When the War is Over
by Elizabeth Becker
also available in Khmer
by Elizabeth Becker
also available in Khmer
While the United States and Vietnam do share responsibility for much of Cambodia's sorrows, ultimately Cambodians were victims of their own leaders and their own tradition and history. The shimmering patina of a tropical paradise masked a country that had been told its were people were threatened by extinction and whose rulers routinely encouraged a corollary belief in Cambodia's cultural and ethnic superiority. It is a country long accustomed to quarrelsome, despotic rulers who treated their subjects, or citizens, like children and saw Cambodia as one of history's great victims. And it is a country with a tradition of violence (Preface, XV).
Cambodia was not stuck off in a forgotten corner of Asia but was dead center in the white-hot fire of the Second Indochina War. South Vietnam and Laos on the eastern and northern boundaries were battlegrounds, Thailand to the west became the American rear guard, home to the jet fighter planes and idling spot for American soldiers on rest and recreation leaves. Sihanouk's pastoral Cambodia was the unlikely neutral spot in the middle (Chapter I, p. 9).
The people accepted the king's word. There were other scattered if impassioned protests against more brutal aspects of French colonial life over the next fifty years, but no more national uprisings. The king had been bought off. In exchange for retaining the throne Norodom allowed France to rule its Cambodian protectorate more or less as it wished.
The episode was emblematic of Cambodia's affairs with the outside world in the modern era. A foreign power, France in this case, provided protection from more dangerous powers, Vietnam and Siam, and then betrayed Cambodia by demanding control over the country. The people resisted but were reined in by a leader who had given in to foreign power. And as would happen again in the future the leader did his utmost to ensure that the Cambodians most responsible for trying to free the country from outright domination were removed from politics and from competing against him. Cambodia emerged weaker, with fewer leaders, and under firmer control of a foreign power (Chapter 2: Birth of Modern Cambodia, p. 35).
10 comments:
Cambodia never had good leaders, that's very true and sad.
How would you describe a typical Cambodian leader?
1) Very stupid
2) Power hungry, controlling
3) Very corrupted
4) Lack of education, skills
5) Would not take any criticism
6) No vision for the country
7) Selffish
8) Treat its followers like dogs
9) No respect for human rights
10) ALL OF THE ABOVE and more...
Yes EB, I'd seen you and I still see you as a freaking Viet sympathizer, a pro-Viet journalist from head to toes...
EB is a more dangerous reporter/journalist than that cash cow Judy Jacobsen of Down Under so-called scholar!!!
Iamgine at one meeting, EB wore hairdo and vietnamese robe talking about Khmer refugees plight!
Incognito
KD = Stupid Khmer Rouge left over! Go to hell khmer rouge!
the country is filled with vietcong, its time to burn, to rid of these viruses.
burn their nests, burn their community, burn their businesses.
Khmer/Cambodian folks, please to make sure that it is not NEW HIDDENT/SECRET YUON/VIET AGENTS THAT FORM NEW KHMER ROUGES AS YUON/VIET PROPAGANDA in the blind eyes of foreigners and Khmer people again.
It is has been a Yuon/Viet trick and secret among Khmer Society. There are many Yuon/Viet born in Cambodian/Srok Khmer speaking Khmer language and their Yuon language. They may causes the problem again in 21st century.
We,Khmer people, should know that Without Khmer Rouges like Pol Pot, Ieng Sari, Khiev Saphan, Noun Chea (who had done the big mistakes and wrong, but they admitted that they had said that they had done something wrong and told the truth in ECCC about Yuon/Viet) including other Khmer Rouges Compatriots who care about Khmer National because they repeatedly heard about the trick of Yuon/Viet playing too many games and tricks to encroach the land of Khmer to overcome and satisfy Hanoi/Ho Chi Minh goals as their plans. So far, Viet/Yuon master-minded evil leaders have not achieved their goals so far until today, but they still keep trying and keep trying to play the trick. Now, Khmer people, you see that Hun Sen is the one that Yuon/Viet Communist Master-Minded evil masters are using him (Hun Sen, their dog) until today. SEE???
Just watch out, Khmer/Cambodian people and don't be fooled.
