Yellow Rain Over Laos

...As a vital part of the Ho Chi Mirth Trail supply tinr for the Vietnam war, Laos was inevitably part o f the sphere of "These internal documents do not disclose the organization that conducted the studies...

...Most of these, he saw, were loose at the point where tip and canister joined, unlike ordinary explosive-type rockets...

...At the end oi every sttik~ in which smoke rockets had been used, the pilot was returned to a "rest house" a: Phor~saven where an army doc,,~r and mlrse would give him a p h ) s i c a l examination...

...Rep...

...Mang Yang, as a s s i s t a n t village c h i e f , composed a letter to the area hospital at Bon Don requesting emergency help...

...They were flown in Soviet-built Ilyushin L-19 "Ravens" or in converted T-41 Cessnas, as part of a coordinated operation between the Laotian army and the P e o p l e ' s Army of Vietnam...

...The pilots knew nothing about the targets until they were told what to attack at the p r e - f l i g h t briefings...

...A specific poisonous mycotoxin group, trichothecene, derived from the grain mould, fungusfusarium, has been frequently reported as a naturally occurring poison in the Soviet Union...

...The P a t h e t Lao d i s t r i c t l e a d e r , Taseng Mai Chank, told Yong Mang Yang what to do...

...weaponry in the gassings...

...It was these hills, the t e r r i t o r y of the Hmong, that the Laotian army had decided to target...

...Some of the informa...

...But all the special rockets loaded at Ban Xon were already joined...

...In Vientiano there are three persons, led by a Socialist Republic of Vietnam expert, who are responsible for putting the chemicals into the heads of U.S...

...A report from the second Laotian pilot, who had defected after serving in the Lao People's Democratic Republic Air Force, confirmed many of these details...

...S l o w l y , a cloud of yellow rain began to fall from the sky...

...Before each mission, the pilots were given a pep talk by their commander...

...Based on interviews with Laotian government defectors and various o t h e r s o u r c e s , it was compiled into an amorphous body of U.S...

...The large-scale gassings went on in Laos until at least May 1979, while American diplomats asked Soviet officials to "use their influence" to stop the attacks, even though the intelligence community had intimated to Congress that Soviet experts were running the campaign...

...Repeated attacks on Phou Bia and the nearby c e n t e r of Phu Kong Klao were reported...

...All the Vietnamese spoke excellent Lao, and would go over situation maps of the target areas with pilots before the mission, just as the Laotian commanders did...

...Eventually, a journalist, Mr...

...In the windless spring morning, the cloud dropped silently toward the houses of the village...

...The information was gathered in late 1978...

...The Soviet reluctance to admit to any role in the gassings is understandable...

...The tricothecene mould isolated on foliage sprayed by the poison gas could not occur naturally in Southeast Asia, and could not grow naturally anywhere in such heavy concentrations...

...In spite of all the compelling and detailed evidence that systematic poison gas attacks on the Hmong people were taking place, the House subcommittee concluded that evidence of Soviet involvement in the gassings was "circumstantial...

...The L-19 raids a~ first carried live conventional rockets and three smoke rockets...

...A pair of Hmong children reported two aircraft dropped a green gas which killed their parents within 20 minutes, although there were no visible signs of injuries and "they appeared to be a s l e e p . " Another attack, said to have killed 1,000 villagers, involved green, red, and yellow gas drops...

...Gradually, his skin t u r n e d r e d d i s h and small black spots formed all over his body...

...There were only a few families in the village, and 14 of their members died in the gas attacks...

...In late 1976, in preparation for airstrikes against two Hmong strongholds--the villages of Phou Bia and Kasy--Laotian pilots began to fly reconnaissar~ce missions...

...Once part of French Indochina, then an independent klngdom, it was overrun during the 1960s by the Communist Pathet Lao guerrillas, who gradually wrested control of the country from Western-backed forces...

...The bags s p l i t , r e l e a s i n g a n o t h e r cloud of yellow fumes...

...Then, the special rockets were brought from Phonsavan to a depot near the Ban Xon airfield and were fitted onto special external arms racks on the L-19s...

