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117-593: The party operated underground during most of its existence, and it took control of the country in April 1975 and established the state known as Democratic Kampuchea . The party lost power in 1979 with the establishment of the People's Republic of Kampuchea following the intervention of Vietnamese military forces . The party was officially dissolved in 1981, with the Party of Democratic Kampuchea claiming its legacy. The party

234-518: A Vietnamese attack, Pol Pot ordered a pre-emptive invasion of Vietnam on 18 April 1978. His Cambodian forces crossed the border and looted nearby villages. Despite Chinese aid, these Cambodian forces were repulsed by the Vietnamese. In early 1979, a pro-Vietnamese group of CPK dissidents led by Pen Sovan held a congress (which they saw as the third party congress, therefore not recognizing the 1963, 1975, and 1978 party congresses as legitimate) near

351-540: A central role in the regime of Democratic Kampuchea. At some time between 1949 and 1951, Pol Pot and Ieng Sary joined the French Communist Party . In 1951, the two men went to East Berlin to participate in a youth festival . This experience is considered a turning point in their ideological development. Meeting with Khmers fighting with the Viet Minh (whom they subsequently judged too subservient to

468-421: A concentration camp. Despite the ideological commitment to radical equality, CPK members, local-level leaders of poor peasant backgrounds who collaborated with Angkar, and the armed forces constituted a clearly recognizable elite. They had a higher standard of living and received special privileges not enjoyed by the rest of the population. Refugees agree that, even during times of severe food shortages, members of

585-622: A crest in 1977 and 1978 when thousands, including some important CPK leaders, were executed. The older generation of CPK members, suspected of having links with or sympathies for Vietnam, were targeted by the Pol Pot leadership. For roughly two years after the CPK took power, it referred to itself as the Angkar ( Khmer : អង្គការ , ALA-LC : ʿʹanggakār [ʔɑŋkaː] ; meaning 'Organization'). However, Pol Pot publicly declared on 29 September 1977

702-584: A customs official, but from this point his political involvement was to increase substantially. Whether or not he had taken part in political activity in France, his position was to move steadily to the left following the winding-up of the Democratic Party during the same year. Sihanouk, having effectively destroyed the ability of the Democratic Party and the socialist Pracheachon opposition to function, now made an attempt to co-opt young leftists into

819-669: A guerrilla struggle. In 1965, Pol Pot made a visit of several months to North Vietnam and China. He probably received some training in China, which enhanced his prestige when he returned to the WPK's liberated areas. Despite friendly relations between Sihanouk and the Chinese, the latter kept Pol Pot's visit a secret from Sihanouk. In 1971, the party changed its name to the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK). The party statutes, published in

936-637: A matter of interest to historians. Some historians, including Michael Ignatieff , Adam Jones and Greg Grandin , have cited the United States intervention and bombing campaign (spanning 1965–1973) as a significant factor which led to increased support for the Khmer Rouge among the Cambodian peasantry. According to Ben Kiernan , the Khmer Rouge "would not have won power without U.S. economic and military destabilization of Cambodia. ... It used

1053-548: A military tribunal, and calls from right-wing members of the Assembly for their immediate execution, fled to join the Communist guerrillas in late April. Hu Nim was later to write that he initially joined them, but returned to the capital after a few days, having been persuaded by senior cadre Vorn Vet that it might be profitable to continue engagement with Sihanouk and persist in anti-government agitation. Sihanouk, however,

1170-579: A new group, the Khmer Students' Union . Inside, the group was still run by the Cercle Marxiste. After returning to Cambodia in 1953, Pol Pot threw himself into party work. At first, he went to join with forces allied to the Viet Minh operating in the rural areas of Kampong Cham Province (Kompong Cham). After the end of the war, he moved to Phnom Penh under Tou Samouth's "urban committee", where he became an important point of contact between

1287-661: A number of ministerial posts. His long political career included spells with the Sangkum regime of Prince Norodom Sihanouk , the Communist guerrilla resistance, the GRUNK coalition government-in-exile, and the administration of Democratic Kampuchea , when the country was controlled by the Communist Party of Kampuchea (the Khmer Rouge). Nim had a reputation as one of the most independent-minded and outspoken members of

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1404-647: A reputation in Phnom Penh's small academic circle. The following year, the government closed the paper, and Sihanouk's police publicly humiliated Khieu by beating, undressing, and photographing him in public—as Shawcross notes, "not the sort of humiliation that men forgive or forget". Yet the experience did not prevent Khieu from advocating cooperation with Sihanouk to promote a united front against United States activities in South Vietnam. As mentioned, Khieu Samphan, Hou Yuon, and Hu Nim were forced to "work through

1521-484: A school for printers and typesetters and also studied civil engineering). Ieng Sary was a Chinese-Khmer born in 1930 in South Vietnam. He attended the elite Lycée Sisowath in Phnom Penh before beginning courses in commerce and politics at the Paris Institute of Political Studies (more widely known as Sciences Po) in France. Khieu Samphan , considered "one of the most brilliant intellects of his generation",

1638-808: A seemingly coherent pattern. Villages were also subdivided into 'groups' ( ក្រុម krŏm ) of 15–20 households who were led by a group leader ( មេក្រុម mé krŏm ). The Khmer Rouge dismantled the legal and judicial structures of the Khmer Republic. There were no courts, judges, laws or trials in Democratic Kampuchea. The "people’s courts" stipulated in Article 9 of the constitution were never established. The old legal structures were replaced by re-education, interrogation and security centres where former Khmer Republic officials and supporters as well as others were detained and executed. After

