Allegations of United States support for the Khmer Rouge

Last updated

The United States (U.S.) voted for the Khmer Rouge and the Khmer Rouge-dominated Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea (CGDK) to retain Cambodia's United Nations (UN) seat until as late as 1993, long after the Khmer Rouge had been mostly deposed by Vietnam during the 1979 Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia and ruled just a small part of the country. It has also been reported that the U.S. encouraged the government of China to provide military support for the Khmer Rouge. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] There have also been related allegations by several sources, notably Michael Haas, which claim that the U.S. directly armed the Khmer Rouge in order to weaken the influence of Vietnam and the Soviet Union in Southeast Asia. These allegations have been disputed by the U.S. government and by journalist Nate Thayer, who argued that little, if any, American aid actually reached the Khmer Rouge. Academic scholar Peter Maguire writes that the U.S. "gave $85 million to the Khmer Rouge between 1980 and 1986," roughly half of which occurred "during the crucial years of 1979 and 1980". [7]

Contents

Background

Khmer Rouge in power

The Khmer Rouge, the communist party led by Pol Pot, came to power in 1975 during the Cambodian Civil War, which was linked to the Vietnam War. They defeated the Khmer Republic, who were heavily supported by the U.S., including a massive bombing campaign against the Khmer Rouge until 1973. North Vietnam, who had many soldiers in Cambodia, and China were the primary backers of the Khmer Rouge during the civil war. Between 1975 and 1979, the Khmer Rouge perpetrated the Cambodian genocide, which killed between 1.5 and 2 million people, nearly 25% of Cambodia's population. [8] During the genocide, China was the main international patron of the Khmer Rouge, supplying "more than 15,000 military advisers" and most of its external aid. [9]

Vietnamese invasion

Vietnam invaded Cambodia in late 1978 and established the People's Republic of Kampuchea (PRK) led by Khmer Rouge defectors. [10] [11] Vietnam's invasion was motivated by repeated cross-border attacks by the Khmer Rouge that targeted Vietnamese civilians, including the Ba Chúc massacre—in which the Khmer Rouge systematically killed the entire population of a Vietnamese village of over 3,000 people, with the exception of one woman who survived being shot in the neck and clubbed, causing her to suffer painful headaches for the rest of her life; before being killed, many of the victims were "barbarously tortured". [12] These attacks killed over 30,000 Vietnamese in total. [13]

Vietnam ousted the Khmer Rouge and ended the genocide in a mere 17 days, and Vietnamese troops occupied Cambodia for the next eleven years. [11] Following the invasion, Vietnam attempted to publicize the crimes of the Khmer Rouge, establishing an ossuary for the victims at Ba Chúc and convincing the PRK to do the same for the Khmer Rouge's Cambodian victims; the Khmer Rouge's most notorious prison, S-21—which held 20,000 prisoners, "all but seven" of whom were killed—was revealed in May 1979 and eventually turned into the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, although there were well over 150 Khmer Rouge death camps "on the same model, at least one per district". [12] [14] [15]

To punish Vietnam for overthrowing the Khmer Rouge, China invaded Vietnam in February 1979, while the United States (U.S.) "merely slapped more sanctions on Vietnam" and "blocked loans from the International Monetary Fund [(IMF)] to Vietnam". [16] [17]

After the 1991 Paris Peace Accords, Thailand continued to allow the Khmer Rouge "to trade and move across the Thai border to sustain their activities [...] although international criticism, particularly from the U.S. and Australia  [...] caused it to disavow passing any direct military support". [18]

Cambodia's UN seat

As a result of Chinese and Western opposition to the Vietnamese invasion and occupation of Cambodia, the Khmer Rouge, rather than the PRK, was allowed to hold Cambodia's United Nations (UN) seat until 1982. After 1982, the UN seat was filled by a Khmer Rouge-dominated coalition—the Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea (CGDK). [4] [5] Owing to Chinese, U.S., and Western support, the Khmer Rouge-dominated CGDK held Cambodia's UN seat until 1993. [19] [20] [21]

