Laos: Battle of the Neckerchiefs

The Laotian army, such as it is, is divided into three parts: 1) neutralists, under General Kong Le, 2) Communist Pathet Lao, under Red Prince Souphanouvong, and 3) rightists, whose nominal leader has been General Phoumi Nosavan. Last week, like self-dividing amoebae, the right-wing troops split into warring factions.

Licenses for Trouble. At issue, as the smoke gradually cleared, were family rivalry and the spoils system. The potent Sananikone clan has never forgiven Phoumi Nosavan for kicking out their patriarch, Phoui Sananikone, as Premier six years ago. One of the clan, General Kouprasith Abhay, is military governor of Vientiane, and he has recently been quarreling with a Phoumi partisan, General Siho Lamphouthacoul, over who should control such imports as liquor and medicine, as well as the lucrative fees from opium and gambling dens. As a result, licensing patrols of Kouprasith's soldiers and Siho's police have been arresting each other, while gamblers and opium-den keepers loudly complained at having to buy two licenses to operate in peace.

Last week a former Phoumi aide, Colonel Bounleut Sycocie, suddenly ordered three companies of Royal Laotian troops to occupy the Vientiane radio station. Taking over the microphone, Bounleut broadcast a demand for a shake-up in the rightist high command, which the Sananikones interpreted as an attempt at a Phoumi comeback. When Bounleut's troops blossomed out with blue neckerchiefs, Kouprasith's forces replied by donning yellow ones (most Asian armies are well supplied with colored kerchiefs, which are used as identifying insignia for the various battalions).

Yellow Fire. The first clash occurred when General Kouprasith, returning to his headquarters east of Vientiane, crashed his car through a "blue" roadblock; a hail of bullets killed three of his men.

Next, a pro-Phoumi commander at Paksane, 100 miles to the northeast, advanced on Vientiane to reinforce Bounleut. His troops were scattered by "yellow" artillery fire with a loss of three dead. Phoumi Nosavan then appeared in the capital in full battle dress, announced that unless Kouprasith ended his siege of Bounleut, he would unleash Siho's police. Kouprasith answered with an artillery and mortar barrage, whereupon Bounleut and his men switched sides, exchanging their blue kerchiefs for yellow.

For ten hours, Phoumi's police and Kouprasith's troops fought it out in the heart of the city. One square block was leveled and the central police station burned to the ground. As is usually the case in Laos, most of the 60 dead were civilian noncombatants. The tide eventually turned against the police, who at one point were attacked by angry wasps disturbed by the gunfire. When the police surrendered, 800 of them were imprisoned in a cigarette factory. Phoumi's luxurious villa was destroyed and Phoumi himself vanished, finally turning up with Police Chief Siho at Udorn, site of a U.S. airbase in nearby Thailand.