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Strongman- The Extraordinary Life of Hun Sen: From Pagoda Boy to Prime Minister of Cambodia
Strongman: The Extraordinary Life of Hun Sen is the biography of the Cambodian leader whose private life has been a closely guarded secret. Fully updated and revised from the authors first edition (Hun Sen: Strongman of Cambodia, published 1999), this volume is based on recently declassified archival documents and hours of new interviews with Hun Sen, his wife Bun Rany, son Hun Manet, other family members and associates. The book chronicles the life of Hun Sen from obscurity as a pagoda boy to strongman status. It reveals the life of Hun Sen and Bun Rany under the Khmer Rouge regime, their troubled romance as junior Khmer Rouge cadres, his escape to Vietnam, and triumphant return to liberate his country from genocide, and his emergence as the longest-serving leader in Southeast Asia."
- GenresBiography
400 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 1999
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November 6, 2019This review appeared in the Asia Sentinel:
By: Our Correspondent
Hun Sen smokes 40 State Express cigarettes a day – a World War II kind of fag – although he is trying to cut back, loves longan fruit, enjoys feeding the pelicans at his private lake at Takhmau, earns US$1,150 a month, though the state covers all his expenses, and prefers his food cooked by his loyal wife Mde Bun Rany.
His favorite dish is green pineapple and cucumber and dry and sour fish. He drinks two cups of coffee daily, and in the evening likes to relax over two pegs of Hennessey brandy topped up with Coca-Cola.
He takes a 15 minute nap to relieve the stress on his false left eye, lost in combat on the last but one day before the fall of Phnom Penh to the Khmer Rouge – for whom Mr Sen was fighting in 1975. There’s only one extant picture of the prime minister with his two real eyes, taken by a farmer who presented it to Hun Sen.
I know all this because the second edition of Hun Sen’s biography, ‘Strongman: the Extraordinary Life of Hun Sen,’ is full of such gossipy minutiae.
From my own knowledge as a correspondent off and on in Cambodia, I know that the 60-year-old Cambodian prime minister has held power since Ronald Reagan was in the White House. A former Khmer Rouge soldier who changed allegiances, Hun Sen said he is not stepping down until he is 90 – and he doesn’t seem to be kidding.
I know that he first became prime minister of a one-party state in 1985, and has been in power most of the time since. He has been premier for 28 years and so he is one of the longest serving autocrats around (there are a couple of older strongmen in the ‘Stans).
Diplomats say that the formerly pro-Vietnamese prime minister, who came to power after he joined a Vietnamese invasion force in 1979, is nowadays in the pocket of China, those who supported the faction of the Khmer Rouge headed by the late Pol Pot.
To this correspondent, the former communist Hun Sen, who took to democracy without enthusiasm, probably enjoys equally good relations with Hanoi and Beijing, though the latter hold the moneybags.
Somehow, during the long years of power, Hun Sen has always managed to manipulate himself to come out ahead of the game. In the last few years, he has even presided over a modest economic growth and stability in a land of desperate poverty, long after the four years of the Khmer Rouge’s brutal rule between 1975 and 1979.
I first came to post-war Cambodia in mid-1979, having earlier covered the Lon Nol civil war after Sihanouk’s overthrow, and saw Cambodians kneeling on the ground on Phnom Penh’s wrecked streets and picking up individual grains of rice, with Vietnamese boi doi (soldiers) driving motorized artillery through town – I hastened to photograph the guns.
I know that, from my own observations, Hun Sen received a terrible jolt when King Norodom Sihanouk, the father of the present King Sihamoni, died on 15th October, 2012. Until that moment, Hun Sen thought he was the one beloved by the people of Cambodia,
But suddenly the streets were full of hundreds of thousands of ordinary Cambodians, from young children to aged crones, and they were all lighting incense and weeping for the late King Sihanouk, the man who presided over a Golden Age, and who won independence from France without having to fight a terrible war, as the Vietnamese communists had to do against the French and then the Americans, who should have known better.
During the cremation, Hun Sen had one of his moments for going somewhat over the top, saying the delay in cremating the former’s king’s body was because the late king’s spirit was waiting for the prime minister to personally light the casket which, incidentally, I could see in the atrium there from where I stood.
"This is a miracle of the late King Father’s secret power: an impossible thing occurred at the time," Sen said. Now he had to inherit the task of protecting the monarchy, he added.
