
The Khmer Rouge: Genocide in the Name of Utopia (2016) - exolymph
https://openendedsocialstudies.org/2016/06/24/the-khmer-rouge-genocide-in-the-name-of-utopia/
======
grawprog
My last boss is probably one of the few people I know I would consider an
actual genuine hero. He singlehandedly rescued his family from the Khmer Rouge
and smuggled them out of the country through China, then to Britain and
finally Canada. He started a business from nothing here and is probably the
best employer i've ever had. His nephew was the manager while I worked there
and is one of the greatest people i've met and became a good friend. Him and
the rest of my boss' family wouldn't be alive today if it weren't for him. He
lost a lot of friends and family because of the genocides.

~~~
Natsu
Yeah, I didn't appreciate this until I read about the survivors, but it's
freaky to imagine that one day you go from living relatively normally, to
being marched out of Phenom Penh at gunpoint by teenagers, separated from your
family, and forced to become rice farming slaves.

And they were slaves, one story is about a person who was starving, just like
everyone else, who dared to catch a fish that swam between their legs to eat.
They were shot for that.

They also practiced eating the rich in the literal sense. For whatever odd
cultural reason, they enjoyed eating human livers from people who were
executed.

When the civil war ended, the king asked the people to return their guns. The
Khmer Rouge kept theirs and intercepted shipments thereof, easily taking over
the disarmed areas.

------
dr_dshiv
>As described in PBS’s Frontline documentary series, “Instead of becoming
pariahs, the Khmer Rouge continued to play a significant role in Cambodian
politics for the next two decades.The Khmer Rouge would likely not have
survived without the support of its old patron China and a surprising new
ally: the United States. Norodom Sihanouk, now in exile after briefly serving
as head of state under the Khmer Rouge, formed a loose coalition with the
guerillas to expel the Vietnamese from Cambodia. The United States gave the
Sihanouk-Khmer Rouge coalition millions of dollars in aid while enforcing an
economic embargo against the Vietnamese-backed Cambodian government. The
Carter administration helped the Khmer Rouge keep its seat at the United
Nations, tacitly implying that they were still the country’s legitimate
rulers."

~~~
leephillips
This was aided by Noam Chomsky, who used his considerable influence to cast
doubt on the idea that the genocide had happened at all.

~~~
alentist
This is not an isolated incident, unfortunately. He also praised Mao’s
policies shortly after they caused the worst famine in human history.

[https://newcriterion.com/issues/2003/5/the-hypocrisy-of-
noam...](https://newcriterion.com/issues/2003/5/the-hypocrisy-of-noam-chomsky)

~~~
boomboomsubban
Chomsky hosts a transcript on the forum those quotes were taken from, and that
article ignored any context for the remarks and edited their content to make
them seem more objectionable than they are. Saying China does not deserve
blanket condemnation as part if a broader discussion is hardly praising Mao's
policies.

The butchering of the second quote is is even worse, omitting the line "But,
as I said before, I don’t think it was the use of terror that led to the
successes that were achieved."

The article later moves on to defend the Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory
bombing, which is fittingly right after discussing Cambodia.

[https://chomsky.info/19671215/](https://chomsky.info/19671215/)

~~~
woodandsteel
What is your own overall view of the Khmer Rouge, and ditto Mao? And have your
views changed over time?

Let me say where I am coming from here. The Khemer Rouge and Mao had in common
certain ideas. They were for socialism, and they were for achieving it through
violent revolution. They believed in the Leninist ideas of vanguardism and
party centralization. And they believed that it was possible to take a
preindustrial country directly to industrialization and then anarchistic
socialism without first having to go through a liberal, capitalist phase.

I think these ideas are mistaken, and whenever they have been tried the result
has been a horror. And it is for that reason the Pol Pot and Maoist regimes
were so brutal. So my question to you is, what do you think of these ideas?

