Jack Cheevers, "Kennedy’s Coup: A White House Plot, a Saigon Murder, and America's Descent into Vietnam" (Simon and Schuster, 2026)

About this episode

Jack Cheevers discusses his book 'Kennedy’s Coup', detailing the events surrounding the assassination of South Vietnam’s president Ngo Dinh Diem and its implications for the Vietnam War.

Based on a decade of research and writing, enriched by eyewitness interviews and revealing documents obtained through dozens of freedom of information requests, Kennedy’s Coup vividly recreates the Kennedy Administration’s secret encouragement of the fatal 1963 military coup against South Vietnam’s president Ngo Dinh Diem.The brutal assassination of Diem by his own generals—which capped weeks of bitter White House infighting—led to dreadful consequences for the United States, opening the door to nine years of costly and futile warfare in Vietnam. Jack Cheevers provides unforgettable portraits of the people behind this fascinating drama: the kindly, philosophy-loving American ambassador who tried to save Diem; the powerful Pentagon and State Department figures who battled for JFK’s ear; the hard-driving young American journalists in Saigon who braved police beatings and death threats to dig out the story; the adder-tongued Madame Nhu, Diem’s beautiful sister-in-law, who enraged critics with outrageous insults; the scheming South Vietnamese generals who slowly tightened a noose around their commander in chief; the hard-drinking CIA agent who carried secret US messages to the…

People in this episode

Guest: Jack Cheevers

Topics covered

• Vietnam War
• Kennedy Administration
• military coup
• historical analysis
• political intrigue

Keywords

• Kennedy
• Vietnam
• Diem
• coup
• CIA
• politics
• history
• assassination
• Jack Cheevers

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: CIA, Pentagon, State Department

Books & works: Kennedy’s Coup: A White House Plot, a Saigon Murder, and America's Descent into Vietnam

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