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Killing Fields of Cambodia
Cambodia is a country located in South East Asia, it is said to be just under half the size of California and twice the size of Scotland. Before Pol Pot’s Genocide which ranged between early 1975-1979, Cambodia held a strong population of 7 million due to the gain of independence from the French rule in the 1950’s.
In 1970 Prince Sihanouk was deposed in a military coup. The leader of the new right-wing government was lieutenant-general Lon Nol, who was made president of the 'Khmer Republic'. Prince Sihanouk and his followers joined forces with a communist guerrilla organisation founded in 1960 and known as the Khmer Rouge. They attacked Lon Nol's army and civil war began.
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| A very small fraction of child victims. |
Once again Cambodia was caught up in another country’s war. Cambodia’s Eastern neighbour Vietnam, who also had fought against the French to gain Independence. As we know after the French were defeated, Vietnam split into nations: Communist North Vietnam and Pro Western South Vietnam who were strongly backed by the USA. Civil war has immediately broken out between these two nations. The Viet Cong, a group of Vietnamese communist guerrillas, whom were backed by China and North Vietnam, based themselves in the shrouded jungles of South Vietnam. From this chosen position they fought the South Vietnamese army from a short distance pushing them back. In 1964 the United States Of America entered the Vietnam war in style, assisted with the power of flight, firepower and a selection of tested poisonous defoliants. Sadly, the Americans could not push back the determined Vietnamese communists.
Under the rule of Prince Sihanouk, up until this point during the Civil war, Cambodia has managed to remain neutral by contributing to both sides. The Vietnamese Communists gained access to the harbours and Ports to collect supplies from its supporting countries. Whilst in secrecy, the Americans were given the go ahead by Cambodia to bomb the harbour and Viet Cong hideouts - illegitimately of course. Cambodia had become part of the Vietnam battlefield. During the next four years, American B-52 bombers, using napalm and dart cluster-bombs, killed up to 750,000 Cambodians in their effort to destroy suspected North Vietnamese supply lines. The inconclusive war in Vietnam cost many American and Vietnamese lives, devastated the country, and achieved nothing but misery for anyone caught up in it, including the Cambodians.
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| Khmer Rouge Guerrilla leader, Pol Pot. |
The Khmer Rouge guerrilla movement in 1970 was small. Their leader, Pol Pot, had been educated in France and was an admirer of Maoist (Chinese) communism; he was also suspicious of Vietnam's relations with Cambodia. The heavy American bombardment, and Lon Nol's collaboration with America, drove new recruits to the Khmer Rouge. So did Chinese backing and North Vietnamese training for them. By 1975 Pol Pot's force had grown to over 700,000 men. Lon Nol's army was kept busy trying to suppress not only Vietnamese communists on Cambodian territory but also Cambodia's own brand of communists, the Khmer Rouge
On April 17, 1975, the Khmer Rouge armies defeated the Lon Nol regime and took the capital, Phnom Penh, immediately dispersing almost all of its more than 2 million inhabitants to a life of hard agricultural labor in the countryside. Other cities and towns were also evacuated. The Khmer Rouge renamed the country Democratic Kâmpŭchéa (DK), and for the next four years the regime, headed by Pol Pot as prime minister and other members of the Standing Committee of the CPK Central Committee, terrorized the population. Almost 1.7 million Cambodians were killed, including members of minority and religious groups, people suspected of disagreeing with the party, intellectuals, merchants, and bureaucrats. 25 % of the urban Khmer population had perished.
The most horrific slaughter took place during the second half of 1978 in a purge of the Eastern Zone on the Vietnam border, where resistance to the Khmer Rouge was strong. At least 250,000 people were killed in the worst single massacre of the Khmer Rouge period. Religion in Cambodia was also affected by the Khmer Rouge regime. Buddhism was completely suppressed from 1975 to 1979; many monks were defrocked and sent into forced labour, while others were killed. The Khmer Rouge also attacked the neighbouring countries of Vietnam, Thailand, and Laos in an attempt to reclaim territories lost by Cambodia many centuries before.
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| Cambodia's Flag |