~~~
boomboomsubban
Broadly, that they are both military dictators whose actions were more
influenced by fighting off external and internal enemies than any ideals.

~~~
woodandsteel
Yes, they were. What I am saying is they were that because they were Marxist-
Leninists. Pol Pot and Mao started out as Marxist-Leninists and that lead them
to establish military dictatorships. That set of prior ideological ideas leads
inevitably to that sort of situation.

One reason I think it is important to stress this is that defenders of
Marxism-Leninism say that regimes like this went bad because they fell away
from Marxist-Leninist values, which implies it could have gone better, but I
say the ideology always leads to that result.

So let me ask you, do you disagree? Do you think it is possible for a Marxist-
Leninist regime to turn out good?

~~~
boomboomsubban
It's not clear. It may be a problem with Democratic centralism, but basically
every example of it being attempted is immediately countered with extreme
hostility from most of the world. Like in China, within two years of the end
of the civil war the US had marched an army to the Chinese border with the
ability to drop nukes on them. That kind of threat leads to a military
dictatorship, no matter what economic policy you hope to try.

~~~
woodandsteel
Thank you for giving an answer. But you know, the original idea of Marxism was
that the revolution would take place in the advanced industrial states, which
have the greatest military power and so would not face this sort of threat.

But when that failed to happen Lenin switched to the idea of revolution in
preindustrial nations, which would lack that military strength. He predicted
this would be safe for Russia because imperialism had run out of options and
would collapse in the great war, and then revolution in the advanced nations
would take place and protect Russia. And then when that failed to happen he
was stuck with socialism in one country, but decided to go ahead anyway, with
the predictable result that it came under military threat first from the
fascists and then the capitalist countries.

In the case of China and Cambodia, military threat was predictable from the
beginning.

So what is your scenario? Is it to wait around for the revolution to finally
takes place in the advanced nations? And what about Trotsky's argument that
Democratic centralism inevitably leads to dictatorship?

Also, since you defended Chomsky, does he ever directly discuss Marxism-
Leninism? My impression is that he is not one, and if that is the case why did
he think that M-L regimes might turn out good?

~~~
boomboomsubban
>And then when that failed to happen he was stuck with socialism in one
country, but decided to go ahead anyway, with the predictable result that it
came under military threat first from the fascists and then the capitalist
countries

With Russia, within roughly a year every major player involved in WWI had
declared war on the Reds. Threats from the facists came much later, when I'd
argue the entire revolution was over.

In general though, Lenin's personal ambition had seemed to be his driving
force for most of his revolutionary career, which is why I'm skeptical of it's
ideal outcome as well.

>In the case of China and Cambodia, military threat was predictable from the
beginning

I agree, but I think the hostility from capitalist countries has an
overbearing influence on the kind of atrocity filled resulting states.

>Is it to wait around for the revolution to finally takes place in the
advanced nations?

I don't really support a violent revolution anywhere, and have moved into the
"slow change" side of revolution.

As for the rest, I also suspect that Democratic centralism is a flawed
premise, and view Lenin's disbanding of the soviets as proof he was aiming for
a dictatorship. As for Chomsky, I don't think he is one. This discussion was
how he doesn't think the revolution was wholly bad, as the propaganda makes it
out to be, but he was hardly praising it either. I'm not really sure why you
started this conversation about Marxism-Leninism if I'm honest.

~~~
woodandsteel
I started this discussion about Marxism-Leninism because I believe that
Marxist-Leninist countries invariably turn brutal, for various reasons (and
you seem to basically agree with me). That being the case, Chomsky should have
assumed from the beginning that reports that Cambodia was brutal were probably
accurate, and I assume he didn't because he has some mistaken ideological
beliefs. And that being the case people should not be defending him.

I think this is part of a much larger problem. I think everyone should have an
understanding of Marxism-Leninism and what is right or wrong about it. One of
many reasons everyone needs to understand Marxism-Leninism is that China
continues to be considerably influenced by it.

I am in my 70's, and it used to be a fair amount of the population had this
understanding, but nowadays very few people do. This has happened partly
because the left, both pro-and anti-communist, has basically stopped
explaining it to people. One consequence is mistakenly defending people like
Chomsky when they go wrong due to poor ideological understanding.

I think there are various reasons the left has stopped explaining Marxism-
Leninism, but I think it is very unfortunate and am angry at them for this,
and I take every opportunity to explain it, and in fact I am planning on
someday writing an article on it.

Let me add it's nice to talk to someone who understands these issues far
better than most people do.

