The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979...
-
Upload
virginia-perr -
Category
Documents
-
view
218 -
download
1
Transcript of The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979...
![Page 1: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/1.jpg)
The Killing Fields of Cambodia
![Page 2: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/2.jpg)
• The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979
• They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings of the 20th Century
![Page 3: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/3.jpg)
• The Khmer Rouge had its origins in the 1960s, as the armed wing of the Communist Party of Kampuchea - the name the Communists used for Cambodia
• Based in remote jungle and mountain areas in the north-east of the country, the group initially made little headway
![Page 4: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/4.jpg)
• But after a right-wing military coup toppled head of state Prince Norodom Sihanouk in 1970, the Khmer Rouge entered into a political coalition with him and began to attract increasing support
• In a civil war that continued for nearly five years, the Khmer Rouge gradually increased its control in the countryside
• Khmer Rouge forces finally took over the capital, Phnom Penh, and therefore the nation as a whole in 1975
![Page 5: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/5.jpg)
• On April 17, 1975, victorious Khmer Rouge troops entered the capital, Phnom Penh, of Cambodia
• The Khmer Rouge were enthusiastically greeted as they entered the capital
• Yet the Khmer Rouge were embittered after years of fighting the brutal civil war and years of American bombing
![Page 6: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/6.jpg)
• Khmer Rouge soldiers marched into Phnom Penh with icy stares carved into their faces
![Page 7: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/7.jpg)
• Pol Pot was the leader of the Khmer Rouge
• During his time in the remote northeast, Pol Pot had been influenced by the hill tribes
• He respected their self-sufficiency, communal living, no use for money, and being “untainted” by Buddhism
![Page 8: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/8.jpg)
• Under directives from Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge began to order the people to abandon their homes in Phnom Penh
• Pol Pot believed that an ideal communist society was a society where all people lived and worked in the countryside as peasants
• Peasants, in fact, were the Khmer Rouge communist ideal
![Page 9: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/9.jpg)
• The Khmer Rouge felt that some people had made an active choice to live in cities and as city dwellers had declared their allegiance to capitalism
• All city dwellers were enemies of the new communist state
![Page 10: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/10.jpg)
• Pol Pot also developed a “four-year plan” in which Cambodians were expected to produce an average national yield of 3 metric tons of rice per hectare (1.4 tons per acre)
• But even in peacetime years, the average national yield was only one metric ton of rice per hectare
![Page 11: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/11.jpg)
• To meet these new demands on rice production, the Khmer Rouge enforced strict policies where workers labored in fields for 12 hours a day without adequate rest or food
![Page 12: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/12.jpg)
• Many people lacked any experience in manual labor and became ill and died
![Page 13: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/13.jpg)
“Keeping new people [city dwellers] is no benefit,” so the Khmer Rouge slogan went; “Losing them is no loss.”
![Page 14: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/14.jpg)
• Foraging for food was a capital offense, despite the fact that the food allowance was so low, hundreds of thousands of people starved to death
![Page 15: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/15.jpg)
• In addition, new rules in Kampuchea were being imposed by Angka (“The Organization”), a secretive team of Khmer Rouge leaders
• Angka banned family relationships and often took advantage of children
• Young children were seen as being pure and untainted by capitalism or family and thus, trained as informers for the new state and future Khmer Rouge soldiers
![Page 16: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/16.jpg)
• If a Cambodian spoke French, was educated, wore glasses, or practiced Buddhism; he was killed
• Families with connections to previous Cambodian governments were susceptible to ill treatment; while former soldiers and civil servants executed
![Page 17: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/17.jpg)
• Among the Khmer Rouge’s rules; religion, money, and private ownership were banned
• Communications with outside world was eliminated
• Families were dismantled
![Page 18: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/18.jpg)
• Yes, Pol Pot said that 2000 years of Cambodian history had now come to an end
• On April 17, 1975, the Year Zero was declared in Cambodia
• The country was renamed the Democratic Kampuchea (DK)
![Page 19: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/19.jpg)
• Pol Pot isolated people from the rest of world and set about emptying cities, abolishing money, private property, religion, and setting up rural collectives
![Page 20: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/20.jpg)
• The Khmer Rouge government was finally overthrown in 1979 by invading Vietnamese troops, after a series of violent border confrontations
![Page 21: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/21.jpg)
• While both Vietnamese and Cambodian communist forces grudgingly supported each other as they fought U.S.-backed forces in South Vietnam and Cambodia during the Vietnam War, ethnic animosities prevented them from developing any lasting bonds
![Page 22: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/22.jpg)
• The Khmer Rouge received support from China, Vietnam's rival to north, while the Vietnamese were assisted by U.S.S.R., which competed with China
![Page 23: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/23.jpg)
• By January 7, 1979, Vietnamese forces successfully occupied Phnom Penh
![Page 24: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/24.jpg)
• Vietnamese soldiers were shocked to see that Cambodia was pockmarked by sunken depressions of dirt
• The depressions marked the spots of mass graves: of hundreds of thousands of Cambodians slaughtered by their own countrymen (the Killing Fields)
![Page 25: The Killing Fields of Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge were the ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 They were responsible for one of the worst mass killings.](https://reader037.fdocuments.net/reader037/viewer/2022110320/56649c9b5503460f949587ba/html5/thumbnails/25.jpg)
• Pol Pot was denounced by his former comrades in a show trial in July 1997, and sentenced to house arrest in his jungle home
• Less than a year later he was dead - denying the millions of people who were affected by this brutal regime the chance to bring him to justice