war between China and Vietnam has momentarily diverted our attention from the pitiful plight of the refugees of our own indo-china War the war we lost our secret army is the story of a remarkable and little known group of those refugees the veterans of our so-called secret war in Laos for 15 years the US fought a secret war against the Communist petl and the North Vietnamese not with American troops but with Native Le oceans instead t of thousands of them Mong tribesmen we used to call them the males but they don't like that name to them it sounds like G or slope Mong means free men they say and though some few of the Mong fought on the side of the Communists the great majority fought for us under the direction of and on the payroll of the CIA when we lost the war the North Vietnamese took La under their control and ever since the Mong the soldiers and their families have been fleeing to the only Haven they can find to Northeast Thailand across the Mong River but thousands of them hope desperately that Thailand is but a way station for them on the road to the land of their old Ally the United States Twilight on the Mong river near Nong Kai in Northeast Thailand and across the Mong communist lais effectively ruled by Vietnam at this moment just beyond those river banks there are scores war of Le oans men women and children planning their escape planning to slip into that River tonight aboard logs or makeshift rafts or even with lengths of bamboo underneath their arms like water wings to make their break to Freedom either tonight or tomorrow night or the next they've been coming across the Mong at the rate of 4,000 a month and a thousand of those each month are the mall in fact that very night 50 Mi up River a group of 100 70 among refugees came across the meong we found them by Chance the next day men women and children camped in front of the local police station many our companion and guide was Edgar pop bule an old Le ocean hand who worked with a M for the US government how long had they been walking before they came across the Mong sa Sal 20 days 20 days walking why did they come the leader of the group told us they had been driven from their Villages by Vietnamese and pathet laau troops their crops destroyed their homes burned and they said they had also been hit from the air by a strange chemical either powder or gas airplanes did drop gas on your Villages many of them had felt dizziness sore eyes and throats nausea and diarrhea and worse did anybody die as a result of that take six of them had been killed and they said there were 400 more from their Villages waiting at that moment on the other side of the river for a chance to cross the ti police Detention Center at Nong Kai where we met hundreds morong who had in recent days crossed the meom this group started out with 93 people only 26 of them made it to Thailand many of the refugees said They too had seen tribesmen killed by chemicals dropped from the air look like it's more raining look like raining looks like rain coming down yes was anybody hurt did anybody get dizzy or vomit or die 20 people dead by the gas 20 people killed by the gas pop bu is a widower who left his farm in Indiana to go to Laos for the US aid program an adjunct there of the cia's secret War these pictures were filmed by CBS News there 9 years ago today pople says we have betrayed them all they became refugees because we was encouraged them to fight for us I promised to myself have no fear we will take care of you and taking care of you is not in a refugee C we promise the United States government you as a representative of the United States government promised the people the males we will take care of abely you fight for us we'll pay you if we win fine if we lose we'll take care of you absolutely right I think they still have that faith in us who are these people the Mong and what debt if any does the United States owe them M tribesmen meeting recently at a refugee camp in Thailand just a few years ago many of these same men were officers in the secret army they were Valiant resilient Dependable fighters on the side of the United States in the indo-china war under terms of the Geneva agreement of 1962 all foreign powers agreed to pull their troops and Military advisors out of LA but both sides ignored that agreement and President Kennedy ordered the CIA to recruit the Mong the CIA would provide arms training salaries M General vanga would provide the troops and of course the casualties tens of thousands of Mong took up arms men women even children some of them as young as 10 we use these men to fight for us American soldiers didn't fight because these fellas were fighting in their place every one of them that died that was an American back home that didn't die or one that was injured or wasn't injured somebody in nearly every family was either fighting or died fighting at the height of the secret War the CIA base at long Chen reportedly had one of the busiest airports in the world Mong Lao and and CIA Pilots flew thousands of dangerous rescue and ground support missions half the M Pilots were killed in action M soldiers ran spy missions deep inside enemy territory even entering China to tap telephone lines there for the CIA CIA personnel and pop bule told us they were ordered to keep the Mong in combat even though Americans on the spot realized it was a lost card we kept these guys fighting for us that's right even even after you and a lot of others thought it was pointless that's right by the time the US finally pulled out in 1975 theong had been decimated out of their total population in Laos of no more than 350,000 10,000 had been killed tens of thousands more wounded their casualty rate was 100 times higher than that of the United States in Vietnam but though the indo-china war has ended for us for them it still continues State Department Officer Lionel rosenblat directs the American Refugee effort in Thailand I asked him why the Ferocious communist attacks on the Mong even as they leave why kill them on the way out we can only theorize that there is a real fear on the part of the authorities in Laos and the North Vietnamese that theong will come back to fight another day they have a distinguished record of fighting there is a long history of animosity as between the and the Vietnamese is there any is there any Revenge involved because they work for CIA because they work for the United States government I would assume there's a great deal of of that that having worked for almost 15 years for the United States that these people are still seen very