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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Laos
Index
Phoumi enlisted the support of the commanders of four
of Laos's
five military regions. He also began immediately
broadcasting
propaganda denouncing Kong Le as a communist and on August
15
proclaimed the establishment of a Counter Coup d'État
Committee. He
appealed to all military personnel to rally behind him,
guaranteed
their salaries, and proclaimed his intention to liberate
Vientiane
from communist hands. Forces loyal to Phoumi seized
Pakxan.
The United States considered Souvanna Phouma's return
to office
bad news. A Department of State cable stated that the
United States
sought "to bring about an acceptable power balance of
non-communist
elements which would eliminate Kong Le and restore
authority and
stability."
Souvanna Phouma, wanting to avoid civil war, with
Phoumi's
concurrence convoked the National Assembly in
Louangphrabang on
August 29. A new government with Souvanna Phouma as prime
minister
and Phoumi as deputy prime minister and minister of
interior was
sworn in on August 31. Phoumi announced the dissolution of
his
Counter Coup d'État Committee. This might have defused the
crisis,
but the same day, Kong Le made a radiobroadcast protesting
the
presence of Phoumi in the cabinet. Souvanna Phouma
convinced him to
change his mind, which he did "for the sake of peace and
reconciliation" on September 1. Phoumi returned to
Savannakhét and
waited.
On September 10, Prince Boun Oum, speaking from
Savannakhét in
the name of the new Revolutionary Committee, announced
that the
constitution had been abolished, and he and Phoumi were
assuming
power. In mid-September, two companies of Kong Le's
paratroopers
routed the two battalions of Phoumi's advance guard from
their
position at Pakxan and installed a defensive line on the
north bank
of the Nam Kading. Phoumi made no move to organize his
paratroop
drop on Vientiane, in spite of the considerable means at
his
disposal. On the evening of September 21, Sarit made a
speech in
which he hinted at Thai armed intervention in Laos.
Kong Le's reputation as a giant slayer had by now
spread from
the capital to the far corners of the kingdom. On
September 28,
when he dropped a handful of paratroopers near Xam Nua in
order to
explain the situation to the 1,500-person garrison that in
principle was loyal to Souvanna Phouma, rumors that the
garrison's
officers, some of whom had been in contact with Phoumi,
might be
cashiered created a panic. The garrison abandoned the town
to the
Pathet Lao, who were accompanied by their North Vietnamese
advisers
from Group 959. The withdrawing column surrendered its
arms to the
Pathet Lao near Muang Peun on October 2.
The Pathet Lao now claimed to be supporting Souvanna
Phouma.
The coup and Phoumi's resistance with foreign assistance,
which the
United States and Thailand had difficulty camouflaging,
gave the
still-secret LPP an unprecedented opportunity to burrow
more deeply
behind the nationalist mantle, and it lost no time in
seizing the
occasion. Many Laotians came to see the Pathet Lao as
acting to
defend the country against United States- and Thai-backed
aggression. Even in Vientiane, there was growing
resentment of the
Thai blockade, which caused a shortage of consumer goods
and rising
prices. Foreseeing an opening for the Pathet Lao to
negotiate with
the new government, Radio Hanoi and Radio Beijing
broadcast support
for Souvanna Phouma.
Although Souvanna Phouma's government was accepted as
the legal
government of Laos by Britain, France, and the United
States, this
did not prevent the United States from broadening its
support to
Phoumi's forces on the grounds that they were fighting the
Pathet
Lao. In fact, there is no record of their taking any
offensive
action against the Pathet Lao. Phoumi had ordered the
pullback from
Xam Nua. Winthrop G. Brown, the new United States
ambassador,
reported instances where Phoumi refused help to engage the
Pathet
Lao because it was offered by Vientiane. The only
offensive actions
taken by Royal Lao Army troops against the Pathet Lao
between
August and December 1960 were those taken by troops loyal
to
Souvanna Phouma in Phôngsali and elsewhere.
The "compromise" worked out by the embassy with
Souvanna
Phouma, in which the prime minister would not object to
direct
United States military aid to Phoumi as long as this aid
was not
used against his government, was a sham. Whenever the
embassy tried
to persuade Phoumi to give up his plan and return to
Vientiane,
Phoumi pleaded fear for his safety and escalated his
demands. In
Louangphrabang, King Savang Vatthana temporized, hoping to
bring
the military leaders together at least in a united stand
against
the communists and putting off a political solution until
later.
Failing to achieve his aim, he retreated, saying he was
disgusted
with all concerned. Brown felt he was waiting for Phoumi's
capture
of Vientiane to get him off the hook and avoid the
necessity of his
taking any categoric action.
