The Pol Pot Regime: Race, Power, and Genocide in Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge, 1975-79

by Ben Kiernan

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31 ratings, 3.61 average rating, 4 reviews (more data...)

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published

October 1st 2002 by Yale University Press

binding

Paperback, 512 pages

isbn

0300096496 (isbn13: 9780300096491)

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"I first visited Cambodia in 1975," Ben Kiernan writes. "None of the Cambodians I knew then survived the next four years." In The Pol Pot Regime,...more

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Winifred added it

04/18/08

Read in April, 2008

recommends it for: historiagrapher wannabes

This is not a "killing fields" work. If it was, I would never had picked it up. I can't even read about orphanages, prisons, zoos or cruelty. But a flip through indicated it was more of a CIA, military dispatch, white paper volume. I know little about the Cambodian war and so chose this to get more informed. Here go my nuggets:

Cambodia rural culture was nuclear family centered but they rarely knew their grandparents names. This is not a big point in the book - but it baffles me.
...more This is not a "killing fields" work. If it was, I would never had picked it up. I can't even read about orphanages, prisons, zoos or cruelty. But a flip through indicated it was more of a CIA, military dispatch, white paper volume. I know little about the Cambodian war and so chose this to get more informed. Here go my nuggets:

Cambodia rural culture was nuclear family centered but they rarely knew their grandparents names. This is not a big point in the book - but it baffles me.

The U.S. carpet bombing a people it was not at war with - made the average Cambodian terrified of the U.S. and gave reason for hating the Americans.

This made many of them prime recruits for the underground communists who were considered the Cambodians only defense. At least they cared about the peasants. The king/president was an American puppet who lived in the city.

As the Vietnam conflict is ending, the Communists become more bold and use the fear of american bombs to evacuate ENTIRE cities withinin days. There was massive confusion among all parties about where they were to go, many did not want to go - but no-one had to be convinced that any and all population centers were easy targets for the U.S. It made no sense when they bombed the border with vietnam, why wouldn't they go for the cities just out of spite?

This is when Kiernan begins this masterwork of both journalism and historiagrphy. He takes on all others who have written seriously about the war and dissects their works while at the same time proving his details to the most minute levels with voluminous interviews, use of reams of paperwork not destroyed, and many surveys taken in the refugee camps. There must be near a thousand footnotes.

I know little of military history, so this was an eye-opener.

Pol Pot hated Vietnam - lots of "issues' there - therapy might have done him some good. He also hated so many subgoups that I can't name them all. Eventually the hate rested on his own staff and that is when his immediate officers began the insurrection that ended the regime.

Pol Pot relied on China for crucial imports - paying for them with anything he could get his hands on. The Chinese considered many of Cambodian animals as powerful herbal remedies and aphrodisiacs. Geckos included. Who knew. So Pol Pot not only starved to death 25% of the populatin -he created an ecological disaster zone.

And while the whole population is forced to grow more and more seasons of rice with little rest and even less rations - Pol Pot is paying for imports with RICE.

This just made me cry. I learned much about this war but now I have even more questions and a heavy heart. What am I to do with this knowledge? ...less

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The Pol Pot Regime: Race, Power, and Genocide in Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge, 1975-79

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