"Don't listen to what the Communists say, but look at what they do"
About this Quote
A warning like this isn’t trying to win an argument; it’s trying to win the frame. Nguyen Van Thieu’s line is an instruction manual for skepticism, calibrated for a Cold War battlefield where words were cheap and perception was strategy. “Don’t listen” is deliberately absolutist, a preemptive strike against the seductive pull of revolutionary rhetoric: liberation, equality, peace. By telling you to ignore the message and study the behavior, Thieu shifts the debate from ideals to consequences, from pamphlets to prisons, from slogans to land seizures, assassinations, and the machinery of one-party control.
The subtext is twofold. First, it delegitimizes the enemy’s moral vocabulary by treating it as camouflage. Communists aren’t merely wrong; they’re performing. Second, it quietly absolves Thieu’s own side from having to match lofty promises with clean hands. If politics is judged by “what they do,” then the contest becomes comparative damage control: whose coercion looks more tolerable, whose failures can be excused as necessity. It’s a line that anticipates modern disinformation logic: trust no stated intent, trust patterns, outcomes, incentives.
Context matters. As the U.S.-backed president of South Vietnam, Thieu needed a rhetorical weapon that could travel easily through speeches, newspapers, and American living rooms. The quote compresses an entire legitimacy crisis into a single, portable directive: stop being charmed, start being afraid. Its effectiveness lies in how it turns cynicism into vigilance and makes doubt feel like patriotism.
The subtext is twofold. First, it delegitimizes the enemy’s moral vocabulary by treating it as camouflage. Communists aren’t merely wrong; they’re performing. Second, it quietly absolves Thieu’s own side from having to match lofty promises with clean hands. If politics is judged by “what they do,” then the contest becomes comparative damage control: whose coercion looks more tolerable, whose failures can be excused as necessity. It’s a line that anticipates modern disinformation logic: trust no stated intent, trust patterns, outcomes, incentives.
Context matters. As the U.S.-backed president of South Vietnam, Thieu needed a rhetorical weapon that could travel easily through speeches, newspapers, and American living rooms. The quote compresses an entire legitimacy crisis into a single, portable directive: stop being charmed, start being afraid. Its effectiveness lies in how it turns cynicism into vigilance and makes doubt feel like patriotism.
Quote Details
| Topic | Truth |
|---|---|
| Source | Later attribution: The World Looked Away (Dave Bushy, 2018) modern compilationISBN: 9781480852389 · ID: HZhIDwAAQBAJ
Evidence:
... Don't listen to what the Communists say, but look at what they do.” Nguyen Van Thieu - 1923-2001 South Vietnam's Second President JULY 1960 The black-haired, darkly tanned, 14-year-old boy ran across the dirt road toward the stream. He ... |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Thieu, Nguyen Van. (2026, January 13). Don't listen to what the Communists say, but look at what they do. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/dont-listen-to-what-the-communists-say-but-look-133230/
Chicago Style
Thieu, Nguyen Van. "Don't listen to what the Communists say, but look at what they do." FixQuotes. January 13, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/dont-listen-to-what-the-communists-say-but-look-133230/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"Don't listen to what the Communists say, but look at what they do." FixQuotes, 13 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/dont-listen-to-what-the-communists-say-but-look-133230/. Accessed 8 Feb. 2026.
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