In 1952, Thái — then, a graduate student at Cornell — first met Diệm as a political exile in Lakewood, New Jersey and helped him make contacts with American politicians and academics. Thái returned to Saigon in 1954 and became one of the closest aides to President Diệm. In late 1961, he resigned as Director General of the national news agency, Vietnam Press, to accept the Nieman Fellowship in Journalism at Harvard (1962–1963). In 1962, Thái published "Is South Vietnam Viable?", exposing the corruption of the Ngo Family dictatorship and accurately predicting the imminent November 1963 coup which overthrew the Diem regime one year later.