LAOS: THE UNLOADED PISTOL

SCARCELY any country on earth is less fitted to serve as a pivotal point in the struggle against Communism than Laos, a land of blue mountains, green jungles and affably unambitious people. Roughly the size of Oregon, Laos is shaped like a pistol with the butt pressing against Red China and the barrel aimed at Cambodia. Statistics are foreign to the Laotian mind, and the population can only be guessed at; estimates range from 1,000,-ooo to 4,000,000. Though it possesses two capital cities--Luangprabang for the royal family. Vientiane for the civil government--Laos has no railroad. Except for jungle paths, navigable rivers like the 1,200-mile Mekong, and barely 500 miles of all-weather road, all travel is by plane from rutted airstrips surrounded by tree-clad hills and swamps.

Though their relaxed attitude toward sex shocks some Westerners,* most visitors agree that the pleasantest thing in Laos is the Laotian people. Laotian girls have oval faces, high cheekbones, blue-black hair, shyly flirtatious eyes, and the world's smallest waists. The men are short-statured, sturdy-legged, even-tempered and given to such amiably negative remarks as "There isn't any," "It doesn't work'' and "It can't be helped." In most years Laotians catch enough fish, grow enough rice and yams and brew enough wine to allow ample time for their festivals. The Bang Fai festival just before the monsoon features the shooting off of giant rockets and noisy fertility processions during which huge phalli are brandished at giggling female spectators.

Totally without industry, Laos has only two legal exports of any importance: 1) benzoin and 2) stick-lac, an insect product that is used as an ingredient in lacquer and varnish. But the country's main crop is opium (one-third of world production") grown on the mountaintops by Meo tribesmen who also profess to be werewolves. Laos' biggest import is U.S. dollars--for the past five years U.S. aid has run from $43 million to $54 million a year.

Out of the Pumpkin. Laotians believe their race sprang from a supernatural pumpkin that an envoy of the King of Heaven split open with a red-hot poker. The first people to tumble out were the aboriginal Kha. a little darkened by the searing heat. After them came the cooler and lighter-skinned Laotians. Anthropologists take a duller view, and say that the Laotians are simply a branch of the great Tibeto-Burman race that swept into southeast Asia over six centuries ago and conquered the local Malay tribes.

But half the population of Laos is thought to be made up of non-Laotian tribesmen--the Meo, Kha. Lu, P'hunoi and a dozen others like the Black Thai, White Thai and Red Thai, who take their names from the color of their clothing. Few of the tribesmen have much love for the Laotians who rule in Vientiane; some do not even know that the Kingdom of Laos exists.

Elephants & Parasol. Historically, Laos was never a strong power. When not invaded by their neighbors, the Laotians wrangled among themselves, divided and subdivided their country into tiny principalities. A great hero, Fa Ngoum, united Laos in the 14th century under the name of the Land of the Million Elephants and the White Parasol. But when France made it a protectorate in 1893, Laos was again a patchwork of small states.

Fifty years of uneventful French rule were followed by Japanese occupation during World War II and a brief resistance to the French return. During the seven-year Indo-Chinese War between the French and the Communist Viet Minh, however, most Laotian rebels stayed prudently in exile, returning only to take over the government when Laos was granted autonomy in 1949.

Under the terms of the 1954 Geneva agreement. France was allowed to main tain 5,000 troops in Laos, was entrusted with the training of the Royal Laotian Army. fact, the French promptly cut their Laotian garrison to fewer than a thousand men, showed so little interest in their training mission that many of the Laotian army's 25,000 men are still incompetent to handle anything heav ier than a submachine gun.

"For Our Sins." All Laotians are careful to propitiate the phis (malignant and mystic spirits of the earth and sky) and nagas (dragon spirits who inhabit rivers), but the prevalent Lao tian faith is Buddhism, with its strong emphasis on harming no living creature. Some medical men attribute the lack of aggressiveness among Laotians to disease rather than Buddhism or innate gentleness. Malaria, yaws, gonorrhea and kwashiorkor (an often fatal protein deficiency) are common; an estimated 50% of Laotian children die in childbirth or infancy. But to all disasters of body or soul, pious Laotians murmur in the words of one of their poets: "For our sins committed in an other world we are in these days suffer ing grievous punishment."

*In his Little World of Laos, Oden Meeker tells of a 17th century Dutch visitor who complained that he could not stroll at night in Laos because of the "horrible fornications" all around. Things have changed very little.

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