Operation Snake Eyes
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Operation Snake Eyes was a proposed military operation of the
Laotian Civil War The Laotian Civil War (1959–1975) was a civil war in Laos which was waged between the Communist Pathet Lao and the Royal Lao Government from 23 May 1959 to 2 December 1975. It is associated with the Cambodian Civil War and the Vietnam War ...
. Planned in mid-December 1969 by the U.S. Ambassador to Laos, the planned
interdiction Interdiction is a military term for the act of delaying, disrupting, or destroying enemy forces or supplies en route to the battle area. A distinction is often made between strategic and tactical interdiction. The former refers to operations whose e ...
of the newly constructed
Chinese Road The Chinese Road (or The Chinese Roads) were a series of highways built as a foreign aid project by the People's Republic of China (PRC) in northern Laos, beginning in 1962. The first new road was built from Mengla, Yunnan Province, PRC to Phongs ...
, Route 46, was aimed at halting the road's progress toward the border with Thailand. The offensive by guerrilla raiders was delayed six months for operational reasons. When it was finally ready to be launched, it was pre-empted by the furor caused by the Cambodian Incursion. Fearful that Operation Snake Eyes would arouse even greater publicity, the
Central Intelligence Agency The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gathering, processing, ...
handlers of the guerrillas canceled the operation on orders of the White House. Attempts to limit Chinese expansion toward the south would be left to future operations, such as Operation Phalat and Operation Sourisak Montry.


Overview

The
Kingdom of Laos The Kingdom of Laos was a landlocked country in Southeast Asia at the heart of the Indochinese Peninsula. It was bordered by Burma and China to the northwest, North Vietnam to the east, Cambodia to the southeast, and Thailand to the west and ...
was freed by the French at the end of the First Indochina War. From its inception, Laos was troubled by a communist insurrection. The United States stepped in to provide foreign aid to Laos, to aid in quelling the uprising. In March 1961, the Geneva Conference of 1954 reconvened with wider participation to reconsider the neutralization of the
Kingdom of Laos The Kingdom of Laos was a landlocked country in Southeast Asia at the heart of the Indochinese Peninsula. It was bordered by Burma and China to the northwest, North Vietnam to the east, Cambodia to the southeast, and Thailand to the west and ...
. Since the 1954 Agreement was signed, a
Pathet Lao The Pathet Lao ( lo, ປະເທດລາວ, translit=Pa thēt Lāo, translation=Lao Nation), officially the Lao People's Liberation Army, was a communist political movement and organization in Laos, formed in the mid-20th century. The gro ...
insurgency had burgeoned, threatening the national sovereignty. This would eventually result in an attempt to settle the
Laotian Civil War The Laotian Civil War (1959–1975) was a civil war in Laos which was waged between the Communist Pathet Lao and the Royal Lao Government from 23 May 1959 to 2 December 1975. It is associated with the Cambodian Civil War and the Vietnam War ...
, the
International Agreement on the Neutrality of Laos The International Agreement on the Neutrality of Laos is an international agreement signed in Geneva on July 23, 1962 between 14 states, including Laos, as a result of the International Conference on the Settlement of the Laotian Question, which la ...
signed on 23 July 1962. Prime Minister Souvanna Phouma curried favor with the
People's Republic of China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
by striking a road construction deal with them in January 1962. The Chinese government committed to building a network of roads connecting Yunnan Province with northern Laos despite the developing
Laotian Civil War The Laotian Civil War (1959–1975) was a civil war in Laos which was waged between the Communist Pathet Lao and the Royal Lao Government from 23 May 1959 to 2 December 1975. It is associated with the Cambodian Civil War and the Vietnam War ...
.Stuart-Fox, p. 56.Conboy, Morrison, p. 313. At the time the agreement was announced, the Battle of Luang Namtha was being fought on the Lao/Chinese border to spark the
Laotian Civil War The Laotian Civil War (1959–1975) was a civil war in Laos which was waged between the Communist Pathet Lao and the Royal Lao Government from 23 May 1959 to 2 December 1975. It is associated with the Cambodian Civil War and the Vietnam War ...
.


Background

The Chinese originally built a road across northern Phongsali Province in 1962 and 1963 as a foreign aid project. They then began an entirely new road construction project in early 1966, extending south from Yunnan Province past Luang Namtha, down the Pakbeng Valley. As Route 46, the new road gathered ever more attention the further south it progressed. The
Royal Thai Government The Government of Thailand, or formally the Royal Thai Government ( Abrv: RTG; th, รัฐบาลไทย, , ), is the unitary government of the Kingdom of Thailand. The country emerged as a modern nation state after the foundation of t ...
worried it might be extended across trackless northwestern Laos to the Thai border. The presence of 25,000 Chinese troops and 400 antiaircraft guns along the new road raised anxiety not only in the Thai and Lao governments, but also in Washington. The American government had a vested interest in Thailand; the Kingdom was a major American supporter in the ongoing Vietnam War.


