Duty instead of intelligence motivated Nolting. He was there to hold the line, not to question it. His policy was to build credit with Diem by agreeing to everything Diem wanted, hoping that one day he could cash in the due bills. It necessitated reassuring Diem constantly, by always giving in, always nodding affirmatively. There was a curious irony in this, because Americans always warned that Asians tended to tell you what you wanted to hear; now we had an American ambassador who told Asians what they wanted to hear. But the special significance of Fritz Nolting was that in the very choice
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