Ben Hopkins travels to Laos’ remote province of Hua Phan to explore the caves that once gave shelter from the largest and most expensive paramilitary operation ever conducted by the US

Vieng Xai, a dust bowl village in the remote northeast province of Hua Phan isn’t the easiest place to reach. Narrow lanes tracing a mountainous terrain slow our bus to a snails pace through a landscape of lush vegetation, precipitous valleys and bamboo villages. Looking out of the window it’s hard to believe this province was once at the epicenter of what remains the largest and most expensive paramilitary operation ever conducted by the US.

From 1964 to 1973 the US military rained down 1.9 million metric tons of bombs Laos, or over half a ton for every man, woman and child. Their aim was to break the will of the Pathet Laos Army – the communist opposition to the Laos Royalists and strong supporters of Ho Chi Mihn’s Viet Cong Army. In their failure they left Laos with the dubious distinction of becoming the most heavily bombed nation, on a per capita basis, in the history of warfare. Vieng Xai – Victory City – stood as the command center of the Pathet Laos resistance and today bears the scars of an illegal war that bought a nation to its knees.

Victory City is a grand term for what is essentially a mud track village boasting a few crumbled, concrete buildings and a central market where vendors struggle to afford transport to the provincial capital, 29km away.  A small airfield and a few barracks painted ochre and green announce my arrival. In the center of town flies swarm around a meat market that looks out to a statue depicting a soldier, a worker and a peasant, their hammers, rifles and sickles hoisted in the air, their feet crushing bombs inscribed USA.

Reminders of America’s nine year Secret War against the Pathet Laos are etched into the psyche and landscape of this province. Rising above the pot marked rice fields are limestone karsts riddled with caves that were used as the people’s only form of defense during Uncle Sam’s nine year onslaught. From 1964 to 1973 over 200 caves were utilized as shelter and barracks for over 30,000 citizens and soldiers. Amongst them was a bakery cave, a bank cave where liberated zone banknotes were printed, a circus cave and even a Chinese Embassy Cave – surely the ambassadorial posting from hell! The daily bombardments halved the population of Vieng Xai and even today, 35 years on there’s a ghost town air about the place.

As I enter the district headquarters to arrange a tour of the caves a couple of bureaucrats are busy gathering dust. When I introduce myself they immediately start arguing over which one will take a few dollars to guide me through the caves.

“Quickly, follow me,” says the older man who nominates himself tour guide over his grumbling colleague. At 35 years of age he was too young to fight the Americans but old enough to remember taking shelter with his family. “My name is Wit, welcome to Cave City” he says as we climb onto a couple of rusty old push bikes and cycle up a mud track. “We’ll visit our leader’s cave first, his name was Keysone.”

Tham Than Keysone was the Pathet Laos chief for the duration of the war. When the Americans retreated he held presidency of Laos until his death in 1992. “The Americans could not kill him,” Wit explains as he leads me 140 meters into a cave that for nine years was his home. Tracing a long tunnel we peer into a series of dank bedrooms and recreation rooms, a now empty library and a meeting room distinguished by a bust of Lenin and a portrait of Che Guevara presented by visiting Cubans. Of more practical use is a large iron oxygen filter donated by the Soviets and placed in a sealed room. On the wall of the nearby cabinet room, history is frozen in time as a map reveals a plot to attack the now infamous Long Chen air base – an American installation once so secret the CIA deceived the US Senate for years about its existence.

“As a child I lived in a cave with over ten families,” Win explains. “Everyday we could hear the airplanes and bombs. When they came my mother would make me sit at the back of the cave.” From the front of the caves soldiers would take aim at streams of US fighter planes that would fly over Vieng Xai on a daily bases, turning to dust the villages and towns of northeast Laos. “Anyone who was out in the fields when the Americans flew over was a target. My uncle died in his rice field. An American dropped the bomb on him. After that my father would only work the fields at night.”