~~~
boomboomsubban
>That being the case, Chomsky should have assumed from the beginning that
reports that Cambodia was brutal were probably accurate, and I assume he
didn't because he has some mistaken ideological beliefs

From Chomsky's viewpoint, the drop in population had two likely causes.
Cambodian atrocities, or the lingering effect from the known US
atrocities/possibly still ongoing ones. When the only reports pinning it on
Cambodia comes through refugee statements made to the US, Chomsky thought
independent verification was necessary.

As for the rest of your post, I've made myself clear that I'm not a proponent
of Leninism. That said, Marxism-Leninism never had the strong or lasting
influence you claim. It was used to foster the revolution, and then pulled out
for various political uses.

Any violence inherent in the ideology is shared by most revolutionary creeds.
During the nineteenth century, it was assumed that any "liberal" revolution
would also inevitably turn brutal as well.

And as for wanting the "left" to explain Marxism-Leninism, most of the left
experience the same twelve years of propaganda on the subject as the right. I
don't see this drastic difference between the sides.

~~~
woodandsteel
Thank you for replying. I think a lot about these issues, but I haven't really
talked with someone on the left about them.

Let me see if I understand what you are saying. First of all, I get the
impression you are a democratic socialist. Is that right? And I take it part
of the reason is that you see violent revolution as at least very often
leading to oppressive regimes. On that I agree.

Ok, now that being the case, I say Chomsky should have predicted this for
Cambodia, but he didn't. And that would seem to indicate that he disagreed
with people like you on the idea that violent revolution leads to oppression.

And if that is true, then I think people on the democratic left who respond to
Chomsky ought to make clear that he was wrong on the question of violent
revolution and oppression. But I have read lots of things by leftists about
Chomsky, and I don't think I have ever seen one that said that.

Maybe they are out there, but the left is sure not communicating this idea to
people in the public who don't read leftist literature, but do run across lots
of things by leftists in forums that reach a larger public.

So first let me ask you, am I right that Chomsky apparently disagrees with you
on the strong connection between violent revolution and political oppression?

And if I am, would agree you that when the democratic left is communicating
with the larger public about Chomsky, one of the things they should do is make
clear that he is wrong about this? And if you disagree, then why not?

~~~
boomboomsubban
Democratic socialist is probably broadly what I would be, but I don't have
much certainty on if it's the best choice, and I don't hold much stock in
those kinds of ideologies.

On Chomsky, no matter how certain you are that violent revolution will lead to
oppression, you need sufficient proof that it is happening before you condemn
the government. Chomsky had, in my mind, legitimate reason to doubt the
evidence coming through the US, and wanted independent verification. I doubt
he thought Cambodia would never do such things.

Even when a state is run by a terrible tyrant, that does not mean they are
guilty of every crime imaginable. Wanting sufficient proof of their misdeeds
before any potential punishment is sane. Waiting may cause more oppression,
but brazenly punishing may hurt more people overall.

To me, the Iraq War largely proves Chomsky's point. Hussein was a tyrant, and
as he had used weapons of mass destruction in the past there was plenty of
reason to suspect he had them. He did not have them though, and the Iraq War
has ruined millions of lives.

~~~
woodandsteel
Sorry I haven't responded. I've been busy. I plan to respond tomorrow

~~~
boomboomsubban
Going to add one more thing. I did a little research on what Chomsky's stated
position on violent revolution is, and he feels it should be a last resort
avoided if possible, as the welfare of the people often suffers. He generally
advocates against all forms of violence.

~~~
woodandsteel
That's good to know.

------
chinhodado
As a Vietnamese, one of the sad thing about this whole ordeal was how
Vietnam's involvement in this was viewed under a very negative light by the
world.

The year was 1978. Vietnam had just came out of the country's great war 3
years earlier, and was extremely exhausted to put it lightly. The last thing
it wanted was getting in another war. But it had no choice. The Khmer Rouge
crossed the Cambodian - Vietnamese border, looted nearby villages and
massacred the people. You can read up on the details, but be warned the
atrocities will ruin your day.

Under the circumstances which can be argued as an existential threat, Vietnam
had no choice but to launch attack on the Khmer Rouge and swiftly got rid of
them and liberated the Cambodian people, ending the genocide.

Yet the world's view on this has been incredibly negative. Even now, Vietnam
is often seen as the invader, the aggressor in the conflict instead of the
Cambodian people's liberator.

