How Legacies of War Turns Survivor Memory into Policy 

Allie Hansen is the Security Assistance Monitor, Arms Trade, and Technology Research Fellow at CIP and an Advocacy Ambassador with Legacies of War.

For over nine years, the United States waged a bloody ‘Secret War’ in the country of Laos, alongside the more overt Vietnam War in Southeast Asia. The U.S. dropped at least 2.5 million tons of explosives on the people of Laos from 1964 to 1973, a quantity comparable to the entire amount used in both European and the Pacific theaters of World War II combined. Laos, a country the size of Utah, was attacked by the equivalent of a planeload of bombs once every eight minutes, 24 hours a day, for nearly a decade. An estimated one million people were displaced, wounded, or killed – almost one out of every two people living in Laos. While the people responsible for the bombing are dead, those in Laos during the Secret War and their descendants continue to pass down and share stories of their survival from the horrors visited upon them.

“What we do in Laos has thus as its aim to bring about conditions for progress toward peace in the entire Indo-Chinese Peninsula,” President Richard Nixon said in a 1970 statement. “We are also supporting the independence and neutrality of Laos.”

American leaders from the President on down justified the Secret War in Laos by claiming to only target North Vietnamese troops and an allied group in Laos called the Pathet Lao. In that 1970 statement, President Nixon described American military action in Laos as “limited” and “defensive,” and dismissed rumors of American war crimes in Laos as “grossly inaccurate.” By the time the Secret War in Laos started, it was known to the administration that groups such as the Pathet Lao used guerilla war tactics, dispersed and under the protection of the forest. Civilian villages were the only visible targets for American pilots in the sky.

In contrast to the reality for people in Laos, Nixon’s public statements are duplicitous at best. His calculated tone and hollow support for Laos independence obscured any objective truth about the United States’ bombing campaign.

This dehumanizing language is common in American foreign policy. Degrading and equating a group of people with an inflated boogeyman to justify violence has been used to rationalize the War on Terror, the recent strikes in the Caribbean, and U.S. support of Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Harmful foreign policy decisions are made at both a physical and a narrative distance from those most impacted. To reverse this trend we must intentionally reintegrate memory like that of the survivors of the Secret War in Laos into our policymaking process. Survivor memory not only deserves to be shared but is also a rigorous source of data that can both correct history and prevent those in power from repeating it. It must be treated as such when crafting foreign policy. 

Seeing Laos Beyond the Bombsight Reticle 

Fred Branfman was the first American to document the atrocities that people in Laos lived through during the Secret War. Branfman and his Laotian partner Bouangeun Luangpraseuth talked to thousands of refugees in Vientiane, the capital of Laos, who had been forced from their homes in a heavily-bombed region of Laos known as the Plain of Jars. They collected a series of drawings and testimonials from the survivors of the Secret War, depicting life under constant shelling from American warplanes, and compiled them in the book Voices from the Plain of Jars.

The United States had intentionally kept its assault on civilians in Laos secret, fearful that knowledge of the war would further hinder public support for its military actions in Southeast Asia. Critically, television coverage of atrocities like the My Lai massacre in Laos’ neighbor, Viet Nam, allowing the American public to witness the war’s human costs, is credited with decreasing voters’ support for U.S. involvement. Because of this, the drawings were some of the only media from Laos collected and shown to the American public. When Branfman returned to the United States, he publicly shared the refugees’ stories in a congressional hearing in 1971. 

The more we spend time with the refugees’ drawings and testimonies, the more we can see ourselves and our loved ones in them.

Without directly facing the human horrors inflicted on the people of Laos, policymakers at home and Americans deployed in Southeast Asia were able to detach from the atrocities they were committing. The United States’ military interventions in Southeast Asia were the first time a majority of damage was inflicted by artillery in the sky instead of troops on the ground, further accelerating this disconnection. 

“[T]ens of thousands of innocents who were killed or wounded were not even regarded as human beings, their lives worth no more than those of chickens, pigs, or water buffalo,” wrote Branfman in Voices. 

Branfman found the contrast between the harrowing memories of people in Laos and the disassociation of the American bombers he encountered particularly appalling . 

