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The situation on the Laotian side is somewhat better. Laos is sparsely populated, but animals large and small are relentlessly hunted by both Hmong tribesmen and Vietnamese poachers who freely cross the border. Wildlife Conservation Society biologist George Schaller has noted that all villagers over the age of 13 seem to have guns, ranging from muzzle loaders to automatic weapons left behind during the war. Alan Rabinowitz, the organizer of the WCS team, says that the area still has remarkable diversity but that all species have been radically reduced by hunting. Laotian trees are also under threat, as deforested neighboring countries look covetously at Laos' timber.
Vietnam and Laos have ample reason to protect the region, if only to preserve vital watersheds and forests and to help halt the desertification that is slowly drying out much of Asia. The area also has global importance. Taxonomists believe it might be one of the best places in the world for studying biodiversity and how it evolves. Scientists have not even begun to examine the biological riches contained in the rugged hills. Says Arctander: "If mankind wants to preserve biodiversity, it makes sense to start in places like Vu Quang, which have proved able to sustain biodiversity for a long time."
Both countries have recently moved to protect these ecosystems. On the basis of recommendations by MacKinnon and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), the Vietnamese government has expanded the Vu Quang reserve from 40,000 to 150,000 acres and shut down logging in the park. Vu Quang connects to the 900,000-acre Nakai Nam Theum National Biodiversity Conservation Area in Laos, and if current proposals are adopted, the two areas will be joined to an additional 750,000 acres of reserves and the surrounding mountainous forests in Vietnam. There are also proposals to enlarge and link protected areas in Laos.
Protection, however, is meaningful only when enforced. It will be no small order for the two governments to control hunting and logging across a 1.75 million-acre expanse, particularly as both countries open their markets and officials and entrepreneurs look to make money.
Still, there is reason to hope that the remote, forbidding region will be preserved. Says David Hulse, head of wwf's efforts in Vietnam: "Hunting only supplements the diets of local villagers, and it imposes little hardship to ask them to put it aside if that is necessary to protect unique natural treasures." Moreover, some influential Vietnamese have become alarmed at the stripping of the nation's forests. General Vo Nguyen Giap, the legendary architect of North Vietnamese military strategy during the wars against France and the U.S., has reportedly remarked to visitors that Vietnam did not fight for decades to gain control of its resources only to squander them once it was independent. Indeed, a people with the will to fight a superpower should have the ability to protect Vu Quang and its many glories.