No Hard Feelings

It seemed clear last week that the 19605 were going to be as bad a decade for civilian-led parliamentary democracy in Southeast Asia as the 19505, when the military took over the governments in Pakistan, Thailand and Burma. The first to go in the new year was tiny, landlocked Laos, which has been wrestling for years with corruption, chaos and Communism--and an amiable indifference to all three. Invaded by Red bands from Communist North Viet Nam last summer (TIME, Aug. 24), Laos was narrowly saved from collapse by quick action in the United Nations, which sent a team of investigators whose presence caused the Reds momentarily to ease the pressure.

But the experience of invasion proved unsettling to 6-ft.-tall Premier Phoui Sananikone, 56, and last month he reversed his anti-Communist stance in favor of "neutralism." Seven members of his Cabinet resigned, and the Committee for the Defense of the National Interest demanded that a provisional government be established. Premier Phoui, feeling menaced "politically and physically," last week handed his resignation to King Savang Vatthana.

While troops stood guard through the capital city of Vientiane and three armored cars stood outside the royal palace, the military junta drove to a meeting in five sleek, black Mercedes and designated General Phoumi Nosavan, 39, Inspector of Armed Forces, as the military strongman of Laos. A government official, urging newsmen to remember that Laos was a Buddhist and basically peaceful country, said: "Please don't dramatize the situation. It's a coup d'etat Laotian style, and not on the South American level. It's all en famille. No bloodshed."

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