Be Careful What You Wish For - You May Already Have It
A People’s History of American Empire mentions that former South Vietnamese prime minister Nguyen Cao Ky was an open admirer of Hitler. Intrigued, I decided to investigate. The charge checks out. Exact quote:
“People ask me who my heroes are. I admire Hitler because he pulled his country together when it was in a terrible state in the early thirties. But the situation here [Vietnam] is so desperate now that one man would not be enough. We need four or five Hitlers in Vietnam.”
– July, 1965 interview with the Daily Mirror
The irony was that by 1965 Vietnam already had its Hitler: Ho Chi Minh. This may sound like mere rhetoric, but the shoe fits. Both Hitler and Ho led totalitarian national socialist movements. Both found their countries divided and unified them with blood and iron. And both were vicious warmongers and mass murderers. If all Ky wanted was a leader to “pull his country together,” he could have just surrendered. With enemies like Ky, Communism needed no friends.
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