That 2018 act doesn’t cover my father because he was off the books. There is only a handful of Hmong men who are recognized. Children definitely were not. To acknowledge men like my father would mean for the US to acknowledge that they’d broken international laws on child soldiers. Additionally, that law still did not make it so that Hmong soldiers could be buried at Arlington. We could bury our recognized officers and bury them in military cemeteries if they chose, but NOT Arlington, the most prestigious and important military cemetery in America. The CIA did and does acknowledge a few, but the true number of soldiers far surpassed those few. They really didn’t care to keep track, that’s why there is no official tally of how many Hmong died in the war. The estimate is loosely between 30% to 50% of our population. The war in Laos is one that does not get enough attention, especially since Laos is still, to this day, the most bombed country ever, with some estimated 80 million bombs and cluster munitions still littering the countryside. America dropped over 2 million tonnes of bombs on Laos, yet there is so very little public knowledge about it. Air America was also trafficking opium to pay for the war. One trip to drop off supplies, and the return trip with a cargo hold of opium.