11/11 Phonsavan: UXO & Bombies

Much of the following post may be upsetting to readers because it explores a darker side of US history. It is also very much one-sided as it is told from the victims' perspective.  I know that some of the information below may be repetitive but I know not all of the blog readers take the time to read every post. Annie

Our flight to Vientiane, Laos’ capital, had been changed from early morning to late afternoon so we had extra time on our hands. We walked back to the market where we had been last night hoping to find some apples but found the market was being torn down.  

 We stopped at another UXO center and watched another heart breaking film about the devastation of UXO in Laos. My notes below include information from that film in addition to the films we'd seen 2 days earlier at the UXO Information Centre.

People live in northern Laos much as they did long ago. Laos is known as a ‘food insecure’ nation, i.e. their people lack reliable access to a sufficient quantity of  affordable, nutritious food. Here in the northern part of the country, if people don’t grow food for their families, they’ll starve. The people are so poor they can only support or feed their families by growing rice and other crops on their small areas of land. We learned that farmers here in Xieng Khuang, this second most heavily bombed province in Laos, feel they have no option but to play the odds in terms of farming their own land. They never know when or if a bomb might explode as they till the land, light a fire or send their children out to play. The psychological impact of that uncertainty is often debilitating and overwhelming, according to the film’s narrator.

It was the Mennonites and Quakers who went to Laos immediately after the war ended in 1975 that brought the attention of the millions of still live bombs remaining in the country to the world. Their goal was to help in the rehabilitation of the country but people continued to die from the bombs and so their volunteer efforts were thwarted. The Mennonites didn’t have experts to help with the mines as they are a pacifist group. 

One film talked about the ‘Bombie Awareness Curriculum’ taught in schools so that children learn what the bombies, i.e. the local term for cluster bombs, and other bombs look like and how dangerous they are. So many of the bombies were buried deep in the soil but rain often washes the soil away leaving them exposed and a magnet especially for children.

Rae McGrath who founded Mines Advisory Group (MAG), was the Co-Laureate of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1997. When MAG representatives first interviewed Laotian civilians in 1994 and discussed removing the bombies and other bombs, the civilians were amazed to consider they didn’t have to live surrounded by bombs. Hearing that gave me goosebumps and chills. 

The primary aim of MAG is to remove the remnants of war so people can resume their lives with unnecessary risk. Bombs are still being found in playgrounds, classrooms and in bamboo trees. One man talked about his finding 50 bombies just around his home and small farm. It was shocking to learn that each bombie contained 18 grams of explosive and 300 ball bearings with the ball bearings shooting out at 2,200 feet a second. 

Without the UXO cleared, building schools, new roads and providing clean water provides enormous risks. 100,000 pieces of ordnance are destroyed yearly in Laos; now 97% of the bombs are deactivated by the UN-funded UXO Laos and not aid groups. The US with 12 other countries has offered aid to Laos to destroy the bombs but, so far at least according to the film, the Lao government has rebuffed American aid because they are suspicious of American help. Again according to the film, the US has never accepted responsibility for what they did to Laos.

There were an estimated 90 million cluster bombs alone that were dropped during the ‘secret war.’ According to the film, there were over a half million bombing missions directed at Laos alone from 1964-73. The US’s initial targets were the Ho Chi Minh supply lines belonging to the Pathet Lao and the North Vietnamese who used Laos but their secondary targets were in Laos.  On 10/30/68, LBJ ordered the end of bombing of North Vietnam but the bombing of Laos increased from 300 missions to 1300 a month.

The longer it takes to remove the bombs, the longer Laos will remain in poverty. At the present rate of demolition, it will take many more decades before Lao villagers are safe from UXO.

Bombies have been called the preeminent symbol of man’s inhumanity to man. The US remains the foremost nation NOT to sign an international agreement banning the use of cluster bombs. How terribly sad to learn that they have been since been used by NATO in Kosovo, in addition to conflicts and wars in the Falklands, in Sudan, Chechnya, Kuwait and Sierra Leone. 

It was interesting to read one of the film's credits and note that the movie was made possible in part by the US Office of Weapons Abatement, an agency neither Steven nor I had heard of.

We left Phonsavan's tiny airport at 5 for the 30 minute flight to Vientiane, Laos' capital.

Posted on 11/14 while waiting in Bangkok airport for a connecting flight to Yangon, Myanmar.