at a dinner table smiling. The first bomb penetrated a room in the western wing where Diệm was reading a biography of George Washington. The bomb failed to detonate, which gave Diệm enough time to seek shelter in a cellar in the eastern wing. He was joined there by his elder brother Archbishop Pierre Martin Ngô Đình Thục, younger brother Ngô Đình Nhu, Madame Nhu—who sustained an arm fracture while running toward the cellar—and their children. Elsewhere within the palace, three servants and guards were killed, and about thirty more staff were injured. Outside the palace grounds, an American contractor died after falling from a rooftop where he had been watching the bombing. Despite the confusion, most of the city's inhabitants went about their usual business, indifferent to the chaos. The attack lasted 30 minutes, and although they carried enough bombs to level the palace, the pilots did not expend all their munitions. Quốc's aircraft was damaged by fire from a minesweeper, forcing him to eject over the Saigon River and land in Nhà Bè, suffering minor facial injuries in the landing. He was arrested by a nearby naval patrol and, before being taken away for interrogation, reportedly asked, "did I kill that filthy character?" Cử believed the attack had been successful and managed to flee to Cambodia safely. Commenting on the attack, a US Air Force officer opined: "with that weather, they did a hell of a job". ==Aftermath==

In a brief radio address, after order had been restored, Diệm dismissed the attack as an "isolated act" and attributed his escape to "divine protection". The Civil Guard had remained loyal, and its commander ordered his airborne forces to take over Tan Son Nhut Air Base. The National Revolutionary Movement, an organization used by the Ngô family to stage orchestrated mass demonstrations in support of themselves, called for the death penalty against the two pilots and further asked Diệm to enact the "strictest measures to insure discipline in the military". As a result of the attack, Diệm ordered that all RVNAF aircraft be grounded and all aerial combat missions be suspended. At the same time, his security officials investigated fighter pilots for any possible anti-regime tendencies. This was achieved by placing tanks on the Bien Hoa Air Base runway. Without assistance from accompanying fighter craft, it was deemed too risky for American helicopters to operate in the jungles against the VC. On 2 March, three days after the attack, Diệm allowed the air force to resume combat operations, Quốc was imprisoned for his actions, while Cử remained in exile in Cambodia, where he worked as a language teacher. As a result, Sihanouk routinely gave asylum to political refugees who had tried to depose or kill Diệm. In November 1960, he granted asylum to a group of paratroopers who tried to depose Diệm. In the meantime, Diệm's police sought to track down Cử's father, who had gone into hiding following the assassination attempt. Quốc advanced to the rank of lieutenant colonel in 18 months before being killed in an air raid over North Vietnam on 20 April 1965. Diệm reaction On 4 March, Diệm held a review of the RVNAF in central Saigon. Large crowds flocked to the Saigon River's banks to watch RVNAF aircraft formations on aerial parade. However, every day civilians were not allowed within a block of the presidential box, where Diệm was accompanied by Nolting and General Paul D. Harkins, commander of Military Assistance Command, Vietnam. The display included 29 A-1 aircraft, the type used in the attack on the Independence Palace. Diệm spoke about the events of 27 February and noted that he was "not unaware" of the supportive reaction of the various segments of society to "the foolish act perpetrated by some treacherous elements" that had "tried to rouse bloody troubles which would have profited only enemies of the fatherland". During Nolting's first meeting with Diệm after the assassination attempt, the president adamantly asserted that the media was responsible for the bombing. He pointed to the Newsweek article and other "derogatory articles in the press", using them to justify his claim that "the Americans were supporting the revolution". In a later meeting with Harkins, Diệm joked: "I shouldn't have put him in the air force, because I had put his father in jail years ago". Diệm predicted that "sometime I'm going to get shot right in the back of the neck. Sometime they'll get me that way". (He and Nhu were deposed and shot dead during the November 1963 coup.) Off the record, one official admitted that "We don't even talk about freedom of the press or ask for other liberties anymore ... Diệm had completely surrounded himself in a protective oligarchy". U.S. reaction The attack sparked conjecture that the United States might deploy combat troops in South Vietnam, even though, at the time, US military personnel were officially serving in solely advisory roles. In response to media concerns about the stability of the Diệm government, US Secretary of State Dean Rusk denied that the US had plans to deploy combat forces. He also ruled out negotiations with the VC, saying "the root of the trouble" was communist violations of the Geneva Accords. United States Ambassador to India John Kenneth Galbraith lobbied Kennedy against the deployment of combat troops, believing that it would lead to endless South Vietnamese requests for more troops. Galbraith further thought that wasting US resources in the jungles of Vietnam would be playing into the hands of the Soviet Union. According to one US observer, the palace bombing provoked "full scale plotting against Diệm". Galbraith noted that "When the man in power is on the way down, anything is better" and considered that any change in South Vietnamese leadership would bring an improvement. ==Notes==