Laotian Civil War - Aftermath

Aftermath

Twenty two years following the end of the Laotian War, on 15 May 1997, the U.S. officially acknowledged its role in the Secret War, erecting a memorial in honour of American and Hmong contributions to U.S. air and ground combat efforts during the conflict. The Laos Memorial is located on the grounds of the Arlington National Cemetery between the John F. Kennedy Eternal Flame and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

The government of Laos has been accused of committing genocide against that country’s Hmong ethnic minority. After the Pathet Lao took over the country in 1975, the conflict continued in isolated pockets. In 1977 a communist newspaper promised the party would hunt down the “American collaborators” and their families “to the last root”. Rudolph Rummel has estimated that 100,000 Hmong perished in genocide between 1975 and 1980 in collaboration with Vietnam People's Army in the ensuing Hmong insurgency.

In 2004, following several years of pressure from a coalition of U.S. conservatives and liberal human rights activists, the U.S. government reversed a policy of denying immigration to Hmong who had fled Laos for refugee camps in Thailand in the 1990s. In a major victory for the Hmong, fifteen thousand Hmong were later recognised as refugees and afforded expedited U.S. immigration rights by the U.S. government.

A legacy of the civil war is continuing casualties from unexploded ordnance (UXO) dropped by the U.S. and Laotian Air Forces from 1964–1973. More than 2 million tons of bombs were dropped on Laos, 30 percent of which failed to explode immediately. However, UXO remains dangerous to persons coming in contact, purposefully or accidentally, with bombs. Casualties in Laos from UXO are estimated at 12,000 since 1973. In 2006, 33 years after the last bomb was dropped and after decades of UXO clearance programs, 59 people were known to have been killed or injured by UXO. So abundant are the remnants of bombs on the Plain of Jars that the collection and sale of scrap metal from bombs has been a major industry since the Civil War.