Wake up, wake up, wake up!!! It is a wake-up call!!!
Khmer Yeurng!
Is Elizabeth Becker pro-Vietnamese?
On February 8, 2012, Elizabeth Becker, a former foreign correspondent for the Washington Post and New York Time revisited Phnom-Penh, Cambodia and gave a lecture at Pannasastra University. She said there had been 30 years of silence on the horrors of the Khmer Rouge Regime and no official acknowledgement that a great crime had been committed. But, with the tribunal, the crime had been acknowledged.
On December 23, 1978, a group of three persons, including two American Journalists, Elizabeth Becker and Richard Dudman, and one British Academic, Malcolm Caldwell were invited to visit Cambodia. Just hours after the interview with Pol Pot, which took place in the French Colonial Head Quarter (La Residence Superieure) in Phnom-Penh, Caldwell was shot to death in the guest house where they all stayed, thus reducing three-person group to two. On 25 December 1978, Vietnam launched a full-scale invasion of Kampuchea (Cambodia).
In Malcolm Caldwell Remembered, Part 5 of the Khmer Rouge Canon 1975-1979,Elizabeth Becker said that Caldwell's death would show that the revolution could not even care for its friends, that it was fraught with chaos, meaning that Vietnam will not allow anyone to survive in Cambodia, be him or her a Cambodian or Foreigner if he or she is not sided with Vietnam’s Indochina Policy. This led to the question why Malcolm Caldwell got killed whereas Elizabeth Becker and Richard Dudman were spared? Was this due to the latter’s two pro-Vietnamese stand?
Malcolm Caldwell was probably slain by someone in the inner party circle opposed to Pol Pot meaning Vietnam’s secret agents, because he might have shown that he was a strong supporter of Pol Pot Regime. Caldwell was an admirer of Pol Pot, because he considered that Pol Pot was the first person to lead the Peasant Revolution. More importantly, Vietnam’s secret agents didn't want their killing fields being revealed to the people in the outside world. If UN knew what was really happening in Cambodia, UN would perhaps send it's peace-keeping forces to oust the Pol Pot's regime. If the UN peace-keeping forces had gone to Cambodia at that time, all the Vietnamese Confederation of Indochina plans could have been derailed. The Vietnamese didn't want their demonic plans to be destroyed by the Western intervention because they have made them since 1930 of Indochinese Communist Party/Federation, by the late Ho Chi Minh. If the UN had started from the West to overthrow the Pol Pot's regime, many of the Vietnamese agents, who secretly had impersonated themselves as the leaders of Khmer Rouge, would have been captured alive for their interrogations.
Based on the above information, All Cambodian Patriots could draw a conclusion whether Elizabeth Becker is a friend of Cambodia or a pro Vietnamese Journalist.
Vietnam secrete agents working at the inner circle of Pol Pot regime did not harm Elizabeth Becker and Richard Dudman, because they were pro vietnam and blame Pol Pot regime for the killing of 2 millions of Cambodians. Indirectly, they have been helping Vietnam to control Cambodia by installing it's puppets: Hun Sen, Chea Sim and Heng Samrin as suppreme leaders of Cambodia.
In fact, Vietnam is the main culprit that behind the killing field, it should also be held responsible for the life of 2 millions cambodians died during 1975 and 1978.
Vietnam is invader not liberator! This is absolutely true.
If it is liberator, why after removing Pol Pot Regime in 1979, Vietnam occupied Cambodia until 1989 and set up a puppet regime under Hanoi's control. Vietnam secrete agents in Cambodia played important role in causing 2millions of cambodians periled.
Vietnam secrete agents working at the inner circle of Pol Pot regime did not harm Elizabeth Becker and Richard Dudman, because they were pro vietnam and blame Pol Pot regime for the killing of 2 millions of Cambodians.
Indirectly, they have been helping Vietnam to control Cambodia by blaming only pol pot regime for the death of 2 millions of Cambodians and treated Vietnam as cambodian savers.
Therefore she is the mouth piece of Vietnam invader and should not be trusted. This is the reason why Vietnam saved her and Rchard Dudman's life but killed only Malcome Caldwell who support Pol Pot Regime.
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