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| Cambodian-Americans gathered at Middlesex Community College, in Lowell, Massachusetts, to talk about Khmer Rouge issues in August 2010. (Photo: Pin Sisovann, VOA Khmer) |
Men Kimseng, VOA Khmer | Washington
“I feel calmer now that I am now able to speak out and participate in other activities with other survivors. I am satisfied that this trial is taking place.”
More Cambodian-Americans will be seeking a place at Khmer Rouge tribunal hearings, with the help of a US-based organization.
The Center for Justice and Accountability is helping organize applications for victims of the regime who fled to the US but who have the right under tribunal rules to file grievances and applications to be witnesses.
A team from the center is now in Cambodia to help move the process along, as the court moves toward a trial of four top leaders.
Henry Chhon is among about a dozen Cambodian-Americans to have filed at the UN-backed court with the help of the center.
He was recently accepted as a participant in the court’s second case, to try senior leaders Nuon Chea, Khieu Samphan, Ieng Sary and Ieng Thirith.
“I am happy I was accepted,” Chhon said in an interview Wednesday.
A former soldier for the US-supported Lon Nol regime before the fall of Phnom Penh, Chhon said he was able to hide his past from the Khmer Rouge. His uncle, who had also been a Lon Nol soldier, was picked up by the regime and sent to a re-education camp, never to return.
His civil party application was originally denied by the court, but it was accepted on appeal and announced at a preliminary hearing Monday. He will be among nearly 1,700 other participants represented by lawyers in the court when a trial for the four leaders begins in earnest later this year.
“I feel calmer now that I am now able to speak out and participate in other activities with other survivors,” he said. “I am satisfied that this trial is taking place.”
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Editors: David Goldman, Erin Mahan
General Editor: Edward C. Keefer
United States Government Printing Office
Washington
Office of the Historian
Bureau of Public Affair
Press Release
Overview
During the period covered by this volume, July 1970–January 1972, the Nixon administration expanded the Vietnam war into Cambodia and Laos as part of its strategy. This volume covers South Vietnam in the context of this larger war in Southeast Asia; therefore, the volume begins in July 1970 in the aftermath of the Cambodian incursion. At the time, a variety of topics dominated the policy discussions of President Nixon and his principal advisers. Among these topics were U.S. troop withdrawals, Vietnamization, negotiations in Paris (both the public plenary sessions and the secret talks between Kissinger and North Vietnamese Politburo member Le Duc Tho), and possible South Vietnamese operations in Cambodia, Laos, and North Vietnam. Throughout the rest of 1970 these themes moved forward on separate paths that occasionally intersected with one another. South Vietnamese operations, first in Cambodia and then in Laos, were seen in policy terms as providing South Vietnam additional time to develop a more effective military, to generate economic growth, and to achieve some degree of political stability. The operations were also to demonstrate the success of Vietnamization and justify the continuing withdrawal of U.S. troops.
In late 1970 and early 1971, the focus shifted to decision making regarding plans to implement a major South Vietnamese out-of-country operation called Lam Son 719, launched in early February 1971. The strategic purpose of the operation was to halt or slow the flow of military supplies to Communist forces in South Vietnam via the panhandle of Laos. At the same time, it would demonstrate the growing military prowess of the South Vietnamese Army. On the negotiating front, Kissinger continued in 1970 and throughout1971 to meet periodically in Paris with Le Duc Tho and other senior Vietnamese Communist functionaries, but made no progress. At the same time, representatives of both sides also met publicly in the plenary meetings. Each side used the public Paris meetings to exchange carefully calibrated propaganda, making the meetings, if possible, less productive than the secret talks. The volume focuses on the Kissinger–Le Duc Tho talks with only occasional documentary coverage of the public talks.
This volume also documents President Nixon’s penchant for secret operations and covert warfare: his continued support for secret bombing campaigns in Cambodia and Laos and his approval of the November 1971 Son Tay raid into North Vietnam to rescue American prisoners of war. Nixon also signed off on new and continuing information gathering initiatives and propaganda that supported intelligence operations against Communist forces, organizations, and governments in South Vietnam, North Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos. Additionally, he approved clandestine support for South Vietnamese political entities friendly to the United States. These operations are documented in some detail to demonstrate the role of covert actions in support of overt political and military operations.
In the waning months of the period covered by this volume, deadlock had set in. Neither side appeared able to win militarily, or even to weaken his adversary sufficiently to make him negotiate in good faith. There were signs, however, that Hanoi might be preparing to mount a major military effort in 1972. Its purpose would be to break through this impasse without having to travel a diplomatic path. The volume concludes at this point.
While acknowledging the mass atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge regime, we should never forget the level of atrocities committed during the US secretive bombing of Cambodia from 1968-1973. A declassified telephone discussion between Henry Kissinger and General Alexander Haig, Nixon's deputy assistant for national security affairs, recorded that Nixon had ordered a “massive bombing campaign in Cambodia [to use] anything that flys [sic] on anything that moves”.
The map of US bombing targets released by Yale University’s Cambodian Genocide Program shows that more than half of the country was affected by the indiscriminate bombings. Professor Ben Kierman, director of the program, puts the casualties figure from the bombing at 150,000 deaths, while Edward Herman, a professor of Wharton School, and Noam Chomsky put the toll at 600,000 using figures provided by a Finnish Commission of Inquiry.
Based on this, we can never naively claim that US bombing led to the mass executions by the Khmer Rouge or refuted the regime's mass atrocities. But, to certain extent, the blanket bombing, which directly led to the destruction of livestock and agricultural land, could have definitely played a role in the mass starvation.
From new data released during the Clinton administration, Taylor Owen, a doctoral student at Oxford University, and Professor Kierman noted that 2,756,941 tons of bombs were dropped on Cambodia.
To put the figure into perspective, just over 2 million tons of bombs were dropped by the allies during all of World War II. The bombs dropped in Cambodia represented about 184 Hiroshima atomic bombs combined, making Cambodia the most bombed nation in the world. Based on the new data, Professor Kierman also stressed that the casualties might be much higher than his earlier predicted 150,000.
Based on this, the bombing contributed to the rise of the Khmer Rouge. The number of Khmer Rouge cadres rose from a group that had an insignificant prospect ousting the US-backed Lon Nol’s regime, roughly from 1,000 in 1969 to 220,000 in 1973.
You all should think about your country in the futher, your country is about going to war with Thailand. You must wake up, stop talking and concerning Khmer Rouge. What would you get from?
Don't worry too much about War
with Thai because Cambodia has
had 6,000,000 Vietnamese immi-
grants and 20,000 Viet troops
behind in Cambodia to make with
Thai.Vietnam govt is honest and
close friend to Hun Sen govt.
Khmer Rouge lost because of Viet
soldiers help.
Let the WAR begin and Vietnamese
troops,so Viet can kill soldiers
and Khmer people.
Then Cambodia can become Champa
and Khmer Krom.
Thai and Vietnam were/are Khmer
enemies.
If Khmer still see Khmer as an enemy , as killers Khme will end up like Champa, Kampuchea-Krom.
Khmer must worry aout Cambodia being swallowed by youn Hanoi.
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