Nate Thayer

All of Kim Jong-eun's men By Nate Thayer

WASHINGTON - The top managers of North Korea's clandestine nuclear and ballistic missile program have been methodically promoted and now dominate the inner circle of Kim Jong-eun's new government, confidential foreign government documents and official media reports from Pyongyang show.

The shadowy group of power brokers in the world's most secretive nation emerged in the first military promotions prominently unveiled during recent high-profile ceremonies as the official mourning period for the death of former dictator Kim Jong-il concluded last week.

These same senior officials are known to be behind Pyongyang's missile test launch - scheduled for the middle of April - which has rattled regional nerves and sabotaged a short-lived agreement withWashington designed to slow North Korea's steady march towards a nuclear weaponized state. The United Nations and United States have charged the "earth observation satellite" launch is a thinly disguised cover for testing capabilities for a nuclear armed long-range ballistic missile.

At least 10 senior North Korean officials, now prominent at the core of power behind 29-year-old hereditary successor Kim Jong-eun, have been named by several foreign intelligence services as in charge of Pyongyang's nuclear and ballistic missile development and export program, including enrichment of uranium to weapons grade strength.

They have also been implicated in selling nuclear and missile technology to Iran and Syria, dispatching special operation teams to attack South Korea and assassinate political opponents, coordinating an international criminal network involved in drug trafficking, counterfeit money laundering, and establishing front companies and banks to raise more than a billion US dollars per year to bankroll the privileged lifestyles of the regime's elite.

The 10 are among North Korean officials and government agencies named by at least 31 governments as part of a network that has imported, sold and developed components and technology for weapons of mass destruction (WMD). They have had their assets frozen, been banned from travel outside of North Korea and forbidden from engaging in business with the countries' nationals or companies, according to official documents.

In the first leadership reshuffle following Kim Jong-il's death and in one of his first public acts as the Korean People's Army Supreme Commander, Kim Jong-eun promoted four key officials to the rank of general at ceremonies marking his deceased father's 70th birthday on February 15.

Pak To-chun, Ju Kyu-chang and Paek Se-bong, previously seen only in civilian dress, were never known to have military rank before being made senior generals. Pyongyang's top spy, Kim Yong-chol, was also recently promoted to four-star general rank. In January, another key powerbroker, Kim Jong-eun's uncle Jang Song-thaek, who appeared for the first time in military uniform at the December funeral ceremonies for Kim Jong-il, was appointed to the rank of four-star general.

All five men are named by the United Nations, the US, the European Union (EU) and other government documents as key managers of Pyongyang's illicit ballistic and nuclear development and export programs.

Nuclear aides
Ju Kyu-chang has been at the center of Pyongyang's clandestine nuclear and missile development policies for more than two decades. He "oversees the development of North Korea's ballistic missile and nuclear programs", according to a December 19, 2011 EU document listing North Korean officials designated on its sanction list.

Ju Kyu-chang is also director of the Korean Workers' Party (KWP) Machine-Building Industry Department, former head of the KWP Second Economic Committee and past head of the National Academy of Natural Sciences. All three government agencies are named by US, UN, EU and other governments as deeply involved in covert nuclear and ballistic missile production, research and export.

According to a May 2010 confidential report to the United Nations Security Council, "Ju served as the overall supervisor for North Korea's missile development, including oversight of the April 5, 2009 Taepo Dong-2 (TD-2) missile launch and the failed July 2006 TD-2 launch."

Those two missile launches were the predecessors to the upcoming launch this month of an "earth observation satellite". Both ballistic missile launches immediately preceded Pyongyang's two underground nuclear explosions.

Daniel Pinkston, an analyst with the International Crisis Group (ICG), said Ju Kyu-chang has "technical expertise regarding the SLV [space launch vehicle] and satellite programs and the nuclear weapons program". In its June 2009 report "North Korea's nuclear and missile programs", ICG said Ju Kyu-chang "is believed to be in charge of an independent entity with custody of North Korea's nuclear bombs" and "was in charge of the August 1998 attempted satellite launch and the 2009 launch".

"I would equate Ju with General Leslie Groves, who headed the US Manhattan Project that produced atomic bombs during World War II," said Larry Niksch, a senior associate with the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies and former Asian affairs specialist for 43 years with the non-partisan Congressional Research Service. "Ju runs the day-to-day programs to develop missiles and probably nuclear weapons," he said in an e-mail this week.

Niksch wrote that Pyongyang reacted to international sanctions by "fashioning an alternative based on illicit programs: counterfeiting of US currency and products, narcotics smuggling, and selling missiles and other weapons to other 'rogue' nations like Syria, Pakistan, and Iran, and terrorist groups like Hezbollah ... I estimate that North Korean earnings from various forms of collaboration with Iran earns Pyongyang upwards of $2 billion annually. Kim Jong-il distributed much of these earnings to his military and communist elite to keep them satisfied and loyal."

Paek Se-bong is chairman of the government's Second Economic Committee (SEC). A classified May 2010 UN "Report to the Security Council from the Panel of Experts" said, "It is broadly believed that the Second Economic Committee of the National Defense Commission plays the largest and most prominent role in nuclear, other WMD and missile-related development programs as well as in arranging and conducting arms-related exports."

According to 2010 US government documents "The US has reason to believe ... [the Second Economic Committee] has been used for North Korea-Iran proliferation-related transactions." A 2009 UN report to the Security Council said the SEC "is a national-level organization responsible for research and development of North Korea's advanced weapons systems, including missiles and probably nuclear weapons". The same UN report said, "Paek is the chief operating officer of the DPRK's [Democratic People's Republic of Korea's] military industry, the country's largest employer and economic consumer."

Paek Se-bong personifies the mysterious grouping of figures in charge of North Korea's illicit weapons program. Very little biographical data exists on Paek Se-bong, who emerged from obscurity in 2003 when he was appointed to head the SEC and made a member of the National Defense Commission (NDC), the supreme ruling body of the DPRK.

After 2003, Paek Se-bong did not appear for eight years in official North Korean media until April 9, 2009 - four days after the highly publicized launch of the last North Korean "satellite". He was at that time reappointed publicly to his position as head of the SEC and a member of the NDC.

That long-range rocket test scuttled ongoing talks over its nuclear program and was followed weeks later by an underground explosion testing a nuclear bomb, which resulted in harsh UN sanctions. It was shortly thereafter that Paek Se-bong's name was placed on international sanction lists.

His name translates to the "Three peaks of Mt Paektu", a term used in official propaganda to refer to Kim Jong-il and his parents. (It is purported to be the mythical birthplace of Kim Jong-il, but he is known to have been born in a village in Siberia where his parents were in exile during World War II.)

Illicit exports
Pak To-chun was placed under international sanction on December 19, 2011, the same day Kim Jong-il's death was announced. According to the EU, "He is in charge of the arms industry. It is reported that he commands the office for nuclear energy. This institution is decisive for [North Korea's] nuclear and rocket launcher program."


An image of a national report meeting held on February 15, 2012, highlighted are Pak To-chun (2nd row, left), Ju Kyu-chang (2nd row, 2nd left) and Kim Yong-chol (3rd row, right), all of whom were given military promotions on the occasion of Kim Jong-il's recent birthday celebration. (Photo: KBS screen grab)

Pak To-chun, also a member of the powerful NDC, is director of the Military Arms Production Department. According to the May 2010 UN report to the Security Council: "The Military Arms Production Department of the Korea Workers' Party oversees the matters related to the Yongbyon nuclear plant and its nuclear weapons programs."

He succeeded Jon Pyong-ho as head of North Korea's military industries in 2010. Jon Pyong-ho was the primary manager since the 1980s of North Korea's clandestine international network tasked with covertly acquiring components and technology to build a nuclear bomb. He was in charge of trading ballistic missile and nuclear technology with Pakistan's Abdul Qadeer Khan network to build Pyongyang's nuclear and other weapons arsenal.