This was a Kim Jong-il moment, something from the weird propaganda fairy tales of the Democratic People’s Republic. There was another one when Hun Sen’s family members saw lights flying out of a chrey tree that had stood for hundreds of years. The Mehtas write: "the light from the tree, being only about 70 meters away, bathed their home in silvery bursts at the time when Bun Rany gave birth to Manet." Shades of the nuttiness in Pyongyang.
Manet is Hun Sen’s eldest son, a graduate of West Point, and seemingly a stable, intelligent man who might well be Hun Sen’s heir, and who could do a respectable job if what we hear is true. When he graduated, the proud father went to West Point to be with Hun Manet.
The book is indeed filled with often fascinating detail, and is not a total whitewash either. Sometimes, the Mehtas, husband and wife, have a clear vision. "Some critics argued," they wrote, "that without the moderating presence of Sihanouk, Hun Sen and the other CPP leaders would function without restraint….." How likely to be true!
At other times, the whitewash brush is out as the Mehtas go overboard. Through Cambodia’s civil wars, a UN peace process, and several elections, the prime minister has always managed to come out top of the heap. In a country plagued by poverty, he brought in recent years some economic growth and stability.
Still, we have also seen a land-grabbing frenzy, human rights abuses, 99 year leases of state land, and the doings of an insatiably greedy ruling elite. The Mehtas have little to say about these lamentable issues.
People like the royalist Prince Norodom Ranariddh, once an honorable leader who could stand up to Hun Sen, have fallen by the wayside. The Mehtas previously wrote a second book, this time about Ranariddh, and they called it ‘Warrior Prince.’ One very much doubts that this book will be resurrected as ‘Strongman’ is being at present. Ranariddh is a much reduced figure.
Human Rights Watch said last year that, instead of prosecuting officials responsible for killings and other serious abuses, ?Prime Minister Hun Sen has promoted and rewarded them."
Yet Hun Sen has always been 100% a Cambodian, and he speaks in a blunt, straightforward way that often appeals to Khmers. As the Mehtas write: "Hun Sen’s earthy outspokenness resonated powerfully with common Cambodians."
Others would say that the prime minister needs to be less ruthless, and commit to human rights.
Still, the Mehtas are right when they say that Hun Sen and his ruling party colleagues have ended the domination of those who have been educated in France or in French, from King Sihanouk to Pol Pot and the Francophile others.
Nowadays, the days of French are over. Even Hun Sen claims to speak some English (and Vietnamese) though he says he is ‘not a puppet.’
As to the 2013 edition of ‘Strongman,’ and how it compared with the original edition in 1999, at least the first half of the new book is lifted direct from the earlier tome, but would be of interest – though sometimes a bit turgid – to those who had not read the original. And the interviews and insights regarding Hun Sen’s and possible heir, Hun Manet, and Hun Sen’s brother, the mysterious Hun Neng, governor of Kompong Cham, are interesting and new and worth reading.
But the period from 1990 until 2013, i.e. 23 years, is covered in one chapter, ‘An Eventual Validation.’ The story ends up to the moment with the cremations of King Sihanouk and Khmer Rouge Brother Number Three Ieng Sary. It is all covered in just 12 and a half pages.
Still, so little is really known about Hun Sen, who almost never gives interviews, that those who have not read the original edition may want to have the current volume on their bookshelves. Those who try to ask Mr Hun Sen an innocent question, as I did during King Sihanouk’s cremation – ‘What was King Sihanouk’s greatest contribution…." are usually met, as mine was, with an angry expostulation. Yet, years ago, Hun Sen travelled around Cambodia with the press in tow, with a bottle of White Horse whisky always on the table at dinnertime in Kampot province or elsewhere.
The current volume concludes: "By 2013, Hun Sen had been in power for 28 years. His promise that he would remain in politics till the age of ninety, remains in the public record. His good health and excellent performance in the general elections of 2008 have positioned him to contest at least four more national elections," the Mehtas point out.
But Khieu Kanharith, minister of information, has been brought in to remind everyone. "This is Cambodia. Anything can happen here." Well, that’s certainly true.
By: Our Correspondent
Hun Sen smokes 40 State Express cigarettes a day – a World War II kind of fag – although he is trying to cut back, loves longan fruit, enjoys feeding the pelicans at his private lake at Takhmau, earns US$1,150 a month, though the state covers all his expenses, and prefers his food cooked by his loyal wife Mde Bun Rany.