1755-399: A smaller scale since the early 1970s. The Khmer Rouge attempted to turn Cambodia into a classless society by depopulating cities and forcing the urban population into agricultural communes through brutal totalitarian methods. The entire population was forced to become farmers in labour camps . During their four years in power, the Khmer Rouge overworked and starved the population while at

1872-468: A three-person committee. The committee chairman was selected by the CPK. This grassroots leadership was required to note the social origin of each family under its jurisdiction and to report it to persons higher up in the Angkar hierarchy. The number of "new people" may initially have been as high as 2.5 million. The "new people" were treated as forced labourers. They were constantly moved, were forced to do

1989-558: Is absolutely no unemployment in Democratic Kampuchea" rings true in light of the regime's massive use of force. The constitution defined Democratic Kampuchea's foreign policy principles in Article 21, the document's longest, in terms of "independence, peace, neutrality, and nonalignment ." It pledged the country's support to anti-imperialist struggles in the Third World . In light of the regime's aggressive attacks against Vietnamese , Thai , and Lao territory during 1977 and 1978,

2106-462: The khum , assumed local government responsibilities in some areas. In January 1976, the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK) promulgated the Constitution of Democratic Kampuchea. The constitution provided for a Kampuchean People's Representative Assembly (KPRA) to be elected by secret ballot in direct general elections and a State Praesidium to be selected and appointed every five years by

2223-495: The Great Leap Forward . Khieu Samphan and Khieu Thirith "just smiled an incredulous and superior smile." Khieu Samphan and Son Sen later boasted to Sihanouk that "we will be the first nation to create a completely communist society without wasting time on intermediate steps." Although conditions varied from region to region, a situation that was, in part, a reflection of factional divisions that still existed within

2340-466: The Khmer Republic , executing all its officers. The leadership of the Khmer Rouge was largely unchanged between the 1960s and the mid-1990s. The Khmer Rouge leaders were mostly from middle-class families and had been educated at French universities . The Standing Committee of the Khmer Rouge's Central Committee (Party Center) during its period of power consisted of the following: In power,

2457-664: The Party of Democratic Kampuchea . • Democratic Kampuchea 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 . From 1975 to 1979,

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2574-459: The People's Republic of China . Sihanouk's popular support in rural Cambodia allowed the Khmer Rouge to extend its power and influence to the point that by 1973, it exercised de facto control over the majority of Cambodian territory, although only a minority of its population. The relationship between the massive carpet bombing of Cambodia by the United States and the growth of the Khmer Rouge, in terms of recruitment and popular support, has been

2691-516: The Third Indochina War . Tensions between Cambodia and Vietnam were growing due to differences in communist ideology and the incursion of Vietnamese military presence within Cambodian borders. The context of war destabilised the country and displaced Cambodians while making available to the Khmer Rouge the weapons of war. The Khmer Rouge leveraged on the devastation caused by the war to recruit members and used this past violence to justify

2808-550: The United Nations (UN). In response, Vietnamese-backed communists created a rival government, the People's Republic of Kampuchea , but failed to gain international recognition. In 1982, the Khmer Rouge established the Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea (CGDK) with two non-communist guerrilla factions, broadening the exiled government of Democratic Kampuchea. The exiled government renamed itself

2925-417: The "Unconditional Divisions", were a privileged group within the military. The Khmer Rouge regime was also characterized by "totalitarian puritanism" with any sex before marriage being punishable by death in many cooperatives and zones. Hu Nim Hu Nim ( Khmer : ហូ នឹម , 25 July 1930 or 1932 – 6 July 1977), alias "Phoas" ( ភាស់ ), was a Cambodian Communist intellectual and politician who held

3042-558: The 1960s came from their ranks. They led an effective insurgency against Sihanouk and Lon Nol from 1968 until 1975 and established the regime of Democratic Kampuchea. Pol Pot , who rose to the leadership of the communist movement in the 1960s, was born in 1928 (some sources say in 1925) in Kampong Thum Province , northeast of Phnom Penh. He attended a technical high school in the capital and then went to Paris in 1949 to study radio electronics (other sources say he attended

3159-409: The CPK during the 1970s, the testimony of refugees reveals that the most salient social division was between the politically suspect " new people ", those driven out of the towns after the communist victory, and the more reliable "old people", the peasants who had remained in the countryside. The working class was a negligible factor because of the evacuation of the urban areas and the idling of most of

3276-408: The CPK's existence shortly before Pol Pot was due to travel to Peking resulted from pressure from China on the Khmer Rouge leaders to acknowledge their true political identity at a time when they increasingly depended on China's assistance against the threats from Vietnam. Accordingly, Pol Pot, in his speech, claimed that the CPK's foundation had been in 1960 and emphasized its separate identity from

3393-434: The CPK's existence. It was also around that time that it was confirmed that Pol Pot was the same person as Saloth Sar, who had long been cited as the CPK's general secretary. The Khmer Rouge government did away with all former Cambodian traditional administrative divisions. Instead of provinces, Democratic Kampuchea was divided into geographic zones, derived from divisions established by the Khmer Rouge when they fought against

3510-766: The Central Zone, there seem to have been more executions than there were victims of starvation. Little reliable information emerged on conditions in the Northeastern Zone, one of the most isolated parts of Cambodia. On the surface, society in Democratic Kampuchea was strictly egalitarian . The Khmer language , like many in Southeast Asia, has a complex system of usages to define speakers' rank and social status. These usages were abandoned, and people were forbidden to speak any language other than Khmer . Neologisms were introduced, and everyday vocabulary