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AN ATOL INVESTIGATION
All of Kim Jong-eun's men
By Nate Thayer

In 2008, a secret delegation of Myanmar military generals traveled to North Korea on a weapons and technology purchasing trip. A leaked detailed report, complete with pictures, showed Jon Pyong-ho hosting Myanmar military officials, including on a tour of a missile factory.

Jon Pyong-ho continues to serve on the powerful NDC and is named on international sanction lists for running a worldwide network trafficking in nuclear material with Iran, Libya, Pakistan and Syria.

"[He] is in charge of nuclear weapons development," according to a 2009 UN report issued after Pyongyang detonated a second underground nuclear explosion. According to a December 21, 2011 EU report ordering new sanctions, the Machine Building 

Industries Department he headed is "responsible for overseeing activities of North Korea's military industries" including "the development of North Korea's ballistic missile and nuclear programs".

In April 2009, Jon Pyong-ho was one of only two officials named as accompanying Kim Jong-il to witness the purported peaceful "space launch" that scuttled earlier bilateral agreements to halt ballistic and nuclear testing, according to photographs and statements from the official Korean Central News Agency archives. The other was Ju Kyu Chang, who was promoted to four-star general during this year's February ceremonies for the deceased Kim Jong-il. Jon Pyong-ho was given special prominence at the recent mourning period closing ceremonies on 25 March.

Kim Yong-chol, a former bodyguard turned head of North Korea's spy agency, also received his fourth star during the recent Kim Jong-il birthday celebrations. Kim heads the Reconnaissance General Bureau (RGB). Both he and the RGB are named in UN, US, EU and other international sanctions for their involvement in banned sales of sophisticated weapons systems, including to Iran and Syria, and have been implicated in launching recent military attacks on South Korea.

Kim Yong-chol and the RGB "specializes in the production of maritime military craft and armaments, such as submarines, military boats and missile systems, and has exported torpedoes and technical assistance to Iranian defense-related firms", according to December 2011 United Kingdom and EU sanctions documents.

The same documents name the RGB as "responsible for approximately half of the arms and related material exported by North Korea" and name RGB front companies that in 2007 and 2008 "facilitated transactions involving ... designated Iranian financial institutions, including Bank Melli and Bank Sepah ... for the benefit of North Korea's Reconnaissance General Bureau's (RGB) weapons program."

Kim Yong-chol was first implicated by intelligence agencies in 2010. In August 2010, US President Barack Obama cited the "unprovoked attack that resulted in the sinking of the Republic of Korea Navy ship Cheonan and the deaths of 46 sailors in March 2010" when issuing Executive Order 13551 that placed US sanctions on a single North Korean official, General Kim Yong-chol, the RGB he commanded, and the Green Pine Associated Corporation, a North Korean front company the US and others have identified as acting on the RGB's behalf to sell prohibited arms, including to Iran and Syria.

The day before Kim Yong-chol was promoted to full general, Pyongyang announced the creation of a new medal, the "Order of Kim Jong-il," awarded for services in building a "thriving socialist nation" and for the military defense of the country. The first recipients of the award included Kim Yong-chol.

Kim Yong-chol's direct superior, General O Kuk-ryol, vice chairman of the National Defense Commission, is another prominent figure in the new regime's inner circle. The UN described O Kuk-ryol as "supervising the acquisition abroad of advanced technology for nuclear and ballistics programs" in a list of sanctioned North Korean officials he was placed on in 2009. The EU added him to its list in December of last year.

At this year's March 25 ceremonies closing Kim Jong-il's 100-day mourning period, Minister of People's Armed Forces and Vice-Marshal Kim Yong-chun delivered the keynote speech which said that Kim Jong-eun "has turned North Korea into an invincible country which nobody dares to attack".

United Nations and US documents from 2011 placed Kim Yong-chun, identified as "special adviser to Kim Jong-il on nuclear strategy" on a sanction list that froze his assets and imposed a travel ban. He currently serves as Pyongyang's de facto defense minister and was one of only eight leaders to walk with Kim Jong-eun alongside the hearse during Kim Jong-il's recent funeral procession.

Analysts say that the decision to name Kim Jong-eun as successor to his father was made by early 2009 and subsequent reshuffles made within the party and military have paved the way for a smooth transition. In February 2009, O Kuk-ryol was appointed vice chairman of the NDC and Kim Yong-chun was appointed minister of the People's Armed Forces.

Top commanders
In April 2009, Kim Yong-chun, O Kuk-ryol, Jon Pyong-ho, Paek Se-bong, Jang Song-thaek and Ju Kyu-chang were all elected to North Korea's highest body, the National Defense Commission. All six are also named as key figures in Pyongyang's nuclear and missile program by the UN, US and other governments, and have all been prominent in public appearances with Kim Jong-eun in recent weeks.

Second Economy Commission chairman Paek Se-bong (circled) applauds at the start of a national report meeting for Kim Jong-il's birthday on February 15, 2012. He was given the rank of colonel general (sangjang) in a military promotions list issued on the occasion of Kim Jong-il's 70th birthday. At past national events, Paek Se-bong had been observed wearing business suits (Photo: KCNA-Yonhap)

Prior to the current diplomatic scuffle over the upcoming supposed satellite launch, North Korea was accused of creating nearly identical crises in 2009 when it launched a long-range, multi-stage rocket it referred to as a space satellite. The move was in defiance of a UN ban, broke off then six-nation nuclear disarmament talks and set the stage for a new underground nuclear test, the country's second.

The following year saw North Korea launch an artillery attack on South Korea that claimed the lives of 46 South Koreans and stoked international fears that the Koreas were near war.

In recent weeks, the same North Korean officials known to command these provocative events have been given high-profile promotions as Pyongyang unveils the new core of leaders behind Kim Jong-eun's new regime. In addition to the 10, other senior officials have also been named as key figures in North Korea's illicit nuclear and ballistic missile program.

Pak Jae-gyong and Hyon Chol-hae, both of the Korean People's Army's political department, are named as "military adviser to Kim Jong-il" in UN and other sanctions lists. Head of the Academy of Science, Pyon Yong-rip, is also named as "involved in WMD-related biological research". All three played prominent roles in the ceremonies that followed the death of Kim Jong-il in the carefully orchestrated succession process to crown Kim Jong-eun as North Korea's new dictator.

Several other powerful figures who are not named in international sanctions also play key roles in the new inner power circle. Korean People's Army chief of staff Ri Yong-ho and two NDC members, Generals U Dong-guk and Kim Jong-gak, are also known to be in Kim Jong-eun's inner circle. 

 
Vice Marshal Kim Jong-gak (2nd right) seen at a March 25, 2012, rally ending the 100 days of mourning Kim Jong-il's death. He nominated Kim Jong-eun as one of the Korean People's Army's delegates to the 4th Party Conference in April 2012. Ministry of State Security's General U Tong-chuk (3rd right).

U Dong-guk heads the State Security Department responsible for domestic intelligence while Kim Jong-gak is in charge of ensuring loyalty to the new leader within the armed forces and party. Kim Ki-nam, meanwhile, leads the formidable propaganda operation in charge of molding Kim Jong-eun's image. Another prominent figure is Choe Tae-bok who is involved in Pyongyang's scientific and technological development which concentrates mainly on efforts to build a sophisticated military state.

The coming weeks will see the further unveiling of top advisers who hold the real power in the new regime, say analysts. The 100th anniversary of the birth of the founder of the North Korean state, Kim Il-sung, will take place on April 15. State media have touted the date for several years as a major national turning point, marking the regime's promise to create "a mighty and prosperous nation".

The official Korean Central News Agency said on Monday that a rare Workers' Party conference will be held on April 11, shortly before Kim Il-sung's birthday celebration. At that event, his grandson, Kim Jong-eun, is expected to be named the secretary general of the KWP, the title previously held by his father Kim Jong-il. Kim Il-sung still retains the title of president in death.

North Korea's parliament, the Supreme People's Assembly, is set to hold its annual session on April 13. It is expected Kim Jong-eun will also be promoted to chairman of the NDC, another post held by his now deceased father. Coincident with these transitional events, Pyongyang informed international maritime and space organizations that it will launch its ballistic missile into orbit between April 12 and 16.