U.S. diplomatic support

According to journalist Elizabeth Becker, former U.S. National Security Advisor (NSA) Zbigniew Brzezinski "claims that he concocted the idea of persuading Thailand to cooperate fully with China in its efforts to rebuild the Khmer Rouge. In the spring of 1979, Brzezinski says, he used the visit of Thailand's foreign minister to press forward his plans." In 1998, in an open letter to The New York Times, Brzezinski stated: "The Chinese were aiding Pol Pot, but without any help or arrangement from the United States. Moreover, we told the Chinese explicitly that in our view Pol Pot was an abomination and that the United States would have nothing to do with him—directly or indirectly." [22] However, in 1980 Brzezinski said that "I encouraged the Chinese to support Pol Pot. I encouraged the Thai to help the [Khmer Rouge] [...] we could never support [Pol Pot] but China could." [23] [24] [25] In Brzezinski's obituary published in The New York Times after his death in 2017, he was described as "tacitly encouraging" China's backing of the Khmer Rouge. [26] China trained Khmer Rouge soldiers on its soil during 1979–1986 (if not later), "stationed military advisers with Khmer Rouge troops as late as 1990", [4] and "supplied at least $1 billion in military aid" during the 1980s. [27]

In November 1975, U.S. National Security Advisor and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger told the Thai foreign minister: "You should tell the Cambodians that we will be friends with them. They are murderous thugs but we won't let that stand in our way." [28] In a 1998 interview, Kissinger said: "some countries, the Chinese in particular supported Pol Pot as a counterweight to the Vietnamese supported people and We at least tolerated it." Kissinger said he didn't approve of this due to the genocide and said he "would not have dealt with Pol Pot for any purpose whatsoever." He further said: "The Thais and the Chinese did not want a Vietnamese-dominated Indochina. We didn't want the Vietnamese to dominate. I don't believe we did anything for Pol Pot. But I suspect we closed our eyes when some others did something for Pol Pot." [29]

Cambodian leader Norodom Sihanouk, when asked about charges of opportunism in May 1987 ("your critics would say [...] that you would sleep with the Devil to achieve your end"), replied: "As far as devils are concerned, the U.S.A. also supports the Khmer Rouge. Even before the forming of the Coalition Government in 1982, the U.S. each year voted in favor of the Khmer Rouge regime. [...] The U.S.A. says that it is against the Khmer Rouge, that it is pro-Sihanouk, pro-Son Sann. But the devils, they are there [laughs] with Sihanouk and Son Sann." [30]

Allegations of U.S. military support

According to Tom Fawthrop, U.S. support for the Khmer Rouge guerrillas in the 1980s was "pivotal" to keeping the organization alive, and was in part motivated by revenge over the U.S. defeat during the Vietnam War. [31] A WikiLeaks dump of 500,000 U.S. diplomatic cables from 1978 shows that the administration of President Jimmy Carter was torn between revulsion at the atrocities of the Khmer Rouge and concern with the possibility of growing Vietnamese influence should the Khmer Rouge collapse. [32]

According to Michael Haas, despite publicly condemning the Khmer Rouge, the U.S. offered military support to the organization and was instrumental in preventing UN recognition of the Vietnam-aligned government. [33] Haas argued that the U.S. and China responded to efforts from the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) for disarming the Khmer Rouge by ensuring the Khmer Rouge stayed armed, and that U.S. efforts for merging the Khmer Rouge with allied factions resulted in the formation of the CGDK. After 1982, the U.S. increased its annual covert aid to the Cambodian resistance from $4 million to $10 million. [34] Haas's account is corroborated by Singaporean diplomat Bilahari Kausikan, who recalled: "ASEAN wanted elections but the U.S. supported the return of a genocidal regime. Did any of you imagine that the U.S. once had in effect supported genocide?" Kausikan described the disagreement between the U.S. and ASEAN over the Khmer Rouge as reaching the threshold that the U.S. threatened Singapore with "blood on the floor". [35]

