Biography on general vang pao

Vang Pao (Hmong: Vaj Pov, born 1929) is a former Major General in the Royal Lao Army. He is an ethnic Hmong and a leader of the Hmong American community in the United States.

Early life

Vang Pao was born on December 8, 1929, in Central Xiangkhuang Province, in the northeastern region of Laos.

He began his early life as a farmer until Japanese forces invaded and occupied French Indochina in World War II. In his early teen years, Vang Pao launched his military career, joining the French Military to protect fellow Hmong during the Japanese invasion.

Military career

The term “Meo Maquis” was originally used by Free French and Allied intelligence officers to describe the Hmong resistance forces working against the Japanese forces occupying Indochina and China during World War II.

After WWII, French GCMA authorities recruited Vang Pao as an officer during the First Indochina War to combat the Viet