To start writing this essay, I chose a cozy bar/restaurant named Tango, in the city center, where I had the pleasure to be surrounded by French and Canadian journalists eating wonderful western food and drinking very expensive red wine.

They were saying incredible Orwellian stuff, plenty of nonsensical true-true they learned in their schools of newspeak journalism, and they were not at all aware of the fact that I was understanding every single word they were pronouncing.

Their gorgeous Laotian girlfriends, 20 years younger than them were sitting in a different table, silent and desperately bored. I will come back to this place, for sure, to have – why not – a conversation with some French and Canadian journalists.

But well, let’s start talking about some of the NGOs present (or not) here in Vientiane. My first visit was to the “museum” of one of them: MAG. MAG is funded by the US government, the European Union, the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the UKAID.

"It has left me with the fundamental belief that aid works."

Actor and @MAGsaveslives supporter Rosamund Pike on seeing MAG's “terrific” #UKaid-funded landmine clearance work in Lebanon.#aidworks pic.twitter.com/76L6RPxvxU

— DFID (@DFID_UK) December 11, 2018

This NGO, which is not at all an NGO (Non-Governmental Organization) because, as you can fact-check in their own website, it is funded by one foreign government, two foreign ministries, a union of 27 governments and a governmental aid fund, although yes, they work on the removal of mines and unexploded ordnances (UXO). Great, lovely!

But, in their “museum”, something very important was missing: clear and visible references about the country to blame for all this bombs and mines, as well the necessary clear and harsh critics to what the USA did here in the past and it is doing right now in Libya, Syria, Yemen, Iraq, and Afghanistan, just to mention a few.

In the whole “museum”, I only found the word “USA” shyly written in 2 posters. Zero critics, zero images of the bombings, the suffering, the killings, the occupation. Nothing, absolutely nothing. Nor references about the Thai airport used by the US to rape Laos the way they raped. 

While reading all the texts spread all over the walls, one is led to believe that the bombs had lives of their own, they could reason, they could have taken the decision to fall over the skies of Laos. Not US human beings deciding, bringing the bombs and dropping them. No, apparently the bombs did all the destruction and terror by themselves. Orwellian newspeak, to say the least.

Another disturbing aspect of this “museum” is the overwhelming omnipresence of US flags, UK flags, and EU flags. As if the sponsors of this macabre farce, fully aware of the lack of legitimate reasons to do all the horrors they did here, and fully aware of the fact that they continue to do today the very same in Yemen or Syria, felt the need to whitewash their despicable and unforgiving crimes against humanity. So they pay for this horror show of UK and US flags representing humanity humanly "helping" the poor victims of the bombs they left here.

Honestly, if the western imperial states truly wanted to help, they should simply pay compensations to the Laos people, by giving money directly to the Laotian government, so they could do the very same work, but without the western Orwellian propaganda used to whitewash their crimes and to commit another kind of genocide: the cultural genocide that started in the refugees camps at the time of the bombings, and that continues until now with the brainwash and instrumentalization western NGOs inflict upon the Laotian people.

It is utterly disgusting to read all the crap they write, and the paternalistic way they treat locals, and the wonderful cars they drive (paid by the naive donors in the West), and the western “values” they impose as if Laos was a culturally inferior nation needing to be babysitted by cultural and intellectually superior white westerners.

We have a huge problem in the West. Even aware of the fact that we the West plundered, bombed, destroyed, colonized and committed genocides all over the planet, somehow, our “culture” is superior and, therefore, we believe we have the "obligation" to teach the uncivilized “monkeys” of the rest of the planet what “humanism” is and what means to be "civilized"!

Perhaps westerners would be less monstrously "humanist" if they were to read what Boaventura de Sousa Santos says in his essay  Toward a Multicultural Conception of Human Rights.

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Anyways, with or without cultural genocide and whitewashing of their own crimes and cultural paternalism, real genocides continue to happen elsewhere. And the responsible are the same. I could try to pretend to believe in the good intentions of the governments of these nations, but the facts do not let me do so.

To be seen as an honest act what they do with MAG, we first need a world without western state terrorism. A world where the USA and its client states like Norway or New Zealand do not use cluster bombs, or white phosphorus, or depleted uranium. But they do use it, right now. During the last month alone, in eastern Syria, the US used cluster bombs and white phosphorus (an illegal chemical weapon), killing hundreds of Syrian civilians in the province of Deir-Ez-Zour.  So they are not honest. No, they are not.

Some readers of this article never heard about these massacres of Syrian civilians? Well, I would not be surprised, since most westerners follow western mainstream lying media. This ones almost never mention the massacres of civilians US commits at the least once a week in eastern Syria. Others do mention, namely RT, PressTV, and Telesur. But these ones, according to western mainstream lying media, even when they inform us with proven facts and live broadcastings, they are accused of spreading "fake news".