Nate Thayer, former Southeast Asia correspondent for the Far Eastern Economic Review, is an investigative reporter specializing in conflict, transnational crime, and Asian affairs. He is currently based in Washington DC and may be reached at [email protected]

(Copyright 2012 Nate Thayer.)

North Korea: A Glimpse at a Simple Criminal Syndicate Posing as a Government By Nate Thayer

North Korea: A Glimpse at a Simple Criminal Syndicate Posing as a Government   

By Nate Thayer

(Copyright Nate Thayer. No republication in part or in whole allowed without prior wirtten permission of the author)      

        After a decade of failed Clinton era diplomacy, the United Nations and both the Bush and Obama administrations shifted to a more confrontational policy regarding the PDRK,  from negotiations on stopping the North Korean program for nuclear and missile development, to increased confrontation over their state sponsored criminal activity and financial sanctions directed to punish the North Koreans for weapons development. This evolved to a collapse of all diplomatic negotiations whatsoever in 2009.      

        The US and its allies have essentially been left bewildered and have little strategic policy towards the PDRK at all. International policy towards North Korea currently is labelled one of "Strategic Patience", a euphamism, after exhausting all obvious paths, since 1985, of engaging the worlds most stark threat to regional and international peace, which has left the world community at a loss of what to do next. And currently having no strategic policy at all.

         Since President Clinton left office in January 2001 until the present, there has been a marked escalation of hostility between the two sides that has reached a complete breakdown in diplomatic negotiations over the development of the PDRK nuclear and other military program. The U.S. and the United Nations, South Korea, Japan, the European Union and a number of other countries have created laws, resolutions, and Presidential Executive Orders to mitigate the effectiveness of some of the North Korean international criminal network and its military programs of acquiring nuclear weapons and exporting sophisticated weapons.

          In September 2005, the Bush administration used provisions of the Patriot Act, which was made law in the wake of the 2001 terrorist attack in the United States, and provisions of the Bank Secrecy Act, an amendment to the Patriot Act, to sanction and seize assets of financial institutions linked with North Korean illegal activities in Macau.

         The North Koreans responded by exploding a nuclear bomb in a test demonstration of its nuclear capablity.

          In October 2006 UN security Council passed unanimously resolution 1718 imposing a series of harsh economic and commercial sanctions on North Korea after the DPRK  conducted tests of a nuclear bomb earlier that month. The UN resolution demanded the DPRK halt its nuclear program and ballistic missile program, authorized the boarding and inspection of all DPRK cargo ships for weapons of mass destruction, banned imports and exports of a wide range of military equipment, deemed that all North Korean companies and individuals engaged in banned DPRK weapons programmers could have their assets frozen, and called for the “return immediately  to the six-party talks without precondition”

          North Korea released an official statement contending it’s   “nuclear test was entirely attributable to the US nuclear threat, sanctions and pressure,” and “was compelled to substantially prove its possession of nukes to protect its sovereignty.” North Korea’s UN Ambassador, Pak Gil Yon, said in reaction “If the United States increases pressure on the Democratic People Republic of Korea, the DPRK will continue to take physical counter measures considering it as an act of war.”

          In June of 2008, Bush declared “a national emergency” saying North Korea threatened U.S. security and interests and issued an executive order based on provisions of the Trading with the Enemy Act and the Patriot Act.  He cited  "the proliferation of weapons usable fissionable material on the Korean peninsula constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.”

          In September of 2005 the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, an interagency task force under the Department of the Treasury was created to combat DPRK illicit international activities.

          In June of 2009, after North Korea’s long range missile tests and another underground nuclear tests earlier that year, the United Nations Security Council issued more sanctions on the DPRK which “bans all arms transfers from North Korea. The resolution “ targeted not only North Korean financial institutions, but key individuals associated with nuclear, ballistic missile, and other WMD related programs.”

          President Obama’s 2010 executive order was specific and direct saying it  “targets the government of North Korea’s continued involvement in a wide range of proliferation and other illicit activities…for sanction individuals and entities facilitating North Korean Trafficking in arms…and engagement in illicit economic activities, such as money laundering, the counterfeiting of goods and currency, bulk cash smuggling and narcotics trafficking. This new executive order supplements existing sanctions targeting proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and those who support them, under which North Korean entities have been designated to date.”

          The Congressional Research Service has said US policy can help reverse the DPRK dependence on its illicit economy by “balancing US interest where foreign policy goals may conflict with anti crime activities. Congress may also be asked to provide funding for energy and food assistance as part of the resolution to the DPRKs weapons program, because some contend that additional supplies of energy and food could reduce the need to rely on illicit activities in some North Korean quarters.”

Here is a glimpse of what the PDRK has been doing concommitently to the international diplomatic effort;

Drug Trafficking

            Profit estimates vary widely for the North Korean drug trade. Estimates range from 100 million dollars to nearly a billion dollars from the combined production, manufacture, and sale of opium, heroin, and methamphetamines. In 2004, more sober estimates were 200 million dollars from the combined heroin and methamphetamine trade, in addition to 500 million dollars from other criminal organized crime. Lower figures can reach 71 million dollars----59 million for heroin and opium and 12 million from amphetamine.  Counterfeit brand name cigarettes are estimated to have a retail value of between 560 and 720 million dollars annually from their manufacture and export  And some U.S. government figures estimate they make more than 500 million dollars a year in the export of weapons systems and components, including the transfer of nuclear technology and expertise. 

          However, it appears that the extraordinary high profile of DPRK official involvement in narcotics trafficking, particularly with the arrest, detention, and expulsion of diplomatic, military, and intelligence officers and officials connected to the government, has led the North Koreans to seek out middlemen in private organized crime syndicates to help distribute the illicit products. These include Japanese, Chinese, other Asian, Russian, and European crime syndicates that distribute their illicit narcotics, cigarettes, counterfeit currency and pharmaceuticals, and even weapons. 

          For at least the last 35 years, officials of the DPRK and other North Korean government operatives have been apprehended for trafficking in narcotics. Since 1976 there have been at least 50 arrests and drug seizures involving North Korean officials in more than 20 countries around the world, said  William Bach, a U.S State Department official,  in May 2003, “And more recently there have been very clear indications especially in the form of methamphetamine seizures in Japan that North Koreans traffic and probably manufacture methamphetamine drugs.”

          The State Department’s annual International Narcotics Country Report released March, 2003 concludes that ”for years during the 1970s 1980s and 1990s, citizens of the DPRK, many of them diplomatic employees of the government were apprehended abroad while trafficking in narcotics……more recently, police investigation of suspects apprehended making large illicit shipments of heroin and methamphetamine to Taiwan and Japan have revealed a North Korean connection to the drugs."

 

Suspects arrested in several countries revealed to authorities direct links with North Korean officials, military vessels and personnel in drug and other illicit trafficking. Defector accounts also confirm government control over opium production, and the manufacture of heroin and methamphetamine by PDRK state entities. “ The most profitable means of state sponsored illegal business remains drug trafficking, gold smuggling, illegal sale and distribution of endangered species, trafficking in counterfeit us currency, and rare metals,” said Raphael Pearl of the independent Congressional Research Service in 2006, “North Korean officials appear to be increasing their involvement in financing  (these activities)”

          Methamphetamine production in North Korea was said to have started in the mid 1990’s. In the late 1990’s North Korea tried to purchase between 20 and 50 tons of ephedrine—the precursor drug for methamphetamines—from several countries, including an Indian pharmaceutical company. That is enough to treat 135 million colds for a country with a population of 23.9 million people. 

          North Korean officials have been directly linked to possessing or selling heroin, methamphetamines, opium, cocaine, hashish, and Ryhopnol (the ‘date rape drug’) in countries as far afield as Venezeula,  Japan, China, Russia, Taiwan, Egypt, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, India, and Turkey. 