His favorite dish is green pineapple and cucumber and dry and sour fish. He drinks two cups of coffee daily, and in the evening likes to relax over two pegs of Hennessey brandy topped up with Coca-Cola.
He takes a 15 minute nap to relieve the stress on his false left eye, lost in combat on the last but one day before the fall of Phnom Penh to the Khmer Rouge – for whom Mr Sen was fighting in 1975. There’s only one extant picture of the prime minister with his two real eyes, taken by a farmer who presented it to Hun Sen.
I know all this because the second edition of Hun Sen’s biography, ‘Strongman: the Extraordinary Life of Hun Sen,’ is full of such gossipy minutiae.
From my own knowledge as a correspondent off and on in Cambodia, I know that the 60-year-old Cambodian prime minister has held power since Ronald Reagan was in the White House. A former Khmer Rouge soldier who changed allegiances, Hun Sen said he is not stepping down until he is 90 – and he doesn’t seem to be kidding.
I know that he first became prime minister of a one-party state in 1985, and has been in power most of the time since. He has been premier for 28 years and so he is one of the longest serving autocrats around (there are a couple of older strongmen in the ‘Stans).
Diplomats say that the formerly pro-Vietnamese prime minister, who came to power after he joined a Vietnamese invasion force in 1979, is nowadays in the pocket of China, those who supported the faction of the Khmer Rouge headed by the late Pol Pot.
To this correspondent, the former communist Hun Sen, who took to democracy without enthusiasm, probably enjoys equally good relations with Hanoi and Beijing, though the latter hold the moneybags.
Somehow, during the long years of power, Hun Sen has always managed to manipulate himself to come out ahead of the game. In the last few years, he has even presided over a modest economic growth and stability in a land of desperate poverty, long after the four years of the Khmer Rouge’s brutal rule between 1975 and 1979.
I first came to post-war Cambodia in mid-1979, having earlier covered the Lon Nol civil war after Sihanouk’s overthrow, and saw Cambodians kneeling on the ground on Phnom Penh’s wrecked streets and picking up individual grains of rice, with Vietnamese boi doi (soldiers) driving motorized artillery through town – I hastened to photograph the guns.
I know that, from my own observations, Hun Sen received a terrible jolt when King Norodom Sihanouk, the father of the present King Sihamoni, died on 15th October, 2012. Until that moment, Hun Sen thought he was the one beloved by the people of Cambodia,
But suddenly the streets were full of hundreds of thousands of ordinary Cambodians, from young children to aged crones, and they were all lighting incense and weeping for the late King Sihanouk, the man who presided over a Golden Age, and who won independence from France without having to fight a terrible war, as the Vietnamese communists had to do against the French and then the Americans, who should have known better.
During the cremation, Hun Sen had one of his moments for going somewhat over the top, saying the delay in cremating the former’s king’s body was because the late king’s spirit was waiting for the prime minister to personally light the casket which, incidentally, I could see in the atrium there from where I stood.
"This is a miracle of the late King Father’s secret power: an impossible thing occurred at the time," Sen said. Now he had to inherit the task of protecting the monarchy, he added.
This was a Kim Jong-il moment, something from the weird propaganda fairy tales of the Democratic People’s Republic. There was another one when Hun Sen’s family members saw lights flying out of a chrey tree that had stood for hundreds of years. The Mehtas write: "the light from the tree, being only about 70 meters away, bathed their home in silvery bursts at the time when Bun Rany gave birth to Manet." Shades of the nuttiness in Pyongyang.
Manet is Hun Sen’s eldest son, a graduate of West Point, and seemingly a stable, intelligent man who might well be Hun Sen’s heir, and who could do a respectable job if what we hear is true. When he graduated, the proud father went to West Point to be with Hun Manet.
The book is indeed filled with often fascinating detail, and is not a total whitewash either. Sometimes, the Mehtas, husband and wife, have a clear vision. "Some critics argued," they wrote, "that without the moderating presence of Sihanouk, Hun Sen and the other CPP leaders would function without restraint….." How likely to be true!
At other times, the whitewash brush is out as the Mehtas go overboard. Through Cambodia’s civil wars, a UN peace process, and several elections, the prime minister has always managed to come out top of the heap. In a country plagued by poverty, he brought in recent years some economic growth and stability.
