Bill Text: MN SF1508 | 2013-2014 | 88th Legislature | Introduced
Bill Title: Resolution urging the President and Congress to amend federal law to expand eligibility for burial in state veterans cemeteries developed with federal funding to include allied Hmong-American and Lao-American surrogate fighters of America's Secret War in Laos
Sponsorship: Partisan Bill (Republican 3)
Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2013-03-21 - Referred to State and Local Government [SF1508 Detail]
Download: Minnesota-2013-SF1508-Introduced.html
1.1A resolution
1.2memorializing Congress and the President of the United States to amend federal
1.3veterans cemetery law to expand eligibility for burial in State Veterans Cemeteries
1.4developed with federal funding to include the Hmong-American and Lao-American
1.5surrogate fighters of America's Secret War in Laos.
1.6WHEREAS, early in the Vietnam War the United States government discovered that
1.7most enemy war materiel and many enemy combatants were being supplied by the communist
1.8government of North Vietnam and their allied communist governments of Red China and the
1.9Soviet Union; and
1.10WHEREAS, the United States government discovered that those enemy combatants and
1.11war materiel were being routed from North Vietnam to the battlefields of South Vietnam via an
1.12ever-more-expansive primitive road system through the mountains of Laos, which came to be
1.13known as the Ho Chi Minh Trail System; and
1.14WHEREAS, the United States government determined that it was of utmost urgency to
1.15interrupt that enemy supply route through the use of targeted military action; and
1.16WHEREAS, the United States government determined that it would be politically
1.17inadvisable to widen the allied war effort through overt military intervention against the enemy
1.18Ho Chi Minh Trail System, and concluded that any allied military action to that effect would need
1.19to be implemented in great secrecy and stealth; and
1.20WHEREAS, the United States government, beginning in 1961 and lasting through 1978,
1.21recruited, trained, equipped, directed, resupplied and paid Hmong and Lao people indigenous
1.22to the mountain highlands of Laos and Vietnam to conduct, under the direction of the Special
2.1Activities Division of the United States Central Intelligence Agency, a Secret War in Laos against
2.2the communist invaders of South Vietnam; and
2.3WHEREAS, indigenous Hmong and Lao fighters were formally organized by the U.S. CIA
2.4into a Special Guerrilla Unit (SGU) led by the principal Hmong leader, General Vang Pao; and
2.5WHEREAS, the members of the CIA's Hmong and Lao Special Guerrilla Unit fought
2.6valiantly and persistently in the American Secret War in Laos to interdict enemy supply lines
2.7on the Ho Chi Minh Trail, to rescue downed United States military pilots from within enemy
2.8territories, and to defend key friendly military outposts in Laos, such as the clandestine and
2.9vital U.S. emergency military airport at Luang Prabang among others, and to draw away from
2.10the main war thousands of enemy combatants to protect against Hmong and Lao SGU attacks
2.11against their supply lines in Laos; and
2.12WHEREAS, by their valiant fighting and the monumental sacrifice of over 100,000 of
2.13their own lives in the American Secret War in Laos, these Hmong and Lao SGU fighters were
2.14able to directly and indirectly save the lives of many thousands of American service members
2.15during the Vietnam War; and
2.16WHEREAS, because of their friendship with and heroic efforts on behalf of the United
2.17States military, the majority of our nation's Hmong and Lao SGU fighters in the American Secret
2.18War in Laos and their family and community members were eventually ruthlessly exterminated
2.19or driven from their jungle mountain homelands in Laos; and
2.20WHEREAS, over a quarter of a million of those Hmong and Lao refugees have sought
2.21refuge in the United States of America and other nations, including nearly 80,000 of whom have
2.22resettled in Minnesota, with most of those refugees having by now been granted United States
2.23citizenship; and
2.24WHEREAS, reasonably accurate records exist to validate the identities of that subset of
2.25refugees who were members of the CIA's Special Guerilla Unit of the American Secret War in
2.26Laos; and
2.27WHEREAS, along with the majority of America's Vietnam War veterans, many of the
2.28Hmong-American and Lao-American surrogate fighters of the American Secret War in Laos are
2.29now nearing the end of their natural lives, with many others having already passed into eternity;
2.30NOW, THEREFORE,
2.31BE IT RESOLVED by the governor and the Legislature of the State of Minnesota that we
2.32urge the President and the Congress of the United States to amend federal law and policy to allow
3.1the Hmong-American and Lao-American surrogate fighters of the American Secret War in Laos
3.2to have the final, eternal honor of perpetual interment alongside their fellow American veterans
3.3within State Veterans Cemeteries throughout the nation, including the existing Minnesota State
3.4Veterans Cemetery at Little Falls, Minnesota.