3627-528: The Cercle Marxiste. The organization was composed of cells of three to six members, with most members knowing nothing about the overall structure. In 1952, Pol Pot, Hou Yuon, Ieng Sary, and other leftists gained notoriety by sending an open letter to Sihanouk calling him the "strangler of infant democracy". A year later, the French authorities closed down the KSA, but Hou Yuon and Khieu Samphan helped to establish in 1956

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3744-472: The Communist Party of Vietnam. This secrecy continued even after the CPK took power. Unlike most totalitarian dictators , Pol Pot was not the object of an open personality cult . It was almost a year before it was confirmed that he was Saloth Sar, the man long cited as the CPK's general secretary. Because of several years of border conflict and the flood of refugees fleeing Cambodia, relations between Cambodia and Vietnam deteriorated by December 1978. Fearing

3861-538: The Communist underground movement. The situation was inflamed in March–April 1967 by a revolt in the far north-east of the country, the Samlaut Uprising , that was blamed by Sihanouk on left-wing agitation, and specifically, though most likely incorrectly, on the activities of the remaining openly leftist politicians: Hou Yuon, Khieu Samphan , Chau Seng and Hu Nim. The first two men, threatened with arrest,

3978-536: The Democratic Party up to the 1955 elections , which handed power to Prince Norodom Sihanouk 's Sangkum movement amidst an atmosphere of extreme political intimidation and possible vote-rigging. The Democratic Party's policies had offered talented Cambodians the chance to study in France on a government scholarship; several future Communists, including Saloth Sar (Pol Pot), Khieu Samphan , Ieng Sary and Hou Yuon , had studied abroad under this system, falling under

4095-582: The Great National Union of Kampuchea as a united front in September 1979 to fight the PRK and the Vietnamese. Khieu Samphan led the front. In December 1979, the armed forces under the command of the party, what remained of the erstwhile People's National Liberation Armed Forces of Kampuchea , were renamed National Army of Democratic Kampuchea . In 1981, the party was dissolved and substituted by

4212-682: The KPRA. The KPRA met only once, a three-day session in April 1976. However, members of the KPRA were never elected, as the Central Committee of the CPK appointed the chairman and other high officials both to it and to the State Praesidium. Plans for elections of members were discussed, but the 250 members of the KPRA were in fact appointed by the upper echelon of CPK. All power belonged to the Standing Committee of CPK,

4329-636: The KUFNS, capturing Phnom Penh on 7 January 1979. The Pen Sovan-led party was installed as the governing party of the new People's Republic of Kampuchea . The CPK, led by Pol Pot, withdrew its forces westwards to an area near the Thai border. With unofficial protection from elements of the Thai Army , it began guerrilla warfare against the PRK government. The party founded the Patriotic and Democratic Front of

4446-752: The Khmer Rouge abolished the old provinces ( ខេត្ត khet ) and replaced them with seven zones ( ភូមិភាគ phoumipheak ); the Northern Zone, Northeastern Zone, Northwestern Zone, Central Zone, Eastern Zone, Western Zone, and Southwestern Zone. There were also two other regional-level units: the Kracheh Special Region Number 505 and, until 1977, the Siemreab Special Region Number 106. The zones were divided into regions ( តំបន់ damban ) that were given numbers. Number One, appropriately, encompassed

4563-470: The Khmer Rouge carried out a radical program that included isolating the country from foreign influence, closing schools, hospitals, and factories, abolishing banking , finance and currency , outlawing all religions , confiscating all private property and relocating people from urban areas to collective farms where forced labor was widespread. This policy aimed to reform professional and urban Cambodians, or "New People", through agricultural labor under

4680-426: The Khmer Rouge had been radicalised during the war years and later turned this radical understanding of society and violence onto their countrymen. This backdrop of violence and brutality arguably also affected everyday Cambodians, priming them for the violence that they themselves perpetrated under the Khmer Rouge regime. Phnom Penh fell on 17 April 1975. Sihanouk was given the symbolic position of Head of State for

4797-615: The Khmer Rouge had largely disappeared. China armed and trained the Khmer Rouge both during the civil war and the years afterward. When the United States Congress suspended military aid to the Lon Nol government in 1973, the Khmer Rouge made sweeping gains in the country, completely overwhelming the Khmer National Armed Forces . On 17 April 1975, the Khmer Rouge captured Phnom Penh and overthrew

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4914-557: The Khmer Rouge launched a national insurgency across Cambodia. Though North Vietnam had not been informed of the decision, its forces provided shelter and weapons to the Khmer Rouge after the insurgency started. The guerrilla forces of the party were baptized as the Kampuchean Revolutionary Army . Vietnamese support for the insurgency made it impossible for the ineffective and poorly motivated Royal Cambodian Army to counter it effectively. The political appeal of

5031-602: The Khmer Rouge was increased as a result of the situation created by the removal of Sihanouk as head of state in 1970 . Premier Lon Nol , with the support of the National Assembly, deposed Sihanouk. Sihanouk, in exile in Beijing , allied with the Kampuchean Communist Party and became the nominal head of a Khmer Rouge-dominated government-in-exile (known by its French acronym GRUNK ) backed by

5148-413: The Khmer Rouge's one-party regime killed millions of its own people through mass executions, forced labour, and starvation, in an event which has come to be known as the Cambodian genocide . The killings ended when the Khmer Rouge were ousted from Phnom Penh by the Vietnamese army . The Khmer Rouge subsequently established a government-in-exile in neighbouring Thailand and retained Kampuchea's seat at

5265-546: The Khmer Rouge, and cadres administered it with strict discipline, random executions were relatively rare, and "new people" were not persecuted if they had a cooperative attitude. In the Western Zone and in the Northwestern Zone, conditions were harsh. Starvation was general in the latter zone because cadres sent rice to Phnom Penh rather than distributing it to the local population. In the Northern Zone and in

