On This Day in History: June 11

The self immolation of Thích Quảng Đức

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Think of how much it hurts when you get the slightest burn. How long can you hold your hand to a flame? What would it take for you to not react to the pain? Thích Quảng Đức showed no signs of feeling pain as he burned alive.

--On This Day in History, Shit Went Down: June 11, 1963--

In the early 60s most Americans couldn’t find Vietnam on a map; many still can’t, despite eight years of massive military intervention. But in 1963 the injustices taking place in the country where an American-puppet dictator ruled would become well known internationally, due to the self-sacrifice of one man.

On June 11, 1963, Đức, a Buddhist monk, entered a busy intersection in downtown Saigon to engage in an act of protest that would hit the front page of newspapers around the world. A significant majority of the South Vietnamese population was Buddhist. South Vietnam President and U.S. lackey Ngô Đình Diệm however, was part of the Catholic minority, and his government enacted numerous discriminatory policies against the Buddhist population.

Đức sat down on a cushion, assuming a meditative lotus position. Another monk poured a five-gallon can of gasoline over him. Đức rotated wooden prayer beads through his fingers and chanted; he struck a match.

Đức was engulfed in flames, but did not cry out, did not move.

Monks, nuns, passersby, even police, prostrated themselves before the burning monk. Cameras snapped photos. President John F. Kennedy said of one photo taken by American journalist Malcolm Browne, “No news picture in history has generated so much emotion around the world.”

That photo later won a Pulitzer Prize. It also served to get Americans questioning the support of Diệm’s government. Via radio, President Diệm made noises of concern over the event and promised to renew the stalled negotiations with Buddhists, but historian Seth Jacobs said, “No amount of pleading could retrieve Diệm’s reputation.” Jacobs also said of Đức’s self-immolation that it “reduced America's Diệm experiment to ashes as well.” The crisis deepened and on November 1,1963, with assistance of the CIA, President Diệm was overthrown and assassinated.

Later, Communist China used the image for propaganda purposes, printing millions of copies and distributing them as an example of American imperialism.

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