much as our accessories what happened during the war in Laos was that the North Vietnamese were stalled very effectively by the Mong and that war is now continuing the full strength of the North Vietnamese Army is uh being brought to bear against the m in their Village areas in W you get more of an idea of how rugged has been the mong's escape from La at the hospital in the United Nations refugee camp at Nong Kai Levy Rock a Philippine doctor who works for the International Rescue committee told us what a toll the Escape had taken on his patients ponia and malnutrition case and this is a case of malnutrition also with pneumonia and this is pneumonia also and that patient is suffering from s malnutrition dent and pneumonia can see Skin and [Music] Bones the doctor told us about this woman Widow of a man who had fought on the secret army for more than a decade she was coming across the river with five of her children four of them were shot and killed she was shot in the leg and her remaining son escaped with a bullet wound in the the back you get many gunshot wounds here in the hospital people who are shot at as they leave L yes [Music] many this is a case of uh three diagnosis acute gastroenteritis pneumonia and mother and she's the mother yes she the mother she she and her family came across the river yes when they cross the river or swim the water is really very cold it is cold yeah so that's one of the uh main one of the main factors also that cause pneumonia also and you know without food you know escaping you know walking so many weeks without food [Music] also hey Mom [Music] [Music] this there is no chance for this patient because the patient cannot urinate anymore anymore 2 hours later this child died yet another refugee camp in Northeast Thailand and another kind of treatment a shaman a witch doctor tries to exercise the evil spirits from the baby's body but the mother is also having her child treated by the Camp's doctor like her most of the Mong find themselves trapped between two worlds the old and the new most of them realize they will never go back to their traditional life in the highlands of Laos they realize that Thailand cannot absorb the huge numbers of refugees Vietnamese Cambodian and leosan now en camps there the Hong want to begin a new life about 8,000 of them have gone to the United States 50,000 are in Thailand in the camps perhaps 20,000 more will make it across the Mong not all want to leave southeast Asia but they do want out of the teaming refugee camps where thousands of them have languished for more than 3 years our problem in US program terms is this we don't have enough numbers to accommodate those who served with us in La both Lao and Ma we're way behind we have a backlog of 20,000 at the moment except for our own the French is the only other government responding to this at all on a proportional basis the French are taking more refugees from Thailand than we are because the number of refugee openings in the United States is so limited us officials have set up a series of priorities first come refugees with immediate family already in the US next people who work directly for the US government the salaries of the men who served in the secret army were in effect paid by the US by the CIA but because the money was funneled through M General vananga those soldiers are labeled as indirect employers of the US and so their cases are given much lower priority as I understand just these three fellas who came over within the last week or 10 days who were gassed on the way out who saw some of their friends die on the way out who fought for vong paow who fought as US soldiers who fought in that so-called secret war in LA and who were promised that we would take care of them their chances of coming to the United States the next year or two or three the way things go right now are minimal I would say their chances are uncertain at best John Tucker us Aid officer now John Tucker this man arrived here he was he was wounded he lost his leg back in 1961 what are his chances of getting to the states he doesn't have a good chance at all under the present program why because so many more highly qualified people in the camps that we can't even touch because the quota numbers are so few we can't use you no more goodbye we're finished with you Dawn in the refugee camp at Lou a special Dawn for 165 Mong boarding buses that will take take them to Bangkok in a few days they will be in America starting new lives in 17 different states those who saw the Mong fight and Die in LA say they are stoic that they rarely cry or admit pain but this morning at Lo it is something different almost all are leaving some family behind cousins fathers grandparents and there is no way of knowing if they will ever see them again what about the Mong who have made it to America how have they fared from most reports they have done well Mike Carroll Works in Thailand for World Vision a volunteer agency he had just returned to L from a trip home to Illinois where he visited 360 M immigrants in six different communities how are they doing well I think they have adapted the best of all the refugees because they expect the least and they appreciate the opportunity to be an America the most but they look so much more primitive let's say than some of the Vietnamese some of these people look really as though they belong to another age well I think these are people that belong to every age and the mo that I saw and all the refugees I saw 95 98% are working they're ready to take minimum wage jobs that Native Americans are refusing now and that that employers find very difficult to fill we are a country of refugees and this is just the newest group to come and uh we've all been refugees at some point or [Music] another it is barely possible that no more of these buses will run after April 30th because the whole us Refugee program is scheduled to run out then leaving refugees in camps scattered throughout southeast Asia but almost no one doubts that Washington will renew the program what the Americans on the scene here want both US Government personnel and the International Rescue committee people alike what they want is an expanded program they say we still owe these refugees a debt the men who fought for us and their families who suffered and they believe that America's conscience cannot be clear until these camps are cleared of refugees and these people have a new beginning some of them settled in other countries of the world but most of them in the country whose War it was the United States [Music] [Music]