Phan Khac Suu

Phan Khắc Sửu was a South Vietnamese engineer and politician who served as a minister in Bảo Đại's government of the State of Vietnam and as a civilian Chief of State of South Vietnam from 1964–65 during the rule of the various military juntas. He was born on January 9, 1893, to a family of landowners in Cần Thơ province, French Indochina. He was a founding member of the Cao Đài religion. His Cao Đài name was Huỳnh Đức. In 1914, he went to study abroad in Tunis and then to Paris, France where he obtained a degree in agricultural engineering. After returning home, he worked as the political affairs officer of the Department of Economic and Technical Research in Cochinchina since 1930. However, in the same year, he joined in support of the Student Movement against the colonial policy of the government. He help initiated the Revolutionary Movement for the Unification of the People of Annam. In 1940, he joined and worked actively in the Vietnamese People's Revolutionary Party, a political organization that worked for Vietnam's independence. Therefore, he was sentenced to eight years of hard labor by the colonial government of Indochina Governor General Jean Decoux and imprisoned on Côn Đảo. After the Japanese coup d'etat of France on March 9, 1945, he was released and returned to the mainland. He and doctor Pham Ngoc Thach founded the Vietnam National Independence Party in Saigon, an anti-French political organization with Japanese support. He also joined the Dan Quy newspaper as the party's spokesman. When the French recaptured the South, he expressed non-cooperation with both the French and Viet Minh authorities. In 1948, he joined the Vietnam Social Democratic Party, a political party with a majority of Hòa Hảo followers, advocating the Bảo Đại solution. With this support, when Bảo Đại's government was established in 1949, he was appointed Minister of Agriculture.