5382-494: The Khmer Rouge, and was eventually arrested, tortured and executed at Tuol Sleng security prison in 1977 during a party purge. Hu Nim was born in 1932 (25 July 1932 according to some sources) in the village of Korkor, Kampong Siem District , Kampong Cham Province to a Sino-Khmer family. Unlike many of his later colleagues in the Party intelligentsia, he came from a poor background. In his 'confession' I would like to report to

5499-510: The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Industry, were controlled and exploited by powerful Khmer Rouge families. Administering the diplomatic corps was regarded as an especially profitable fiefdom. According to Craig Etcheson, an authority on Democratic Kampuchea, members of the revolutionary army lived in self-contained colonies, and they had a "distinctive warrior-caste ethos." Armed forces units personally loyal to Pol Pot, known as

5616-561: The National Government of Cambodia in 1990, in the run-up to the UN-sponsored 1991 Paris Peace Agreements . In 1970, Premier Lon Nol and the National Assembly deposed Norodom Sihanouk as the head of state. Sihanouk, opposing the new government, entered into an alliance with the Khmer Rouge against them. Taking advantage of Vietnamese occupation of eastern Cambodia, massive United States carpet bombing ranging across

5733-557: The Party Standing Committee in his notes. By the time of his last confession on 28 May he wrote: "I have nothing to depend on, only the Communist Party of Kampuchea. Would the Party please show clemency towards me," adding "I am not a human being, I am an animal". He was finally killed on 6 July. The historiography of the Vietnamese-backed People's Republic of Kampuchea regime, which ousted

5850-505: The Party about my history , extracted under torture at Tuol Sleng, Nim was to relate that "my father, Hou, died in 1936 when I was just six years old. I then lived in the care of my mother, named Sorn, a poor peasant. She earned her living by offering household services to people". His mother, who remarried a landless peasant farmer, eventually sent him to live with Sam Khor at a pagoda in Mien , Prey Chhor District . Brought up by Sam Khor, Nim

5967-450: The RAK had 230 battalions in 35 to 40 regiments and in 12 to 14 brigades. The command structure in units was based on three-person committees in which the political commissar ranked higher than the military commander and his deputy. Cambodia was divided into zones and special sectors by the RAK, the boundaries of which changed slightly over the years. Within these areas, the RAK's first task was

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6084-462: The Samlot region of the Northwestern Zone (including Battambang Province), where the insurrection against Sihanouk had erupted in early 1967. With this exception, the damban appear to have been numbered arbitrarily. The damban were divided into districts ( ស្រុក srok ), communes ( ឃុំ khum ), and villages ( ភូមិ phum ), the latter usually containing several hundred people. This pattern

6201-470: The Sangkum by its rightist elements, though thanks to his local popularity, Hu Nim (along with Hou Yuon) was able to retain his seat, despite Sihanouk actively campaigning against him. He was briefly made part of a leftist "counter-government" set up by Sihanouk to balance Lon Nol 's right-wing cabinet, but from this point the political tide was to turn against the remaining leftists who had not already joined

6318-497: The Sangkum movement; amongst the prospective candidates Hou Yuon, Chau Sau , Uch Ven and Hu Nim all won seats. Nim became Under-Secretary of State in the office of the Prime Minister , and held a variety of junior ministerial posts over the next nine months. More significantly, he began to build up a substantial base of support in his Kampong Cham constituency, which he was to represent for the next nine years, becoming one of

6435-437: The United States intervention saved the Lon Nol regime from collapse in 1970 and 1973. Craig Etcheson acknowledged that U.S. intervention increased recruitment for the Khmer Rouge but disputed that it was a primary cause of the Khmer Rouge victory. William Shawcross wrote that the United States bombing and ground incursion plunged Cambodia into the chaos that Sihanouk had worked for years to avoid. By 1973, Vietnamese support of

6552-738: The Vietnamese border. Along with Heng Samrin , Pen Sovan was one of the foremost founding members of the Kampuchean United Front for National Salvation (KUFNS or FUNSK) after becoming disillusioned with the Khmer Rouge. Effectively, the CPK was then divided into two, with the Pen Sovan-led group constituting a separate party, the Kampuchean People's Revolutionary Party (now the Cambodian People's Party ). The Vietnamese forces invaded Cambodia along with

6669-510: The Vietnamese) convinced them that only a tightly disciplined party organization and a readiness for armed struggle could achieve revolution. They transformed the Khmer Students' Association (KSA), to which most of the 200 Khmer students in Paris belonged, into an organization for nationalist and leftist ideas. Inside the KSA and its successor organizations was a secret organization known as

6786-485: The above-ground parties of the left and the underground secret communist movement. His allies, Ieng Sary and Hou Yuon, became teachers at a new private high school, the Lycée Kambuboth, which Hou Yuon helped to establish. Khieu Samphan returned from Paris in 1959, taught as a University of Phnom Penh law faculty member, and started a left-wing French-language publication, L'Observateur . The paper soon acquired

6903-434: The aged and the disabled, and they set up stockpiles of food outside the city for the refugees; however, the supplies were inadequate to sustain the hundreds of thousands of people on the road. Even seriously injured hospital patients, many without any means of conveyance, were summarily forced to leave regardless of their condition. The foreign community, about 800 people, was quarantined in the French embassy compound, and by

7020-432: The armed forces; and fifty, for worker and other representatives. The legislature was to be popularly elected for a five-year term. Its first and only election was held on 20 March 1976. " New People " apparently were not allowed to participate. The executive branch of government also was chosen by the KPRA. It consisted of a state presidium "responsible for representing the state of Democratic Kampuchea inside and outside