~~~
walrus01
I can tell you that from at least this Canadian's perspective, using military
force to eliminate the Khmer Rouge was no less necessary than using military
force to eliminate the Nazi control of Germany. I think you'll find that among
people who have extensively studied asian and southeast asian history and
military topics, it's almost universally agreed upon how evil their regime
was.

The full weight of the evidence for how many people they killed, which only
surfaced by the mid to late 1980s, only further reinforces this.

~~~
cryptonector
Mind you, the Vietnamese government went to war with the Khmer Rouge because
the latter attacked Vietnam, not because the killing fields became
unacceptable.

~~~
chinhodado
It's true, and it's sad but that's just how it works. Unless a country is
attacked, it's very hard to find justification to intervene in the internal
affairs of another country. That said, once war is inevitable, the atrocities
of the Khmer Rouge made Vietnam understand that such a regime cannot be
allowed to be left alone, both for the sake of the Vietnamese and Cambodian
people.

------
mr_overalls
I attended a university-based martial arts class in the late 1990s. A
somewhat-elderly Asian lady (probably mid-50's) began attending classes and
progressing through the ranks. She was kind of. . . well, a goofball.
Transgressive sort of humor. Made jokes about people's girlfriends. Laughed
through demos.

The only time I saw her utterly serious is when the instructor showed off some
knife-defense techniques he learned at a seminar. She got a weird look on her
face at the overly-styled techniques we were being show and very clearly said,
"We did it like this in Cambodia." She grabbed the rubber knife from the
sensei, seemingly teleported behind his back, clamped a hand over his mouth,
and drew the knife across his throat. "So they no hear any noise," she
explained. As a bunch of 20-something kids, we looked on in horror. She seemed
to remember herself and looked embarrassed. Left early from class and never
came back.

------
mdxchhcxdm
My parents survived this awful tragedy. They shared stories of how they dealt
with the intense hunger, exhaustion, and living in a state of perpetual
terror. More often, they'd speak of the family that were taken from them--
uncles, aunts, and grandparents that I'll never meet. My grandpa was a
musician that composed much of the popular Khmer music of the 60s influenced
by American rock. Nothing has been more devastating than not knowing the
whereabouts of loved ones. One of the most brutal legacies of the Khmer Rouge
is the separation and destruction of families and communities.

Through a DNA testing site, we recently matched with an unknown relative,
leading to a joyful reunion between my mom and an aunt who cared for her
before the war.

DNA analysis has helped identify the unknown remains of Pearl Harbor service
members[1], bringing closure for families. I'm certain this technology could
do the same for many Cambodian families.

[1] [https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/Recent-News-
Stories/Articl...](https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/Recent-News-
Stories/Article/2033698/update-on-pearl-harbor-identifications/)

~~~
hackerbabz
Sinn Sisamouth?

~~~
mdxchhcxdm
No, but he did compose songs for Sinn Sisamouth, who often brought sweets for
my mom whenever he visited their home in Phnom Penh.