...In late November, a five-man UN medical team investigating reports of chemical warfare in Southeast Asia and Afghanistan reported that it "found itself unable to reach a final conclusion as to whether or not chemical warfare agents had been used...

...weapons and supplies in the gassings...

...I hope we will be able to put to rest any fear that those lethal agents used in Laos are captured American stocks left over from the war," said Rep...

...This was the "compelling but preliminary" evidence presented on September 14 by United States Secretary of State Alexander Haig...

...It was a fine morning in May 1978, and the small village of Bang Non Po in C e n t r a l Laos was about to be eradicated...

...intelligence during the Vietnam conflict rankled the guilt-laden C a r t e r foreign policy...

...The backbone of the country is a series of steep ridges and valleys, covered in jungle...

...From his account, the secret American report of the gas operation was compiled...

...Regular gassings had been underway for two years when the U.S...

...As r e p o r t s became more frequent in the late seventies, events in Laos were overshadowed by the tragedy of Cambodia...

...The v simply sta_tethat "the U.S...

...The gas was dangerous for a week unless washed away' by rain...

...The first sign that a special campaign was to be mounted came when two Laotian helicopters were flown from the Phonsavan airfield in Xieng Khouang province to Long Tieng on a series of missions that transported rockets back to Phonsavan for storage...

...The Hmong made perfect targets...

...C o i n c i d e n t a l l y , U.S...

...By 1978- the year when the most serious effects from the gassings are reported-the pilot was being given a very thorough physical check by the doctor, and being "closely watched" by the nurse...

...This special treatment continued until late 1978, when a squadron of MIG-21 fighters supplied by the Soviet and Vietnamese air forces took over the attacks on Phou Bia...

...diplomats were presenting the Soviets with the detailed reports of their evidence that the Lao government was gassing the Hmong...

...in addition, anything having to do with the after-effects of the clandestine role played by U.S...

...I f you a r e a t t a c k e d a g a i n , " he said, "shoot the plane down for proof...

...Their reports of the attacks tended to be exaggerated...

...Their villages were small and isolated...

...It was next to impossible to draw up an accurate picture of the military operations being conducted against them...

...Hmong from the same central highlands of Laos described a bewildering variety of different-colored clouds of gas, all producing deadly symptoms...

...The team was headed by Viacheslav Ustinov, the UN Under Secretary General for Political and Security Council Affairs and former head of the Soviet Ministry of Foreign Affairs "Third African Department...

...The eyewknesses of attacks on Phou Bia said propelled a i r c r a f t - - p r o b a b l y the L-19s---had dropped two or four rockets from external racks on several passes over the village...

...Reports were even received of accidental attacks on friendly villages by aircraft with Vietnamese markings, which dropped chemicals that led to the death of 300 Hmong, mostly children, who had sided with and even sheltered the government troops...

...The fall of Laos to Communist forces in 1975 did not end their s t r u g g l e , if only because they knew t h e i r past r e s i s t a n c e had marked them for reprisals...

...intelligence sources also received some of the most detailed information of the whole campaign from Hmong r e f u g e e s who were driven into Thailand by the same series-of repeated attacks during 1978...

...Such actions led American diplomats in Thailand, who had been directly exposed to the horror of the refugees' stories, to decide that only firm evidence--in the form of samples of the poison gas itself--would convince public opinion...

...But later only fi)ur rockets, normaJiya[l smoke ones, were carried...

...Initially, only Laotian officers accompanied the pilots on the a i r s t r i k e s , but a fortnight into the campaign, Vietnamese officers began riding in the rear seats of the L-19s and alternating missions with the Laotians...

...manuf~tctured jackets...

...stan coincided with those caused by a class of chemicals known as mycotoxins...

...The few American State Department employees, Australian relief workers, and Western correspondents in Thailand who first heard of the gassings found t h e i r efforts to a l e r t the public scarcely encouraged by the Carter Administration's desire to improve relations with Hanoi...

...But was it less "circumstantial" than the information given American intelligence three years before--in the middle of the gassing campaign--which was kept secret for want of proof while thousands of Hmong continued to suffer and die...