Academic scholar Peter Maguire writes that the U.S. "gave $85 million to the Khmer Rouge between 1980 and 1986," roughly half of which occurred "during the crucial years of 1979 and 1980". [7]

By contrast, Nate Thayer recounted that "The United States has scrupulously avoided any direct involvement in aiding the Khmer Rouge", instead providing non-lethal aid to non-communist Khmer People's National Liberation Front (KPNLF) and Armee Nationale Sihanouk (ANS) insurgents, which rarely cooperated with the Khmer Rouge on the battlefield, despite being coalition partners, and which fought with the Khmer Rouge dozens of times prior to 1987. According to Thayer, "In months spent in areas controlled by the three resistance groups and during scores of encounters with the Khmer Rouge [...] I never once encountered aid given to the [non-communist resistance] in use by or in possession of the Khmer Rouge." [36]

State Department investigation

Although U.S. policy was to provide support to "15,000 ineffective 'noncommunist' rebel fighters", Joel Brinkley stated that "charges made the rounds that some of the American aid, $215 million so far, was finding its way to the Khmer Rouge". A subsequent investigation led by Thomas Fingar of the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) "found some leakage—including sharing of ammunition, joint defense of a bridge, and using one truck to transport both 'noncommunist' and Khmer Rouge fighters to a fight." Fingar was dismissive of his own investigators' report, which he characterized as an "epiphenomenon in a flea circus": "Isn't the larger objective here defeating the Vietnamese puppets in Phnom Penh?" [37]

See also

Related Research Articles

The history of Cambodia, a country in mainland Southeast Asia, can be traced back to Indian civilization. Detailed records of a political structure on the territory of what is now Cambodia first appear in Chinese annals in reference to Funan, a polity that encompassed the southernmost part of the Indochinese peninsula during the 1st to 6th centuries. Centered at the lower Mekong, Funan is noted as the oldest regional Hindu culture, which suggests prolonged socio-economic interaction with maritime trading partners of the Indosphere in the west. By the 6th century a civilization, called Chenla or Zhenla in Chinese annals, firmly replaced Funan, as it controlled larger, more undulating areas of Indochina and maintained more than a singular centre of power.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Khmer Rouge</span> Members of the Communist Party of Kampuchea

The Khmer Rouge is the name that was popularly given to members of the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK) and by extension to the Democratic Kampuchea through which the CPK ruled Cambodia between 1975 and 1979. The name was coined in the 1960s by Norodom Sihanouk to describe his country's heterogeneous, communist-led dissidents, with whom he allied after the 1970 Cambodian coup d'état.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pol Pot</span> Cambodian communist leader (1925–1998)

Pol Pot was a Cambodian revolutionary, politician and dictator who ruled Cambodia as Prime Minister of Democratic Kampuchea between 1976 and 1979. Ideologically a Maoist and a Khmer ethnonationalist, Pot was a leader of Cambodia's Communist movement, known as the Khmer Rouge, from 1963 to 1997. He served as General Secretary of the Communist Party of Kampuchea from 1963 to 1981, during which Cambodia was converted into a one-party state. Between 1975 and 1979, Pot perpetrated the Cambodian genocide, in which an estimated 1.5–2 million people died—approximately one-quarter of the country's pre-genocide population. In December 1978, Vietnam invaded Cambodia to remove the Khmer Rouge from power. Within two weeks, Vietnamese forces occupied most of the country, ending the genocide and establishing a new Cambodian government, with the Khmer Rouge restricted to the rural hinterlands in the western part of the country.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cambodian Civil War</span> 1970–1975 conflict

The Cambodian Civil War was a civil war in Cambodia fought between the forces of the Communist Party of Kampuchea against the government forces of the Kingdom of Cambodia and, after October 1970, the Khmer Republic, which had succeeded the kingdom after a coup.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ieng Sary</span> Co-founder and senior member of the Khmer Rouge

