Arrest and Assassination of Ngo Dinh Diem - Culpability Debate

Culpability Debate

The responsibility for the assassinations was generally placed on Minh. Conein asserted that "I have it on very good authority of very many people, that Big Minh gave the order", as did William Colby, the director of the CIA's Far Eastern division. Đôn was equally emphatic, saying "I can state without equivocation that this was done by General Dương Văn Minh and by him alone." Lodge thought that Xuân was also partly culpable asserting that "Diệm and Nhu had been assassinated, if not by Xuân personally, at least at his direction."

Minh placed the blame on Thiệu, after the latter became President, for the assassinations. In 1971, Minh claimed that Thiệu was responsible for the deaths by hesitating and delaying the attack by his Fifth Division on Gia Long Palace. Đôn was reported to have pressured Thieu during the night, asking him on the phone "Why are you so slow in doing it? Do you need more troops? If you do, ask Đính to send more troops – and do it quickly because after taking the palace you will be made a general." Thiệu stridently denied responsibility and issued a statement which Minh did not publicly rebut: "Dương Văn Minh has to assume entire responsibility for the death of Ngô Đình Diệm."

During the presidency of Richard Nixon, a U.S. government investigation was initiated into American involvement in the assassinations. Nixon was a political foe of Kennedy, having narrowly lost to him in the 1960 Presidential election. Nixon ordered an investigation under E. Howard Hunt into the murders, convinced Kennedy must have secretly ordered the killings but the inquiry was unable to find any such secret order.