Lao Voices

Laos is still littered with more than 266 millions of unexploded bombs, known locally as bombies. This is the legacy of the secret war, a covert operation conducted by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Between 1964-1973 the US dropped more bombs on this tiny country, more than the total amount dropped during World War II against Germany and Japan. For ten years Laos was being bombarded with bombs, on the average of every 9 minutes, 24 hours a day.

Now, more than 30 years later the country is still trying to clean up the mess the Americans left behind. It is estimated that 30% of these bombies failed to explode. So Laos is home to about 78 millions UXO. While 400,000 of the bombies have been cleared during the past ten years, it’s only a beginning of endless task. The recovered bombies only account for 1/2 of 1 percent of what it is believed to be underneath the ground of Laos.