Word: laos
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...year-old war in Laos is fought by words and guns, by strange antagonists for curious motives. Many of the Meo people battle the Communist Pathet Lao rebels because the Pathet Lao interfere with their traditional opium trade. Laotian politicians-right, left and neutralist -jabber inconclusively in the hope of forming a coalition government that can unite the country. And in faraway Geneva, Russia, Red China, the U.S. and eleven other nations scrap interminably over a workable arrangement for ending the war. Biggest bone of contention: the withdrawal of foreign troops from Laos, including the 300-man U.S. Military Assistance...
With the disintegration of the West's position in Laos, most areas along the South Viet Nam border are now held by the Pathet Lao, and the Ho Chi Minh Trail has become an almost open thoroughfare through which Communist reinforcements pour into Diem's beleaguered country. Already the Communists are hard at work enlarging camps and even building airstrips in southern Laos for the rising struggle against South Viet Nam's harassed 150,000-man army...
...aloof, he was almost totally out of touch with the people, remained in his palace constantly. Even onetime admirers began to grumble about the influence of 51-year-old Brother Ngo Dinh Nhu. From a soundproofed office inside the palace, Nhu operated his own political party, the Can Lao, an elite group of 70,000 that was under orders to spy on the citizenry. There were also mutters about Nhu's wife, a pretty, dynamic feminist who carried on her own battles as a member of the National Assembly. She irritated many by ramming her "Family Code" through the legislature...
Radio Hanoi has been wooing the Meos for years with Meo-language broadcasts, but the tribe reportedly split into pro-and anti-Communist factions after a quarrel over the division of the opium crop. Colonel Vang and his cousin, Health Minister Touby Lyfoung, lead the loyalist Meos. The Pathet Lao Meos follow Chief Phay Dang, described by Communist Journalist Wilfred Burchett, who once visited him, as "a noble figure with a fine head, the dignity and poise of a great Indian chief...
Whatever their political sympathies, valley Lao wonder if the Meos, now that they have taken up modern arms, will ever put them down. Said one official: "We feel pity for them, disdain, but also respect. They have too much ability in a simple way, and too much money from their opium. They've chosen to live on the very tops of the mountains, among the clouds...