Excerpt
PARIS, 2005
By the time I started looking for Madame Ngo Dinh Nhu, the former First Lady of South Vietnam had been living in exile for over forty years. In the 1960s, at the height of her fame, the thirty-nine year old Madame Nhu had been named by the New York Times the most powerful woman in Asia, if not the world.” But it was her reputation as the Dragon Lady that brought her real distinctionwhen the Buddhist monks were setting themselves on fire in the streets of Saigon, Madame Nhus response was unspeakably cruel: Let them burn and we shall clap our hands,” she said with a smile. If the Buddhists wish to have another barbecue, I will be glad to supply the gasoline and a match.” The dangerous, dark eyed beauty quickly became a symbol of everything that was wrong with the American involvement in the Vietnam War.
Madame Nhu faded from public view after November of 1963. That was when her husband, Ngo Dinh Nhu, and his brother, South Vietnam President Ngo Dinh Diem, were killed in a coup that was sanctioned and supported by the government of the United States. As President John F. Kennedy explained to his close friend, Paul "Red” Fay, the reason that the United States had to get rid of the Ngo brothers was in no small part because of Madame Nhu. That goddamn bitch,” he said to his friend. Shes responsible...that bitch stuck her nose in and boiled up the whole situation down there.”