US thwarts plot to overthrow commies in Laos

Times:

A plot by pro-American dissidents to overthrow one of the last Asian communist dictatorships has been thwarted by a US undercover agent who posed as an arms dealer.

Prosecutors in California charged ten people with conspiring to stage a coup in Laos, in a plot that recalls an airport departure lounge spy novel.

The alleged leader of the plot is a 77-year-old former Laotian general who has dedicated his life in exile in America to removing the communist regime from his homeland.

Laos remains one of the world’s most obscure countries, a landlocked jungle where communist guerrillas and US special forces fought a “secret war” 40 years ago. But now US authorities find themselves in the ironic position of leaping to the defence of an authoritarian regime they spent 13 years, and many lives, fighting to destroy.

Chief among those arrested yesterday and Monday was General Vang Pao, 77, a senior leader-in-exile of the Hmong ethnic group, and a former protégé of the US in its covert war in Laos, which lasted from 1962 to 1975.

Members of his group are accused of fundraising to form and equip a mercenary army in violation of the Neutrality Act, which forbids Americans from plotting against countries with which the US is at peace.

...

“This investigation read like a movie script, but turned out to be reality,” said Michael Sullivan, head of the ATF, who directed the operation code-named Tarnished Eagle. “Fortunately, we were able to disrupt their activities before their plot evolved into a coup against a country with which the United States is at peace.

...

Perhaps Congress should pass a law calling for regime change in Laos. Having to continue to exist in a communist dictatorship should be considered cruel and unusual punishment. BTW, who says no dominoes fell in South East Asia when the communist defeated South Vietnam?