[Vision2020] Who is Responsible for the Killing Fields?

[nickgier at roadrunner.com]

Greetings:

Gail and I just returned from a month-long trip to Vietnam and Cambodia.  We were concerned about the Red Shirt protesters in Bangkok (our trans-Pacific flight gateway).  Their Yellow Shirt opponents had shut down the airport for a week several years ago.  The Thai army had surrounded the airport and our taxi was checked for explosives, so we made it in an out without any trouble.

My head is filled with new column ideas, and this is the first one. The full text is attached. April 17 was the 35th anniversary of the fall of Phnom Penh and the 40th anniversary of Tricky Dick's invasion of Cambodia.

Next week is a column on our tour of Vietnam where all my preconceptions were blown away; a column on the Vietnamese monk Thich Nhat Hanh (we visited one of his monasteries); a column on crawling through VC tunnels; and finally one on the battle of Dien Bien Phu where the French got their butts kicked on May 8, 1954.

Twenty-five people have now died in Bangkok, so I guess I'll research a column on that topic as well. On our way to India for my first sabbatical in India in 1992, we stopped in Bangkok and took a 2-week tour of the country, even though the State Department warned us not to stay.  University students, with the help of their king, had overthrown the military dictatorship and the morale of the people was sky high.  We felt perfectly safe.

Wonderful to be back home and back with the Vision,

Nick Gier

WHO IS RESPONSIBLE FOR CAMBODIA’S KILLING FIELDS?
 
With the 35th anniversary of the fall of Saigon coming up on April 30, most of us forget that the Cambodian capital fell to the Communists the same year on April 17.  Led by Pol Pot and his henchmen, the Khmer Rouge launched an insane campaign of retribution that led to the death of about 2 million people.  

In 1968 the Khmer Rouge numbered only a few hundred comrades, so what made it possible for the most extreme element of the Cambodia left to come to power? Norodom Sihanouk, now the beloved “King-Father of Cambodia,” right-wing leader Lon Nol, the North Vietnamese, Communist China, and Richard Nixon must all share in the blame.   

In March 1945 Sihanouk declared Cambodia’s independence, but the French, with U.S. support, reclaimed its colonial possessions in Indochina.  While Ho Chi Minh went to war with the French, Sihanouk remained staunchly anti-Communist and the French allowed him retain his throne. Cambodia’s independence was granted in late 1953, and the French were forced to leave Indochina after their defeat at Dien Bien Phu in May of 1954.  

While remaining officially anti-Communist and neutral during the Second Indochina War (our conflict), Sihanouk allowed the Vietnamese Communists to move supplies along on his side of the border and to use the port of Sihanoukville. 

In March of 1970 Lon Nol, a right-wing army general deposed Sihanouk and condemned him to death in abstentia, but the Cambodian people rallied to their prince’s side. Sihanouk allied himself with Pol Pot and, mainly as a result Sihanouk’s prestige, Khmer Rouge forces grew from 6,000 to 50,000.  Just like the corrupt South Vietnamese generals on whom we lavished support, Lon Nol did not have a chance against disciplined Communist soldiers.

In 1969 President Richard Nixon ordered secret bombing attacks in Cambodia and Laos, and then launched an invasion of Cambodia on May 1, 1970. The first killing fields were Cambodian villages where, from 1969-1973, hundreds of thousands of people died by B-52 bombing raids. Yale historian Ben Kiernan has done the most extensive surveys of the actions of the Pol Pot regime. Over 60 percent of those interviewed said that they turned to the Khmer Rouge because B-52s destroyed their villages. 

After Pol Pot ordered several major cross border attacks, the Vietnamese finally lost their patience with the Khmer Rouge.  Early in 1979 they launched an invasion of Cambodia and the Pol Pot regime crumbled within months. The Khmer Rouge were able to hold out for years in the jungles, primarily because of Chinese and North Korean aid. 

Because President Ronald Reagan did not want to give any credit to the Vietnamese Communists, he opposed giving the Khmer Rouge’s UN seat to the new government. At the same time the U.S. gave aid to rebel forces who were opposed to the Vietnamese imposed government. 

The indirect effect U.S. aid was to support the Khmer Rouge, who were in a coalition with the other rebels, and whose troops levels went back up to 35,000.  The Vietnamese had to expend considerable effort to defeat Pol Pot’s forces, and he was finally forced over the border where the pro-American Thai government protected him.

In 1989 the Vietnamese withdrew all of its forces, and under UN auspices elections were held in 1993.  Thirty years too late, the first Khmer Rouge official, simply known as “Duch,” is now being tried for crimes against humanity.

For the first time since the French Protectorate of 1863, the Cambodian people can pursue their own affairs without adverse external interference. They no longer have to fear a madmen such as Pol Pot or dread quarter-ton bombs dropping from 30,000 feet.

Nick Gier was co-president of the Student-Faculty Committee to End the War in Vietnam in 1965-66 at Oregon State University.  He taught philosophy at the University of Idaho for 31 years.


 



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