Lt. Neng Xiong
"Nhia Cha Xiong"
SGU Veteran
Coon Rapids, MN
File No.: 23/50
May 2024

Neng Xiong was born in the town of Mouang Cha, Laos in 1950. He recalled the CIA-backed Secret Army coming to train and station in his town in 1961. A few years later, the Secret War had escalated with more North Vietnamese Army invading Laos. At age 15, he was pulled into the war as more SGU soldiers were needed to defend their homeland and US objectives inside Laos. Within 13 days of his recruitment, his battalion was deployed to the battlefield to engage against the enemy. He was wounded on this deployment. Xiong stayed as a soldier until the war ended in 1975. As other CIA-backed Hmong soldiers and their families left Laos to Thailand to avoid  being captured, Xiong and his family sought refuge in the jungle. Life got more difficult living in the wild as they were constantly being hunted down by the Communists NVA and Pathet Lao troops. By 1979, he took his family and swam across the Mekong River to Thailand. They remained in the Ban Vinai Refugee Camp until its closure in the early 1990s, when they decided to come to the US. ∆

*** Video has been edited and modified, which the correspondence from the video may different from the transcription. Please review the transcription as needed to reflect video flow. English transcription for this interview is available upon request.