...When f i r s t r e p o r t s of the P a t h e t Lao campaign came out, they were discounted as tall s t o r i e s - - t h e evidence, a f t e r all, came from a "biased source," the Hmong, who were tainted by their association with Vang Pao...

...Unlike ordinary ground-burst explosive shells, they detonated in the air, some producing a mixture of white and blue smoke, some red and yellow...

...The most famous of these was the CIA's " s e c r e t army" ofHmong tribesmen, led by the charismatic General Vang Pao...

...government has received:-a report..'" THE...

...intervention in Indochina," announced a Novosti Press Agency statement released last fall to rebut the new American allegations, The official news agency Tass asserted that the United States is only repeating these charges to prepare Americans for a limited nuclear war in which it will use its own chemical weapons...

...Their bases were strategically located within striking range, and any r e s i s t a n c e soldiers trying to flee to Thailand would have to cross enemy lines at least once in a month-long trek...

...Then the first attacks began...

...Rocket attacks were made, but the crews responsible for loading rockets on the attack aircraft were told that the special ammunition moved to Phonsavan should not be used--even though Phonsavan was much n e a r e r the t a r g e t zone of Bouamlong than was Long Tieng, where the aircraft rearmed...

...The pilots were also warned to keep the smoke rocket missions secret...

...These had released a yellow powder that contaminated water supplies and produced "harmful g a s e s . " Whoever drank the water began to vomit, their eyes turned red, and they died within the hour...

...Scores of other villages in the rough hill-country in Central Laos, inhabited by Hmong tribesmen, were also a t t a c k e d by P a t h e t Lao government p l a n e s r e l e a s i n g clouds of toxic, bright-colored gas...

...otherwise, the operation could prove hazardous to the crew...

...Bang Non Po was attacked by the yellow...

...In addition to the standard pilot's salary of 12,500 kip monthly, they received a bonus of 3,700 kil~ daily as additional '~flight pay," and free meals at Phonsavan...

...It read in part: The LPLA unit responsible for the chemical warfare rockets is a special LPDR Air Force unit to which is attached a Soviet expert...

...Vang Pao, now r e s e t t l e d to a farm in Montana, claims the f i r s t gas attacks against the Hmong villages began in early 1976...

...lion comes from interviews conducted in the Ben Vinay refugee camp in northern Thailand...

...The yellow rain in fact turned out to be not one, but many different chemical agents...

...To understand how such a blatant breach of international law was p e r m i t t e d i to continue in the face of overwhelming evidence--the scarred and pitted bodies of refugeesmone must begin with the history of the Hmong...

...Thus, even though samples of the poison gases were obtained, and exact d a t e s , places, and even a long roll of the name:~ of the Hmong victims e s t a b l i s h e d , it has taken Western leaders a full three years to admit openly that the Laotian government has lived up to its promise to "exterminate the Hmong" and that it has done so with Vietnamese--and Soviet--support...

...He h e a r d no explosions as the MIG-21 fighter circling above him dropped four brown rice sacks from its belly, then turned and headed northwards...

...Other refugees said small aircraft had fired rockets at t h e i r villages...

...L-19s had fired rockets which released green or red smoke that caused unconsciousness, vomiting, and bleeding from the mouth and the nose...

...They never communicated with Laotian ground officers during the flight...

...But more importantly, the information also details Soviet involvement in the gassings...

...Sterling Seagrave,'~ pointed out that the reported symptoms of the yellow rain sprayed in Cambodia, Laos, and Afghani...

...AMERICAN SPECTATOR JANUARY 1982 7 influence of Viemam--a "sideshow" in Indochina if ever there was one...

...The first kind, the smoke rockets, could only be fited at targets away from c~,mbined Laotian and Viemamese troops...

...Days later, a messenger reported that a medical team would be sent to the village to "check into the m a t t e r . " Several weeks afterwards, a six-man Lao medical team arrived and diagnosed the villagers' illness as " f e v e r " rather than the after-effects of chemical warfare...

...Gradually, an elite corps of pilots who flew the L-19s on tile special missior, s formed...

...The pilot could see the rockets which he was firing at the Hmong were little more than smoke dispensers...

...Evans and Company, Inc., $11.95...

...Those badly affected died within 24 hours...