7137-532: The bombing's devastation and massacre of civilians as recruitment propaganda and as an excuse for its brutal, radical policies and its purge of moderate communists and Sihanoukists." Pol Pot biographer David P. Chandler writes that the bombing "had the effect the Americans wanted – it broke the Communist encirclement of Phnom Penh", but it also accelerated the collapse of rural society and increased social polarization. Peter Rodman and Michael Lind claimed that

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7254-475: The central committee left Phnom Penh to establish an insurgent base in Ratanakiri Province in the northeast. Pol Pot had shortly before been put on a list of thirty-four leftists whom Sihanouk summoned to join the government and sign statements saying Sihanouk was the only possible leader for the country. Pol Pot and Chou Chet were the only people who escaped. All the others agreed to cooperate with

7371-428: The city and would return in "two or three days". Some witnesses say they were told that the evacuation was because of the "threat of American bombing" and that they did not have to lock their houses since the Khmer Rouge would "take care of everything" until they returned. These were not the first evacuations of civilian populations by the Khmer Rouge. Similar evacuations of populations without possessions had occurred on

7488-508: The communist party. The Khmer Rouge abolished the Royal Government of National Union of Kampuchea ( GRUNK , established in 1970) and promulgated the Constitution of Democratic Kampuchea on 5 January 1976. The Khmer Rouge continued to use Sihanouk as a figurehead for the government until 2 April 1976 when Sihanouk resigned as head of state. Sihanouk remained under comfortable, but insecure, house arrest in Phnom Penh, until late in

7605-479: The corruption and "parasitism" of city life would be completely uprooted. In addition, Pol Pot wanted to break up the "enemy spy organisations" that allegedly were based in the urban areas. Finally, it seems that Pol Pot and his hard-line associates on the CPK Political Bureau used the forced evacuations to gain control of the city's population and to weaken the position of their factional rivals within

7722-471: The country's few factories. The one important working class group in pre-revolutionary Cambodia—labourers on large rubber plantations—traditionally had consisted mostly of Vietnamese immigrants and thus was politically suspect. The number of people, including refugees, living in the urban areas on the eve of the communist victory probably was somewhat more than 3 million, out of the total population of roughly 8 million. As mentioned, despite their rural origins,

7839-499: The country, and Sihanouk's reputation, the Khmer Rouge were able to present themselves as a peace-oriented party in a coalition that represented the majority of the people. Thus, with large popular support in the countryside, the capital Phnom Penh finally fell on 17 April 1975 to the Khmer Rouge. Thus, prior to the Khmer Rouge's takeover of Phnom Penh in 1975 and the start of the Zero Years, Cambodia had already been involved in

7956-503: The country. "New people" were subjected to unending political indoctrination and could be executed without trial. The situation of the "old people" under Khmer Rouge rule was more ambiguous. Refugee interviews reveal cases in which villagers were treated as harshly as the "new people", enduring forced labour, indoctrination, the separation of children from parents, and executions; however, they were generally allowed to remain in their native villages. Because of their age-old resentment of

8073-421: The country." It served for a five-year term, and its president was head of state. Khieu Samphan was the only person to serve in this office, which he assumed after Sihanouk's resignation. The judicial system was composed of "people's courts", the judges for which were appointed by the KPRA, as was the executive branch. The constitution did not mention regional or local government institutions. After assuming power,

8190-613: The countryside and which commanded at least 5,000 armed men. Following the conference, about 1,000 members of the KPRP, including Son Ngoc Minh, made a Long March into North Vietnam , where they remained in exile. In late 1954, those who stayed in Cambodia founded a legal political party, the Krom Pracheachon , which participated in the National Assembly elections of 1955 and 1958. In the September 1955 election, it won about 4% of

8307-425: The end of the month the foreigners were taken by truck to the Thai border. Khmer women who were married to foreigners were allowed to accompany their husbands, but Khmer men were not permitted to leave with their foreign wives. Western historians claim that the motives were political, based on deep-rooted resentment of the cities . The Khmer Rouge was determined to turn the country into a nation of peasants in which

8424-526: The establishment of Democratic Kampuchea, the 68,000-member Khmer Rouge-dominated KPNLAF ( Khmer People's National Liberation Armed Forces ) force, which completed its conquest of Phnom Penh, Cambodia in April 1975, was renamed the RAK ( Kampuchea Revolutionary Army ). This name dated back to the peasant uprising that broke out in the Samlout District of Battambang province in 1967. Under its long-time commander and then Minister of Defense Son Sen ,

8541-512: The existence of the CPK in a five-hour-long speech. He revealed the true character of the supreme authority in Cambodia, an obscure ruling body that had been kept in seclusion. The CPK had been extremely secretive throughout its existence. Before 1975, secrecy was needed for the party's survival. Pol Pot and his closest associates relied on continuing the extreme secrecy to consolidate their position against those they perceived as internal enemies during their first two years of power. The revelation of

8658-560: The government and were afterward under 24-hour watch by the police. In the mid-1960s, the United States Department of State estimated the party membership to be approximately 100. The region Pol Pot and the others moved to was inhabited by tribal minorities, the Khmer Loeu , whose rough treatment (including resettlement and forced assimilation ) at the hands of the central government made them willing recruits for

8775-510: The grassroots elite had adequate, if not luxurious, supplies of food. One refugee wrote that "pretty new bamboo houses" were built for Khmer Rouge cadres along the river in Phnom Penh. Members of the Central Committee could go to China for medical treatment, and the highest echelons of the party had access to imported luxury products. They also had a tendency to nepotism similar of the Sihanouk-era elite. Pol Pot's wife, Khieu Ponnary ,