Still, we have also seen a land-grabbing frenzy, human rights abuses, 99 year leases of state land, and the doings of an insatiably greedy ruling elite. The Mehtas have little to say about these lamentable issues.
People like the royalist Prince Norodom Ranariddh, once an honorable leader who could stand up to Hun Sen, have fallen by the wayside. The Mehtas previously wrote a second book, this time about Ranariddh, and they called it ‘Warrior Prince.’ One very much doubts that this book will be resurrected as ‘Strongman’ is being at present. Ranariddh is a much reduced figure.
Human Rights Watch said last year that, instead of prosecuting officials responsible for killings and other serious abuses, ?Prime Minister Hun Sen has promoted and rewarded them."
Yet Hun Sen has always been 100% a Cambodian, and he speaks in a blunt, straightforward way that often appeals to Khmers. As the Mehtas write: "Hun Sen’s earthy outspokenness resonated powerfully with common Cambodians."
Others would say that the prime minister needs to be less ruthless, and commit to human rights.
Still, the Mehtas are right when they say that Hun Sen and his ruling party colleagues have ended the domination of those who have been educated in France or in French, from King Sihanouk to Pol Pot and the Francophile others.
Nowadays, the days of French are over. Even Hun Sen claims to speak some English (and Vietnamese) though he says he is ‘not a puppet.’
As to the 2013 edition of ‘Strongman,’ and how it compared with the original edition in 1999, at least the first half of the new book is lifted direct from the earlier tome, but would be of interest – though sometimes a bit turgid – to those who had not read the original. And the interviews and insights regarding Hun Sen’s and possible heir, Hun Manet, and Hun Sen’s brother, the mysterious Hun Neng, governor of Kompong Cham, are interesting and new and worth reading.
But the period from 1990 until 2013, i.e. 23 years, is covered in one chapter, ‘An Eventual Validation.’ The story ends up to the moment with the cremations of King Sihanouk and Khmer Rouge Brother Number Three Ieng Sary. It is all covered in just 12 and a half pages.
Still, so little is really known about Hun Sen, who almost never gives interviews, that those who have not read the original edition may want to have the current volume on their bookshelves. Those who try to ask Mr Hun Sen an innocent question, as I did during King Sihanouk’s cremation – ‘What was King Sihanouk’s greatest contribution…." are usually met, as mine was, with an angry expostulation. Yet, years ago, Hun Sen travelled around Cambodia with the press in tow, with a bottle of White Horse whisky always on the table at dinnertime in Kampot province or elsewhere.
The current volume concludes: "By 2013, Hun Sen had been in power for 28 years. His promise that he would remain in politics till the age of ninety, remains in the public record. His good health and excellent performance in the general elections of 2008 have positioned him to contest at least four more national elections," the Mehtas point out.
But Khieu Kanharith, minister of information, has been brought in to remind everyone. "This is Cambodia. Anything can happen here." Well, that’s certainly true.
December 10, 2014
I read this book when I was obsessed with Cambodian politics while I was in grade 10 in high school. This book is a biography of Hun Sen, one of the longest ruled leaders in the South East Asia and around the world, also the current prime minister of the Kingdom of Cambodia. This book is mostly according to the interview of the authors with Hun Sen and his wife. It described how he struggled with his life from a boy who lived in countryside to become a Khmer Rough soldier, then the youngest minister of foreign affairs, and final, the prime minister of Cambodia since 1985. However, there is still many other controversial information about the origin of his real biography or what he'd been doing during 1970s-1990s.
May 28, 2020
This is a hagiography, but what makes it interesting is the access the author had to Hun Sen and his family. So he can tell us little details of his daily life, like his smoking habits or Bun Rany’s anxieties. As a balanced account of Hun Sen as a politician, however, it will not do.
March 17, 2018
## Các ngôi đền cao chót vót được xây dựng theo dạng quả núi có vai trò như nơi sùng bái vua chúa, mà tích cách linh thiêng của nhà vua được cất giữ vào ngôi đền bằng lingas (một linh vật để thờ). Đến khi nhà vua qua đời, ngôi đền trở thành lăng mộ của vị vua ấy, chứ không giống như các vua Pharaon thời Ai Cập cổ. Bieur tượng linga, sự hợp nhất cả thế quyền lẫn thần quyền đã trở thành nét đặc trưng của người trị vì, và là biểu tượng cho tính thần thánh của vương quyền.
