(AP Photo/Brendan Smialowski, Pool)
Can the U.S. recover from its military legacy in Laos and begin competing in the country, or has China already won this economic war?
In the first visit by a U.S. Secretary of State to Laos since 1955, Hilary Clinton met with Prime Minister Thongsing Thammavong and Foreign Minister Thongloun Sisoulith to discuss a renewed U.S. effort to clean up unexploded bombs from the Vietnam War, as well as the controversial Mekong River Dam.
The U.S. military legacy in Laos is stunning:
The U.S. dropped more than 2 million tons of bombs on the impoverished country during its “secret war” between 1964 and 1973 – about a
ton of ordnance for each Laotian man, woman and child. That exceeded the amount dropped on Germany and Japan together in World War II,
making Laos the most heavily bombed nation per person in history.
Four decades later, American weapons are still claiming lives. When the war ended, about a third of some 270 million cluster bombs dropped
on Laos had failed to detonate, leaving the country awash in unexploded munitions. More than 20,000 people have been killed by ordnance
in postwar Laos, according to its government, and contamination throughout the country is a major barrier to agricultural development.
Cleanup has been excruciatingly slow. The Washington-based Legacies of War says only 1 percent of contaminated lands have been cleared
and has called on Washington to provide far greater assistance. The State Department has provided $47 million since 1997, though a larger
effort could make Laos “bomb-free in our lifetimes,” California Rep. Mike Honda argued.
While the aim of cleaning up many of the bombs that have been dropped in Laos is admirable, the U.S. may also be visiting the country to make in-roads in Indochina, and compete with China in this newly booming economic region. Chinese State Councilor Meng Jianzu recently met with Lao President Chummaly Saynhasone, and a discussion was held around deepening joint policing and economic ties. China has given significant aid and grants to Laos, in exchange for soft benefits (such as: backing for Chinese policy from everything to Taiwan to Tibet; access for Chinese companies to exploit Lao resources; and lines of communication though Laos to Thailand).
Can the U.S. recover from its military legacy in Laos and begin competing in the country, or has China already won this economic war?