Opposition at the Altar

The confrontation between South Viet Nam's militant Buddhists and Premier Nguyen Cao Ky careened wildly onward last week. The immolation epidemic of the week before had burned itself out, but the Buddhists had turned to new weapons in their battle to force Ky to resign.

In Saigon, bespectacled Thich Tarn Chau, leader of the moderate wing of the Unified Buddhist Church, opened the week by calling for passive resistance instead of rioting. Then, as if to convince the U.S. that his campaign was directed not at the war effort but only against the oppressions of Ky (himself a Buddhist), Tarn Chau issued a hawkish manifesto opposing any peace conference as a "surrender to the Viet Cong." He also paid a surprise visit to American Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge.

That was well and good, but just as the Americans were beginning to breathe more easily, Tarn Chau went back on the offensive. He issued an ultimatum giving Ky and Chief of State Nguyen Van Thieu 48 hours to resign, warned that if they did not meet his deadline all Buddhist monks would submit to "voluntary imprisonment."

Immoderate as the moderate Tarn Chau might have appeared, he could not hold a candle to Thich Tri Quang, the rebellious high priest of Hue. Carrying civil disobedience to an ingenious new low, Tri Quang ordered all Buddhists in the ancient imperial capital to display their defiance by hauling family altars out of their homes into the nearest street. Thousands complied, and the Hue police did nothing to stop them. The altars blocked all roads, halting for 48 hours convoys on their way to a military buildup north of Hue--until Tri Quang generously allocated a few hours every day for the troops to pass. Then, writing a violent letter accusing Washington of "imperialism," he went on a hunger strike.

None of the Buddhist maneuvers seemed to faze the energetic Premier. Instead of resigning, Ky was busy consolidating his strength in the Hue-based I Corps, whose officers had been in rebellion against the government in Saigon. Working carefully, he finally felt strong enough to dispatch 400 combat police to take over Hue. His cops entered the city without interference, arrested Hue's own rebellious police, and ordered the altars removed. And as the fasting Tri Quang grew so weak that he was admitted to a local military hospital, Ky happily announced that all was well. So well that he might even fly off to South Korea for a meeting of Asia's anti-Communist nations.

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