Former president of South Vietnam dies at 78

Associated Press

BOSTON — Former South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu, who led his nation in the war that tore apart his homeland and bitterly divided the United States, then was forced to step down as North Vietnamese troops closed in, has died. He was 78.

Thieu collapsed Thursday at his home in suburban Foxboro and died late Saturday at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, hospital spokesman Jerry Berger and cousin Hoang Duc Nha said Sunday.

Thieu had been in a coma and was kept on a respirator until relatives could gather in Boston, Nha said.

Nha said the family had contacted many members of the Vietnamese expatriate community.

"Most of the expatriates now, with the more than 35 year of history, can see his role in a much clearer way, how he contributed to Vietnam," he said.

Thieu assumed power as chief of state in 1965, the same year President Johnson ordered the first major escalation of the war, sending more than 100,000 U.S. troops to Vietnam. He presided over the U.S.-backed South Vietnam until the fall of its capital city, Saigon, in 1975, to Communist-led troops from North Vietnam.

He then largely disappeared from public view and lived quietly in exile, first in London, then in the Boston area, a symbol of the war in which nearly 60,000 American troops died.

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