Editing Nguyễn Văn Thiệu (section)

==Early years==
Born in [[Phan Rang–Tháp Chàm|Phan Rang]] on the south central coast of Vietnam, Thiệu was a son of a small, well-off landowner who earned his living by farming and fishing. Thiệu was the youngest of five children.<ref name=lat>{{cite news|url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2001-oct-01-me-52050-story.html|title=South Vietnam Wartime President Nguyen Van Thieu, 78, Dies|author=Lamb, David|work=Los Angeles Times|date=1 October 2001|access-date=1 April 2025|archive-url=http://web.archive.org/web/20011002024035/http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/front/la-100101thieu.story?coll=la-home-todays-times|archive-date=2 October 2001|url-status=dead|url-access=limited}}</ref> According to some reports, Thiệu was born in November 1924, but adopted 5 April 1923, as his birthday on grounds that it was a more auspicious day.<ref name=nyt>{{cite news|url=https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/2001/10/01/obituaries/01THIE.html|title= Nguyen Van Thieu, Former President of South Vietnam, Dies at 78|author=Butterfield, Fox|work=The New York Times|date=1 October 2001|access-date=1 February 2025|archive-url=http://web.archive.org/web/20171006000702/http://www.nytimes.com/2001/10/01/us/nguyen-van-thieu-is-dead-at-76-last-president-of-south-vietnam.html|archive-date=6 October 2017|url-status=live}} The article was later published online as "[http://www.nytimes.com/2001/10/01/us/nguyen-van-thieu-is-dead-at-76-last-president-of-south-vietnam.html Nguyen Van Thieu Is Dead at 76; Last President of South Vietnam]" with a correction added: "A front-page headline yesterday on the obituary of Nguyen Van Thieu, former president of South Vietnam, misstated his place in the sequence before that country fell to the North Vietnamese in 1975. He served almost until the end, but the last president was Gen. Duong Van Minh. The obituary also referred incorrectly at one point to the year of the coup he helped organize against President Ngo Dinh Diem. It was 1963, not 1965."</ref> His elder brothers raised money so that he could attend the elite schools run by France, who were Vietnam's colonial rulers.<ref name=nyt/> Although not yet a Catholic (he converted later in life after getting married), Thiệu attended Pellerin, a French-run Catholic school in [[Huế]], the imperial seat of the [[Nguyễn dynasty]]. He returned to his hometown after graduating.<ref name=tel/>

During World War II, [[Imperial Japan]] invaded [[French Indochina]] and seized control. Ninh Thuận was taken over by the Japanese in 1942, but the reaction from the locals was muted, and Thiệu continued to work the ricelands alongside his father for another three years.<ref name=lat/>