## Trong đời sống hằng ngày của họ có các yếu tố tự nhiên phải được tiết chế - nhằm tìm được sự chúc lành cho các vụ thu hoạch và có nước. Vì vậy, dân chúng Khơme tin rằng phải làm nguôi cơn giận của các vị thần.
## Các vua của Ankor tuyệt đối tin tưởng rằng, để duy trì mãi mãi quyền lực của mình, họ cần phải xây dựng thêm nhiều đền chùa. Vì vậy, vua Jayavarman VII đã nỗ lực bằng mọi cách để truyền bá hình ảnh của mình qua sự sùng bái vua chúa, đến nỗi chưa đến 40 năm mà ông đã xây dựng không dưới 12 kiến trúc đồ sộ - kiến trúc nổi tiếng nhất là Ankor Thom và Ta Prohm.
## Vào thời điểm này, phong trào cộng sản hừng hực dấy lên ở vùng nông thôn. Phong trào này được Saloth Sar lãnh đạo, một trí thức học ở Pháp, sau này lấy tên là Pol Pot. Ông đoạt được học bổng sang Paris học ngành vô tuyến điện, nhưng đã bỏ bê việc học hành và được cho là đã tham gia vào Đảng Cộng sản Pháp.
## Sau đó Pol Pot thấy được nguồn cảm hứng chủ nghĩa cộng sản theo kiểu Mao Trạch Đông, và tìm cách tạo khuôn mẫu chủ nghĩa Mao ở Campuchia qua việc đấu tranh giai cấp và cải cách ruộng đất.
## Khơme Đỏ tiến vào Phnom Penh vào ngày 17/4/1975. Các cuộc thảm sát bắt đầu diễn ra vào ngày đầu tiên và hầu như đã tiếp tục xảy ra trong bốn năm. Vào lúc kết thúc chế độ này, tổng số người thiệt mạng được ước tính vào khoảng 1,7 triệu người dân vô tội Campuchia, họ đã bị tra tấn và bỏ đói cho đến chết. Khơme Đỏ cho phép Shihanouk trở lại Phnom Penh vào tháng 12/1975, nơi ông hầu như bị giam hãm dưới cung điện và chẳng hay biết các người bạn Khơme Đỏ của ông đã di tản dân ra khỏi các thành phố, cấm tiêu tiền và biến đất nước thành trại tập trung.
## Khi Pol Pot phát triển mối quan hệ thân hữu hơn với Trung Quốc, thì Hun Sen được Hà Nội bao bọc. Việt Nam cần một liên minh Campuchia để đối trọng với trục Trung Quốc - Khơme Đỏ đe dọa tới Việt Nam.
## Hun Sen không dễ dàng thuyết phục được phía Việt Nam giúp ông giải phóng Campuchia khỏi chế độ diệt chủng của Khơme Đỏ bằng cách ủng hộ ít nhất 50.000 quân thiện chiến. Xét cho cùng, từ trước tới nay, VN đã là một liên minh đáng tin cậy của Khơme Đỏ. Hà Nội đã huấn luyện các lực lượng Pol Pot vào những ngày đầu của phong trào kháng chiến và hai bên đã chỉ đạo các hoạt động phối hợp chung chống lại lực lượng cộng hòa Lon Nol, quân lực miền Nam Việt Nam và quân đội Mỹ.
## Đôi khi lực lượng của ông phải chờ bộ đội VN đến, ông thừa nhận vì "bên chúng tôi không ai biết lái xe tăng". Ở những nơi mà lực lượng của ông gặp phải sự chống cự mạnh, họ đã chờ các lực lượng VN đến chọc thủng phòng tuyến của Khơme Đỏ bằng xe tăng và pháo binh.
## Sau ba ngày đàm phán tại lâu đài lịch sử, họ đã đồng ý yêu cầu một nhân vật đầy quyền lực của Bắc Triều Tiên, ông Kim Nhật Thành điều đình giữa TQ và VN, những bên ủng hộ chính.
## Dân chúng vẫn còn tin tưởng ông và đảng của ông, ông đã ủng hộ khá thỏa đáng với 51 ghế trong Quốc hội, dân chúng coi ông như vị cứu tinh của họ khỏi chế độ diệt chủng. Nhưng họ cũng muốn tạo cho Hoàng tử Ranariddh cơ hội điều hành đất nước và cải thiện đời sống của họ. Họ đã gửi cho Hun Sen một thông điệp trí mạng rằng ông chưa đủ khả năng giải thoát họ khỏi cảnh nghèo nàn thật đáng sợ.