“I remembered how gentle Thao Vong, the thirty-eight-year-old rice farmer who had been blinded in an air raid, had described the horror his life had become. It was chilling to hear how cold and bloodlessly [American] pilots described their role in ruining his life,” recounted Branfman. One pilot told him “‘I’m as liberal, as much for peace as anyone else. But war is not a pretty thing. In a guerrilla war, the civilians are going to pay a price.’” 

Despite Branfman having shared the refugees stories with Congress in 1971, the United States did not openly recognize its involvement in the Secret War in Laos until over two decades later. In 2016, President Barack Obama traveled to Laos and acknowledged the civilian cost of the American Secret War in Laos for the first time 52 years after it was first waged.

The conclusion of the American Secret War in Laos was not the end of the horrors for the people of Laos. Of the at least 2.5 million tons of explosives dropped, around 30% failed to detonate, leaving millions of pieces of explosive ordnance (UXO) polluting the agricultural land that people in Laos rely on to provide for their families. Since the end of the Secret War, at least 25,000 people have been injured or killed from explosive ordnance in Laos. Today, Laos is still the most UXO-contaminated country in the world, and only an estimated 10% of previously contaminated land has been cleared for safe use.

In 2003, Channapha Khamvongsa, a Lao-American activist, rediscovered the original drawings collected by Fred Branfmann decades before after fortuitously meeting one of his colleagues in Washington, D.C. Recognizing that the drawings still had an important story to tell, she used them as inspiration to found Legacies of War, an organization that advocates for demining efforts in Southeast Asia. In 2010, Kahmvongsa spoke at the House of Representatives Subcommittee on Asia, the Pacific, and the Global Environment– the first hearing focusing on UXO in Laos with a Lao-American giving testimony. Fueled by the stories from the refugees and guided by the leadership of Khamvongsa, Legacies of War ushered millions of dollars of congressional funding for demining in Laos in just two decades. From 2004 to 2023, U.S. funding for demining in Laos increased from $1.4 million to $36 million. A total of almost $80 million was allocated for demining efforts across Southeast Asia in 2023. Legacies of War leadership was passed on to Sera Koulabdara in 2019, and she now chairs the U.S. Campaign to Ban Landmines and Cluster Munitions coalition and oversees a Demining/UXO caucus that educates the staff of 74 congressional offices. Channapha, Sera, and Legacies of War are a testament to the material impact of survivor memory on policy.

Human Rights: A Legal Framework Built on Survivor Memory

Legacies of War’s story is not the only of its kind. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), the first legal framework that defines the enshrined right of all people to life and freedom, was signed 77 years ago today, on December 10th, 1948. The UDHR has roots in stories not unlike those told by survivors of the American Secret War in Laos. It came on the heels of the the Holocaust, where the world bore witness to genocide as Jewish communities were designated as sub-human. Testimonies such as The Diary of a Young Girl by 13-year-old Anne Frank, published a year before the signing of the UDHR, painted a personal and vivid picture of the humanity that was robbed from Jewish people in Nazi-occupied Europe. Many Americans grow up rightfully learning about the Holocaust. Its stories are often paired with the phrase “Never Again,” using the power of survivor memory to motivate young people to stand up and speak out against antisemitism. 

The opening statement of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights simply states the foundation of the legal system that defines what we now call human rights. From its roots in Holocaust memory, a more radical, universal idea blossomed:

“All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.” 

In November, former Obama speechwriter Sarah Hurwitz remarked that Holocaust education for Jewish Americans has “backfired” as many young Jewish Americans universalize its teachings to speak out against Israel’s genocide in Gaza. 

In Israeli-occupied Palestine, social media has allowed Palestinians to share their stories of living through a genocide directly with the world. Like the stories and drawings shared by the refugees in Laos, they bring to life what many Americans only know about through a filter of disinformation. Hurwitz referred to this Palestinian content as a “wall of carnage” that prevents Jewish Americans from being persuaded by “facts and arguments” in support of Israel. In the same vein that Hurwitz advocates for survivor memory through Holocaust education, she blatantly asserts that the memory of Palestinians be stifled. Much like the memories of Holocaust survivors, the voices of Palestinians are the most accurate, rigorous source of information available. Anyone who has listened will know that members of the U.S. political class like Hurwitz have it twisted: human rights are not a privilege saved for a select few.

