Cambodian Genocide Essay”What is rotten must be removed”When: 1975-1979v1925: Pol Pot (Saloth Sar) is born into a farming family in central Cambodiav1949: Pol Pot moves to Paris and becomes absorbed in Marxism (communism)v1953: Pol Pot returns to Cambodia and joins the underground Communist movementv1962: Pol Pot, now leader of the Cambodian Communist Party, is forced to flee into the jungle and forms the armed resistance movement against Prince Sihanouk, known as the Khmer Rouge and wages war on Sihanoukv1970: Prince Sihanouk is ousted by a U. S. military coup and joins Pol Pot’s group in opposing the new military governmentv1970: U. S. invasion of Cambodian border occupied by the North Vietnamese, forces the Vietnamese deeper into the jungle where they ally themselves with the Khemer Rougev1969-1973: The U. S.
occasionally bombs North Vietnamese sanctuaries in eastern Cambodia, killing 150,000 Cambodian peasants, and hundreds of thousands of Cambodian peasants fled to Phnom Penh, Cambodia’s capitolvBy 1975: U. S. had withdrawn all troops from Vietnam and Cambodia lost its American military supportvApril 17, 1975: Seizing the opportunity in Cambodia’s disorganized government, Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge army marched into Phnom Penh and took control of CambodiavDecember 25, 1978: Vietnam launches a full-scale attack of Cambodia vJanuary 7, 1979: Phnom Penh falls and Pol Pot was deposed v1979-1996: Pol Pot retreats into Thailand with his Khmer Rouge and continues to attack a succession of Cambodian governmentsv1996: Pol Pot loses control of the Khmer Rouge vApril 1998: Pol Pot dies of a heart attack before he could be tried for the events of 1975-1979.Where: CambodiavCambodia in South East AsiavPol Pot renamed Cambodia the “Democratic Republic of Kampuchea” and instituted prisons and new provincial boundaries all over Cambodia, including the evacuation of Cambodia’s capital: Phnom Penh, and S-21: a secret prison operated by Pol Pot’s regime in Phnom Penh vVietnam: which attacked on the borders of Cambodia leading to the overthrow of Pol PotApplication of the United Nations Definition:Killing of members of the group:vDeadly purges to kill many target groupsv20,000 tortured and killed in Tuol SlengvPeople suspected of disloyalty were shot on sightv212,500 Chinese living in Cambodia perishedv20,000 killed on the evacuation of Phnom PenhCausing serious bodily or mental harmvPrisoners in the camps were beaten to submission so that they would not question authority and only workvImposed a harsh schedule on those who survived the march from the cities, so that the only thing they could think of was sleep, if they resisted while working, they were shotvIn camps, prisoners were tortured into false confessions of crimes and were beaten until they believed what they saidvTold that “whether or not you die is not of great significance”Inflicting on the group conditions of lifevForcibly evacuated all cities vMarch to the countryside, as many as 20,000 died along the wayvMillions forced into slave laborvAccustomed to city life, the Cambodians started to die from diet of one tin of rice every other day, 18 hours of work every day, one day of rest every 10 days, disease, malnutrition, and overwork, in Pol Pot’s “killing fields” Imposing measures to prevent births and Transferring children of the groupvPol Pot did not try to prevent births of the target groups, he tried to force births from the acceptable Cambodian populationvPol Pot forcibly took thousands of children from the cities, marry them in communals against their will, and force them to have children vThe women that were of the target groups had their children not old enough for reproduction killed brutallyDetermination of Target Group: Communist opposition, ethnic Vietnamese and Chinese, Buddhist monks, anyone of “the old society”vPol Pot said “What is rotten must be removed” and that 1975 was “year zero.” His idea of recreating society was to “purify” Cambodia by removing capitalism, western culture, city life, religion, and all foreign influences, in favor of peasant CommunismvThe educatedvThe wealthyvBuddhist monksvPolice, doctors, lawyers, teachers, former government officials and anyone else who had a position of authority or intelligence in CambodiavEx-soldiers and their familiesvAnyone suspected of disloyaltyvEthnic groups, the Vietnamese, Chinese, and Cham Muslims, and 20 other smaller groupsPolitical and Economic Motivation:vLeaders were oPol Pot, who was the leader of the Khmer Rouge and the person behind the genocideoTa Mok, known as “the butcher,” set up guerrilla stronghold in northern .
