SANTA BARBARA, Calif. (KEYT) – As part of Your News Channel’s coverage of this year’s Memorial Day events, we sat down with a man working to get the recognition he and those who served alongside him, earned during a clandestine mission over officially neutral Laos in October of 1969.
After achieving independence from France in 1953, landlocked Laos descended into a chaotic civil war that had international implications.
One of the first priorities of the incoming Kennedy Administration was to negotiate with the Soviet Union to officially designate Laos as a neutral nation. A marked change from the direct confrontation in the Korean War.
While the Kennedy Administration successfully negotiated just such an agreement with its Cold War adversary, unofficial military support for anti-Communist forces continued through the decade…