Today marks 77 years since the UDHR was created. Even so, American leaders are increasingly removed from the terror they inflict on people abroad. In November, the United States was one of just five states at the United Nations to vote down legislation emphasizing the dangers of autonomous weapons systems, machines designed to target and kill people with no human intervention. 

The framework of human rights offers us a chance to break out of the accelerating dehumanization of war and expand our definition of survivor memory to include victims of American imperialism and intervention. The notion of human rights would not exist without the testimonies of survivors. 

In commemoration of the UDHR and in recognition of our own part in dispossessing the rights of people abroad, the United States must take steps to expand the role of survivor memory into its policymaking process.

Institutionalizing Survivor Memory

Policy players who are serious about reversing the harmful escalation of violence in American foreign policy must take steps to integrate the expertise of survivors into the center of their work. There are a variety of policy recommendations that can be implemented by members of congress and their staff on Capitol Hill, leaders of think tanks and coalitions, and journalists that are serious about using survivor memory to slow the destructive tailspin of American foreign policy.

• • Members of the House and Senate should join caucuses led by survivors of American imperialism. 

Joining caucuses such as the Legacies of War-led UXO/Demining Caucus are the most immediate way representatives and their staff can demonstrate their commitment to learning from the expertise of survivors. While any congressperson can join foreign policy caucuses, it is particularly important that members of foreign policy committees on the hill are in all of the relevant caucuses led by survivors of American war abroad.

• • Intentional staffing and witness testimony can promote survivor memory on the Hill.

When foreign policy committees such as the Armed Services Committee and the House Foreign Affairs Committee are gathering expert testimony for a hearing on a region, conflict, or issue area, at least one of the expert witnesses must have personal experience at the receiving end of American foreign policy in that area. In addition to this, a pre-existing research group like the Congressional Research Service should have a branch dedicated entirely to collecting and providing first-hand accounts of survivors to Congress.

Members of congress should be intentional about hiring foreign policy staffers that have personal experience in a foreign policy issue that their constituents are interested in. Meetings with diaspora leaders in home districts can help guide policy and staffing decisions. In addition to this, members of foreign policy committees in the Senate and the House should create professional pipelines and scholarship programs to support staffers with survivor expertise.

• • Survivorship should be regarded as a form of expertise in academic and foreign policy spaces.

Title is meaningful in policy spaces: it determines who gets a voice in conversations and debates. The title given to survivors of American imperialism should be no less than the leading experts. Personal experience with the effects of American war contains the full gravity and nuance that is necessary to pass legislation that matches the moment. No guest on a panel, co-author on a research paper, interviewee on a show or for a news article should be given any higher priority than that of the survivor. The expertise of survivors does not require any “scientific support” from American historians or scientists to be rigorous.

• • The collection and preservation of survivor memory of American wars and interventions abroad should be federally funded and publicly available.

The upkeep of survivor memory and story databases should be supported by public funding, insulated from congressional attacks, and made freely available. In addition to this, public high schools and universities should be encouraged to use these collections as primary sources for education and research. Legacies Library created and maintained by Legacies of War is a good example of a collection of survivor memory by a nonprofit – these initiatives should not require donations or grants to continue upkeep.

Human rights are a shared language that allows us to see the humanity in each other. They are a needle that threads through each of our lives, reminding us that threats to the rights of any human are threats to our own humanity. The families separated at the U.S.-Mexico border are our families. The children buried under the rubble in Palestine are our children. The elderly in Laos hiding in holes from the bombs dropped overhead are our grandparents. The connections that stories make are not only valuable in rhetoric: they create real policy change. 

If the public narrative always serves the people that gain power and profit from war, we can never take the first step toward a world that is reflective of the ideals of the UDHR. Looking honestly at survivor memory forces us to do the essential first step of ethical policymaking: facing the human consequences of our policy decisions, both at home and abroad. This is inherently messy and often uncomfortable, but it must be. Our humanity requires it to be.

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