          Japan has been a particular target for North Korean drugs. In 1999, two separate seizure of 100 kilograms and 564 kilograms of methamphetamine was seized. In 2000, 250 kilograms of methamphetamine seized, in 2001 a North Korean military ship was sunk by a Japanese patrol boat suspected of attempting to smuggle in drugs, and in 2002 separate seizures of 150 kilograms and two packages containing 500 pounds of methamphetamine said to be from North Korea discovered floating onshore. And in 2003 the Australian authorities seized a North Korean ship near the coast off Melbourne with 125 kilograms of heroin and arrested it’s North Korean crew. The ship tried to flee Australian navel vessels for four days and was holding no other cargo. Included onboard was a Korean Worker’s Party “political officer” with no  maritime function.

           In Egypt North Korean diplomats have been expelled repeatedly for smuggling large quantaties of drugs over three decades. In 1976 diplomats were expelled for having 400 kilograms of hashish in their luggage, in 1998 diplomats were expelled with a half million tablets of Rohypnol—the so-called ‘date rape’ drug, and in2004, two diplomats in Egypt were expelled with 150,000 tablets of Clonazipam, an anti anxiety drug.  These are just a random list of the broad range of official involvement in narcotics smuggling worldwide.

          The contraband is often smuggled by land from North Korea through China and Russia or by ship to markets in Europe, Asia and the Middle East through private trading companies controlled by Bureau 39, diplomatic pouch, and hidden in cargo labeled legitimate material.

          But North Korea’s state sponsored criminal syndicates have shifted priorities of the type of smuggled goods and the tactics used to transport and deliver them over the last 35 years, seeking to maximize profits and mask the source of origin as they have faced increasing international scrutiny. They have shifted from counterfeit dollars and opium and heroin in the 1970’s and 80’s to a sharp rise in methamphetamine in the 90’s to counterfeit cigarettes and pharmaceuticals and illegal weapons transfers in the last decade. They also have been involved in smuggling illicit elephant ivory, rhinocerous horns, conflict gemstones, fake postage stamps, untaxed liquor, CD’s, cigarettes, gold, vehicles, often through diplomatic pouched declared as innocuous goods. They have smuggled internationally controlled precursor chemicals for drug manufacture, and nuclear and weapons components, through front companies and organized crime groups. And they have increasingly shifted from direct retail delivery, through use of diplomats and state front companies, to wholesalers selling to organized crime syndicates who distribute the illicit goods worldwide. They have created a maze of changing front companies and bank accounts located worldwide, to stifle international scrutiny and disguise violations of national laws and international sanctions that can be directly linked to the North Korean regime. So as seizures of particular commodities ebb and flow, and distribution networks change, their commitment to controlling a worldwide criminal syndicate remains a central feature of state policy and aggregate revenues from illegal goods has remained consistent or increased. One marked shift is partnering with established criminal syndicates to transport and distribute illegal goods. “ DPRK linked illicit trading networks exist on every continent today – increasingly in partnership with organized crime groups,” said David Asher, a former senior U.S. government official in charge of counter North Korean criminal operations until 2005, citing a 2005 indictment of 87 people throughout the United States, “…an expansive network in the US linked to North Korea and Chinese criminal partners was documented. This network, as the unsealed indictments show, was engaged in selling tens of millions of dollars per year of contraband – everything from counterfeit US currency, counterfeit US postage stamps, counterfeit US branded cigarettes and state tax stamps, counterfeit Viagra, ecstasy, methamphetamine, heroin, AK-47s, and even attempting to sell shoulder fired missiles (manpads) and rocket propelled grenades (RPGs) into the US.”

William Newcomb, a former senior U.S. State Department official and North Korea specialist remarked in March 2011 that,” On the other hand, the continuing large-scale traffic in counterfeit cigarettes from DPRK territory suggests that enforcement against notorious organized criminality is lax. It is also possible that a lucrative counterfeit cigarette trade has replaced a riskier drug trafficking business as a generator of revenue for the DPRK state”

          The lower profile, if indeed diminishing involvement, in narcotics trafficking by the North Koreans could be a reflection of the negative consequences of the very high profile criminal seizures, arrests, detentions, and expulsions incontrovertibly linking the regime to state sponsored illegal narcotics smuggling over 30 years since 1976. They have long had dealings with private organized crime from China, Russia, and Japan and appear to have expanded these networks worldwide—along with an estimated 120 shell front corporations—the PDRK increasingly acting as a wholesaler, using them as middlemen for distribution outside the country.

 

Shipping

 

          Dozens of ships linked to North Korea have been seized with counterfeit US dollars and narcotics, as well as weapons,  and cigarette paper, among other things. This exposed the highly unusual arrangement North Korea had entered into with the Cambodian Government to operate a “Flag of Convenience” office in Singapore, controlled and staffed by  North Koreans, for a reportable bribe of millions of dollars and the promise that 30 North Korean ships could be registered under the Cambodian flag.

          The company, the Cambodian Shipping Company, was established in 1994 by a long time North Korean diplomat who had served in Cambodia, and finally shut down under international pressure in 2002 after having numerous ships seized for illegal activity, including those originating from North Korea.

         “Of most concern to the US and indeed to South Korea was the clear evidence that North Korean freighters flying the Cambodian flag or on the Cambodian register were moving ballistic missiles to clients in the Middle East and Africa,” , said Michael Richardson, author of the book “A Time Bomb for Global Trade: Maritime Related Terrorism in the Age of Weapons of Mass Destruction”.

          In 2001 Irish customs found 20 million smuggled cigarettes on a Cambodian-registered ship that arrived from Estonia, its manifest claiming it had timber. The cigarettes concealed in the centre of bales of timber, were liable to tax amounting to about three million Irish pounds. It was the largest seizure of tobacco in Irish history.  Irish officials said they were destined for a terrorist faction called the Real IRA, whose leader Shawn Garland was later indicted by the United States for laundering millions of dollars of counterfeit U.S. dollars he received at the North Korean embassies in Moscow and Minsk, Belarus and distributed throughout Europe. The 2001 cigarette bust was also said to originate in North Korea.

          Spain seized a ship, tracked by U.S. intelligence departing from North Korea in November 2002 allegedly carrying cement to Yemen. In December 2002 it was seized in the Indian Ocean by Spanish and American military vessels. The So San was a Cambodian registered vessel said to be loaded with cement “but an examination revealed 15 Scud missiles with 15 conventional warheads, 23 tanks of nitric acid rocket propellant and 85 drums of unidentified chemicals all hidden beneath the bags of cement.” It was allowed to continue at the time. It’s cargo was later determined to have ended up in Libya. An embarrassed State Department spokesman responded: "At first we couldn't verify the nationality of the ship because the ship's name and the indications on the hull and the funnel were obscured. It was flying no flag." 

       Lloyd’s List, a shipping industry newspaper, said dozens of North Korean ships flew the Cambodian flag. 

       Also in 2002, the French seized the Cambodian registered ship the Winter after a firefight.   They seized one ton of cocaine worth over 100 million dollars. The cargo was registered as scrap destined for Spain.  Greek, French, and Spanish authorities had tracked the vessel.                   

          David Cockroft,  head of the International Transport Workers’ Federation  said: "As long as governments and the UN turn a blind eye to the way FOCs allow criminals to operate anonymously, ships will be used to transport everything from drugs and illegal immigrants to the supplies used by the al-Qaida men who blew up the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania," Adding "The world should join us in demanding that Cambodia shut down this sleazy and pestilent offshore registration."

         Lim In-Yong, a senior North Korean diplomat who had been stationed in Cambodia, owned the CSC , which was awarded the contract as the exclusive Cambodian government representative to register flags of convenience  vessels in 1994. He was, on paper in partnership with the son in law of Cambodian King Norodom Sihanouk, Kek Vandy, married to the King’s eldest daughter.  The CSC quickly gained a reputation as a rogue operation.

         The Company, operating under the legal representative of the Cambodian government but operated by North Koreans, rapidly became notorious for illegal activities of the ships it registered. Aside from the above mentioned cases, they were implicated in smuggling oil out of Iraq during the embargo, smuggling cigarettes to Albania and Crete, human trafficking and prostitution to Japan and Crete, as well as other hauling contraband from weapons to drugs.  Intelligence officials suspected North Korea was using CSC vessels to ship ballistic missile technology to Iran, Iraq, and Pakistan.  Under Flags of Convenience vessels, it is difficult to identify who is the real owner of a ship.