8892-553: The hardest physical labour, and worked in the most inhospitable, fever-ridden parts of the country, such as forests, upland areas, and swamps. "New people" were segregated from "old people", enjoyed little or no privacy, and received the smallest rice rations. When the country experienced food shortages in 1977, the "new people" suffered the most. The medical care available to them was primitive or nonexistent. Families often were separated because people were divided into work brigades according to age and sex and sent to different parts of

9009-898: The ill-fated Khmer Republic led by General Lon Nol. There were seven zones, namely the Northwest, the North, the Northeast, the East, the Southwest, the West and the center, plus two Special Regions, i.e. the Kratie Special Region no 505 and (before mid-1977) the Siemreap Special Region no 106. The regions were subdivided into smaller areas or tâmbán . These were known by numbers, which were assigned without

9126-655: The influence of the French Communist Party in the process. Hu Nim was to take this route in 1955: intending to become a customs officer, he studied at the Customs School and law school in Paris , travelling several hours every day by Metro to get to his place of study. Amongst the expatriate community, he met Hou Yuon and several other future colleagues, although stating in his 'confession' that "political activities were not carried out because my studies required so much attention". Nim returned to Cambodia in 1957 to work as

9243-455: The joint struggle against French colonial rule, the party's history would later be rewritten, stating 1960 as the year of the party's foundation. According to Democratic Kampuchea's version of party history, the Viet Minh 's failure to negotiate a political role for the KPRP at the 1954 Geneva Conference represented a betrayal of the Cambodian movement, which still controlled large areas of

9360-479: The membership of which comprised the Secretary and Prime Minister Pol Pot , his Deputy Secretary Nuon Chea and seven others. It was known also as the "Centre", the "Organisation" or " Angkar ", and its daily work was conducted from Office 870 in Phnom Penh. For almost two years after the takeover, the Khmer Rouge continued to refer to itself as simply Angkar. It was only in a March 1977 speech that Pol Pot revealed

9477-470: The mid-1970s, claim that the party congress approved the name change in 1971. The change in the party's name was a closely guarded secret. Lower-ranking members of the party and even the Vietnamese were not told of it, and neither was the membership until many years later. The party leadership endorsed an armed struggle against the government led by Sihanouk. In 1967, the CPK made several small-scale attempts at insurgency but failed with little success. In 1968,

9594-725: The most visible and well-known Cambodian leftists. By the early 1960s, Nim had joined the staff of the Sihanoukist daily newspaper Neak Cheat Niyum , and after a trip to Beijing was asked to form the Khmer-Chinese Friendship Association ; he also travelled to Pyongyang and to Hanoi , where he met Ho Chi Minh . Continuing his studies in law at the University of Phnom Penh , he completed his doctoral thesis, on land tenure and social structure, in 1965. The 1966 elections resulted in domination of

9711-446: The nation. The conditions of the evacuation and the treatment of the people involved often depended on which military units and commanders were conducting the specific operations. Pol Pot's brother – Chhay , who worked as a Republican journalist in the capital – was reported to have died during the evacuation of Phnom Penh . Even Phnom Penh's hospitals were emptied of their patients. The Khmer Rouge provided transportation for some of

9828-469: The new government of Democratic Kampuchea and, in September 1975, returned to Phnom Penh from exile in Beijing. After a trip abroad, during which he visited several communist countries and recommended the recognition of Democratic Kampuchea, Sihanouk returned again to Cambodia at the end of 1975. A year after the Khmer Rouge takeover, Sihanouk resigned in mid-April 1976 (made retroactive to 2 April 1976) and

9945-403: The now renamed "Workers' Party of Kampuchea" (WPK). Sihanouk habitually labeled local leftists the Khmer Rouge, a term that later came to signify the party and the state. During the 1950s, Khmer students in Paris organized a communist movement, which had little connection to the hard-pressed party in their homeland. The men and women who returned home and took command of the party apparatus during

10062-471: The party. The party congress did not elect a full Central Committee , but instead appointed a Party Propagation and Formation Committee. At its formation, the Cambodian party was called the Kampuchean People's Revolutionary Party (KPRP). The Vietnamese heavily dominated the ICP, and the Vietnamese party actively supported the KPRP during its initial phase of existence. Due to the reliance on Vietnamese support in

10179-690: The peremptory execution of former Khmer National Armed Forces (FANK) officers and of their families, without trial or fanfare to eliminate Khmer Rouge enemies. The RAK's next priority was to consolidate into a national army the separate forces that were operating more or less autonomously in the various zones. The Khmer Rouge units were commanded by zonal secretaries who were simultaneously party and military officers, some of whom were said to have manifested " warlord characteristics". Troops from one zone were frequently sent to another zone to enforce discipline. These efforts to discipline zonal secretaries and their dissident or ideologically impure cadres gave rise to

10296-569: The promise to "maintain close and friendly relations with all countries sharing a common border" bore little resemblance to reality. Governmental institutions were outlined very briefly in the constitution. The legislature, the Kampuchean People's Representative Assembly (KPRA), contained 250 members "representing workers, peasants, and other working people and the Kampuchean Revolutionary army." One hundred and fifty KPRA seats were allocated for peasant representatives; fifty, for

