President Nguyen Van Thieu resigns (1975)

On April 21st 1975 South Vietnamese president Nguyen Van Thieu resigned. In his final public address, Thieu launched an extraordinary verbal assault on the United States:

“The Americans have asked us to do an impossible thing… You have asked us to do something you failed to do, with half a million powerful troops and skilled commanders, and with nearly $300 billion in expenditure over six long years.

If I do not say that you were defeated by the communists in Vietnam, I must modestly say that you did not win either. But you found an honourable way out. And at present, when our army lacks weapons, ammunition, helicopters, aircraft and B-52s (bombers), you ask us to do an impossible thing, like filling up the ocean with stones…

Likewise, you have let our soldiers die under the hail of shells. This is an inhumane act by an inhumane ally. Refusing to aid an ally and abandoning it is an inhumane act…

The United States is proud of being an invincible defender of the just cause and the ideal of freedom in the world… Are US statements worthy? Are US commitments still valid?

Some $300 million is not a big sum to you. Compared to the amount of money you spent here in ten years, this sum is sufficient for only ten days of fighting. And with this sum, you ask me to score a victory or to check communist aggression, a task which you failed to fulfil in six years, with all US forces, and with such an amount of money. This is absurd.”