Video: 'Nov. 2, 1963 | CBS Special Report on Vietnam: "Death of a Regime"' (aired Sunday, Nov. 3, 1963 at 10:30 EST)

(Friday, November 1, 1963, 1:30 p.m. Saigon Standard Time; during the 1963 South Vietnamese coup d’état, part of the Buddhist crisis of the Vietnam War) — The 1963 South Vietnamese coup d’état in which President Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother and advisor Ngo Dinh Nhu were deposed by a group of CIA-backed Army of the Republic of Vietnam officers who disagreed with Diem’s handling of the Buddhist crisis and the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong threat to South Vietnam, began today when three marine battalions of South Vietnam initiated their seizure of communications throughout the capital city, taking control of the city’s radio stations, national and municipal police stations, and the public and Defense Ministry telecommunications centers.

Video: 'Vietnam: A Television History (Ep-3) America's Mandarin (1954-1963)' (Nov. 1, 1963, at 45:52)

The planners had set a deadline of 1:15 p.m. Saigon Standard Time to either begin the coup or to call it off, and were waiting until visiting U.S. Admiral Harry Felt had departed. Admiral Felt’s airplane took off at 1:00 pm.

Video: 'Vietnam: The Ten Thousand Day War - Days of Decision [3/13]' (Nov. 1, 1963, at 7:40)

Diem and Nhu quietly escaped Gia Long Palace by 8:00 p.m. and fled to refuge at the Roman Catholic church in the nearby Cholon section of the city.

Video: 'The Fabulous Sixties: 1963' (Vietnam coup at 29:59)

The Kennedy administration had been aware of the coup planning, but Cable 243 from the United States Department of State to U.S. Ambassador to South Vietnam Henry Cabot Lodge Jr., stated that it was U.S. policy not to try to stop it.

Lucien Conein, the Central Intelligence Agency’s liaison between the U.S. Embassy and the coup planners, told them that the U.S. would not intervene to stop it. Conein also provided funds to the coup leaders.

Video: '45 85 Part 9' (Vietnam coup at 6:59)

The coup was led by General Duong Van Minh and proceeded smoothly as many loyalist leaders were captured after being caught off-guard and casualties were light.

Diem was captured and executed the next day along with Nhu.