a kingdom whose unity was confirmed by the
Geneva Agreements of 1954, Laos was torn by
regional, tribal and factional strife. The commu-
nist Pathet Lao (Lao National Movement) were
growing stronger in the north. Another army
faction, which was anti-communist, was backed
by the Americans. A third group, the so-called
neutralists, tried to maintain at least the sem-
blance of unity by constructing a coalition of all
parties and factions, which would each be left in
de facto control of the regions they held. That
was most unwelcome to the Americans, since the
communist regions of the country bordered on
North and South Vietnam and so acted as a
passage for supplies and men along the maze of
jungle trails known as the Ho Chi-minh trail, by
which it took two months to reach the South
from the North. The Pathet Lao were also threat-
ening to expand their influence into the strategic
central Plain of Jars, controlling routes between
the capital Vientiane, the royal palace at Luang
Prabang and North Vietnam. This sparsely popu-
lated country of some 2.5 million bordered not
only on North and South Vietnam, but also on
China, Burma, Thailand and Cambodia, and so
was a potential cockpit of struggle between more
powerful neighbours.
In Washington, Laos appeared to hold the key
to the defence of non-communist south-east Asia.
The Eisenhower administration was therefore
determined to maintain a Laotian government in
power untrammelled by communist or neutralist
coalition partners. In neighbouring Cambodia,
Prince Sihanouk sustained a skilful balancing act
between rival factions and no less adroitly main-
tained a precarious neutrality and unity from 1954
to 1970. That was also the aim of the most durable
of the Laotian leaders, Prince Souvanna Phouma,
who tried to establish a neutralist coalition with
his brother, the red prince Souphanouvong,
who represented the Pathet Lao, and with the
American-supported General Phoumi Nosavan.
He succeeded for a time, but the US backing for
Phoumi and for the Royal Laotian Army ruined
any chances of a neutralist solution. As American
penetration increased, so did North Vietnamese
support for the Pathet Lao. But by 1961 the inef-
fectualness and weakness of General Phoumi had
become painfully evident. With Soviet and North
Vietnamese support, the communists threatened
to take over the whole of Laos. Eisenhower’s and
Kennedy’s hostility to the neutralist Souvanna
Phouma had removed the one Laotian leader who,
if only for a time, might have held the Pathet Lao
in check.
SEATO, the south-east Asian collective de-
fence treaty, organised by Dulles in September
1954, unlike NATO had no standing armies, nor
had its signatories promised military support to
each other. So, although it was extended to cover
the defence of Cambodia and South Vietnam, it
provided no guarantees of help and proved of
limited value when the US did appeal for military
assistance. The Eisenhower administration also
sent military advisers to South Vietnam and to
Laos, yet the Laotian Royal Army never became
an effective fighting force capable of dealing with
the guerrilla tactics of the Pathet Lao. The influx
of Americans and dollars, moreover, corrupted
and undermined the South Vietnamese and the
Laotians. American advisers, in any case, suffered
from one disability they could not overcome: they
were foreigners, white outsiders. The Pathet Lao
and the Vietcong, for all the violence and disor-
der they brought to their fellow countrymen,
were their own people. An enormous amount of
financial aid was poured into south-east Asia;
most of it went to the military or lined the
pockets of corrupt officials. What the pattern of
military aid reveals are the priorities of the US in
south-east Asia from the mid-1950s to the mid-
1960s. By far the largest amount of aid as calcu-
lated per head of population was sent to Laos and
South Vietnam during the decade from 1955 to
- About half that amount per head went to
Cambodia and the Philippines. Thailand also
received substantial aid whereas in comparison,
Indonesia, Burma and Malaysia were granted very
little assistance.
Eisenhower was committing technical, financial
and military aid to enable the anti-communist
forces in south-east Asia to defend themselves
against the communists. But he was opposed to
using US military forces on the Asian mainland
(except in South Korea). The mighty US Seventh
Fleet with its nuclear weapons was close by. What
1
AMERICA’S MISSION IN THE WORLD 559