Ieng Sary was the co-founder and senior member of the Khmer Rouge and one of the main architects of the Cambodian Genocide. He was a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Kampuchea led by Pol Pot and served in the 1975–79 government of Democratic Kampuchea as foreign minister and deputy prime minister. He was known as "Brother Number Three", as he was third in command after Pol Pot and Nuon Chea. His wife, Ieng Thirith, served in the Khmer Rouge government as social affairs minister. Ieng Sary was arrested in 2007 and was charged with crimes against humanity but died of heart failure before the case against him could be brought to a verdict.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cambodian–Vietnamese War</span> 1977–1991 conflict

The Cambodian–Vietnamese War was an armed conflict between Democratic Kampuchea, controlled by Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge, and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. The war began with repeated attacks by the Kampuchea Revolutionary Army on the southwestern border of Vietnam, particularly the Ba Chúc massacre which resulted in the deaths of over 3,000 Vietnamese civilians. On 23 December 1978, 10 out of 19 of the Khmer Rouge's military divisions opened fire along the border with Vietnam with the goal of invading the Vietnamese provinces of Đồng Tháp, An Giang and Kiên Giang. On 25 December 1978, Vietnam launched a full-scale invasion of Kampuchea, occupying the country in two weeks and removing the government of the Communist Party of Kampuchea from power. In doing so, Vietnam put an ultimate stop to the Cambodian genocide, which had most likely killed between 1.2 million and 2.8 million people — or between 13 and 30 percent of the country’s population. On 7 January 1979, the Vietnamese captured Phnom Penh, which forced Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge to retreat back into the jungle near the border with Thailand.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nuon Chea</span> Cambodian politician and war criminal (1926–2019)

Nuon Chea, also known as Long Bunruot or Rungloet Laodi, was a Cambodian communist politician and revolutionary who was the chief ideologist of the Khmer Rouge. He also briefly served as acting Prime Minister of Democratic Kampuchea. He was commonly known as "Brother Number Two", as he was second-in-command to Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, General Secretary of the Party, during the Cambodian genocide of 1975–1979. In 2014, Nuon Chea received a life sentence for crimes against humanity, alongside another top-tier Khmer Rouge leader, Khieu Samphan, and a further trial convicted him of genocide in 2018. These life sentences were merged into a single life sentence by the Trial Chamber on 16 November 2018. He died while serving his sentence in 2019.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Khmer People's National Liberation Front</span> Political party

The Khmer People's National Liberation Front was a political front organized in 1979 in opposition to the Vietnamese-installed People's Republic of Kampuchea (PRK) regime in Cambodia. The 200,000 Vietnamese troops supporting the PRK, as well as Khmer Rouge defectors, had ousted the Democratic Kampuchea regime of Pol Pot, and were initially welcomed by the majority of Cambodians as liberators. Some Khmer, though, recalled the two countries' historical rivalry and feared that the Vietnamese would attempt to subjugate the country, and began to oppose their military presence. Members of the KPNLF supported this view.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea</span> Cambodian government in exile (1982–1992)

The Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea, renamed in 1990 to the National Government of Cambodia, was a coalition government in exile composed of three Cambodian political factions, namely Prince Norodom Sihanouk's FUNCINPEC party, the Party of Democratic Kampuchea and the Khmer People's National Liberation Front (KPNLF) formed in 1982, broadening the de facto deposed Democratic Kampuchea regime. For most of its existence, it was the internationally recognized government of Cambodia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Khmer Serei</span> Rebel movement in Cambodia

The Khmer Serei were an anti-communist and anti-monarchist guerrilla force founded by Cambodian nationalist Son Ngoc Thanh. In 1959, he published 'The Manifesto of the Khmer Serei' claiming that Sihanouk was supporting the 'communization' of Kampuchea. In the 1960s, the Khmer Serei were growing in numbers, hoping to become a major political and fighting force.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Democratic Kampuchea</span> 1975–1979 state in Southeast Asia

Democratic Kampuchea was the official name of the Cambodian state from 1976 to 1979, under the totalitarian dictatorship of Pol Pot and the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK), commonly known as the Khmer Rouge. The Khmer Rouge's capture of the capital Phnom Penh in 1975 effectively ended the United States-backed Khmer Republic of Lon Nol.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">People's Republic of Kampuchea</span> Cambodian communist regime (1979–1989)

The People's Republic of Kampuchea (PRK) was a partially recognised state in Southeast Asia which existed from 1979 to 1989. It was a satellite state of Vietnam, founded in Cambodia by the Vietnamese-backed Kampuchean United Front for National Salvation, a group of Cambodian communists who were dissatisfied with the Khmer Rouge due to its oppressive rule and defected from it after the overthrow of Democratic Kampuchea, Pol Pot's government. Brought about by an invasion from Vietnam, which routed the Khmer Rouge armies, it had Vietnam and the Soviet Union as its main allies.

