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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Laos
Index
Historically, Laos was subject to the will of its
stronger
neighbors, enforced by military means. By force of
circumstances in
warding off repeated foreign invasions, Laotians developed
battle
skills using elephants and compiled a history full of
warlike
deeds. Lan Xang, or the Kingdom of the Million Elephants,
the first
state in the recorded history of Laos, maintained a
standing army
of 150,000 men
(see The Founding of Lan Xang
, ch. 1).
Regiments
included cavalry, infantry, and an elephant corps. Prince
Fa Ngum,
Lan Xang's founder, redeveloped the old Mongol model of an
army
composed of units of 10,000, which gave rise to the name
of the
successive reign, Sam Sen Thai, or, 10,000 Thai. The
army's
strength enabled Fa Ngum to expand Lan Xang's borders to
the
western escarpment of the Khorat Plateau, the crest of the
Annamite
Chain in the east, and the northern edge of Khmer and Cham
civilizations in the south. To the north and east
especially,
however, mountain tribes resisted absorption and
maintained a
degree of independence.
Following Fa Ngum's death, struggles with Siamese and
Burmese
states in which his successors became embroiled, sapped
the
strength of the army and led to the decline and eventual
splitting
up of Lan Xang. In 1778 the capital of the Vientiane
kingdom was
attacked and destroyed for the first time by a Siamese
army. By the
1820s, Laos had reestablished sovereignty over its own
borders,
enough so that the king of Vientiane launched a disastrous
military
expedition against Siam (present-day Thailand). Laotian
forces were
overwhelmed by the superior firepower and strategy of the
Siamese
army, which attacked and destroyed Vientiane for a second
time in
1828.
Data as of July 1994
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