Major General Phoumi Nosavan was a military strongman who was prominent in the history of the Kingdom of Laos; at times, he dominated its political life to the point of being a virtual dictator. He was born in Savannakhet, the French Protectorate of Laos, on 27 January 1920. Originally a civil servant in the French colonial administration of Laos, during the last year of World War II he joined the resistance movement against the Japanese occupiers. Exiled from 1946 to early 1949 for his opposition to French return to colonizing Laos, he returned to his native soil to begin a military career in 1950 after the collapse of the anti-French Lao Issara government. By 1955, he was Chief of Staff of the brand-new Royal Lao Army. While in that position, he was largely responsible for appointing senior officers into command positions in the Military Regions of Laos. Following that, in 1957 he was the first Lao officer to be schooled in France at the École de Guerre. While in France, he became acquainted with Central Intelligence Agency operative John F. "Jack" Hasey. Phoumi returned to Laos to become a founding member of the Committee for the Defence of National Interests on 17 June 1958. On 25 December 1959, he took control of the capital of Vientiane and of the nation in a bloodless coup.
Captain Kong Le was a 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.
Colonel Bounleuth Saycocie was a Lao military and political figure of the Second Indochina War.
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.
Operation Momentum was a guerrilla training program during the Laotian Civil War. This Central Intelligence Agency operation raising a guerrilla force of Hmong hill-tribesmen in northeastern Laos was planned by James William Lair and carried out by the Thai Police Aerial Reinforcement Unit. Begun on 17 January 1961, the three-day Auto Defense Choc course graduated a clandestine guerrilla army of 5,000 warriors by 1 May, and of 9,000 by August. It scored its first success the day after the first ADC company graduated, on 21 January 1961, when 20 ADC troopers ambushed and killed 15 Pathet Lao.
The Wapi Project was a civic action program originated by the Royal Lao Government; it was performed in Military Region 4 of Laos from late 1963 through 1967. Notable for being among the first integrated programs to offer integrated services to the Lao Theung populace of southern Laos, it became a victim of its own success. Its lean efficiency led to its being crowded out of funding by more expensive programs.
The Auto Defense de Choc (ADC) was a militia training program for the Royal Lao Armed Forces. Begun by a French military mission in 1955, its 100-man companies were placed under command of the local Military Region commander when trained. By 1 September 1959, 20 ADC companies were in training, and there were 16,000 ADC soldiers nationwide. When Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) operatives Theodore Shackley, James William Lair and others slipped into the Kingdom of Laos in the early 1960s, they instituted an American version of the ADC dependent on pre-packed airdropped materiel. Using a three-day training schedule in Operation Momentum, Shackley, Lair and others, worked with Vang Pao to raise a guerrilla force of 5,000 troops in several months.
The 1967 Opium War took place in northwestern Laos between February and August 1967; actual fighting took place from 29 July to 1 August 1967. A mule train, led by Burmese militia, carrying 16 tons of opium crossed into Laos to Ban Khwan, where they were attacked by rival drug smugglers from the Chinese Nationalists' Third and Fifth Armies. The intended recipient of the shipment, Royal Lao Army General Ouane Rattikone, bombed both sides while moving in troops to sweep the battlefield. With both Burmese militia and Nationalist Chinese defeated and expelled from Laos, the Lao general confiscated the opium for himself.
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.
Forces Armées Neutralistes was an armed political movement of the Laotian Civil War.
Kham Ouane Boupha is a Laotian soldier and politician. Appointed to command Phongsali Province in the Kingdom of Laos in 1957 or 1958 while he was in his mid-twenties, he would maintain that base throughout the impending Laotian Civil War. During that war, in April 1963, he would defect from government service to head the pro-communist Patriotic Neutralists movement. At the end of the war, as the Communists succeeded to power through the Provisional Government of National Union, Kham Ouane Boupha was appointed Deputy Minister of Defense on 9 April 1974. He was promoted to become Minister of Defense on 12 May 1975 and served as such for many years, even while he was also Minister of Justice. He retired from cabinet rank in 2006, becoming a Minister in the Office of the Prime Minister.
