World: LAOS: Four Phases to Nonexistence

THE hesitation waltz went on last week in Laos. Neutralist Prince Souvanna Phouma flew in from Paris, but threatened that unless he got the neutralist coalition government he wanted by June 15, he would fly back to France—probably for good. Red Prince Souphanouvong remained in the Communist-held north, issuing occasional bulletins to the effect that he would be delighted to join Souvanna's coalition. But the other vital ingredients—pro-Western Prince Boun Oum and right-wing General Phoumi Nosavan—were missing. Continuing their junketing round of Southeast Asian nations in search of money and sympathy, the two arrived at Manila, where they got plenty of sympathy. Neutralism, declared President Diosdado Macapagal, "is the gateway to Communism." He found it incomprehensible, he said, that the U.S. in Laos was giving support to neutralists like Souvanna Phouma and withholding aid from staunch anti-Communists like his guests.

The questions raised by Macapagal are frequently heard in the U.S. One reason that the Administration's answers seem to carry little conviction is that, since its inception, the Laos problem has been murky, full of U.S. policy reversals and disagreements. The record:

Phase One: Coalition. Though it has a king, a government and an army and can be found on a map, Laos does not really exist. Many of its estimated 2,000,000 people would be astonished to be called Laotians, since they know themselves to be Meo or Black Thai or Khalom tribesmen. It is a land without a railroad, a single paved highway or a newspaper. Its chief cash crop is opium.

Laos was dreamed up by French Diplomat Jean Chauvel, who in 1946 was France's Secretary-General of Foreign Affairs. At the time, France was trying to reassert its authority in Indo-China, whose rebellious inhabitants had no desire to return to their prewar status as colonial subjects. In place of original Indo-China, consisting of various kingdoms and principalities, Paris put together three new autonomous states within the French Union: Viet Nam, Cambodia and Laos. Drawing lines on a map, Chauvel created Laos by merging the rival kingdoms of Luangprabang, whose monarch became King of Laos, with Champassak, whose pretender was consoled by being made permanent Inspector General of the new state.

French influence did not long survive the drawing of the map. Nine years later, with the humiliating defeat of Dienbienphu, France withdrew from Indo-China, and the fledgling state of Laos was on its own, along with the other remnant states of partitioned Indo-China. Independence was complicated by the fact that two Laotian provinces were securely in the hands of Communist Pathet Lao bands under Red Prince Souphanouvong. In 1956 his halfbrother, Prince Souvanna Phouma, was chosen Premier and soon integrated the two Red provinces into the kingdom by giving Souphanouvong a Cabinet post. In a subsequent national election, the Reds increased their strength by taking nine of 21 contested seats in the National Assembly.