------
walrus01
For anyone who hasn't seen it, I recommend watching The Killing Fields.
Obviously it's from a very British/American perspective. Since I doubt that
the film production companies that made it are earning much, if any revenue
from it these days, I don't feel bad about linking to a torrent of it:

[https://rarbg.to/torrent/cbm3x4z](https://rarbg.to/torrent/cbm3x4z)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Killing_Fields_(film)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Killing_Fields_\(film\))

~~~
anonAndOn
Highly recommended. Haing Ngor won the Best Supporting Academy Award for his
portrayal which also may have offended Pol Pot/the Khmer rouge enough to get
him killed. [0]

[0][https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haing_S._Ngor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haing_S._Ngor)

~~~
hutzlibu
"Defense attorneys suggested the murder was a politically motivated killing
carried out by sympathizers of the Khmer Rouge, but offered no evidence to
support this theory.[13] Kang Kek Iew, a former Khmer Rouge official on trial
in Cambodia, claimed in November 2009 that Ngor was murdered on Pol Pot's
orders, but U.S. investigators did not find him credible."

More likely just murder and theft, it seems.

~~~
anonAndOn
Selective quote, much? The very next sentence is,

"Some criticized the theory that Ngor was killed in a bungled robbery,
pointing to $2,900 in cash which had been left behind and the fact that the
thieves had not rifled his pockets."

~~~
hutzlibu
Nope, I just stopped reading there. But I still see no convincing link to the
red khmer.

------
snicker7
My grandfather was a victim (he was educated and a well-to-do farmer). They
beheaded him in front of the village. My mother and her family were forced to
watch and clap.

~~~
3131s
That's tragic.

My mother-in-law lost her parents and six siblings all on the same day... she
was the oldest and the only one to have moved out of the family home already.
She had also recently had a baby and lost the child, because she herself was
starving from the forced labor and could not produce breast milk.

------
at_a_remove
It's enlightening to contemplate the impact of such a thing, all the way out
to the song "Holiday in Cambodia." Imagine seeing a tree with a plaque on it
stating that this was the place where they used to smash infants' heads
against the trunk. They were always just one murder away from achieving
perfection, and in light of such a goal, what is a single life?

I was recently remarking to someone on their Year Zero, their willful
destruction of all that had gone before. Certainly we have seen it with ISIS
and Mao encouraged it for that revolution, but this was much more thorough.
Pagodas were turned into warehouses and statues were of course destroyed. It
certainly seem to be a common thread in communist revolutions: all that has
gone before must be destroyed.

Now I am going to see if I cannot find Spalding Gray's _Swimming to Cambodia_.

~~~
kikokikokiko
History is a series of bad remakes that should never have been made. The US
seem to be going on a very good direction, toppling Washington and Jefferson's
statues lately.

~~~
ipnon
I take the Spike Lee approach, if people are going to violently vent their
anger its better they destroy some object than end someones life. We can
always make another statue.

~~~
virtuous_signal
I'm not really sure anger or violence works that way. Some would say that
tolerating violence leads to more, or more severe violence.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory)

------
femiagbabiaka
So much of the tragedy of our times has been along those lines. Reading this
book (amongst others) about the atrocities committed in service of the British
idea of utopia in India evoked similar feelings:
[https://www.amazon.com/Inglorious-Empire-What-British-
India/...](https://www.amazon.com/Inglorious-Empire-What-British-
India/dp/1849048088).

In comparison, the turn towards soft power in the 21st century on the macro
(political) and micro (personal) levels is much appreciated, despite all of
its ills.

~~~
growlist
Any particular reason you chose that example?

~~~
blaser-waffle
Flog their book, push propaganda, or just someone projecting their feelings
about a topic that is tangentially related to the main thread.

HN is targeted by agi-prop and marketing as much as any other social media
site.

~~~
femiagbabiaka
Please forward the list of acceptable books to discuss on HN so I can comply
with it! I'm guessing Elad Gil, Peter Thiel... what else?

------
1MachineElf
My fianceé's mother was one of those children who was seperated from her
parents in Cambodia during this time. What became of them is unknown, but it
could have been any of the gruesome fates covered by this exposé. I learned a
portion of the story from what she could share through tears, and thanks to
this article I now understand more.

Thanks for sharing. One day I will need to go there and see some of these
sites for myself.

------
sfpoet
I still get chills hearing about Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge. This article
struck me in a different way: the farmers vs urbanites. I never saw it this
way before.

~~~
refurb
The Khmer Rouge weren’t dumb. Pol Pot came from a wealthy family and was
educated at the top French-Cambodian schools.