          By 2002 the company had registered ships of which 25 had shipwrecked, 41 crashed, nine fires and 45 arrests. Nine CRC registered ships were banned from entering European ports as unfit to sail.

 A Cambodian government official, Ahamed Yahya ,  responded to the public inquiries. “We don’t know or care who owns the ships or whether they’re doing ‘white’ or ‘black’ business … it is not our concern.”

          Under growing international complaints, the Cambodian government withdrew its license to the North Korean controlled CSC. But there are 40 nations that offer flags of convenience services, making it easy to disguise the origin and cargo for the transport of illegal goods.  And making sanctions against interdicting North Korean illicit cargo much harder. “Arms smuggling, the ability to conceal large sums of money, trafficking in goods and people, and other illegal activities can also thrive in the unregulated havens which the flag of convenience system provides,” said Nick Winchester, an analyst in the Seafarers' International Research Centre at Cardiff University in Wales.

Cigarettes

          Since at least the mid-1990s, the DPRK has engaged in the manufacture of counterfeit cigarettes along with packaging and tobacco revenue stamps of various countries. Taiwan law enforcement  seized  20 shipping containers of fake cigarette wrappers destined for North Korea. According to a report from a private investigation launched by a consortium of Tobacco companies targeted by North Korean counterfeiters, “the seized materials could have been used to package cigarettes with a retail value of $1 billion.”

          It reportedly hosts similar foreign-operated counterfeit cigarette ventures. Tobacco industry investigations concluded in 2005 that North Korea operated 10-to-12 active plants and determined that the DPRK military and the “internal security service” operated at least one plant each.

Tobacco industry investigators estimated North Korea could gross between $520 million and $720 million annually. 

Made in North Korea ” counterfeit cigarettes are marketed throughout Asia, especially Taiwan and Indonesia, and in the United States. More recently, North Korea began making counterfeit pharmaceuticals, in particular Viagra, for foreign distribution, mostly Japan and South Korea.

          North Korean factories are reckoned to produce 41 billion fake cigarettes a year, for sale in China, Japan and the US,” according to testimony in front of the U.S. Congress.

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Khmer Rouge, Cambodian Government Suffer Memory Failure in Court: This Might Help By Nate Thayer

Khmer Rouge, Cambodian Government Suffer Memory Failure in Court: This Might Help

By Nate Thayer

The witness at the moment on the stand testifying against Ieng Sary in today’s Khmer Rouge trial in Phnom Penh seems to be suffering a memory lapse. Let’s try to help him, and a few others who have remarkably similar maladies. The three leaders of the Khmer Rouge in the docket: Khieu Samphan, Nuon Chea, and Ieng Sary. The chief witness on the stand is Long Narin, for the last 30 years, Ieng Sary’s chief spokesman and closest loyalist.

He seems to be having memory problems. Let me see if this jogs his memory:

On August 6 1996, Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge clandestine radio burst on the air and called for “the arrest and destruction  of Ieng Sary and his miscreant clique,” said the radio announcer,”Ieng Sary has hidden himself among the resistance fighters for years,” stole party money, and was nothing less than an “agent of Vietnam. He is therefore sentenced to death.” The Khmer Rouge radio announcer whose voice it was? Khieu Samphan.

That would be Ieng Sary, Pol Pot’s brother-in-law. For relevant historical context, the two had been sentenced to death together already-together-as the “Pol Pot--Ieng Sary clique” in 1979 by the Vietnamese installed Hun Sen Government compromised of ex-Khmer Rouge..

On August 7, 1996, Ieng Sary replied on his newly acquired—now rebel—radio station. The Ieng Sary radio crackled from the jungle denouncing Pol Pot as “the cruelest and most savage of murderers” naming Nuon Chea as Pol Pot’s chief “henchman.” “The war criminals are nobody else but Pol Pot and his handful of henchmen: Nuon Chea…who are the mass murderers of the people of Cambodia, committing until now enormous crimes against mankind. As such, they are sentenced to death.”

Ieng Sary’s radio concluded that “This impetuous mass movement, this groundswell swept up all at once the bloodthirsty, dictatorial clique of Pol Pot and Nuon Chea…” The radio voice, reading from a statement signed in Ieng Sary’s name, ended with “I have decided to resume leadership.” The man whose voice it was? Long Narin. --The man testifying this morning in the docket unable to recall the “details” of his relationship with defendant Ieng Sary.

And for good measure, 3 days later Pol Pot’s radio announced: “The Cambodian people are not confused. They can tell gold from shit…So one-eyed Hun Sen, out-and-out lackey of communist Vietnam, stop barking like a mad dog to deceive others. You yourself have already been sentenced to death.” The announcement was made in the name of Khieu Samphan.

That same day, Ieng Sary’s radio went on the air with the voice of Long Narin and cleared things up a bit: “Constant mutual suspicion reigns,” Long Narin, chief spokesman for Ieng Sary declared.

That radio station was a gift of Hun Sen. Who promptly welcomed Ieng Sary back into the national fold and government. On 14 August, 1996, Hun Sen publicly declared over His radio, “I would like to guarantee the life, the security of Ieng Sary,” the same man he had sentenced to death a few years earlier. But now, Hun Sen had a change of heart and appointed Ieng Sary the new Governor of the Province of Pailin. He also loudly called for, and received, a royal pardon from all previous crimes issued by King Sihanouk. And he recognized Ieng Sary’s newly named political party The Democratic National Union Movement.

However Hun Sen’s then co Prime Minister Prince Norodom Ranariddh, objected: “Pol Pot, Ieng Sary…at least five or six of them are completely unacceptable.” Hun Sen dismissed that remark less than a year later when he launched a bloody coup, murdering and torturing scores of Ranarridh’s supporters and driving him from power. A number had their tongues ripped out while alive, under interrogation, or their eyes gouged out, or their penises chopped off and stuffed in their mouths, before being executed by leaders of the current government holding a trial against ex colleagues accused of committing “crimes against humanity” and “torture” in Phnom Penh.  

On September 8, 1996, DNUM issued a typewritten document in English and Khmer and signed on official DNUM stationary and signed “Long Narin, Spokesman”. The document said “following the decision not to participate in the UNTAC organized elections, the dictatorial Khmer Rouge leadership was obliged to move its headquarters…At that time, though the old fox Pol Pot decided not to publicize his Machiavellian decision about His Excellency Ieng Sary for fear of the People’s and the Army’s opposition. His Excellency Ieng Sary had no more position in the leadership.” (signed) “DNUM Chief Spokesman, Long Narin”

The Ieng Sary radio was more specific on the reason for his break with Pol Pot and Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan. “I wanted to stay in Democratic Kampuchea, because I wanted to preserve our unity and thought it was still possible for me to express my opinion to a certain extent,” but “the dictatorial and murderous gang of Pol Pot (i.e. Sary’s current partners in the defence docket in the UN court, Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan) began to openly make false accusations against me by labeling me as an agent of communist Vietnam and the Alliance (the grouping of the U.S., European and Asian countries now allied with the Phnom Penh government), as a traitor to the nation, the people and the Party” This “led me to make the decision to split forever with the  dictatorial gang of Pol Pot, Nuon Chea…and found DNUM on August 15 1996…this movement stems from the profound aspirations of the cadre, combatants, and people of the liberated zone who rose in a tumultuous movement to eliminate the dictatorial and murderous gang of Pol Pot…it is a historical current no one can stop.”

So Ieng Sary left the “murderous gang” of Pol Pot, Nuon Chea, and Khieu Samphan, according to his own statement read by his chief spokesman Long Narin, not because of 1.7 million people who died while all three—now in court as co defendants-- were in command together. But because he was accused of being a “Vietnamese agent” and “traitor to the Party.”

