Construction began on August 5, 1956 according to the plans drawn up by the architects Tran Van Duong and Do Ba Vinh, while the directing engineers were Du Ngoc Anh and Ho To Thuan. The pagoda was opened on May 2, 1958 by the Most Venerable Thich Khanh Anh. The pagoda was built to enshrine a sample of the relics of Gautama Buddha, giving its name.
South Vietnam's Buddhist majority had long been discontented with the strong favouritism shown by Diem towards his fellow Catholics. Discontent with Diem and Nhu exploded into mass protest during the summer of 1963 when nine Buddhists died at the hand of Diem's army and police on Vesak, the birthday of Gautama Buddha. In May 1963, a law against the flying of religious flags was selectively invoked; the Buddhist flag was banned from display on Vesak while the Vatican flag was displayed to celebrate the anniversary of the consecration of Archbishop Ngo Dinh Thuc, Diem's brother. The Buddhists defied the ban and a protest was ended when government forces opened fire. With Diem remaining intransigent in the face of escalating Buddhist demands for religious equality, sections of society began calling for his removal from power.
The protests were orchestrated from within Xa Loi, where thousands of monks arrived from across South Vietnam to organise demonstrations, hunger strikes, organise media releases and print pamphlets. The government of Diem was unable to break the protestors and demonstrations increased throughout the summer. However, the movement was broken with a series of raids on pagodas and monasteries across South Vietnam. Squads of Special Forces, led by Le Quang Tung and combat police flattened the gates and smashed their way into the pagoda at around 00:20 on August 21, 1963, as Xa Loi's brass gong was clanged as a warning signal of the attack. Nhu's men were armed with pistols, submachine guns, carbines, shotguns, grenades and tear gas.
The red bereted Special Forces were joined by truckloads of steel-helmeted combat police in army camouflage uniforms. Monks and nuns who barricaded themselves behind wooden shields were attacked with rifle butts and bayonets. The gong of the pagoda was drowned out by the burst of automatic weapons fire, the sound of exploding grenades, shattering glass and human screaming. One monk was thrown from the balcony down to the courtyard 6 meters below. Nhu's men vandalized the main altar and managed to confiscate the intact charred heart of Thich Quang Duc, the monk who had self-immolated in protest against the policies of the regime.
The Buddhists managed to escape with a receptacle with the remainder of his ashes. Two monks jumped the back wall of the pagoda into the grounds of the adjoining US Aid Mission, where they were given asylum. Thich Tinh Khiet, the 80 year old Buddhist patriarch of
Vietnam, was seized and taken to a military hospital on the outskirts of Saigon. The commander of the III Corps of the ARVN, General Ton That Dinh, soon announced military control over
Saigon, canceling all commercial flights into the city and instituting press censorship. Across the country, hundreds were estimated to have died or vanished, and more than one thousand monks were incarcerated. |
|
Package Vietnam Tours
