Embedded Files
Pres. John F. Kennedy in March 1961. In the early years of his presidency, he also dispatched CIA personnel to Laos. The maroon-color shaded region on the map was MR II, commanded by Gen. Vang Pao, and was the area where the heaviest fighting in Laos took place. Courtesy The John F. Kennedy Library
1960
A coup d'état (Typically, it is an illegal, unconstitutional seizure of power by a political faction, the military, or a dictator. ) in 1960 in the Lao capital, Vientiane, deepened the country’s political instability.
As a result, newly elected US president John F. Kennedy authorized the recruitment of ethnic minorities in Laos to participate in covert military operations against the spread of communism.
CIA agent Bill Lair met with the young Hmong military officer Vang Pao to discuss supporting US objectives in Laos.
A sharp increase in the number of Hmong troops, supported by American military and CIA advisers, along with huge drops of military supplies, signaled the start of what is now called the Secret War.
1963
Of the 300,000 Hmong people living in Laos, more than 19,000 men were recruited into the CIA-sponsored secret operation known as Special Guerrilla Units (SGU) while some enlisted as Forces Armees du Royaume, the Laotian royal armed forces.
Each soldier was paid an equivalent of three dollars a month. Air America—the “private” airline contracted by the CIA—dropped 40 tons of food per month. King Sisavang Vatthana of Laos appointed Touby Lyfoung to his advisory board.
The US funded new schools throughout the remote regions of Laos, which opened opportunities to Hmong girls.
As the war escalated, some Hmong girls were trained as nurses and medics to care for wounded soldiers.
1968-1969
In the two worst years of the both the American War in Vietnam and the Secret War in Laos, 18,000 Hmong soldiers were killed in combat, in addition to thousands more civilian casualties.
The March 1968 assault by North Vietnamese and Pathet Lao forces on the top-secret airbase at Phou Pha Thi—known to the CIA as “Lima Site 85”—resulted in the deaths of 12 US Air Force personnel, and many more Hmong and Thai soldiers.
By 1969, Hmong troop strength was nearing 40,000. Under the new administration of President Richard Nixon, U.S. bombing of Laos escalated, and Congress learned of CIA covert military operations in Laos.
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