Siho Lanphouthacoul was a Laotian paramilitary police officer. He used his powers as the National Director of Coordination to build Laotian police forces into a national power. Appointed as Director prior to the August 1960 coup by Kong Le, Siho gathered and trained two special battalions of paramilitary police during the latter part of 1960. When his patron, General Phoumi Nosavan, seized power in December 1960, Siho's new battalions helped carry the day at the Battle of Vientiane. Acquiring the National Police from the Ministry of the Interior, and co-opting local military police, Siho consolidated the Lao police into the Directorate of National Coordination. Attaining a strength of 6,500 men, the DNC would be Siho's instrument for his short-lived 18 April 1964 coup.
The 1964 Laotian coups were two attempted coup d'etats against the Royal Lao Government. The 18 April 1964 coup was notable for being committed by the policemen of the Directorate of National Coordination. Although successful, it was overturned five days later by U.S. Ambassador Leonard Unger. In its wake, Neutralist Prime Minister Souvanna Phouma forged a fragile coalition with the Pathet Lao communists. On 4 August 1964, Defense Minister Phoumi Nosavan attempted to take over Vientiane with a training battalion. This coup was quickly crushed by the local Royal Lao Army troops, as the police sat out the conflict.
Beginning in 1955, the Kingdom of Laos was divided into five Military Regions (MR), roughly corresponding to the areas of the country's 13 provinces. The Military Regions were necessitated by the poor lines of communication within the country. The Military Districts were the basis of a culture of warlordism in the Royal Lao Armed Forces (FAR) high command, with most MR Commanders running their zones like private fiefdoms.
The 1966 Laotian coup d'état was brought about by political infighting concerning control of the Royal Lao Air Force, and use of its transports for smuggling. General Thao Ma, who wished to reserve the transports for strictly military use, was forced into exile on 22 October 1966 by fellow generals angling to use the transports for smuggling opium and gold.
Project Copper was a coordinated military action undertaken by the Kingdom of Laos and the Khmer Republic from 1 January–May 1971. It used U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) funds channeled through the Central Intelligence Agency to train three Cambodian battalions to interdict the Sihanouk Trail before it joined the Ho Chi Minh Trail. Committed to battle in southern Laos on 1 January 1971, one battalion deserted the battlefield, a second one mutinied during training, and a third had to be repurposed after suffering 80 casualties. By late January, the project was temporarily suspended.
Operation Snake Eyes was a proposed military operation of the Laotian Civil War. Planned in mid-December 1969 by the U.S. Ambassador to Laos, the planned interdiction of the newly constructed Chinese Road, Route 46, was aimed at halting the road's progress toward the border with Thailand. The offensive by guerrilla raiders was delayed six months for operational reasons. When it was finally ready to be launched, it was pre-empted by the furor caused by the Cambodian Incursion. Fearful that Operation Snake Eyes would arouse even greater publicity, the Central Intelligence Agency handlers of the guerrillas canceled the operation on orders of the White House. Attempts to limit Chinese expansion toward the south would be left to future operations, such as Operation Phalat and Operation Sourisak Montry.
The Chinese Road were a series of highways built as a foreign aid project by the People's Republic of China (PRC) in northern Laos, beginning in 1962. The first new road was built from Mengla, Yunnan Province, PRC to Phongsali, Laos; it was completed on 25 May 1963. The next major road built was Route 46, begun in the 1966 dry season and stretching from the southern tip of Yunnan Province southward toward the border of the Kingdom of Thailand. As 25,000 Chinese troops and 400 antiaircraft guns came to be posted to defend Route 46, and Thai support of American war efforts in both the Laotian Civil War and the Vietnam War became widely known, there was uneasiness among both Thai and American intelligence communities concerning Communist China's intents in constructing the all-weather highway. American interest in the new road extended up to the White House.
Operation Phalat was a military offensive of the Laotian Civil War aimed at an active defense of the Kingdom of Thailand's northern border with the Kingdom of Laos. Evoked by the approach of The Chinese Road, and despite feeble cooperation from the Royal Lao Government, the Thai military established a three-battalion presence on Lao territory south of the Mekong River as a defense against potential invasion by the People's Republic of China.
Operation Sourisak Montry VIII was a Thai military offensive against an encroaching Chinese Communist presence just north of the Mekong River. Operation Phalat established a base camp at Xieng Lom, Laos, on the southern bank of the Mekong River, and garrisoned it with three Thai mercenary battalions. Operation Sourisak Montry was a series of indecisive skirmishes in the same area, during which the Thais won a Pyrrhic victory over the Pathet Lao in mid-March 1972.
Ouane Rattikone 
Republic of China 
CIA