Ngo Dinh Can - Rule

Rule

With Diệm's ascent to the leadership of South Vietnam in 1955, Cẩn's stock rose. Cẩn had no formal position in the government but was effectively regarded as the warlord of central Vietnam. He had almost unlimited power in the region, often interfering with army operations against the Việt Cộng in a style described as "feudal". Robert Scigliano, a journalist and academic from the Michigan State University Vietnam Advisory Group, asserted that Cẩn, along with Nhu, Madame Nhu and eldest brother Archbishop Pierre Martin Ngô Đình Thục formed "an extralegal elite which, with Diệm, directs the destiny of Vietnam". Cẩn sometimes vetoed government-appointed officials posted to central Vietnam from Saigon.

Cẩn ran his own personal army and secret police, which fought the Việt Cộng and imprisoned other anti-communist political opponents. Cẩn accumulated great wealth through corrupt practices such as graft in awarding foreign aid contracts from the United States governments of Dwight D. Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy to Vietnamese businessmen. He required the businessmen to pay a fee to the National Revolutionary Movement – the official party of the regime – in return for the processing of applications for foreign aid contracts and import licenses. Cẩn was widely believed to be selling rice to North Vietnam on the black market, as well as organising the trafficking of opium throughout Asia via Laos, and monopolising the cinnamon trade.

He was often in conflict with his brothers regarding internal matters, with Nhu, Diệm's most influential adviser, controlling the southern part of the country. The brothers often competed with each other for U.S. aid contracts and the rice trade, but did not interfere with matters in one another's territorial zone. Cẩn had once tried to set up an office for his secret police in Saigon (which was in Nhu's southern region) by showing Diệm his long list of detained political opponents, but insisted that he not have to report to Nhu. He brutally suppressed dissent by using torture and re-education camps to achieve his aims. Comparing Cẩn to his brothers, Scigliano said that he was "also considered the most severe, some would say primitive, member of the family and he rules his domain with a strict and sometimes brutal hand". Referring to his autocratic style, a Vietnamese critic said that unlike Diệm, Cẩn was consistent and left his followers in no doubt as to what he wanted: "They are not confused by double talk about democratic ideals and institutions". His creation of a well-defined system of incentives and deterrence has been cited as one reason for his success.