Similar to the North Vietnamese massacre of 3,000 civilians during the Battle
of Hue, it’s the doctors, teachers, professors and other elite who have the
power to oppose you. The rural folks have little power or money to resist.

~~~
cpursley
Maybe I'm not so paranoid after all about the hints of a sort of cultural
revolution going on in the US.

~~~
pnw_hazor
Similar, to some of the stuff in the late 60's, America is being subjected to
a textbook Marxist action. However, instead of using economic class
stratification to sow societal collapse, Marxists are using race and identity.

However, I don't think they will succeed. If Trump loses the election, the
media narrative will flip and things will settle down fairly quickly. If Trump
wins the election, I think the weak-bonded BLM/Antifa/Black-bloc coalition
will breakdown too.

~~~
mirkules
It’s no coincidence this is happening now. The seeds of Marxism were planted
long before the Soviet Union died.

One of the most fascinating lectures by Yuri Bezmenov, a KGB defector,
described 30+ years ago exactly what the long-term plans of the USSR were. It
is eerie how much of it applies today:
[https://youtube.com/watch?v=1FElIhOh_KI](https://youtube.com/watch?v=1FElIhOh_KI)

------
phenkdo
This is a great "follow-up" documentary about the reporter investigating his
family's deaths and talking to Pol Pot's deputy "brother number 2" icymi

[https://enemiesofthepeoplemovie.com/](https://enemiesofthepeoplemovie.com/)

~~~
refurb
Holy god that trailer is chilling.

------
todaysAI
I'm sorry I read about S-21 years ago because it stays with me to this day due
to one thing: the lack of mercy.

It somehow compels me to go see it even though I have resisted the idea. I
know I will one day.

------
aaron695
I think by far the best documentary on Cambodia is -

The Cambodian Space Project: Not Easy Rock'n'Roll (2015)
[https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4678238/](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4678238/)

It ties the past to the present and it doesn't bring the whole country to that
one incident but also acknowledges it has affected so much.

~~~
sleepyhead
Oh didn’t know there was a documentary, will check it out. I saw them do a
musical in Kampot which was very interesting. RIP Srey Thy, too early.

------
gus_massa
There is an interesting video about this in the "Rare Earth" channel
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUCiADFjQG0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUCiADFjQG0)
(He has a more videos about Cambodia.)

------
pnw_hazor
"In Washington, then-Representative Christopher Dodd of Connecticut averred:
``The greatest gift our country can give to the Cambodian people is peace, not
guns. And the best way to accomplish that goal is by ending military aid
now.''"

"In the news columns of The New York Times, the celebrated Sydney Schanberg
wrote of Cambodians that ``it is difficult to imagine how their lives could be
anything but better with the Americans gone.'' He dismissed predictions of
mass executions in the wake of a Khmer Rouge victory: ``It would be
tendentious to forecast such abnormal behavior as national policy under a
Communist government once the war is over.'' On April 13, 1975, Schanberg's
dispatch from Phnom Penh was headlined, ``Indochina without Americans: for
most, a better life.''"

[http://archive.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/...](http://archive.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/1998/04/30/american_leftists_were_pol_pots_cheerleaders/)

~~~
longtimegoogler
The irony is that many will say the same about the US invasion of Iraq and
removal of Saddam Hussain.

Often there are no easy answers. Did Dodd know the full extent of the Khmer
Rouge's crimes?

------
mc32
I hope this gets thoughtful discussion.

The events are very tragic. I know people whose families were in danger of
being sent to the camps —they escaped though laborious trudging through jungle
at night, escape to Vietnam and then HK as boat people before moving on to
better places.

How does idealism end up in such a dark ditch like this where your own
neighbor thinks the horror is so bad they have to go in a clean things up,
despite nominally being “on the same side”

~~~
1123581321
That is why critiquing and opposing bad ideas is important. Idealism and
altruism do not inherently improve or redeem goals or philosophies.

~~~
femiagbabiaka
agreed, authoritarianism is something we should leave in the 20th century.