This was according to Long Narin, who this morning, in court, can’t recall the details of his relationship with Ieng Sary. The same Long Narin who helpfully hand delivered English translated copies, with his signature, to reporters at the time. The spokeseman for Ieng Sary who was later pardoned, appointed by Hun Sen to the current government, and then arrested by the same Hun Sen, still current Prime Minister of Cambodia. (who, just to complete the circle, was an officer in the Khmer Rouge army commanded by the now defendants during the same period when hundreds of thousands were killed).

All four had previously, at various times, sentenced each other to death. Then later welcomed in high ceremony into the current government. Only to be pressured to have some arrested by the international community. And of which all of the above figures contend they have had a lapse of memory of above mentioned details. Perhaps this might help jog their convenient, individually selective memories a bit.

International Campaign to Ban Landmines soundly rebuts my story against Treaty

International Campaign to Ban Landmines soundly rebuts my blog post opposing landmine treat

Yeshua Moser-Puangsuwan
Research Coordination:
Ban/Policy (Asia)
Non-State Armed Groups (Global)

Dear Nate: Good to see your article, and I couldn't agree more with you on the lunacy of armed conflict as you perfectly describe it.
However, your conclusion regarding landmines is questionable. Your argument seems to be since conflict is unlikely to cease soon (agreed) then any international convention to take away a tool of the mass insanity will fail (facts are against you on the later).
We watch this carefully, and track it in our annual Landmine Monitor reports (www.the-monitor.org).
While there are some ups and downs in the pattern, we are clearly making a difference.
Since the 1997 Treaty came into existence, casualties from antipersonnel mines have dropped almost 75%.
80% of the world's governments have joined the treaty, which requires them to destroy their stockpiles and production capacity- they can't give it away or sell it.
Known legal trade in the weapon has halted for more than a decade.
Ground has been cleared of the weapon, last year areas of land 9 times the size of metro Paris were cleared of mines and returned to productive human use.
Non-state armed groups have also stopped using the weapons. A couple of reasons for this, one is the global norm we have created which stigmatizes users of the weapon, and many non-state armed groups are struggling for legitimacy and therefore do not use the weapon. Also they have relied in the past on state stocks which they could buy, steal or lift from the field, as those stocks are destroyed, and land is cleared under the convention, they have lost those sources.
The main countries in which non-state armed groups still use landmines- Afghanistan, Burma and Colombia, they make their own. However, since 2000, use of mines, self-made or otherwise, by non-state armed groups has dropped from 18 to 4 in 2011.
While we have yet to totally eradicate the weapon, we are on track.
And this has saved an enormous number of lives, both of combatants and non-combatants.
You are right, basically we need to bring a halt to this mass insanity in which young males are enticed to kill the latest enemy for the latest reason.
However, taking away a few of the means in the meantime can't hurt.
Cordially,
Yeshua

--
Yeshua Moser-Puangsuwan
Research Coordination:
Ban/Policy (Asia)
Non-State Armed Groups (Global)

www.the-monitor.org
an initiative of the
International Campaign to Ban Landmines
1997 Nobel Peace Co-Laureate
www.icbl.org
providing research & monitoring for the
Cluster Munition Coalition
www.stopclustermunitions.org

Yeshua: Thanks for the reasoned well sourced reply. Of course we are in agreement on the basic issues. I do take issue with some of your definitions and statistical methodology at first read. But I will make sure I examine what you are basing your conclusions on before responding.

My basic point is that while formal landmines can be restricted, they will be replaced by more crude explosive devices to serve the same tactical purpose. And they will be much harder to track control remove regulate or enforce. For instance what do you categorize IED'd as. Surely they are landmines. And surely they are in wider use now than 1997 What do govt and guerrilla forces use to secure their perimeter with in Afghanistan for instance. Particularly in contested remote areas? Or in African conflicts? I will respond thoughtfully after reading your msg carefully.

Of course we are on the same team here. Anything that will eliminate or reduce civilian and combatant casualties is good. And to make them effectively more enforceable by international treaty. So, as I said in my post, my comments were as much interrogative as a statement. I remain open minded and will reply. I would like to post your comment as a reply on my blog if I have your permission

warm regards on good work,
Nate

Nate,
Sure, you are welcome to post my reply on your blog.
There has been a dramatic increase in IEDs in insurgencies around the world, especially since Iraqi insurgents brought the superpower to its knees through their use. Wow, what self-respecting rebel is going to pass up this easy to make weapon?
However, IEDs do not resemble, nor are they used in the same way, as the landmines proscribed by the 1997 Convention.
This difference is further obfuscated by many journalists reporting anything on the ground which goes boom as a 'landmine' (especially in S Asia... I'll be giving a workshop on Reporting on Explosive Weapons at the Indian Press Club in January as part of our efforts to get accurate reporting).
The convention was mobilised by humanitarian groups, a history you know well. The focus was on the indiscriminate nature of the weapon. Once laid, it kills friend or foe, much like the AV mine you got up close and personal with.
The Mine Ban Treaty bans any weapon, not just antipersonnel mines, which explodes due to the presence, proximity or activity of a human being. This means they are activated by the victim.
Most IEDs are targeted weapon, they are not victim activated. They require the operator to trigger them, usually through remote, electric, command (frequently cellphones, but also by wire). These targeted bombs have been used in Iraq, Chechniya, Afghanistan, S. Thailand and India by rebels to devastating effect.
Of course, just like US drones, they sometimes get it wrong and wipe out a bus load of ordinary folk. When that happens, by either NATO or the Maoists, it is a war crime, but does not come under the Mine Ban Treaty.
So, no, IEDs are not covered by the Mine Ban Treaty. With the exception of those which meet the treaties definition, however most don't. Do we need another convention to cover them? Well that's not going to happen. Anyway I'd prefer a convention against all war, or if we keep them only sending presidents and generals to fight them.....
by the way, all explosive boobytraps are prohibited by the mine ban treaty.
Cordially,
Yeshua

Yeshua:

I take no issue with any of the below. And again we are on the same team onn these issues. I am aware of how you described the  tactical use of IED's. And I am not trying to much up the debate with Socratic logic to detract from the legitimacy of your premise or the practical compromises that have to be made.

My original point was the use of a tactic weapon to secure the perimeter of infantry grunts actually at risk and deployed to carry out the combat. If landmines are banned, what will/do they now use in there place to secure their perimeter? I know it is different for newer usage of asymmetrical warfare, "terrorism" which targets civilians, and urban warfare in general (all of which violate existing international rules, laws, conventions, and treties of war), but in the field, say Afghanistan, what do forward deployed soldiers use to secure their AO? If they aren't using landmines, they are replacing them with something. And victim-activated devices may be banned, but thats the only way you are going to secure whatever piece of real estate you are using as a forward operating base. So, are they using imporvised explosives designed for other purposes or homemade or landmines? If not then waht? They certainly aren't going to rely on a gentleman's agreement with the other side when office hours are open for business. That is pretty much the basis of my entire admittedly intentionally provocative post. if you can convince me of another way that two sides on a mission to murder the other can replace that or not need to employ it, then I will promptly retract my (very luke warm and probably not really honestly committed to but meant to initiate a debate) initial opposition to the Treaty

Thanks for the substantive and thoughtful rersponses,

Nate

Below is the Original post or you can see full version on this blog:

Why Landmines Should not be Banned

 

By Nate Thayer

Great piece by Luke Hunt, as is his norm. But with the full knowledge I will get rebuked like a convicted pedophile arguing for the right to work as a summer camp counselor for teenagers, I am opposed to a ban on landmines and the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Treaty. I promise I love my mother, dogs, children, and freedom etc. etc. But, in my view, an international treaty making  it illegal to manufacture, produce sell, export, buy, and use anti-personnel mines will result in increasing civilian and non-combatant casualties, and increase both the number of combatants wounded and the severity of their wounds. Here is my reasoning:  

The statistics swing wildly, as does the category what team is allowed to murder whom and when, which team doesn’t have the thumbs up to kill, or whom it is against the rules to murder (see below for far more random data than you want to know), but it is generally accepted that well over 250 million people were killed by political groups in the 20^th century—far more than any century in human history. It was a century that began with a murder that sparked a war in Sarajevo, interrupted by an icon event of world harmony and unity—the Olympics—in Sarajevo and ended with a mass orgy of mass killing and atrocities in Sarajevo. And it only seems to be getting worse since. There have been several hundred wars this last century, but the figure swings wildly depending on who is counting what and where.