Operation

In mid-December 1969, U.S. Ambassador
G. McMurtrie Godley George McMurtrie Godley (1917–1999) was an American diplomat who served as United States Ambassador to Laos 1969-1973, at the height of the Vietnam War. President Richard Nixon nominated Godley as Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and P ...
had suggested that the
Central Intelligence Agency The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gathering, processing, ...
's guerrilla forces might block Route 46. Three guerrillas platoons from Nam Yu were infiltrated 50 kilometers south of Luang Namtha to spy on the road construction; they were dubbed Teams 37A, 37B, and 37C. Even though Godley was in charge of all U.S. military and
paramilitary A paramilitary is an organization whose structure, tactics, training, subculture, and (often) function are similar to those of a professional military, but is not part of a country's official or legitimate armed forces. Paramilitary units carr ...
activity in the Secret War, his aggressive suggestion was rejected in Washington. He countered with a plan to scale the suggested Operation Snake Eyes back to a passive road watch program spying on Chinese activities. His argument for the operation was that if the U.S. did not take action to support its allies in the war, they might act unilaterally. In January 1970, as the road watch proposal was being bruited about in Washington, two Thai mercenary pilots of the
Royal Lao Air Force The Royal Lao Air Force (french: Aviation Royale Laotiènne – AVRL), best known to the Americans by its English acronym RLAF, was the air force component of the Royal Lao Armed Forces (FAR), the official military of the Royal Lao Government and ...
bombed a Chinese convoy on Route 46, destroying 15 trucks.Conboy, Morrison, pp. 315–316. A week later, in response to the Thai bombing, the original Snake Eyes proposal to block Route 46 was approved, but with one proviso: Laotian Prime Minister Souvanna Phouma would have to cease waffling and publicly oppose the road construction to give justification for the attack.Conboy, Morrison, p. 315. As events turned out, Operation Snake Eyes was put on hold for six months so that it would begin in the rainy season against a skeleton crew of Chinese workers. It would be supported by the Royal Thai Air Force. CIA-sponsored hill tribes road watch teams augmented by
Chinese Nationalist Chinese nationalism () is a form of nationalism in the People's Republic of China (Mainland China) and the Republic of China on Taiwan which asserts that the Chinese people are a nation and promotes the cultural and national unity of all Chin ...
s from nearby Burma would spy on the builders in the meantime. In the meantime, a
company A company, abbreviated as co., is a Legal personality, legal entity representing an association of people, whether Natural person, natural, Legal person, legal or a mixture of both, with a specific objective. Company members share a common p ...
of
Commando Raiders The Commando Raiders or Commando Raider Teams (CRTs) were a Laotian elite paramilitary Special Operations and pathfinder force, which operated closely with the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) during the final phase of the Laotian Civil War ...
was recruited in
Luang Prabang Luang Phabang, ( Lao: ຫລວງພະບາງ/ ຫຼວງພະບາງ) or ''Louangphabang'' (pronounced ), commonly transliterated into Western languages from the pre-1975 Lao spelling ຫຼວງພຣະບາງ (ຣ = silent r) ...
and trained to monitor the road. They took up road watch duties in June 1970.Conboy, Morrison, pp. 314–315. When the time rolled around to stage Operation Snake Eyes, two separate guerrilla units were poised for a pincer movement. The Nam Yu contingent already had the three teams in place, and would push southeast to join them. A second unit would move west from the direction of Luang Prabang, under the command of Captain Xieng Manh Noy Sirisouk. When Operation Snake Eyes was again scheduled, the Cambodian Incursion intervened. There was such public furor over that invasion that the White House decided not to risk further publicity by staging Snake Eyes. After all this hesitation, Sirisouk was primed for combat. He was disgusted with the latest postponement order, angry at his CIA advisor, and refused to return the unit's weapons to the adviser. He marched his troops on the royal capital of Luang Prabang, then veered off short to cross the Mekong River and encamp them on an obscure mountaintop. Operation Snake Eyes ended when Captain Sirisouk quit the Laotian Civil War because of the White House order.


Aftermath

The failure to launch Operation Snake Eyes to check Route 46's extension south led to the later necessity for operations to defend the Thai border, such as Operation Phalat and Operation Sourisak Montry.Conboy, Morrison, pp. 318–319.


Notes


References

* Castle, Timothy N. (1993). ''At War in the Shadow of Vietnam: U.S. Military Aid to the Royal Lao Government 1955–1975''. Columbia University Press. . * Conboy, Kenneth and James Morrison (1995). ''Shadow War: The CIA's Secret War in Laos''. Paladin Press. {{ISBN, 0-87364-825-0. * Stuart-Fox, Martin (2008) ''Historical Dictionary of Laos''. Scarecrow Press. ISBNs 0810864118, 978-0-81086-411-5. Snake 1969 in Laos