# Chương cuối - Tóm tắt quyển sách
## Trong đời sống hằng ngày của họ có các yếu tố tự nhiên phải được tiết chế - nhằm tìm được sự chúc lành cho các vụ thu hoạch và có nước. Vì vậy, dân chúng Khơme tin rằng phải làm nguôi cơn giận của các vị thần.
## Các vua của Ankor tuyệt đối tin tưởng rằng, để duy trì mãi mãi quyền lực của mình, họ cần phải xây dựng thêm nhiều đền chùa. Vì vậy, vua Jayavarman VII đã nỗ lực bằng mọi cách để truyền bá hình ảnh của mình qua sự sùng bái vua chúa, đến nỗi chưa đến 40 năm mà ông đã xây dựng không dưới 12 kiến trúc đồ sộ - kiến trúc nổi tiếng nhất là Ankor Thom và Ta Prohm.
## Vào thời điểm này, phong trào cộng sản hừng hực dấy lên ở vùng nông thôn. Phong trào này được Saloth Sar lãnh đạo, một trí thức học ở Pháp, sau này lấy tên là Pol Pot. Ông đoạt được học bổng sang Paris học ngành vô tuyến điện, nhưng đã bỏ bê việc học hành và được cho là đã tham gia vào Đảng Cộng sản Pháp.
## Sau đó Pol Pot thấy được nguồn cảm hứng chủ nghĩa cộng sản theo kiểu Mao Trạch Đông, và tìm cách tạo khuôn mẫu chủ nghĩa Mao ở Campuchia qua việc đấu tranh giai cấp và cải cách ruộng đất.
## Khơme Đỏ tiến vào Phnom Penh vào ngày 17/4/1975. Các cuộc thảm sát bắt đầu diễn ra vào ngày đầu tiên và hầu như đã tiếp tục xảy ra trong bốn năm. Vào lúc kết thúc chế độ này, tổng số người thiệt mạng được ước tính vào khoảng 1,7 triệu người dân vô tội Campuchia, họ đã bị tra tấn và bỏ đói cho đến chết. Khơme Đỏ cho phép Shihanouk trở lại Phnom Penh vào tháng 12/1975, nơi ông hầu như bị giam hãm dưới cung điện và chẳng hay biết các người bạn Khơme Đỏ của ông đã di tản dân ra khỏi các thành phố, cấm tiêu tiền và biến đất nước thành trại tập trung.
## Khi Pol Pot phát triển mối quan hệ thân hữu hơn với Trung Quốc, thì Hun Sen được Hà Nội bao bọc. Việt Nam cần một liên minh Campuchia để đối trọng với trục Trung Quốc - Khơme Đỏ đe dọa tới Việt Nam.
## Hun Sen không dễ dàng thuyết phục được phía Việt Nam giúp ông giải phóng Campuchia khỏi chế độ diệt chủng của Khơme Đỏ bằng cách ủng hộ ít nhất 50.000 quân thiện chiến. Xét cho cùng, từ trước tới nay, VN đã là một liên minh đáng tin cậy của Khơme Đỏ. Hà Nội đã huấn luyện các lực lượng Pol Pot vào những ngày đầu của phong trào kháng chiến và hai bên đã chỉ đạo các hoạt động phối hợp chung chống lại lực lượng cộng hòa Lon Nol, quân lực miền Nam Việt Nam và quân đội Mỹ.
## Đôi khi lực lượng của ông phải chờ bộ đội VN đến, ông thừa nhận vì "bên chúng tôi không ai biết lái xe tăng". Ở những nơi mà lực lượng của ông gặp phải sự chống cự mạnh, họ đã chờ các lực lượng VN đến chọc thủng phòng tuyến của Khơme Đỏ bằng xe tăng và pháo binh.
## Sau ba ngày đàm phán tại lâu đài lịch sử, họ đã đồng ý yêu cầu một nhân vật đầy quyền lực của Bắc Triều Tiên, ông Kim Nhật Thành điều đình giữa TQ và VN, những bên ủng hộ chính.