But my conclusion is that it looks like it is going to be a while before people figure out another way to settle their differences. Another way than sending off as-close-to-teenage-boys-that-might-still-think-it-is-a-like-a-video-game as they can get away with, to do their killing or get killed trying to not let the other team kill the guy who sends the other guy who thinks it is like a video game off to prevent him from getting killed while trying to kill the opposing teams elite.

But, at the end of the day, anybody who has been to war knows that the first thing you do when you seize a piece of real estate is to protect your perimeter from being penetrated by someone trying to kill you. It is human nature. So you can take care of such matters as eating, talking, sleeping, thinking, and, in general trying not to dwell on the fact that you are unwanted where you are enough that someone will kill you for being there. It has nothing to do with politics. Or country. Or freedom. Or justice. Or ideology. Or patriotism etc. It has to do with not getting killed.

To secure your perimeter you must make the other team afraid enough to not risk trying to breach it. So you put things that explode and will kill them under the ground or along a path or between trees to make a circle around you that will kill them so they won’t kill you. So you can eat, sleep, and wake up. It has nothing to do with landmines per se. They make them designed to just blow your leg off and NOT kill you so two other guys will be out of action also because they need to carry you back from whence you came. Actually the good ones are designed to blow three peoples legs off to make SIX other guys, totaling nine, to be out of action. They have landmines that can bounce in the air and instead of blowing your leg off, blow up chest high to kill a bunch of the other team. Or attached in a line down a path so the first guy sets off an explosion that kills a whole line of guys going back, say, 40 feet. There are all kinds of tricks. You can easily make your own landmine from any explosive—a mortar, or artillery shell, grenade or a Budweiser beer can filled with innards of bullets etc. The point being that banning landmines isn’t going to stop some young fellow from doing whatever he can to make sure he can eat and sleep to minimize the chances of someone from the other team trying to kill him successfully while he does so.

It is human nature to try and avoid death, pain, injury or danger.

I will add here I speak as someone who has been on the wrong side of a landmine. Actually two landmines placed on top of one another just for good measure. Two anti-tank mines. I was in a Russian truck that the team I was with had just captured from the other team. After taking their whole town. We were driving at night down a jungle dirt path back towards our team’s locker room. Before this particular battle, the team I was with didn’t have any tanks—or trucks. These anti-tank mines are pressure designed. You can walk on them and they won’t go off, but you drive over it and the weight of the vehicle will create an explosion that will shake the earth ten miles away. I was 4 feet away when we did just that. It was placed earlier by my own team I was with to prevent the other team from driving their tanks—or trucks—through my team’s perimeter. But I guess they forgot. There were three of us in the front of the truck and six in the bed of the Russian Zil transport military vehicle. I was in the middle in the front. The mine blew the truck into the air like a child’s toy and shredded it into a thousand shards of lethal metal. The other two people sitting with me were killed. Well not immediately. I woke up in the engine compartment of the now non-existent truck with a severed leg across my face. It wasn’t mine. I checked. It was however the driver whom I had been sitting next to. He was holding the stump of his leg with the expression of frozen eyed indescribable shock of someone who knows he is about to die. He cried calling for his mother for what seemed like a long time. Then he died. The fellow sitting on my other side was luckier. He took shrapnel through his brain and died instantly. It was rainy. It was night. It was a jungle. And we were seven miles from the nearest place where someone wouldn’t shoot us if we arrived. Several were badly injured. I had shrapnel through my legs torso and head. And several broken bones. We tied a hammock to a small tree we cut down and carried the more seriously wounded through the jungle towards “home”. I only realized my ankle bone was sticking out of my leg when I stepped in a muddy puddle and pain shot up to my brain. I only realized I had pieces of metal in my head when I tasted blood dripping in my mouth, wiped my face, and my hand was covered in bright crimson liquid. Two died while we walked—for two and a half hours.

My point being only I really don’t like landmines at all. So it might seem odd I support them being used as a weapon of war, but it isn’t idle ignorance of the suffering they inflict. But it makes a lot of sense actually. Because I didn’t and don’t want to die.

If you make landmines illegal, it will be like alcohol prohibition or making marijuana illegal. It won’t stop them from being used; it will just make the issue worse. Think IED and Iraq and Afghanistan. Those aren’t landmines. But they are. They are just homemade. And far messier and harmful.

If landmines are controlled and regulated, it is a far more sensible and workable option. They can be designed to easily be detected and removed. Rules of war can be made to require they be mapped when placed, removed when the other team seizes that particular plot of land, or made to disintegrate after a period of time--whenever whatever organized lethal squabbling brought these young boys to wherever they are that requires more than turning off the bedside lamp to get a good night sleep.

But you can’t make laws that prevent people from trying simply to not let someone else they really have no beef with personally be able to kill them when they are eating lunch or sleeping. If you want to stop that from happening, then perhaps it is better to focus on not ordering sending these people off to kill and get killed because you want to protect your money, political power, or religion, or race, or whatever belief system is deemed worthy enough to declare war on the other team.

 

According to the Red Cross, the civilian to soldier death ratio in wars fought since the mid-20th century has been 10:1 and rising. From 1900 to 1987 more than 170 million were killed as defined by “death by government.” From 1945 and up to 1987, about 76,000,000 people have been murdered in cold blood by one regime or another. Most of this for political reasons of state or power, but also outright genocide—murder for reasons of ethnicity, race, religion, or nationality. From 1900 to 1987, about 39,000,000 people were killed in genocide or 20 million by the definition of genocide since WW2. And estimated 19 more million were killed between 1990 and 2000. So 80 million in war murdered since WWII. Only twelve countries in the world have a population larger than this. Then you add on that the additional that have been killed by government violence in the 20^th century—not war among combatants--but mass murder or intentional killings of their own people under their political control. Estimates are more than 150 million. The statistics people have actually devoted their lives to figure out categorizing the above to justify, excuse, create rules to make it morally OK, or to blame it on the other team are staggering. There is a list “ Attributing casualties caused just to Christians” and lists of  “How many people have died in the name of Christ, Christianity and Catholicism?” and lists of “Victims of the Christian Faith” which include “Ancient Pagans, Mission,  Crusades (1095-1291), Heretics, Witches,  Religious Wars,  Jews,  Native Peoples,  20th Century Church Atrocities”,  Then there is a list of “Death by Government” and an actual US military computerized system to estimate acceptable levels of “Collateral Damage” i.e. percentage of civilians acceptable to kill in a military operation.  The software used is known as “FAST-CD” or “Fast Assessment Strike Tool—Collateral Damage." A helpful, if a bit transparently sure- of-himself author explains how it works which I am not sure really makes much difference if you’re the one who is dead. “When followed, this process dramatically reduces the amount of collateral damage in U.S. military operations, and also ensures high levels of political accountability.” Here he gives the people who might be killing you a bit of wiggle room. “However, due to the realities of combat operations, the process is not always followed. The U.S. military’s collateral damage estimation process is intended to ensure that there will be a less than 10 percent probability of serious or lethal wounds to non-combatants. Less than 1% of pre-planned operations which followed the collateral damage estimation process resulted in collateral damage.” What a relief to know that, I am sure any reader would agree. The author continues to reassure potentially dead people: “When collateral damage has occurred, 70% of the time it was due to failed “positive identification” of a target, 22% of the time it was attributable to weapons malfunction, and a mere 8% of the time it was attributable to proportionality balancing - e.g. a conscious decision that anticipated military advantage outweighed collateral damage. ^“ Ah hah! So only 8% of the times were the murders of women, children, old people or other people not dressed hostilely intentionally killed? What a reassurance that is.  He continues, a bit annoyingly, self-riotously: “According to public statements made by U.S. government officials the President of the United States or the Secretary of Defense must approve any pre-planned ISAF strike where 1 civilian casualty or greater is expected.” 