The Central Intelligence Agency of the United States conducted secret operations in Cambodia and in Laos for eight years as part of the conflict against Communist North Vietnam.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">GRUNK</span> Government-in-exile of Cambodia (1970–1976)

The Royal Government of National Union of Kampuchea was a government-in-exile of Cambodia, based in Beijing and Hong Kong, that was in existence between 1970 and 1976, and was briefly in control of the country starting from 1975.

General Sak Sutsakhan was a Cambodian politician and soldier who had a long career in the country's politics. He was the last Head of State of the Khmer Republic, the regime overthrown by the Khmer Rouge in 1975. Sak Sutsakhan formed a pro-US force known as the Khmer Sâ. As a businessman, Sak Sutsakhan notably owned a Dairy Queen franchise in Anaheim, California.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Communist Party of Kampuchea</span> Ruling party of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979

The Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK), also known as the Khmer Communist Party, was a communist party in Cambodia. Its leader was Pol Pot, and its members were generally known as the Khmer Rouge. Originally founded in 1951, the party was split into pro-Chinese and pro-Soviet factions as a result of the Sino–Soviet split with the former being the Pol Pot faction, and the latter adopting a more revisionist approach to Marxism. As such, it claimed that 30 September 1960 was its founding date; it was named the Workers' Party of Kampuchea before it was renamed the Communist Party in 1966.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cambodian genocide denial</span> Early skepticism in Khmer Rouge atrocities

Cambodian genocide denial is the belief expressed by some academics that early claims of atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge government (1975–1979) in Cambodia were much exaggerated. Many scholars of Cambodia and intellectuals opposed to the US involvement in the Vietnam War denied or minimized reports of human rights abuses of the Khmer Rouge, characterizing contrary reports as "tales told by refugees" and US propaganda. They viewed the assumption of power by the Communist Party of Kampuchea as a positive development for the people of Cambodia who had been severely impacted by the Vietnam War and the Cambodian Civil War. On the other side of the argument, anti-communists in the United States and elsewhere saw in the rule of the Khmer Rouge vindication of their belief that the victory of Communist governments in Southeast Asia would lead to a "bloodbath."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cambodian genocide</span> 1975–1979 mass killing of Cambodians by the Khmer Rouge

The Cambodian genocide was the systematic persecution and killing of Cambodian citizens by the Khmer Rouge under the leadership of Prime Minister of Democratic Kampuchea, Pol Pot. It resulted in the deaths of 1.5 to 2 million people from 1975 to 1979, nearly 25% of Cambodia's population in 1975.

So Phim was a leader of the Khmer Issarak movement, the third-rank official of the Permanent Bureau and of the Military Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Kampuchea, deputy head of the People's National Liberation Armed Forces of Kampuchea, and secretary of East Zone of the Democratic Kampuchea of the Khmer Rouge, until he refused to apply the Cambodian genocide designed by Pol Pot and his comrades, a refusal that led to his own suicide in June 1978.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cambodian conflict (1979–1998)</span> 1979-1998 Armed Conflict in Cambodia.

The Cambodian conflict, also known as the Khmer Rouge insurgency, was an armed conflict that began in 1979 when the Khmer Rouge government of Democratic Kampuchea was deposed during the Cambodian-Vietnamese War. The war concluded in 1999 when remaining Khmer Rouge forces surrendered. Between 1979 and the 1991 Paris Peace Agreements, it was fought between the Vietnam-supported People's Republic of Kampuchea and an opposing coalition. After 1991, the unrecognized Khmer Rouge government and insurgent forces continued to fight against the new government of Cambodia from remote areas until their defeat in 1999.