------
ralfd
Funny, did you find that from the „notice the skulls“ reference in a certain
subreddit?

~~~
exolymph
Haha yes I did!

------
rado
Didn’t Kissinger’s atrocious bombing of Cambodia help pave way for the Khmer
Rouge?

~~~
ZeroGravitas
More than that, the Khmer Rouge were actively supported by the US.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegations_of_United_States...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegations_of_United_States_support_for_the_Khmer_Rouge)

~~~
refurb
Your article says “allegations”, but you’re stating it as fact.

~~~
truculent
It also has a section "Undisputed US support"

~~~
refurb
Which makes up about 5% of the claims and when you read it you’re like “ok,
they wanted the KR to keep their UN seat”.

------
geodel
Well that was then. This time we got it right.

------
botwriter
Before Covid I was living out in Phnom Penh. I adore Cambodia and its people
who are some of the friendliest people I've ever met in the world!

The Khmer Rouge were a mixture of Marxism and Khmer nationalism. Black lives
matter is a mixture of Marxism and Black nationalism...

It's very apt to have this article here. I'll always challenge Marxism because
I've seem the results and what it does to people. My landlord was a child
solider his mother a lovely elderly women who's only English was "hello" with
a very toothless grin. But if children walked past she would go silent because
when the Khmer rouge were in power if children heard you say anything which
could be construed as wrong you'd be murdered.

The Khmer don't talk of post traumatic stress they call it 'broken courage'.

I've met so many people who's parents did amazing things. My ex girlfriends
grandfather fled to Thailand as he was a teacher and considered educated. Her
father worked the field during the Khmer rouge period afterwards who got an
education where he could and put himself through medical school and became a
doctor. He's one of the most incredible people I've ever met. My ex keeps a
picture of him in her purse on the back in written my hero my father.

You do walk around and see old people and the thought does wonder in your mind
are you a victim of genocide or a war criminal. The Khmer have forgiven though
and should be an inspiration to us all.

Black lives matter terrifies me because I look back in history and I've seen
what racial Marxism does!

~~~
kls
They will argue that true communism has not been given it's fair shake, the US
intervention prevented it, and that this time they will get it right. They
could not package traditional communism in a palatable manner so the Marxist
went back to the drawing board and packaged it with social issues. Anytime the
government get's involved in social issues it becomes a mess, personal
liberties get infringed on and it turns out bad.

------
ZeroGravitas
Does this skip over any bits or did it really go from "royal hanger on learns
colonialism is bad in Paris" to "let's teach the kids how to torture people"
really quickly in reality?

~~~
cryptonector
[deleted]

~~~
dang
Please don't post generic ideological boilerplate to HN. An internet forum is
incapable of treating this material in any way other than predictable, tedious
flamewar.

[https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...](https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20generic%20ideolog&sort=byDate&type=comment)

------
zozbot234
Article is from (2016)

~~~
dang
Thanks! Added.

------
Jenz
> The Khmer Rouge believed that parents were tainted with capitalism, so they
> separated children from their parents, indoctrinated them in communism, and
> taught them torture methods with animals. Children were a “dictatorial
> instrument of the party” and were given leadership in torture and
> executions.

This sounds like it’s taken straight out of Orwells 1984.

~~~
notahacker
Wait until you read about the forced confession extraction in S-21 / Tuol
Sleng...

~~~
Jenz
I came back here in a hurry, having just read that part... where did they get
this from? Why on earth would they be interested in forcing ‘confessions’ out
of people, just to execute them later?

Maybe my initial comment should be that this _is_ taken out from [a book] that
both Orwell, and the Khmer Rouge has read; which book would this be?

~~~
refurb
It's not an uncommon tactic. Identify the people you want eliminated, force a
confession (whether true or not), then carry out "justice".

You're not opposed to justice are you?

------
peisistratos
The US tends to play word games to where they never armed the Taliban, Osama
bin Laden and al-Qaeda in the 1970s and 1980s.

