Kingdom of Luang Prabang (Japanese puppet state)

puppet state of the Empire of Japan, which existed from 9 March 1945 to 12 October 1945.^[1]

Champassak provinces. This would erupt into a full Thai invasion in January 1941. After initial Thai victories their offensive stalled, and the French scored a great naval victory at Ko Chang, leading to a stalemate. The Japanese mediated a ceasefire and compelled the French colonial government to cede Champassak and Sainyabuli province in Laos and Battambang province in Cambodia to Thailand, ending the war.^[2][3]

Phetsarath became the first prime minister while a new advisory council for King Sisavang Vong was headed by Savang Vatthana.^[4]

Governor-General of Indochina Jean Decoux encouraged the rise of a Lao nationalist movement, the Movement for National Renovation, which sought to defend Lao territory from Thai expansion. A French report stated "If the protectorate government does not succeed in creating an autonomous Laotian individuality—at least among those who have received education—then they will feel themselves increasingly attracted towards the neighboring country and this situation will create new difficulties". More schools were built in Laos during this period than in the last 40 years and the French School of the Far East was even renamed the "Temple for the National Idea of Laos".^[4] The movement also published a propaganda newspaper, Lao Nyai (Great Laos) in January 1941, slamming Thai policies over the Lao people and the ceded lands while promoting a sense of identity across Laos. It ran poetry competitions that celebrated Lao culture and history, and ran columns that reintroduced the ‘glorious lineage’ of the modern Lao from the time of Lan Xang. The paper, however, was not allowed to stray outside official French policy or to become explicitly nationalistic.^[2][4] The paper also covered the movements of King Sisavang Vong who, emboldened by the expansion of his kingdom and of secret French assurances of further expansion, made trips to several southern cities, including Champasak, on his way to Phnom Penh in 1941.^[4] In the south of the country later in the war, the Lao-Seri movement was formed in 1944 which unlike the Movement for National Renovation was not supportive of the French and declared a "Laos for Laotians" policy aimed at achieving outright independence.^[5]

Phetsarath, into declaring the French protectorate over his kingdom ended, while entering the nation into the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere on 8 April 1945.^[4]