...Minutes later, Yong Mang Yang saw his people beginning to die...

...This type of operation would "wipe out" the reactionary Hmong people...

...This makes it possible to piece together just what effect the raids carried out by the L-19s had on the "enemy tribesmen" below...

...Finally, during the Carter years U.S...

...This was done at the request of the Congress, since the Soviet Union, "as the principal sponsor of Hanoi, particularly in the military sphere, had special responsibility to join with the United States in seeking permanently to outlaw the use of chemical agents in warfare...

...Most of the critical information given to the House subcommittee members came to U.S...

...tSeagraye's findings have since been detailed in his new book, Yellow Rain (M...

...The pilots provided chapter and verse on the entire operation, including how it was run by the Vietnamese and Soviets...

...i n t e l l i g e n c e assessments and included in some drafts of a S t a t e Department r e p o r t on chemical warfare in Southeast Asia, * and apparently also in f n a t e r l a l s made available to the House subcommittee which in late 1979 began hearings on the matter...

...Whatever the case, systematic campaigns were not mounted until the next year when P a t h e t Lao soldiers began to encounter organized military attacks by Vang Pao's men...

...So did concern that closer study of the Hmong tragedy itself might point to the use of discarded U.S...

...Almost all the rest fell severely ill...

...The pilot claims he flew some missions using American-manufactured warheads which came in two parts, with the tip and canister separated for storage and then joined together before being loaded onto the aircraft racks...

...After the last attack, which was the most severe, Yong Nie/~olas Rothwel/ is a reporter f o r the A u s t r a l i a n , a uatioua/ uewapaper p u b - lished in Sydney...

...Because the clouds had been described as "yellow rain" the experts tested for mustard gas, soman, and other nerve gases...

...intelligence from two Laotian defectors, both pilots who had flown on the gassing missions (many of the investigators in the State Department and U.S...

...During the sixties, the United States mobilized several clandestine groups to fight the Pathet Lao and the North Vietnamese...

...The Soviet Union rejects allegations that it prepared the poisons used to kill the Hmong tribesmen and says the United States is trying to Blame Moscow for what it did itself in Vietnam...

...Phu Kong Klao had been hit repeatedly, with the last chemical attack of 1978 occurring in October...

...In Savannakhet province, there are two other persons responsible for Southern Laos...

...Those exposed to the gases began to vomit, ran about, lost their balance, and died within ten minutes...

...L aos has been a battlefield for 30 years...

...Although such evidence has for .the most p a r t been s t u d i o u s l y i g n o r e d , the campaign of poison gas a t t a c k s c a r r i e d out against the Hmong people in the central hill-country of Laos between 1977 and_1979 is well documented...

...These conventional attacks on Bouamlong went on for three months, until the dry season began...

...The first narrative is the story of a Laotian People's Liberation Army Pilot, who began flying chemical warfare operations against Hmong resistance strongholds in 1976...

...Documents on which the foregoing account is based, however, show that American intelligence knew more than three years ago that Soviet personnel were managing the gassings...

...The area is impassable to conventional troops...

...Yong Mang Yang could smell noth/ng, and he could not breathe through his nose, which ran and i t c h e d . He s t a g g e r e d through the cloud, feeling as if sand were in his eyes, crying tears of blood, real/zing he was b l i n d e d . Minutes a f t e r the r a i n cleared, he himself began vomiting, his stomach a c h e d , and he f e l t a c r u s h i n g sensation in his chest...

...During the two years that the pilot flew these missions, he learned from the Laotian People's Liberation Army officers who flew with him that there were two types of rockets...

...But the second kind, conventional closesupport rockets, could be fired near friendly troop positkms...

...But in addition to these interviews, there is another set of findings which is not as widely known...

...A d i f f e r e n t Vietnamese officer was assigned to each strike...

...They were allowed privileges unheard of in the Laotian army...

...One Lao National Forces officer claimed he had seen Soviet observers inspecting a village a f t e r a chemical attack on J u l y 15...

...I t was not until September 1981, when the Reagan Administration produced chemical analysis of foliage affected by the spray of "yellow rain," that U.S...

...Lester Wolff (D-NY) at the outset of the hearings...