The West fakes news and call them The Truth, without even having journalists on the ground. The alternative Russia, Iranian or Venezuelan counterparts, with journalists on the ground, show us live facts but what they say is considered "fake news". And most of the western populace swallows it. Uncivilized West buys its own lies. 

What is true about Syria is also true about Yemen. The situation in Yemen is even worst, as despicable is the total absence of reports in the West about the crimes against humanity committed by Saudi Arabia, the UK, and the US in Yemen. Yes, at the same time they are funding MAG to remove US bombs in Laos, the US and the UK are helping Saudi Arabia to do the very same in Yemen.

Please read my article Propagated Fake News VS Untold Reality to understand why I say so. Or visit the Facebook page We support the Yemeni people against the crimes of the Saudi coalition, managed by mister Mohammed Abdullah Al-Babli, who kindly sends me reports about the UK/US/Saudi genocidal acts in Yemen like this one: Report on the Aggression on Yemen.

Or, at the least, watch this:

(alternative link: http://media.almasirah.net/uploaded/Videos/2018/08-2018/08-08-2018/jrymh_aladwan_alsawdy_alamryky_basthdaf_asrh_fy_sfyan_bmhafdhh_amran_08_08_2018.mp4)

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In the museum, there was a Canadian director, unfortunately too busy to answer my inconvenient questions. She left the build and drove her expensive car towards the center. So I talked with two very kind Laotian employees for more than one hour.

It was interesting to notice that the first level of speech was simply a regurgitation of memorized propaganda. The US and its client states are very kind and very altruist, and they help us so much with the removal of UXO's, and they give us jobs, etc. Sure, cool.

But then, when I started asking disturbing questions, the true human beings inside these two women came to the surface.

Asked about why there are no clear references to the perpetrators of all these crimes, they agreed the "information" in the museum should be changed.

Asked about the cultural genocide brought by drunk westerners and NGOs paid by those who destroyed Laos, they had the very same perspective as I do.

When I confronted them with a possible better solution - West to give the money directly to the Laotian people and let them take care of the problem -  they were more than excited about it.

These two women also agreed that the US and its vassal states praising themselves by sponsoring NGOs like MAG, is shameful behavior, and surely not the most honest way to deal with the problem.

They agree the US should keep a very low profile and, at the same time, give them very big economic compensations for the crimes they committed here. They would like to see Laotian in charge of the work to do, using the money got from the compensations.

They told me, and I agree, that Laotians in particular and Asians, in general, are very sociable, they like to work together for the common good and help each other, they do not need guidance from the  "selfish westerners who leave they elder citizens in special homes". So true. My reply was very simple: "that's why the US bombed you, to erase mutual aid, social behavior, socialism, communism...".

But well, these kind ladies need to have jobs to pay their bills. They pragmatically, yet sadly, argue that, for now, the best thing to do is to work for these NGO's to get money and to remove the bombs.

Last words about this pragmatic ladies. When asked about, they admitted never have heard about the US bombing Syria and Yemen. But they were shocked. And they wanted to know more. They asked me to help them "google" it. So did I. And yes, they were appalled and outraged to discover the US and UK do it now, in 2018, while removing old bombs in Laos.

And yes, I confronted them again with that terrible contradiction: "How come the US and allies are here removing cluster bombs and, at the same time, they are dropping cluster bombs in Yemen or Syria? If they were honest about their intentions here, don't you find unnecessary to show their flags all over the museum? And don't you think they should first stop bombing Yemen and Syria?".

Of course, they agreed, they honestly agreed with me. They told me the problem is "the people don't know history, most of the westerners visiting us, especially the Americans, never heard about the bombing of Laos"! Exactly. So I replied: "We the West hide past horror in order to repeat it in the present. The western populace must not know what happened in Laos, so we can have Laos 2.0 like Yemen or Libya or Syria".

They understood, they agreed, they were appalled and they wanted to know more about it. Here is the fundamental difference between Asians and westerners. Laotians in particular and Asians, in general, are far from being perfect, sure.

Although immensely ignorant (western propaganda and westernization are also to be blamed), they can reason with logic when confronted with shocking facts. They can reconsider what they think or believe about a certain issue.

Most westerners can no longer do so. Kim Jong-un is a mad guy no matter what; Russians, Iranians, and Chinese are evil no matter what; Cuba is poor because of communism; etc. An ignorant Laotian listens and wants to learn. An ignorant westerner is arrogant and will immediately impose a "safe space" of relativism and postmodern nonsense. In most of cases, tons of facts will never be enough to demolish the wrong negative opinions they have about al-Assad, Kim Jong-un or Putin. I will talk more about this subject in the fourth part, sharing parts of the conversations I had here with several westerners here in Vientiane.

Luís Garcia, Vientiane, Laos