Trần Văn Hương (; 1 December 1902 – 27 January 1982) was a South Vietnamese politician who was the penultimate president of South Vietnam for a week in April 1975 before its surrender to the communist forces of North Vietnam. Before ascending to the presidency, he served as vice president under President Nguyễn Văn Thiệu since October 1971 after being elected on a joint ticket with Thiệu in the 1971 South Vietnamese presidential election. Prior to that, he was prime minister for three months from November 1964 to January 1965 under the supervision of a military junta led by General Nguyễn Khánh; during this time, there was widespread civil unrest from the Buddhist majority and power struggles with the military. He also served as prime minister again from May 1968 to August 1969.
Biography
Hương was born into a poor Mekong Delta family and given as a baby to foster parents, and later became a schoolteacher. He initially joined the Vietminh and led a band of 150 fighters in the Plain of Reeds before leaving as the communists took over. He refused to return to teaching under the French colonial framework and found work in a pharmacy. Known for riding his bicycle around town,
First prime ministership
On 26 September 1964, and due to US pressure, General Nguyễn Khánh and the senior officers in his military junta created a semblance of civilian rule by forming the High National Council (HNC), an appointed advisory body akin to a legislature.
The HNC, selected the aging civilian politician Phan Khắc Sửu as chief of state, and Sửu selected Hương as prime minister, a position that had greater power. However, Khánh and the senior generals retained the real power. At the time, both Saigon and Washington were planning a large-scale bombing campaign against North Vietnam in an attempt to stop support for the Vietcong (VC) insurgency, but were waiting for stability in the south before starting the air strikes. Known for his rigid attitude towards dissent,
Khánh and some younger generals wanted to forcibly retire officers with more than 25 years of service, as they thought them to be lethargic and ineffective, but most importantly, rivals for power. The HNC turned down the request to approve the policy. There was speculation the HNC did this as many of them were old, and therefore did not appreciate the generals' negativity towards seniors. Hương did not speak up initially, but had actually privately endorsed the dissolution of the HNC, as both he and the "Young Turks" thought it would allow them to gain more power and influence over Khánh. The Americans were extremely angry with the generals' action, and when Ambassador Maxwell Taylor met Hương afterwards, he urged the prime minister to reject the dissolution of the HNC. Hương said he and Suu had not been notified of the moves, but agreed to step in and take over the body's work. Taylor nevertheless asked Hương to publicly condemn the coup and call on the army to release those arrested. Hương also said he would be willing to reorganize his administration to meet the wishes of the military, and that retaining their support was essential in keeping a civilian government functional. Taylor said the US did not agree with military rule as a principle, and might reduce aid, but Hương was unmoved and said the Vietnamese people "take a more sentimental than legalistic approach" and that the existence of civilian procedure and the HNC was much less pressing than the "moral prestige of the leaders". the younger generals called a media conference, where they maintained the HNC had been dissolved in the nation's best interests and proclaimed their ongoing confidence for Suu and Hương. Khanh and the younger generals had heated arguments with Taylor in private, before taking their disputes to the media. Defying Taylor earned Khánh heightened approval among his junta colleagues, as the ambassador's actions were seen as an insult to the nation. On the night of 23 December, Khánh convinced his fellow officers to join him in lobbying Hương to declare Taylor persona non grata and expel him from South Vietnam. They were confident Hương could not reject them and side with a foreign power at the expense of the military that had installed him.
As the generals and Hương were unwilling to reinstate the HNC, Taylor sent General John L. Throckmorton to meet them and mend relations, and the Vietnamese got their way. An anonymous South Vietnamese government official said "Our big advantage over the Americans is that they want to win the war more than we do." They also agreed to appoint a civilian body and release those arrested in December. An official announcement was made by Hương and Khánh three days later, in which the military again reiterated their commitment to civilian rule through an elected legislature and a new constitution, and that "all genuine patriots" would be "earnestly assembled" to collaborate in making a plan to defeat the communists. In Huế, matters degenerated into a riot as 5,000 demonstrators attacked the U.S. Information Service Library and burned 8,000 books. Khánh and I Corps commander General Nguyễn Chánh Thi turned a blind eye to the rioting and destruction of property. It was believed that they did so to allow the disorder to ruin the Hương government and allow them to inherit power. Reliant on Buddhist support, Khánh did little to try to contain the protests. Khánh persisted with the facade of civilian government by retaining figurehead chief of state Phan Khắc Sửu and making economics professor Nguyễn Xuân Oánh the caretaker prime minister.
Khánh's deposal of the prime minister nullified a counter-plot involving Hương that had developed during the civil disorders that forced him from office. In an attempt to pre-empt his deposal, Hương had backed a plot led by some Đại Việt-oriented Catholic officers reported to include Generals Nguyễn Văn Thiệu and Nguyễn Hữu Có. They planned to remove Khánh and bring Khiem back from Washington. The US Embassy in Saigon was privately supportive of the aim,
Khánh's deposal of Hương further heightened American opposition to him and fears that his reliance on Buddhist support would result in his not taking a hardline position against the communists. Aware that US support for him was further ebbing away, Khánh tried to initiate peace negotiations with the VC, but he only managed an exchange of letters and was yet to organize any meetings or negotiations before he was overthrown. In the meantime, this only intensified US efforts to engineer a coup, and many of Khánh's colleagues—mostly Catholic Đại Việt supporters—had by then privately concluded that he was set to pursue a deal with the communists.
1967 presidential election
In the 1967 South Vietnamese presidential election, Hương finished fourth with 474,100 votes (10.0%).
In May 1968, President Thiệu appointed Hương to the post of prime minister, replacing Nguyễn Văn Lộc. After a week of negotiations with Thiệu, Kỳ, various military officers and civilians, Hương assembled a cabinet with representation from a variety of interests but not members of the Đại Việt. Hương mostly favoured technocrats, keeping six of Loc's ministers in his 18-man cabinet.
In March 1969, Hương's military-escorted motorcade was taking him home for his lunch break when a man wearing a Vietnamese Rangers uniform approached and fired on a traffic policemen who was organising a clearing for Hương's convoy and an abandoned cyclo was pushed into the street. After an exchange of gunfire, Hương's convoy sped away and he eventually returned to his office after lunch.
Hương's actual influence was limited, as Thiệu and his military contacts continued to maintain real power. In August 1969, Thiệu replaced him with General Trần Thiện Khiêm. Speculation that Hương would be replaced had been ongoing for a period. The National Assembly had criticised Hương, arguing that his fiscal and anti-corruption policies were ineffective, and Thiệu had not consulted him about policy developments for several months. Hương had also become impaired by asthma and rheumatism by this time.
Presidency
On 21 April 1975, Thiệu resigned and handed the presidency to Hương. On 28 April 1975, after one week as president, Hương resigned and handed power over to General Dương Văn Minh, who presided over the surrender of the government two days later. Instead, he asked for all officials of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam to be released from prison before he would take his place among the freed. His request was ignored. The former president died quietly in his own home in 1982, just 11 months before he was 80. Hương had a wife and two sons.