The 1st Laotian Parachute Battalion (French : 1er Bataillon de Parachutistes Laotiens (1er BPL); 1st BPL) was a paratroop battalion of the French Union Army formed in Vientiane, French Indochina in 1951. It was composed of French officers and Laotian non-commissioned officers and enlisted men, and fought in the First Indochina War.
The 1st BPL began forming in October 1951 at Chinaimo near Vientiane, and reached a strength of 853 men in a headquarters and three companies by 1 April 1952. Its 2nd Company was formed from Commandos 4, 5, and 6 of the 1st Laotian Para-Commando Company. During 1952 it was involved in twenty operations, six of which involved parachute jumps. Between 15 and 24 December 576 men from the unit parachuted into Sam Neua to reinforce its garrison in Operation Noel; they were reinforced by eighty more to form a fourth company in February 1953. The Sam Neua garrison was defeated by a Vietminh invasion of 40,000 troops commanded by General Võ Nguyên Giáp, [1] forcing the remnants of the 1st BPL to flee toward the Plain of Jars. [1]
It was reformed at Chinaimo a month later, and conducted reconnaissance and commando operations north of Luang Prabang for the rest of the year, including Operation Dampieres in September. The 1st BPL began preparing for Operation Condor, an attempt to relieve the Dien Bien Phu garrison, during March 1954. It advanced towards the Laotian-Vietnamese border in April and early May, withdrawing in mid-May after the garrison surrendered. The BPL reunited on 18 June near Savannakhet at the French Air Force's Seno Airbase. Between 2 and 4 August it conducted the final airborne operation of the war, in which it parachuted into the town of Phanop in Khammouane Province, linking up with local militia units and sweeping the territory up to Mụ Giạ Pass on the Vietnamese border. [2]
Following the implementation of the Indochina ceasefire on 6 August, the 1st BPL with 981 personnel returned to Seno and transferred to the Laotian National Army. Following the October departure of its French officers, the unit was redesignated the 1st Parachute Battalion (French: 1er Bataillon Parachutiste – 1er BP). [1]
Captain Kong Le was a Laotian paratrooper in the Royal Lao Army. He led the premier unit of the Royal Lao Army, 2ème bataillon de parachutistes, which campaigned relentlessly during 1959 and 1960. The idealistic young American-trained Lao Theung officer became known worldwide when on 10 August 1960 he and his mutinous paratroopers overthrew the Royal Lao Government in a coup d'état. He declared he aimed at an end to government corruption; to the shock of American officials, he declared U.S. policies were responsible for the ongoing fraud.
Operation Castor was a French airborne operation in the First Indochina War. The operation established a fortified airhead in Điện Biên Province, in the north-west corner of Vietnam and was commanded by Brigadier General Jean Gilles. The Operation began at 10:35 on 20 November 1953, with reinforcements dropped over the following two days. With all its objectives achieved, the operation ended on 22 November. Castor was the largest airborne operation since World War II.
The 2nd Foreign Parachute Regiment is the only airborne regiment of the Foreign Legion in the French Army. It is one of the four infantry regiments of the 11th Parachute Brigade and part of the spearhead of the French rapid reaction force.
Pierre Charles Albert Marie Langlais was a senior French military officer who fought in World War II and the First Indochina War. Hailing from the Brittany region of France, Langlais was known as a tough and uncompromising character with an "unflagging devotion to his men."
The 1st Marine Infantry Parachute Regiment or 1er RPIMa is a unit of the French Army Special Forces Command, therefore part of the Special Operations Command.
The 1st Foreign Parachute Regiment was an airborne regiment of the Foreign Legion in the French Army which dated its origins to 1948. The regiment fought in the First Indochina War as the three-time reconstituted 1st Foreign Parachute Battalion, the Suez Crisis and Algerian War, but was dissolved along with the 10th Parachute Division and 25th Parachute Division following the generals' putsch against part of the French government in 1961.
The Royal Lao Army, also designated by its anglicized title RLA, was the land component of the Royal Lao Armed Forces (FAR), the official military of the Kingdom of Laos during the North Vietnamese invasion of Laos and the Laotian Civil War between 1960 and 1975.
The 1st Vietnamese Parachute Battalion was a French-Vietnamese paratroop battalion formed in Saigon, French Indochina on May 1, 1951.
The 5th Vietnamese Parachute Battalion was one of the Vietnamese National Army (VNA)'s airborne forces under the command of the Operational Group North-West (GONO), French Far East Expeditionary Corps. They were a paratrooper battalion formed in Hanoi, French Indochina in 1953.
