Amin’s Patel expulsion also coincided with the tail end of the Vietnam War and the United States was dealing with a large influx of Vietnamese refugees at the time. President Nixon and Secretary of State Kissinger were well briefed on the Ugandan situation and were sympathetic to the plight of the Patels, but were limited in the number of Indian-origin refugees they could accept. Being “members of the Commonwealth,” the vast majority of the Patels and Ismailis were allowed to settle in England and Canada. A few thousand families were also accepted by the United States as refugees.