10413-517: The purges that were to decimate RAK ranks, to undermine the morale of the victorious army, and to generate the seeds of rebellion. In this way, the Khmer Rouge used the RAK to sustain and fuel its violent campaign. According to Pol Pot, Cambodia was made up of four classes : peasants , proletariat , bourgeoisie , and feudalists . Post-revolutionary society, as defined by the 1976 constitution of Democratic Kampuchea, consisted of workers, peasants, and "all other Kampuchean working people." No allowance

10530-463: The refugees were considered "new people"—that is, people unsympathetic to Democratic Kampuchea. Some doubtless passed as "old people" after returning to their native villages, but the Khmer Rouge seem to have been extremely vigilant in recording and keeping track of the movements of families and of individuals. The lowest unit of social control, the krom (group), consisted of ten to fifteen nuclear families whose activities were closely supervised by

10647-469: The same time executing selected groups who had the potential to undermine the new state (including intellectuals ) and killing many others for even minor breaches of rules. Through the 1970s and especially after mid-1975, the party became increasingly paranoid, blaming failures caused by its agricultural policies on external enemies (usually the CIA and Vietnam) and domestic traitors. The resultant purges reached

10764-424: The same time, Pol Pot and Ieng Sary were named to the Central Committee to occupy the third and the fifth highest positions in the party hierarchy. Another committee member was veteran communist Keo Meas . In Democratic Kampuchea, this meeting would later be projected as the founding date of the party, consciously downplaying the history of the party before Pol Pot's ascent to leadership. On 20 July 1962, Tou Samouth

10881-542: The scent of honey, but [who] hides his claws like a tiger", adding that he "had the face of a Vietnamese or Chinese". In this climate, it was unsurprising that Nim soon received instructions from Vorn Vet to take to the forests. On 5 October, Sihanouk warned him that he would be "subjected to the military tribunal and the execution block"; he left for the Cardamom Mountains , escaping waiting intelligence agents, two days later. Like Hou Yuon and Khieu Samphan, Nim

10998-406: The similarly, if not more, violent and radical policies of the regime. The birth of Democratic Kampuchea and its propensity for violence must be understood against this backdrop of war that likely played a contributing factor in hardening the population against such violence and simultaneously increasing their tolerance and hunger for it. Early explanations for the Khmer Rouge brutality suggest that

11115-466: The supervision of the untainted rural "Old People". The goal was to develop an economy based on the export of rice to develop industry later. The party adopted the slogan: "If we have rice, we can have everything". These actions and policies resulted in massive deaths through executions, work exhaustion, illness, and starvation. In Phnom Penh and other cities, the Khmer Rouge told residents that they would be moved only about "two or three kilometers" outside

11232-541: The system" by joining the Sangkum and accepting posts in the prince's government. From 28 to 30 September 1960, twenty-one leaders of the KPRP held a secret congress in a vacant room of the Phnom Penh railroad station. Approximately 14 delegates represented the rural faction, and seven represented the urban faction. This pivotal event remains shrouded in mystery because its outcome has become an object of contention (and considerable historical rewriting) between pro-Vietnamese and anti-Vietnamese Khmer communist factions. The party

11349-523: The urban and rural elites, many of the poorest peasants probably were sympathetic to Khmer Rouge's goals. In the early 1980s, visiting Western journalists found that the issue of peasant support for the Khmer Rouge was an extremely sensitive subject that officials of the People's Republic of Kampuchea were not inclined to discuss. Although the Southwestern Zone was one original centre of power of

11466-472: The vote but did not secure a seat in the legislature. Members of the Pracheachon were subject to constant harassment and arrests because the party remained outside Prince Norodom Sihanouk 's Sangkum . Government attacks prevented it from participating in the 1962 election and drove it underground. It is speculated that the decision of Pracheachon to file candidates for the election had not been approved by

11583-607: The war with Vietnam he departed for the United States where he made Democratic Kampuchea's case before the Security Council. He eventually relocated to China. The "rights and duties of the individual" were briefly defined in Article 12. They included none of what are commonly regarded as guarantees of political human rights except the statement that "men and women are equal in every respect." The document declared, however, that "all workers" and "all peasants" were "masters" of their factories and fields. An assertion that "there

11700-584: Was a part of the party's radical People's Movement wing, the Pracheachollana , led by Um Sim and associated with the republican nationalist Son Ngoc Thanh . Nim married in 1952, and subsequent to finishing his studies worked briefly as a teacher. After further studies in Law and Economics he moved into government work, and secured a full-time post at the Ministry of the Interior. He continued his work for

11817-548: Was altered to encourage a more collectivist mentality. People were encouraged to call each other "friend", or "comrade" (in Khmer, មតដ mitt ), and to avoid traditional signs of deference such as bowing or folding the hands in salutation. They were also encouraged to talk about themselves in the plural "we" rather than the singular "I". Aspects of life from the Khmer Republic such as art, television, mail, books, movies, music, and personal vehicles were prohibited. The language

11934-509: Was appointed head of the Calmette Hospital although she had not graduated from secondary school. A niece of Ieng Sary was given a job as English translator for Radio Phnom Penh although her fluency in the language was relative. Family ties were important, both because of the culture and because of the leadership's intense secretiveness and distrust of outsiders, especially of pro-Vietnamese communists. Different ministries, such as

12051-404: Was arrested by the Party security apparatus on 10 April 1977. Over a period of several months, he was brutally tortured in security prison S-21 , where the leader of the interrogation unit was the feared Mam Nai . Nim appears to have only reluctantly implicated himself in 'counterrevolutionary' activity, even displaying what in relative terms seems "extraordinary courage" by including criticism of

