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Turning Swords into Ploughshares
HIBUON, Laos - On the surface, the sleepy dwellings of Hibuon, hugging the banks of the Nam Theun River, could be seen as any village in Southeast Asia. Homes on stilts rise into the air as potbelly pigs, chickens and roosters roam about as everything seems fair game for grazing. But in reality, this is not just any village.
The gentle faces of its people mask the horrors of a long forgotten war, while daily reminders seem to have become a permanent part of their lifestyle. Step down to the shoreline and you will see what I mean.
Jettisoned from the sky nearly thirty years earlier, B-52 fuel pods have taken on a new shape as one of the most unusual forms of river transportation you will likely come across. Aluminum in construction, these pods have been sliced in half by the village blacksmith and riveted at the joins. Ideal for water travel, buoyant, and as light as any canoe, their nose comes to a chiseled point, like a rocket, with fins projecting from each side. A slab of wood for a bench and you literally are riding on a water rocket.
Being whisked down river, you become aware that the land, rich with vegetation, has long grown over the scars it had endured during the bombing. Further down stream you begin to notice more and more of these "rocketboats", some tied up on the shoreline, others being used for fishing, and a couple of kids simply floating along innocently in another.
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Looking up at the serene, blue sky I can't believe what it would have been like living here during the Vietnam war. What had this region once endured.
Once home to Air America and the CIA run "secret war," Laos would gain the stigma of becoming the world’s most heavily bombed country. Bombing runs from bases originating in Northern Thailand were flown into Laos to sever the Ho Chi Minh trail and destroy communist bases in Northern Vietnam. Pilots often returning from attack runs, would jettison their payload rather than return to bases; on orders to release all ordinance.
With little natural metal resources in the country, discarded munitions have taken on a peculiar and sometimes deadly form of recycling over the decades since the war. While unexploded ordinance (UXO) poses a different threat, weapons of war have indeed been forged into practical tools. It's a testament to the ingenuity of these people who seem to have moved beyond a war that is still very much in the minds of many Americans.
For myself, I left this village a little wiser, knowing that the human spirit continues to live and dwell in all of us.
— december 1999
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