Brown cabled Washington on October 5 that in the
continued
absence of an agreement between Phoumi and Souvanna
Phouma, United
States support of Phoumi would lead to "further
disintegration" of
the anticommunist forces and would involve the United
States in
actions that risked internationalizing the conflict in
Laos.
At a meeting on October 11 with a visiting United
States
delegation made up of Parsons, Assistant Secretary of
Defense John
N. Irwin II, and Vice Admiral Herbert D. Riley, chief of
staff to
the Commander in Chief Pacific, Souvanna Phouma gave an
indictment
of the provocative errors committed by his successors
after
formation of the first coalition. He warned that the only
course
for Laos was to implement the 1957 agreements before the
Pathet
Lao--with whom he was in touch and intended to resume
negotiations-
-presented even more far-reaching demands. The first
Soviet
ambassador to Laos, Aleksandr N. Abramov, arrived as
Parsons was
leaving.
After conferring with the king, the Parsons-Irwin-Riley
team
proceeded to Bangkok. On October 17, Irwin and Riley met
with
Phoumi in Ubol. Although the Department of State at that
point was
under the impression that United States policy required
that Phoumi
dissolve the Revolutionary Committee, both as a gesture of
good
faith toward Souvanna Phouma in preserving the unity of
anticommunist forces in Laos and, more practically, in
order to
avoid the growing impression abroad that the United States
was
illegally aiding a rebel movement, no mention of this
point was
made either in Parsons' instructions to his two colleagues
or at
the October 17 meeting.
Following the formal conversation, Riley took Phoumi
aside and
told him that the United States had completely lost
confidence in
Souvanna Phouma and was backing Phoumi to go back and
clean up the
situation. Irwin similarly told Phoumi that the United
States was
only supporting him in building up his defenses for the
moment; in
the long run, the United States was supporting him all the
way. The
message was not lost on Phoumi. The effect of these
unauthorized
remarks was to undercut both Souvanna Phouma's efforts to
negotiate
a compromise solution with Phoumi and Brown's bona fides
with
Souvanna Phouma, already strained by the continuing United
States
aid flowing into Savannakhét in the absence of any
matching
military action against the Pathet Lao. Phoumi's
intransigence in
turn led the Department of State to make ever-increasing
demands on
Souvanna Phouma in the interest of "compromise," beginning
with the
charge that the prime minister was not exercising
sufficient
control over Kong Le, the demand that he take appropriate
precautions to prevent Kong Le from launching an attack on
Savannakhét, and so forth.
Souvanna Phouma began negotiations with the Pathet Lao
on
October 18. However, his position was much weaker than in
1957 when
he faced the same set of Pathet Lao demands. Although
nothing
substantive would come from these negotiations, they
provided fuel
for Phoumi's anticommunist propaganda and heightened
nervousness in
Washington and Bangkok.
Next, Phoumi forced the commander of the Louangphrabang
garrison to declare for the Revolutionary Committee. This
was an
important move, for it placed the king within Phoumi's
territory.
In Bangkok, Sarit's first reaction on hearing the news was
to ask
the United States ambassador, U. Alexis Johnson, whether
now would
be a good time for the Revolutionary Committee to
"establish itself
as a government." General Ouan Ratikoun quickly defected
to
Savannakhét. Phoumi captured another general, Amkha
Soukhavong, at
Xiangkhoang and gained the support of General Sing
Ratanassamay.
Phoumi's troops had been paid without Brown's having been
consulted. Ambassador Johnson, without consulting Brown,
assured
Sarit that the United States would pay Phoumi's troops, an
action
that Brown protested.
When Phoumi finally launched his offensive on the Nam
Kading on
November 21, Souvanna Phouma vainly attempted to contact
him. With
badly needed supplies to Vientiane, especially fuel, still
cut off
by the Thai blockade, Souvanna Phouma's forced acceptance
of a
Soviet offer of aid lent Phoumi's imminent attack "to
drive out the
communists" a semblance of legitimacy. On December 11,
Phoumi led
the forty National Assembly deputies who had gathered in
Savannahkét over the preceding weeks to vote no confidence
in
Souvanna Phouma's government. The king accepted the vote
as legal
the next day when he signed Royal Ordinance No. 282,
dismissing
Souvanna Phouma's government and giving powers
provisionally to the
Revolutionary Committee. Royal Ordinance No. 283,
approving a
provisional government formed by Prince Boun Oum, who
acted as
front man for Phoumi--the king had scruples about naming a
general
to be prime minister--was signed on December 14. The
Department of
State notified its acceptance of the new regime and said
it was
acting to meet its requests for assistance "to restore
peace to the
country." At this time, neither the deputies nor the court
were
free agents--and Souvanna Phouma had not resigned.
Data as of July 1994
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