Nguyen Van Thieu

Although Nixon had no clout in Hanoi, he had a channel to U.S. ally and South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu and convinced him to pull out of the peace talks shortly before the election.

Meanwhile Hanoi's representatives for the first time abandoned their insistence that the South Vietnamese government headed by Nguyen Van Thieu must be removed before any peace agreement could be concluded.

She had agreed, if necessary, to use her contacts to convey secret messages on Nixon’s behalf to Nguyen Van Thieu, the president of South Vietnam.

In 1975, with Communist forces closing in, South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu resigned after nearly 10 years in office and fled the country.

He rose to become its secretary general, as well as an increasingly outspoken critic of President Nguyen Van Thieu, a former army friend.