Word: khmers
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...merely allowing for the likelihood that Cambodia lasted longer under Lon No1 than it would have under Sihanouk does not answer Shawcross' most forceful charge: that the Khmer rouge created the massive holocaust only because they had been "brutalized" by incessant American bombings and the actions of the U.S.-supplied Cambodian Army. This unsupported assertion has probably been the cause of more bad sentiment towards American involvement in Cambodia--and, indeed, anywhere else in the world--than any other aspect of American foreign policy in many years. But Shawcross' claim is almost completely false...
Prince Sihanouk explains how the Khmer Rouge created their army only after "several years of persistent indoctrination" which dated back far before 1970. It was all part of an effort of the Khmer Rouge (whose central leadership consisted of only four members: Pol Pot, Ieng Sary, and their wives) to create a fanatically dedicated--and extraordinarily ruthless--army to carry out a plan hatched in the minds of Pol Pot during his education at the Sorbonne. To further this goal, the Khmer Rouge recruited 12-year-olds for intensive training which emphasized forture, the "tantalizing prospect" of playing...
Eberstadt is convinced the United States is not directly at fault for the creation of the Khmer Rouge, but Gooi says the U.S. played a "large role" in demoralizing the Cambodian people and consequently in causing the radical takeover...
Their hope now is the Khmer Serie--a nominal military force which is viewed here as "an alternate force for liberation." Eberstadt sees them as just a big "hoax...
Least tolerant of all were the new leaders of Kampuchea. Under the direction of Prime Minister Pol Pot and a shadowy group of doctrinaire fanatics called Angka Loeu (the Organization on High), the Khmer Rouge began methodical destruction of every vestige of religion. Christian ministers were slaughtered and Muslim mosques destroyed. The greatest indignities, however, were reserved for Buddhists, who constituted 90% of Kampuchea's population. Insurgents fresh from the jungle looted the country's 2,800 temples. "Buddhas were thrown into rivers or used as firewood," recalls Oum Soum, 62, deputy director of Phnom-Penh...