The Royal Lao Armed Forces, best known by its French acronym FAR, were the official armed defense forces of the Kingdom of Laos, a state that existed from 1949 to 1975 in what is now the Lao People's Democratic Republic. First created under the French protectorate of Laos on July 1, 1949, the FAR was responsible for the defense of the Kingdom since its independence in October 1953 from France, until its dissolution on December 2, 1975. It operated notably during the North Vietnamese invasion of Laos and the Laotian Civil War from 1960 to 1975.
The Royal Lao Police, was the official national police force of the Kingdom of Laos from 1949 to 1975, operating closely with the Royal Lao Armed Forces (FAR) during the Laotian Civil War between 1960 and 1975.
The Battle of Lak Sao, fought between November 1963 and January 1964, was a major engagement of the Laotian Civil War. In November 1963, General Phoumi Nosavan, who held the reins of military power in the Kingdom of Laos, launched a military offensive against North Vietnamese invaders that cut across the northern panhandle of the nation. Although unsupported in this proxy action by his backers in the U.S. Embassy, he went ahead with his plan to push northwards from Nhommarath, then veer eastwards to the Vietnamese border. Phoumi's Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) advisors warned him that the North Vietnamese would retaliate, but he disregarded them.
The Battle of Vientiane was the decisive action of the 1960 Laotian coups. Fought between 13 and 16 December 1960, the battle ended with General Phoumi Nosavan winning control of the Kingdom of Laos with the aid of the Royal Thai Government and the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. Vientiane was left devastated by the fighting, with about 600 civilians dead, about the same number of homes destroyed, and 7,000 left homeless. The losing Forces Armées Neutralistes under Captain Kong Le retreated onto the strategic Plain of Jars, to begin an uneasy coexistence with the Pathet Lao and the invading People's Army of Vietnam.
The 1960 Laotian coups brought about a pivotal change of government in the Kingdom of Laos. General Phoumi Nosavan established himself as the strongman running Laos in a bloodless coup on 25 December 1959. He would be himself overthrown on 10 August 1960 by the young paratrooper captain who had backed him in the 1959 coup. When Captain Kong Le impressed the American officials underwriting Laos as a potential communist, they backed Phoumi's return to power in November and December 1960. In turn, the Soviets backed Kong Le as their proxy in this Cold War standoff. After the Battle of Vientiane ended in his defeat, Kong Le withdrew northward to the strategic Plain of Jars on 16 December 1960.
The Directorate of National Coordination or DNC was the airborne-qualified paramilitary Security Agency and élite field force of the Royal Lao Police. Closely modelled after the Royal Thai Police (RTP) Border Patrol Police Aerial Reinforcement Unit (PARU) commandos and similar in function to the later South Vietnamese National Police Field Force, the DNC was active during the early phase of the Laotian Civil War from 1960 to 1965.
The 1965 Laotian coups were two separate and simultaneous coups that struck the Kingdom of Laos in January 1965. General Phoumi Nosavan, a participant in four prior coups, had been deprived of troop command as a result; nevertheless, he managed to come up with troops for another try at overthrowing the Royal Lao Government. Simultaneously, Colonel Bounleut Saycocie independently mounted his own coup; after a short term takeover of Vientiane's radio station and infrastructure, he and his coup troops would rejoin the government forces sent to attack them. General Kouprasith Abhay, the military region commander, suppressed both coups. After re-acquiring Bounleut's troops, Kouprasith turned on the national police force and its commander, Siho Lamphouthacoul, as he felt they were untrustworthy and likely to join Phoumi's coup. The police force was defeated and disbanded. The troops Phoumi counted on never reached Vientiane; they were defeated and dispersed. By 4 February 1965, both coups were defeated. A purge of suspected dissident officers from the Lao officer corps followed.
SPECOM was the English acronym for Special Commando or Commando Speciale in French, the commando unit of the Royal Lao Armed Forces, which operated during the final phase of the Laotian Civil War from 1972 to 1975.
The Royal Lao Army Airborne was composed of the élite paratrooper battalions of the Royal Lao Army (RLA), the land component of the Royal Lao Armed Forces, which operated during the First Indochina War and the Laotian Civil War from 1948 to 1975.
Operation Counterpunch, waged 26 September 1970 to 7 January 1971, was a military offensive of the Laotian Civil War. Royalist General Vang Pao's guerrilla army regained the vital all-weather forward fighter base at Muang Soui on the Plain of Jars from the People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN). The preemptive Counterpunch was credited with delaying an imminent PAVN wet season offensive for a month. The guerrilla army survived, though still heavily outnumbered by the PAVN.
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