The Geneva Accords, which were signed on July 21, 1954 in Geneva, Switzerland were intended to address the disintegration of what had previously been French Indochina. This included the formation of several states, among them the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (usually known as North Vietnam), the State of Vietnam (later the Republic of Vietnam, or South Vietnam), as well as the kingdoms of Cambodia and Laos.
Present for the signing of the Geneva Accords were representatives from the newly formed nations as well as diplomats from France, the Soviet Union, China, the United States, and the UK. The presence of major players from both sides of the Cold War power divide presaged the conflicts that would almost immediately arise following the signing of the Accords.
As political and social upheaval marked the fractured nations that were formed following the Accords, Cold War powers maneuvered behind the scenes, fighting proxy wars to cement their cultural and political dominance. While the war in Vietnam soon became infamous, however, the Laotian Civil War—which took place in tandem with it—is often referred to as a “secret war,” because the involvement of foreign powers was kept largely off the books, despite extensive bombing and major initiatives launched by the CIA and others.
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Internal Conflicts, External Adversaries
Nominally neutral in the wake of the Geneva Accords, Laos was ostensibly under the control of the Royal Lao Government. The People’s Army of Vietnam (PAVN) maintained a major presence within the country, however, and sponsored an internal communist rebellion among the Pathet Lao, who opposed the Royal Lao Government.
The People’s Army of Vietnam established the notorious Ho Chi Minh trail along the border between Laos and Vietnam, a vital artery to move troops and supplies into South Vietnam and a key element of the Vietnam War. At the time, South Vietnam had the backing of the United States and other anti-communist allies, and as the conflict in Vietnam heated up, it spilled into Laos.
So, while the Pathet Lao (backed by the PAVN) fought the Royal Lao Government (backed by the US), the conflict became a proxy for the fighting in Vietnam, which was already a proxy for the antagonism between the Cold War powers of the United States and the Soviet Union. A proxy war of a proxy war.
The CIA and Millions of Bombs
Initially, the CIA made attempts to disrupt the operations of the PAVN and the Pathet Lao without direct military intervention. This included training some 30,000 guerilla soldiers, mostly recruited from among the Hmong peoples of Laos, to support the Royal Lao Government. This operation was made possible partly by Air America, an airline covertly owned by the CIA which provided support, logistics, supplies, and intelligence.
Though they remained predominantly covert at the time, US operations in Laos were not limited to training and logistics. The areas of Laos which were under the control of the PAVN or the Pathet Lao were hit with what has been described as the largest bombing campaign in history, with the United States Air Force dropping more than 260 million bombs on the region between 1964 and 1973—“nearly a ton [of ordnance] for every person in Laos.”
The Secret War in Laos
The covert nature of the US involvement in the Laotian Civil War was seen as necessary because both the US and their adversaries in North Vietnam had signed agreements stating that Laos would remain neutral—agreements that both sides had effectively broken before the ink was yet dry on the paper.
Even while the United States committed troops and ordnance to the conflict in Vietnam, they were also undertaking the largest covert operation in US history in Laos. Officials continued to deny the existence of US involvement in Laos, even as millions of bombs poured onto the countryside from United States Air Force planes. This denial led press throughout the world to dub the Laotian Civil War the CIA’s “Secret War.”
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Proxy War, Mirror War
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Pathet Lao soldiers in Vientiane, Laos, 1973.
Photo Credit: Wikipedia
Events in Laos mirrored, in many ways, those of other proxy wars being fought in surrounding nations such as Vietnam and Cambodia. Despite unprecedented bombardment and the assistance of the United States and other anti-communist allies, the forces of the Royal Lao Government gradually fell before the Pathet Lao and the PAVN.
The fall of Saigon to the Viet Cong and the PAVN in March of 1975 opened the door for victory by the Pathet Lao in Laos. Seeing what had happened in neighboring Vietnam and Cambodia, the Royal Lao Government decided that surrender was a better option than being defeated by force, and by August Pathet Lao forces were in the capital of Vientiane, which had fallen completely before the end of the year.
Ahead of (and immediately following) the fall of Vientiane, many who had supported the Royal Lao Government fled the country into neighboring Thailand. This massive exodus is believed to have drained Laos of roughly 10% of its total population—numbers that had already been reduced drastically by the lengthy fighting and extensive bombing which had taken place over the prior decades.
The Deadly Aftermath
The Laotian Civil War began in 1959, not long after the signing of the Geneva Accords in 1954, and it was over by 1975. Yet the echoes of the conflict can still be felt today, and not just within the borders of the small, landlocked nation. Today, Laos is still ruled by the Lao People’s Revolutionary Party, the modern incarnation of the Pathet Lao which took power following the civil war.
The reminders of the war are more than merely political, however. The millions of bombs dropped on Laos during the conflict are a deadly legacy, with an estimated 78 million pieces of unexploded ordnance left at war’s end. These continue to kill and injure individuals every year, and the Laotian government has estimated that around 30,000 or more people have been killed by the explosive remnants of war since 1975.
Despite the dangers, however, the sheer quantity of ordnance dropped on Laos was so plentiful that harvesting scrap metal from bombs remains a major industry within the ravaged country to this day.
Sources: History.com, Win Without War
