Clamor Overhead

Along the jungle battlefront in Laos, not much was happening. Soldiers lounged barefoot within stockades built of sharpened bamboo stakes--thought to be protection enough in a country where the elephant charge has fallen out of fashion and the tank has not yet been introduced. But the cold-war clamor was as loud as ever. The U.S. last week gave the royal Laotian army four T-6 trainers, a lumbering plane that is nonetheless the hottest thing Laotian pilots can handle. They flew them north into the Communist-held countryside, wildly firing .30-cal. machine guns and 5-in. rockets toward any clump of trees where they thought the enemy might be hiding. Soviet commentators instantly broke into shrill cries of alarm, declared it was just like "the grim days of the 1930s, when fascist birds of prey barbarously bombed Spanish towns."

Neutralists and the nervous complained that by supplying the T-6s, the U.S. had risked "provoking" the Communists into expanding the war. Current U.S. policy is still to seek a negotiated solution. But while the international dickering goes on, the U.S. made plain its intention to help the Laotian government in its fight against the Communists. Demanded one harrassed U.S. official in Vientiane:

"What are we supposed to do--let the Russians keep pouring their guns and ammunition in? And once the Communists are ready, is the Laotian government supposed to lie down and let the Communists walk over them?"

Missing Town. Reports from the remote battlefront were hard as ever to decipher. Information Minister Bouavan Norasingh called in newsmen one day and announced that "three battalions of Russians, Pathet Lao and Viet Minh" had just invaded from North Viet Nam near the town of Ban Le. But when pressed, Information Minister Bouavan had to admit that he had no idea where Ban Le was. All that seemed to be going on for sure was a buildup by both sides around the Plaine des Jarres, the strategic central plateau captured by pro-Communist Captain Kong Le a week earlier with the help of an airlift by Russian Ilyushin 14s (TIME, Jan. 13).

Russian planes were still flying supplies to Kong Le and reportedly a few trained Viet Minh cadres as well. The Laotians still could not capture any North Vietnamese invaders, but they rounded up enough Communist-supplied arms to put on an impressive show in Vientiane for U.S. Ambassador Winthrop Brown. Some shells bore Chinese markings. But, ironically, most of the display could be identified as U.S.-made munitions, allegedly captured by the Viet Minh from the French at Dienbienphu.

Just about everybody had a plan for pacifying Laos, but none of the plans agreed. Revival of the old International Control Commission that policed Laos from 1954 to 1958 seemed the likeliest solution, and the U.S. and Britain supported the idea. The chief problem was that both India, chairman of the old commission, and Russia, the chief troublemaker, refused to recognize the U.S.-backed government of Premier Prince Boun Oum.

Middleman. A man in the middle is exiled Prince Souvanna Phouma, a supple but basically pro-Western politician who Russia loudly insists is still the "legitimate" Premier of Laos (ignoring the fact that he too was brought to power by a coup last August).

A delegation from Premier Boun Oum visited him in Cambodia last week, found him planting gladiolas on the grounds of the borrowed palace where he lives. They offered him a free choice of posts in the new government, hoping to thus put out of business the "government" the Russians claim to be supporting. Souvanna dismissed his visitors as "a pathetic bunch of clowns" and went back to his gardening. "We have been a plaything of the big powers, a doll which has been broken," he said loftily. "It is up to the big powers to mend us."

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