## Dân chúng vẫn còn tin tưởng ông và đảng của ông, ông đã ủng hộ khá thỏa đáng với 51 ghế trong Quốc hội, dân chúng coi ông như vị cứu tinh của họ khỏi chế độ diệt chủng. Nhưng họ cũng muốn tạo cho Hoàng tử Ranariddh cơ hội điều hành đất nước và cải thiện đời sống của họ. Họ đã gửi cho Hun Sen một thông điệp trí mạng rằng ông chưa đủ khả năng giải thoát họ khỏi cảnh nghèo nàn thật đáng sợ.
# Chương cuối - Tóm tắt quyển sách
January 4, 2025
Hun Sen, nicknamed Le Strongman after the late King Norodom Sihanouk popularised the term, was Cambodia’s longest serving Prime Minister. Lacking money, education, and social status, Hun Sen nonetheless managed to grasp the highest power in Cambodia for quite a while, first serving as Prime Minister in 1985 and after short intermission, continued to serve in that position until 2023, when he decided to step down in favour of his son and eventual successor, Hun Manet.
As the title of the book suggests, Hun Sen, like most Kampuchean boys his age, lacked formal education. His family was unable to afford him formal education, thus sending him to be among the monks. The rise of Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouges, endorsed by King Sihanouk, drove Hun Sen to the jungle, to serve as one of the Maoist soldiers, climbing steadily in military rank, losing one of his eyes, and marrying her wife in a bizarre Khmer Rouge mass wedding. His break with Khmer Rouge came in 1977, when he defected to Vietnam, returning in 1979 alongside the invading Vietnamese and drove Khmer Rouge back to the jungle.
Entering politics as foreign minister of Vietnam and Soviet aligned Cambodia, he managed to deal with King Sihanouk and his ambition to return to politics, his similarly ambitious sons, whose mutual enmity was exploited by Hun Sen. Then, there was numerous donor countries and UNTAC that came to administer Cambodia on transitional basis.
A rather sympathetic biography of Hun Sen, this book tends to put blame on Cambodia’s numerous troubles on parties other than Hun Sen, which is understandable since the authors clearly on Hun Sen’s good book and would not want to incur the wrath of Le Strongman. However, this book serves as an important gateway to understanding the life of one of the longest-serving, most powerful politician in Southeast Asia.
As the title of the book suggests, Hun Sen, like most Kampuchean boys his age, lacked formal education. His family was unable to afford him formal education, thus sending him to be among the monks. The rise of Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouges, endorsed by King Sihanouk, drove Hun Sen to the jungle, to serve as one of the Maoist soldiers, climbing steadily in military rank, losing one of his eyes, and marrying her wife in a bizarre Khmer Rouge mass wedding. His break with Khmer Rouge came in 1977, when he defected to Vietnam, returning in 1979 alongside the invading Vietnamese and drove Khmer Rouge back to the jungle.
Entering politics as foreign minister of Vietnam and Soviet aligned Cambodia, he managed to deal with King Sihanouk and his ambition to return to politics, his similarly ambitious sons, whose mutual enmity was exploited by Hun Sen. Then, there was numerous donor countries and UNTAC that came to administer Cambodia on transitional basis.
A rather sympathetic biography of Hun Sen, this book tends to put blame on Cambodia’s numerous troubles on parties other than Hun Sen, which is understandable since the authors clearly on Hun Sen’s good book and would not want to incur the wrath of Le Strongman. However, this book serves as an important gateway to understanding the life of one of the longest-serving, most powerful politician in Southeast Asia.
February 14, 2014
Terribly biased biography with poor writing throughout. That said, it is the only book on one of the world's longest reigning leaders and not available from street vendors in Phnom Penh so there must be at least something Hun Sen doesn't accept in this book. As well, there is of necessity bias in biographies as the writer attempts to write from the protagonists perspective. Getting to know his character and even insecurities from this book, provide a valuable understanding of the Cambodian situation but please read with a grain of salt. Sam Raisy's (opposition leader) book "We didn't start the fire" is likely a good 'balance' to this political biography.
November 9, 2021
Viết chủ yếu về chính trường Campuchia, còn cụ thể về sự xuất chúng của Hunsen thì chưa được chi tiết lắm. Đọc chương cuối là nắm được hết thông tin về cuộc đời Hunsen. Cần thêm nhiều minh chứng vị dụ về sự tài tình của Hunsen thay vì chỉ kể qua loa kết quả rồi bảo là xuất chúng
October 2, 2018
Excellent book for those with little knowledge about Cambodia
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