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Tragedy in Paradise by Charles Weldon M.D. A Country Doctor at War in Laos A true story of warfare, adventure and humanitarian assistance. "One of the wounded was the soldier whom the Pathet Lao had shot and knifed open. This man was hit by six bullets. One grazed his head; two went through the left arm; one hit his left flank; and two went through his left thigh, shattering the bone. two loops of intestine were protruding from a long, gaping wound in his abdomen. To my amazement, he was still conscious and responsive to questioning."
"We irrigated the intestines with saline solution and cleansed them as well as we could. After stuffing the protruding bowel back into the abdominal cavity, we strapped the wound closed with tape, and applied a dressing. With his other wounds bandaged, a traction splint on the shattered leg, and IV fluids containing massive doses of antibiotics going into his veins, he asked for a cigarette!" For 11 years during the Vietnam War, from 1963 -1974, Dr. Charles Weldon worked in Laos alongside the Meo refugees and tribesmen fighting the North Vietnamese Army and their Pathet Lao allies. Flying all over the country with CIA-run Air America, he was in charge of the remote, primitive, bamboo-and-thatch hospitals, and the "clandestine schools and bootleg teachers" that provided the only moral and physical support to these people in their struggle against overwhelming odds. Tragedy in Paradise is his fascinating memoir of that time. A unique account of a tragic and little-known chapter in the "secret" war in Laos, and of the wider conflict in Indochina as a whole. Paperback
Bangkok 1999
Asia Books
284 pages
ISBN 9748237389
For delivery in Thailand please go to
www.dco.co.th/product_info.php?products_id=363
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