Word: laotians
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...nine months ago: 205,000 combat troops, plus 45,000 administrative and political cadre (see map following page). Powerful enemy forces remain deployed throughout the country, with the heaviest concentrations in the III Corps area, which contains Saigon. While the enemy maintains strong support forces in its Laotian and Cambodian sanctuaries and north of the Demilitarized Zone, few large units have recently crossed into the South. One of these was the 24th Regiment of the 304th NVA Division, which disappeared into the North after the siege of Khe Sanh was lifted last year. In recent weeks the enemy has ominously...
From the moment they landed in the Laotian capital of Vientiane, the first stop on their way home, the men were besieged by questions. What had it been like? Had they been mistreated or brainwashed? But the prisoners said little more than that their treatment had been "adequate"-obviously out of fear that any statement might spoil the chances of release for their comrades still in North Viet...
...government's hold on the Mekong Valley, where two-thirds of Laos' 3,000,000 people live. The U.S.-backed government of neutralist Premier Prince Souvanna Phouma permitted American bombing of the Ho Chi Minh Trail in eastern Laos, but allowed no major allied ground forays. Warfare Laotian-style also developed seasonal cycles. The Communists struck during the dry season, phasing their offensives out just be fore the rains came. The government, because of greater air mobility, usually managed to regain during the rainy sea son what it had lost in the dry months...
...three major government outposts in Communist-controlled northeastern Laos. Then, last April, Communist forces began moving on Muong Soui. To relieve the pressure on the garrison, government troops under General Vang Pao, a seasoned guerrilla leader, mounted a daring diversion: backed by U.S. jets and Laotian T-28 fighter-bombers, they struck deep into Pathet Lao territory, capturing the Communist "capital" of Xieng Khouang, less than 50 miles from the North Vietnamese border. It was a short-lived victory. Vang Pao's men held on for less than a month before they were ousted from the bombed-out town...
...Hasty Return. The Muong Soui setback, combined with smaller Communist strikes at other government outposts, caused a crisis in Vientiane, 110 miles to the south. Although neither Vientiane nor Luang Prabang was endangered by the Communist thrust, some right-wing Laotian politicians called for direct U.S. intervention. Souvanna Phouma, vacationing in France, at one point considered flying home but later decided against it-perhaps because a hasty return would have made the situation look even worse. When the U.S. State Department charged that North Viet Nam had "aggressive designs" on Laos, Hanoi immediately countercharged that the U.S. was keeping...