John Riordan is an American banker credited with saving 105 South Vietnamese lives during the

Fall of Saigon The Fall of Saigon, also known as the Liberation of Saigon by North Vietnamese or Liberation of the South by the Vietnamese government, and known as Black April by anti-communist overseas Vietnamese was the capture of Ho Chi Minh City, Saigon, t ...

. He is known as the "

Oskar Schindler Oskar Schindler (; 28 April 1908 – 9 October 1974) was a German industrialist, humanitarian and a member of the Nazi Party who is credited with saving the lives of 1,200 Jews during the Holocaust by employing them in his enamelware and ...

of the Vietnam War".

Actions during the Fall of Saigon

In April 1975, Riordan was an Assistant Manager at Citibank in Saigon (modern-day Ho Chi Minh City). He was ordered to evacuate along with other Americans as

North Vietnamese Army The People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN; vi, Quân đội nhân dân Việt Nam, QĐNDVN), also recognized as the Vietnam People's Army (VPA) or the Vietnamese Army (), is the military force of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam and the armed win ...

forces approached the city (then the capital of South Vietnam) during the final days of the

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam a ...

. Riordan initially obeyed the evacuation orders and was flown to nearby

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...

. In

, Riordan began plotting ways to rescue his South Vietnamese coworkers, who were ineligible for evacuation (because they were not Americans) and who were likely to be executed by the

Vietcong , , war = the Vietnam War , image = FNL Flag.svg , caption = The flag of the Viet Cong, adopted in 1960, is a variation on the flag of North Vietnam. Sometimes the lower stripe was green. , active ...

(because they were closely affiliated with Americans). He proposed numerous plans to Citibank and the US government but was repeatedly turned down. Eventually, Citibank told him to cease and desist his rescue efforts or be terminated from employment. On April 19, 1975, Riordan flew back to Saigon alone. He gathered all of his South Vietnamese coworkers and their families (105 people in total) and hid them in his villa and a nearby villa near the city. Facing no other options, Riordan decided to claim the 105 people as his dependents so that they would qualify for evacuation aboard US military cargo planes. He applied at the evacuation office ten separate times, listing several of the 105 as his dependents each time. Riordan himself flew out with the last group a few days before the

.Stahl, Lesley (October 13, 2013). "Daring Rescue Days Before the Fall of Saigon". '' 60 Minutes''. CBS News. Retrieved October 15, 2013.

Recognition

Citibank, instead of terminating Riordan, praised his efforts and worked to resettle all of the South Vietnamese workers and find them new jobs. Nevertheless, his story was largely unknown until October 2013 when Riordan was profiled on 60 Minutes.

Personal life

Riordan is openly gay.Riordan, John P. (2015)
''They Are All My Family: A Daring Rescue in the Chaos of Saigon’s Fall''
New York: '' PublicAffairs''–'' Perseus''. pp. 50, 88. Retrieved May 6, 2015. .

Works

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Riordan, John Year of birth missing (living people) Living people American bankers American expatriates in Vietnam Citigroup employees American LGBT military personnel Gay men