...The rockets had released a green cloud that caused headaches, dizziness, vomiting of blood, and death shortly afterward...

...James Leach (R-Iowa) said he had been given " p e r s u a s i v e corroborating evidence" that the poisons came from the Soviet Union...

...The world public knows the extent of American chemical warfare during the U.S...

...Other sources described earlier attacks in the Phou Bia region...

...Moments after the yellow rain touched them, the women and children began vomiting and-blacking out, followed seconds later by the men...

...rain four times within the next year...

...House of Repres e n t a t i v e s Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific Affairs held a hearing in December 1979 on the "Use of Chemical Agents in Southeast Asia Since the Vietnam War...

...The a s s i s t a n t c h i e f of the v i l l a g e o f Hmong tribesmen, Yong Mang Yang, had h e a r d the drone of an a i r c r a f t minutes before but had scarcely looked up from his work...

...For two years attempts to isolate known chemical poisons on the foliage collected proved fruitless...

...One reason for this reluctance may be that the evidence implicates captured U.S...

...At Phong Saran, Xieng Khouang province, there are two persons responsible for this activity along with four Soviet experts...

...The entire operation was mounted within the hills of Central Laos...

...They were told the purpose of firing the rockets was to "cause the Hmong people to die out completely...

...As discussed above, Soviet and Vietnamese supervisors had been seen, according to refugees, checking the effects of the poisons...

...policymakers, including the Congress, were reluctant to pursue growing evidence of Soviet complicity in the gassings...

...Yong Mang Yang's story is one of 40 separate accounts of gassings told over t h e p a s t t h r e e y e a r s to r e f u g e e workers and State Department personnel, and later made public...

...Less understandable, however, is the implicit sympathy it received from unexpected quarters: Even as the subcommittee held its hearing on December 12, 1979, U.S...

...Their regard for detail did not match the needs of Western officials looking for "hard evidence...

...He provided information about the gas attacks carried out against the Hmong of Phou Bia, and said chemicals had been dispensed from light aircraft by Lao People's LiberaTHE AMERICAN SPECTATOR JANUARY 1982 9 tion Army units in a concerted campaign in May 1978...

...Refugees said 1,200 people had been killed by the gas in this area alone...

...There was also a "yellow gas" which was even more rapidly acting than the green one...

...Between June and August of 1976, the Laotian air force Ravens mounted several attacks on Vang Pao's troops in the same area, concentrating on the redoubt of Bouamlong...

...Ironically, one purpose of this inquiry was to e s t a b l i s h beyond any doubt that American herbicides left behind in Vietnam at the end of the war, such as Agent Orange, were not being used in the attacks on the Hmong...

...officials even suggested the poisons had been supplied by the Soviet Union...

...10 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR JANUARY 1982...

...Before every mission that carried the special rockets, the L-19 pilots were warned by Laotian commanders to fly at above normal a l t i t u d e s when firing the rockets...

...The missions, "specifically intended to dispense toxic chemical agents on Hmong v i l l a g e r s " in the vicinity of Phou B i a - - o n e of the hide-outs of Vang Pao's secret anti-Communist army--began in April or May 1976...

...This step led to a quest for hard evidence, such as trees and clothing charred or partly destroyed by the tinknown gas...

...The last surge of attacks in Laos began in June 1979--the same month that Jimmy Carter and Leonid Brezhnev embraced each other, signed the Salt II treaty in Vienna, and pledged themselves to fight for world peace...

...Part of the pilot's routine pre-flight check called for him to examine the tip 8 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR JANUARY 1982 portion of the new rockets...

...Odd samples had already been brought over the border by Hmong refugees, but were in such poor condition they could not be chemically analyzed...

...Army Medical Corps who worked with the refugees in Thailand had no knowledge of any of this information...

...Our intelligence agency," Leach added, however, "has determined for national s e c u r i t y reasons that this information should not be made public...

...Although all the major powers have had nerve gas stockpiles since before World War If, chemical warfare has hardly ever been used before...

...A rainbow of toxic gases had colored the skies above Laos...

...Piloting a Cessna, the Laotians would take two or three Vietnamese army staff officers at a time on detailed overflights of Hmong villages...