References

Citations

  1. Becker, Elizabeth (1998-04-17). "Death of Pol Pot: The Diplomacy; Pol Pot's End Won't Stop U.S. Pursuit of His Circle". The New York Times . cf. Lewis, Daniel (2017-05-26). "Zbigniew Brzezinski, National Security Advisor to President Jimmy Carter, Dies at 89". The New York Times .
  2. Brzezinski, Zbigniew (1998-04-22). "Pol Pot's Evil Had Many Faces; China Acted Alone". The New York Times .
  3. Hodgson, Godfrey (2017-05-28). "Zbigniew Brzezinski obituary". The Guardian .
  4. 1 2 3 PoKempner 1995, p.  106.
  5. 1 2 SarDesai 1998, p.  163.
  6. Beachler, Donald (2016-09-05). "How the West Missed the Horrors of Cambodia". The Daily Beast . Retrieved 2017-07-16.
  7. 1 2 Maguire 2005, p. 70.
  8. Locard 2005, p. 121.
  9. Kurlantzick 2008, p.  193.
  10. Brinkley 2011, p.  56.
  11. 1 2 SarDesai 1998, pp.  161163.
  12. 1 2 Pringle, James (2004-01-07). "MEANWHILE: When the Khmer Rouge came to kill in Vietnam". The New York Times . Retrieved 2017-07-21.
  13. Haas 1991, p. 13.
  14. Locard 2005, p. 134.
  15. Kiernan 2014, pp.  464465.
  16. SarDesai 1998, pp.  162163.
  17. Brinkley 2011, pp.  5152.
  18. PoKempner 1995, pp.  107108.
  19. Oberdorfer, Don (15 September 1980). "U.S. to Support Pol Pot Regime For U.N. Seat". The Washington Post .
  20. "#KYR: Cambodia - Special Issue". The Cove via Australian Army.
  21. Rungswasdisab, Puangthong. "Thailand's Response to the Cambodian Genocide". MacMillan Center for International and Area Studies at Yale University.
  22. Brzezinski, Zbigniew (1998-04-22). "Pol Pot's Evil Had Many Faces; China Acted Alone". The New York Times . Retrieved 2017-07-12.
  23. Maguire 2005, pp. 70, 209.
  24. Becker 1986, p.  440.
  25. Becker, Elizabeth (1998-04-17). "Death of Pol Pot: The Diplomacy; Pol Pot's End Won't Stop U.S. Pursuit of His Circle". The New York Times . Retrieved 2017-07-12.
  26. Lewis, Daniel (2017-05-26). "Zbigniew Brzezinski, National Security Advisor to President Jimmy Carter, Dies at 89". The New York Times . Retrieved 2017-07-12.
  27. Brinkley 2011, pp.  6465.
  28. Ben Kiernan, "The Pol Pot Regime: Race, Power and Genocide under the Khmer Rouge (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2003), xi, note 3
  29. "Henry Kissinger on Pol Pot". Charlie Rose YouTube Channel. 2007-08-27. Retrieved 2017-07-16.Event occurs from 11:14 to 12:35.
  30. Weiner, Debra (May 1987). "Playboy Interview: Prince Norodom Sihanouk". Playboy . 34 (5): 61–62, 74.
  31. Fawthrop 2004, p. 109.
  32. Parkinson, Charles; Cuddy, Alice; Pye, Daniel (May 29, 2015). "The Pol Pot dilemma". The Phnom Penh Post . Phnom Penh, Cambodia. Retrieved August 29, 2016.
  33. Haas 1991, pp. 17, 28–29.
  34. Haas 1991, p. 18.
  35. "S China Sea 'an existential issue to legitimise CCP rule'". Today . Singapore. March 31, 2016. Retrieved July 19, 2017.
  36. Thayer 1991, pp. 180, 187–189.
  37. Brinkley 2011, pp.  58, 65.

Sources