who are the hmong people why was the vietnam war called the secret war

In 1975, the United States withdrew its forces from Vietnam. Thus, the Hmong became known as “the Secret Army” and their participation in the war was called “the Secret War”. Most experts agree that more than 25,000 Hmong lost their lives fighting for the United States during the Vietnam War.ĭue to intense political pressures at home, the United States had vowed not to escalate the war into Laos. The Hmong suffered devastating losses estimated at more than 100 time greater (proportionately) than the United States. In the 1960s, the CIA began secretly enlisting Hmong to prevent North Vietnamese troops from entering and moving supplies to South Vietnam through Laos. They were chosen by the CIA because of the geographically strategic location in the mountains of Laos.

The word Hmong mean “free people” or “mountain people”. Being culturally similar to the Chinese, Hmong origins can be tracked back to China, where they lived peacefully hundreds of years. According to Daphne Winland, the Hmong belong to the Sino-Tibetan language family. The “secret war” refers to the thousands of Hmong who were recruited by the U.S military through the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to help fight the war against Communism in Southeast Asia. While we are told about the Vietnam war in school, we never learn of the “secret war” fought on behalf of the United States during this time. I heard about the “secret war” of Vietnam for the first time the other day in class when we talked about the Hmong. “The Americans gave us weapons and told us to shoot the enemy, then they left us and we’ve been slowly dying here ever since…When the Lao Army kills one of our men, they feel as though they’ve killed an American in revenge for us helping them during the war.’”

Who are the hmong people why was the vietnam war called the secret war