3.5BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the secretary of state of the state of Minnesota shall
3.6transmit copies of this memorial to the speaker and the clerk of the United States House of
3.7Representatives, the president and the secretary of the United States Senate, the United States
3.8Secretary of State, and presiding officers of both houses of the legislatures of each of the other
3.9states of the union, and to Minnesota's senators and representatives in Congress.
1.2memorializing Congress and the President of the United States to amend federal
1.3veterans cemetery law to expand eligibility for burial in State Veterans Cemeteries
1.4developed with federal funding to include the Hmong-American and Lao-American
1.5surrogate fighters of America's Secret War in Laos.
1.6WHEREAS, early in the Vietnam War the United States government discovered that
1.7most enemy war materiel and many enemy combatants were being supplied by the communist
1.8government of North Vietnam and their allied communist governments of Red China and the
1.9Soviet Union; and
1.10WHEREAS, the United States government discovered that those enemy combatants and
1.11war materiel were being routed from North Vietnam to the battlefields of South Vietnam via an
1.12ever-more-expansive primitive road system through the mountains of Laos, which came to be
1.13known as the Ho Chi Minh Trail System; and
1.14WHEREAS, the United States government determined that it was of utmost urgency to
1.15interrupt that enemy supply route through the use of targeted military action; and
1.16WHEREAS, the United States government determined that it would be politically
1.17inadvisable to widen the allied war effort through overt military intervention against the enemy
1.18Ho Chi Minh Trail System, and concluded that any allied military action to that effect would need
1.19to be implemented in great secrecy and stealth; and
1.20WHEREAS, the United States government, beginning in 1961 and lasting through 1978,
1.21recruited, trained, equipped, directed, resupplied and paid Hmong and Lao people indigenous
1.22to the mountain highlands of Laos and Vietnam to conduct, under the direction of the Special
2.1Activities Division of the United States Central Intelligence Agency, a Secret War in Laos against
2.2the communist invaders of South Vietnam; and
2.3WHEREAS, indigenous Hmong and Lao fighters were formally organized by the U.S. CIA
2.4into a Special Guerrilla Unit (SGU) led by the principal Hmong leader, General Vang Pao; and
2.5WHEREAS, the members of the CIA's Hmong and Lao Special Guerrilla Unit fought
2.6valiantly and persistently in the American Secret War in Laos to interdict enemy supply lines
2.7on the Ho Chi Minh Trail, to rescue downed United States military pilots from within enemy
2.8territories, and to defend key friendly military outposts in Laos, such as the clandestine and
2.9vital U.S. emergency military airport at Luang Prabang among others, and to draw away from
2.10the main war thousands of enemy combatants to protect against Hmong and Lao SGU attacks
2.11against their supply lines in Laos; and
2.12WHEREAS, by their valiant fighting and the monumental sacrifice of over 100,000 of
2.13their own lives in the American Secret War in Laos, these Hmong and Lao SGU fighters were
2.14able to directly and indirectly save the lives of many thousands of American service members
2.15during the Vietnam War; and
2.16WHEREAS, because of their friendship with and heroic efforts on behalf of the United
2.17States military, the majority of our nation's Hmong and Lao SGU fighters in the American Secret
2.18War in Laos and their family and community members were eventually ruthlessly exterminated
2.19or driven from their jungle mountain homelands in Laos; and
2.20WHEREAS, over a quarter of a million of those Hmong and Lao refugees have sought
2.21refuge in the United States of America and other nations, including nearly 80,000 of whom have
2.22resettled in Minnesota, with most of those refugees having by now been granted United States
2.23citizenship; and
2.24WHEREAS, reasonably accurate records exist to validate the identities of that subset of
2.25refugees who were members of the CIA's Special Guerilla Unit of the American Secret War in
2.26Laos; and
2.27WHEREAS, along with the majority of America's Vietnam War veterans, many of the
2.28Hmong-American and Lao-American surrogate fighters of the American Secret War in Laos are
2.29now nearing the end of their natural lives, with many others having already passed into eternity;
2.30NOW, THEREFORE,
2.31BE IT RESOLVED by the governor and the Legislature of the State of Minnesota that we
2.32urge the President and the Congress of the United States to amend federal law and policy to allow
3.1the Hmong-American and Lao-American surrogate fighters of the American Secret War in Laos
3.2to have the final, eternal honor of perpetual interment alongside their fellow American veterans
3.3within State Veterans Cemeteries throughout the nation, including the existing Minnesota State
3.4Veterans Cemetery at Little Falls, Minnesota.
3.5BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the secretary of state of the state of Minnesota shall
3.6transmit copies of this memorial to the speaker and the clerk of the United States House of
3.7Representatives, the president and the secretary of the United States Senate, the United States
3.8Secretary of State, and presiding officers of both houses of the legislatures of each of the other
3.9states of the union, and to Minnesota's senators and representatives in Congress.