From 1964 onwards the US military ratcheted up the attacks to an intensity never known before and as the US public became fixated on the war in Vietnam the pummeling of Laos went on almost unnoticed. Unnoticed because the CIA imposed a ban on reporting an illegal war that targeted a neutral country, thereby contravening the terms of the Geneva Convention. To borrow an infamous quote about Vietnam from US General Curtis LeMay, Laos was “bombed back to the Stone Age.”

Stepping out of the cave it’s difficult to imagine the carnage that Win grew used to. The scent of jasmine and frangipani trees has replaced the stench of cordite while the only sound today is of children playing.

Cycling through a rice field we circle three bomb craters now full of shrubbery and wild flowers. “This is the Hospital Cave,” Wit explains as he pushes open the thick steel doors, “where my father died.” Inside are the shattered remains of a 100 meter long ward with blue washed walls. With only a gas lamp we step cautiously into the ward. The smell is rancid and all that remains are a few broken beds once tended by Cuban doctors and under foot a sea of crunched glass; broken vials of medicine and things I try not to focus on. “You are lucky,” Win explains as we leave, “usually we don’t take tourists into there, too many ghosts.”

The following morning I share a few cups of thick black Laos coffee with Win. “Changes are coming to Laos” he says with an air of optimism. “There are more tourists and the Chinese pay for everything – new roads and shopping centers.” When I suggest that means they’re colonizing the country he replies, “That’s okay, Laos can’t move forward on its own, too much corruption.” There’s a few caves left to visit so we drink up and cycle off to the cave of the Red Prince, as Wit mysteriously phrases it.

One of the tragedies of the war was the pitting of Laos factions against one another. The Hmong hilltribe people were armed and trained by the US to fight the Pathet Laos. Tens of thousands were killed and still face persecution today. Prince Souphanouvong, known as the Red Prince, turned his back on his own family and a system he believed to be a puppet regime for imperialist powers to join the Pathet Laos leaders in the caves of Vieng Xai.

An elderly woman scales the outside of the cave to pick wild berries as we climb the steep steps to the caves entrance. The generator is down so again it’s by the light of a hissing gas lamp that we enter into the cave. “The Red Prince lives here,” Wit whispers. Lives or lived I wonder as I keep my eyes peeled for ghosts. The cavern had been divided into wooden partitions creating bedrooms for the Princes ten children. Born into the lower echelons of the royal family and destined to play a secondary role to his intellectually inferior brothers the Prince fell in love with an innkeepers daughter from Vietnam and committed himself to the communist cause. “The Red Prince, he was murdered after the war; no one can speak about it.” Wit explains, adding fuel to my curiosity but refusing to comment further despite being bombarded with questions. When a rat the size of a cat emerges from under the princes bed Wit jumps out of his skin and tells me it’s time to go. “Reincarnation,” I suggest to a grimace.

When the war ended the Pathet Laos leaders built houses in front of their caves and many remained in Vieng Xai. It’s not difficult to see why. The landscape is stunning and the houses are adorned with wild flowers, fruit trees and fish ponds born from bomb craters and known today as peace ponds. Heaven might look like this region northern Laos and in the eyes of a tourist it may be just that. But look a little closer and the legacy of the nine year secret war and the failings of communism are everywhere to be seen. The average wage is around 1 US$ a day. The markets are threadbare and you need never look far to see limbless mine victims wheeling their way through the streets with a tin in their hand. Not just war veterans but young people also. Thirty years on the landscape remains littered with UXO. The mine clearing foundation Minetech International estimate every month at least one person in most of Laos 17 provinces will lose their life to US UXO – the number could be much higher but deaths aren’t recorded in Laos. Most of the victims are farmers but many are children collecting scrap metal for village merchants.

“So many things in Laos are made from the steel of bombs,” Wit explains. Cluster bomb casings can be transformed into attractive pot plants if turned on their side. Stood upright they can be used as fence posts or pillars for rice barns. Scrap aluminum is often melted down and fashioned into items of everyday use such as cooking pots and spoons. “I even know people who used the aluminum from exploded bombs to build false legs,” Wit laughs, painfully aware of the irony.

When I ask him what he thinks of the Americans now he replies, “I forgive them, it was a long time ago, but even now I think they should clear our land of the mines, after all, they put them there.”