Tom Paine 1949
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- Mar 15, 2020
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I spent a week or two in Cambodia with my wife in 2014. We first visited the famous temple complex Angkor Wat near the tourist city Sean Reap. We also traveled by private taxi to visit smaller magnificent abandoned temples in the jungle. They were just an hour’s ride or so out on dusty dirt roads. It took only about 35 minutes to get out where electric power lines ended. In another direction, traveling by bus, boat and motor scooter coach on narrow dirt levees we visited whole communities of “homes” built on stilts 50 feet in the air — awaiting the famous Monsoon flooding of the Tonle Sap Great Lake region. People there lived on their tiny boats, fished from them, depended on them for a living.
In the Cambodian capital we visited the famous prison Tuol Sleng of the Khmer Rouge. My Chinese wife noted that China had supported the Khmer Rouge at the time when that prison and countless others in the countryside were filled with city folk — “intellectuals.” I noted the U.S. also supported the Khmer Rouge “government in exile” & soldiers in the jungle for years after it was overthrown by Vietnam.
In Phnom Pen we visited the repainted old temples and palace of the late King Sihanouk and his clan, and walked along the banks of the Mekong River, where I spoke briefly with a raving Englishman who lived in the city. He was screaming about the hell the U.S.A. had brought to Cambodia. I knew the history but let him rage on. It brought back memories...
I recall as a young man reading that the peasant army of Pol Pot had taken Phnom Penh. Like most everyone back then, I figured there was little difference between those Cambodian youngsters and the tough North and South Vietnamese soldiers who had finally taken Saigon. But it was not so.
The article below brought back these memories — of lessons learned and NOT learned, of what modern war can do to a primitive agrarian society, of the hypocrisy and cynicism of U.S. and Chinese leaders. Both these countries supported the Khmer Rouge long after Pol Pot’s atrocities were well known internationally. The U.S. encouraged China to act as its “cat’s paw” invading newly unified Vietnam in 1979. China wanted to prove it was “worthy” of being a U.S. ally, and after the Cultural Revolution, a nationalistic war effort seemed to the weakened and divided CCP leadership a way of busying and buying off generals in the Red Army. China had earlier “switched sides” and now tried to “teach Vietnam a lesson” both for opposing the U.S. and overthrowing Pol Pot in 1978.
This article does not mention the cynical Chinese role in this sordid affair, and may slightly exaggerate the numbers killed in this period, but the basic facts are correct. The Vietnamese overthrow of Pol Pot probably saved at least another million Cambodian lives. The Vietnamese people were to pay dearly for this righteous and necessary intervention.
As Khmer Rouge prison commander dies, media quiet on UK & US’ roles in aiding regime responsible for Cambodian genocide
In the Cambodian capital we visited the famous prison Tuol Sleng of the Khmer Rouge. My Chinese wife noted that China had supported the Khmer Rouge at the time when that prison and countless others in the countryside were filled with city folk — “intellectuals.” I noted the U.S. also supported the Khmer Rouge “government in exile” & soldiers in the jungle for years after it was overthrown by Vietnam.
In Phnom Pen we visited the repainted old temples and palace of the late King Sihanouk and his clan, and walked along the banks of the Mekong River, where I spoke briefly with a raving Englishman who lived in the city. He was screaming about the hell the U.S.A. had brought to Cambodia. I knew the history but let him rage on. It brought back memories...
I recall as a young man reading that the peasant army of Pol Pot had taken Phnom Penh. Like most everyone back then, I figured there was little difference between those Cambodian youngsters and the tough North and South Vietnamese soldiers who had finally taken Saigon. But it was not so.
The article below brought back these memories — of lessons learned and NOT learned, of what modern war can do to a primitive agrarian society, of the hypocrisy and cynicism of U.S. and Chinese leaders. Both these countries supported the Khmer Rouge long after Pol Pot’s atrocities were well known internationally. The U.S. encouraged China to act as its “cat’s paw” invading newly unified Vietnam in 1979. China wanted to prove it was “worthy” of being a U.S. ally, and after the Cultural Revolution, a nationalistic war effort seemed to the weakened and divided CCP leadership a way of busying and buying off generals in the Red Army. China had earlier “switched sides” and now tried to “teach Vietnam a lesson” both for opposing the U.S. and overthrowing Pol Pot in 1978.
This article does not mention the cynical Chinese role in this sordid affair, and may slightly exaggerate the numbers killed in this period, but the basic facts are correct. The Vietnamese overthrow of Pol Pot probably saved at least another million Cambodian lives. The Vietnamese people were to pay dearly for this righteous and necessary intervention.
As Khmer Rouge prison commander dies, media quiet on UK & US’ roles in aiding regime responsible for Cambodian genocide
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