12168-652: Was born in 1931 and specialized in economics and politics during his time in Paris. In talent, he was rivaled by Hou Yuon (born in 1930), who studied economics and law. Son Sen (born in 1930) studied education and literature, while Hu Nim (born in 1932) studied law. Most members of the Paris student group came from landowners' or civil servants' families. Three of the Paris group forged a bond that survived years of revolutionary struggle and intraparty strife. Pol Pot and Ieng Sary married Khieu Ponnary and Khieu Thirith (also known as Ieng Thirith ), purportedly relatives of Khieu Samphan. These two well-educated women also played

12285-535: Was founded in 1951, when the Indochinese Communist Party (ICP) was divided into separate Cambodian, Lao and Vietnamese communist parties. The decision to form a separate Cambodian communist party was taken at the ICP congress in February of the same year. Different sources claim different dates for the party's founding and first congress. Son Ngoc Minh was appointed as acting chairman of

12402-541: Was given the chance to study at Kampong Cham junior school, going on to the Lycee Sisowath in the capital, Phnom Penh . Here, he stayed at the Unnalom Monastery, with his studies being funded by the family of his future wife. In the early 1950s, Nim - in common with many other later Communists - became associated with the left-leaning, pro-independence Democratic Party . As his confession stated, he

12519-505: Was head of the Association of Democratic Khmer Women and her younger sister, Khieu Thirith , served as minister of social action. These two women were considered among the half-dozen most powerful personalities in Democratic Kampuchea. Son Sen's wife, Yun Yat , served as minister for culture, education and learning. Several of Pol Pot's nephews and nieces were given jobs in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. One of Ieng Sary 's daughters

12636-415: Was made for a transitional stage such as China's New Democracy in which "patriotic" landlord or bourgeois elements were permitted to play a role in socialist construction. Sihanouk writes that in 1975 he, Khieu Samphan , and Khieu Thirith went to visit Zhou Enlai , who was gravely ill. Zhou warned them not to attempt to achieve communism in a single step, as China had attempted in the late 1950s with

12753-471: Was made one of its most prominent figures as Minister for Information. There were soon disagreements between Nim and the Party 'Centre' led by Saloth Sar (Pol Pot) and Ieng Sary , as Nim - along with Hou Yuon and Khieu Samphan - opposed the party line on the collectivisation of agriculture in the "liberated" areas. Nim was to gain a reputation as one of the more outspoken members of the Party, being generally in favour of more moderate economic policies. Nim

12870-489: Was murdered by the Cambodian government. At the WPK's second congress in February 1963, Pol Pot was chosen to succeed Tou Samouth as the party's general secretary. Tou's allies Nuon Chea and Keo Meas were removed from the Central Committee and replaced by Son Sen and Vorn Vet . From then on, Pol Pot and loyal allies from his Paris student days controlled the party center, edging out older veterans whom they considered excessively pro-Vietnamese. In July 1963, Pol Pot and most of

12987-443: Was placed under house arrest, where he remained until 1979, and the Khmer Rouge remained in sole control. In deportations that became markers of the beginning of their rule, the Khmer Rouge demanded and then forced the people to leave the cities and live in the countryside. Phnom Penh —populated by 2.5 million people —was soon nearly empty. The roads out of the city were clogged with evacuees. Similar evacuations occurred throughout

13104-473: Was renamed the Workers Party of Kampuchea at the meeting. The question of cooperation with, or resistance to, Sihanouk was thoroughly discussed. A new party structure was adopted, and for the first time, a permanent Central Committee was appointed with Tou Samouth (who advocated a policy of cooperation) as the party's general secretary. His ally Nuon Chea (Long Reth) became deputy general secretary. At

13221-543: Was roughly similar to that which existed under Sihanouk and the Khmer Republic, but inhabitants of the villages were organized into groups ( ក្រុម krom ) composed of ten to fifteen families. On each level, administration was directed by a three-person committee ( kanak , or kena ). CPK members occupied committee posts at the higher levels. Subdistrict and village committees were often staffed by local poor peasants, and, very rarely, by "new people." Cooperatives ( សហករណ៍ sahakor ), similar in jurisdictional area to

13338-593: Was to continue in his post as Minister of Information after the 1975 Communist victory in the Cambodian Civil War , and the establishment of Democratic Kampuchea after the remaining Sihanoukists were purged from the administration. He gained a certain amount of international prominence as the regime spokesman during the Mayaguez incident . Nim was later implicated in a confession made by Northern Zone commander Koy Thuon , another former schoolteacher, and

13455-504: Was to respond by calling Nim "dangerous", and to ban the Khmer-Chinese Friendship Association. An attempt by Nim to submit a petition for its reinstatement backfired dramatically, when it was discovered that the cadres who had collected the thumbprints used for signatures had done so under false pretences: Sihanouk called a meeting where he admonished Nim in person as "a little hypocrite" whose "words carry

13572-430: Was transformed in other ways. The Khmer Rouge invented new terms. People were told they must "forge" ( លត់ដំ lot dam ) a new revolutionary character, that they were the "instruments" ( ឧបករណ៍ opokar ) of the Angkar, and that nostalgia for pre-revolutionary times ( ឈឺសតិអារម្មណ៍ chheu satek arom , or "memory sickness") could result in their receiving Angkar's "invitation" to be deindustrialised and to live in

13689-569: Was widely assumed to have been murdered by Lon Nol's security police. Hu Nim was to spend the next three years in the Cardamoms as part of the Communist guerrilla movement. After the Cambodian coup of 1970 , however, in which Sihanouk was deposed by Lon Nol, the situation was to change dramatically. Sihanouk established a Beijing -based government-in-exile, the GRUNK , in collaboration with his former communist enemies, and Hu Nim - now described by Sihanouk as one "of our outstanding intellectuals"

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