In the same manner its easy to play word games to where after years of
screaming headlines about genocide (which I guess does not include the US
carpet bombing of Cambodia), as soon as the Khmer Rouge, whatever that is
supposed to be, gets pushed out of power in 1979, the US begins aiding the KR
in a myriad of ways, including in 1985 when it began somewhat openly, somewhat
clandestinely, arming the Khmer Rouge. ( This marks the start of the heavy
armament [https://www.nytimes.com/1985/04/10/world/u-s-may-
help-2-rebe...](https://www.nytimes.com/1985/04/10/world/u-s-may-help-2-rebel-
groups-of-cambodians.html) \- note all the denials that any of the arms are
going to the KR - later reports showed they indeed were).

It's kind of amusing to watch Americans in hysterics claiming a group is
committing genocide, then arming that group for victory in their civil war,
then going back to tearing their shirts about this genocide they claim
happened. If it happened, then the good old USA armed the KR after all the
period it supposedly happened.

~~~
drocer88
Do you have any evidence that the U.S. directly supported the Taliban or al-
Qaeda?

~~~
walrus01
They didn't, he's oversimplifying it greatly. The US armed the Mujahadeen
throughout the 1980s (through the Pakistani ISI and Pakistani state), leaving
behind a vast amount of unused weaponry in Afghanistan. This was during the
period prior to the soviet ground forces' withdrawal from Afghanistan and
prior to the ending of the Najibullah government, and the killing of
Najibullah.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammad_Najibullah](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammad_Najibullah)

It definitely is a fact that during the 1980s the US pursued a policy of "the
enemy of my enemy...", in which the hardcore fundamentalist/sharia law
politics and religious ideology of some of the mujahadeen they supported (Bin
Laden included), were seen as secondary or tertiary to the primary mission of
killing soviet soldiers, and bringing about the end of the soviet-backed
government.

 _Some_ of the former Muj, predominantly the very fundamentalist Pashtun
factions, later became the Taliban which seized Kandahar in 1994, and then
Kabul in 1996. At that point the US had not been supporting them for at least
4 years. After the Taliban became an actual "thing" the US shifted its support
to the northern alliance/northern warlords such as Dostum and Massoud.

------
dr_dshiv
Marx on the need for a dictatorship of the proletariat, 1850:

"When the Democrats propose measures which are not revolutionary, but merely
reformist, the workers must press them to the point of turning such measures
into direct attacks on private property; thus, for example, if the small
middle class propose to purchase the railways and factories the workers must
demand that such railways and factories, being the property of the
reactionaries, shall be simply confiscated by the State, without compensation.
If the Democrats propose a proportional tax, the workers must demand a
progressive tax; if the Democrats themselves declare for a moderate
progressive tax, the workers must insist on a tax so steeply graduated as to
cause the collapse of large fortunes; if the Democrats demand the regulation
of the State debt, the workers must demand State bankruptcy.

Thus the demands of the workers must everywhere be directed against the
concessions and measures of the Democrats.... to concentrate as much power as
possible in the hands of the State. They need not be misled by democratic
platitudes about the freedom of the Communes, self-determination, etc. Their
battle-cry must be ‘the revolution in permanence.’”

~~~
EarthIsHome
The phrase "Dictatorship of the Proletariat" used to trip me up. It is the
will of the people: a true democracy.

As much as we call what we have a "democracy", we don't live in one; it's an
illusion. What we have is a Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie that ignores the
masses.

~~~
rumanator
> What we have is a Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie that ignores the masses.

Sounds like you've lost yourself in your wordplay. Where you draw the line
between your "masses" and your "bourgeoise"?

~~~
ipnon
And this tended to be the beginnings of violence in communist revolutions. It
typically ends when the distinction between proletariat and bourgeoise
dissolves into revolutionary and imperialist or party member and non-party
member.

Take China for example. The country became relatively peaceful internally once
it became acceptable to merely not oppose the communist party, compared to the
"revolutionary times" of the civil war and cultural revolution.

I feel like good research on how and why revolutions arise, communist ones
specifically, is lacking. We do not understand their initial conditions. Maybe
we must turn to Marxists or communists directly for this understanding.