Then the lists get endlessly more entertaining on who it is OK to kill, who, and why is doing the killing, and who killed against the rules (the rules of OK being quite remarkably distinct from each other) There is the “Overview of Twentieth Century Wars, Massacres and Atrocities: Source List and Detailed Death Tolls for Man-made Multicides throughout History” It only gets more unpleasant. There are lists that just include soldiers—dismissing the women children and civilians as not statistically relevant to study for that project. “There are endless lists of “Wars of the Twentieth Century” and “Death Tolls for the Multicides of the Twentieth Century”,(see below starting with “Alphabetical Index (A-J)” Almost every war falls into one of two categories: Ethnic conflict or religious conflict. There are lists of subcategories or additional lists where religion is just one of several issues worth murdering or being killed for. And then a list where different ethnic groups fought for primarily religious reasons. There is a list which is prefaced: “This list focuses on atrocities which are largely the direct result of unbridled corporate exploitation. Obviously, many additional conflicts have an underlying economic cause which operates indirectly.”

Then you have what defines a civilian casualty of war. The label ‘civilian’ is parsed and selectively applied in a multitude of definitions to make killing them acceptable for one team or another. You would think a civilian is pretty simple-- any person who does not belong to the armed forces of one side trying to kill the other team. But there are endless debates about, for example, civilian contractors, working with the military, or “terrorists” (which is another category with an endless disputed list of one group of people given the A-OK too kill another group). Not to mention whether said defined terrorist group has the green light to kill category “B” of said defined target for murder. So that complicates the whole issue of how one defines a “civilian casualty of war.” The disputed groups of who without a uniform and gun shooting back at you deserves to die a legal murder include: Those killed as a direct effect of war; Those injured as a direct effect of war; Those dying, whether during or after a war, from indirect effects of war such as disease, malnutrition and lawlessness, and who would not have been expected to die from such causes in the absence of the war; Victims of one-sided violence, such as when states slaughter their own citizens in connection with a war; Victims of rape and other sexual violence in connection with a war; Those forced to flee their homes from war – that is, refugees and Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs); and those who, even after a war is over, die prematurely from injuries sustained in war. 

Virtually every atrocity statistic is denied, minimized or rejected by someone, but the following lists of dead people from being murdered for a political reason are among the most argued about: Racism, since, as a collection of physical traits is not really a scientific concept, how do you attribute motive to murder from purely racial conflicts and all other ethnic conflicts? Whether a conflict is racist depends on whether the bad guy comes from the other side of the river or the other side of the planet. Generally, racism is covered by the African Diaspora, Apartheid, Colonial Activities and Indians.

 Then there is the list of “Secondary Wars and Atrocities of the Twentieth Century” and “Deaths by Mass Unpleasantness: Estimated Totals for the Entire 20th Century” Which I find particularly clever.

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Then there is the Infamous Proverbial Body Count Quiz Show Debate: How many people died in all the wars, massacres, slaughters and oppressions of the Twentieth Century? Here are a couple figures to choose from. Note the categories the different researchers deem OK to call “Against The Rules.”

Cherif Bassouni, "Searching for peace and achieving justice: the need for accountability", published on Law and Contemporary Problems, vol. 59: no. 4.) 33 million "military casualties" (that would mean dead boys carrying a gun wearing the same color coordinated clothes only); 170 million which is defined as dead people killed by or fighting their own governments in "conflicts of a non-international character, internal conflicts and tyrannical regime victimization" and “includes 86 million since the Second World War” for a grand total of 203 million people.

 

Or you can choose Zbigniew Brzezinski, “Out of Control: Global Turmoil on the Eve of the Twenty-first Century (1993)”  He counts "Lives deliberately extinguished by politically motivated carnage":  which he says is 167 million to 175 million which includes “War Dead: 87,500,000”,  “Military war dead: 33,500,000”, “Civilian war dead: 54,000,000”,  “Not-war Dead: 80,000,000”,  “Communist oppression: 60,000,000” Or then for selective reading there is David Barrett, “World Christian Encyclopedia (2001)”,  who just counts “Christian martyrs only” at 45.5M.  Or Stephane Courtois, in “The Black Book of Communism”, who limits dead victim to “Victims of Communism only” at 85-100 million. Or there is Milton Leitenberg who slices up the body count to only include “Politically caused deaths in the 20th century” which he puts at 214 million to 226 million” which sub diced up into “Deaths in wars and conflicts, including civilian: 130 million to 142 million” and ‘Political deaths, 1945-2000” which, probably through some government funded research grant comes up with the pretty darn laser clear number of “50 million to 51 million. Then there is the oddly titled list “Not The Enemy Media”  which lists those “Killed through U.S. foreign policy since WWII, as of July 2003” to the pretty darn mathematically specific “10,778,727 to 16,861,695 (1945-May 2003).” Or there is the abruptly titled ominous list by Rudolph J. Rummel, titled “ Death By Government”, which  comes up with (Google the word, I had to) "Democides - Government inflicted deaths (1900-87)” and has a grand total of exactly “169,198,000” which includes the suspiciously partisan sounding categories of “Communist Oppression” which he places at “110,286,000” and the very different murderer but same dead result of “Democratic democides” which are suspiciously lopsidedly slim at “2,028,000.” He also, for fun or because his government research grant budget hadn’t been all spent yet maybe, has a list clarifying “Not included among democides”( but just as dead: my inserted notation): “Wars: 34,021,000” and “Non-Democidal Famine (which he helpfully defines for us: my notation) “(often including famines associated with war and communist mismanagement):”  and then provides further scientific sub categories of “China (1900-87): 49,275,000” and “Russia: (1921-47): 5,833,000” for a total of “258,327,000 for all the categories listed here.” Phew!!

Or the more sober data chart of Matthew White, “Historical Atlas of the Twentieth Century, 2010)” which has the list as follows: “Deaths by War and Oppression during the 20th Century: 203 million”

	Military	Collateral*	Democide	Famine	Total
Wartime	37m	27m	41m	18m	123m
Peacetime	0	0	40m	40m	80m
TOTAL	37m	27m	81m	58m	203m

Mr. White, thankfully defines “Collateral = civilian deaths that are generally considered to be an unavoidable, legitimate byproduct of waging war.” And breaks it down further as “My estimate for the Communist share of the century's unpleasantness: Genocide & Tyranny: 29 million” and just to be clear adds it is “including intentional famine.” There is a separate list of dead people from other people being upset with some group of another people Mr. White includes of  “Man-made Famine: 41 million” adding “(excluding intentional famine, but including both wartime and peacetime)” which , frankly still leaves me a bit confused. He has other lists for the cause of a specific group of dead people which are “Communist-inspired War (for example the Russian Civil War, Vietnam, Korea, etc.)”  which he calculates at “Military: 7 million” and “Civilian (collateral): 10 million” And just so he is perfectly clear as to who caused who to be dead from what and for what reason, he adds “NOTE: With these numbers, I'm tallying every combat death and accidental civilian death in the war, without differentiating who died, who did it or who started it. According to whichever theory of Just War you are working from, the Communists may be entirely blameless, or entirely to blame, for these 17 million dead.” His final tally for dead people by political allegiance (or more accurately lack of allegiance, but still dead for some degree of political something or other he continues: “TOTAL: 87 million deaths by Communism.” And “RESIDUE: 116M deaths by non-Communism.”

He has further lists, he says “For Comparison” of dead people including “smallpox, smoking, abortions, Cats and Dogs, Influenza Epidemic 1918-1919, ASIDS, Homicides, Disasters, racism, Decommunization (I didn’t bother to Google that one), Medical Mistakes, and Eaten by Tigers”

 

Ok, I will stop here but I will let the lists continue on their own. But a warning to those who dare read on: You might be, statistically, risking dying from old age or confusion before getting to the end……………….

 

Khmer Rouge Apologist Noam Chomsky: Unrepentant

Khmer Rouge Apologist Noam Chomsky: An Offense to all who died under Pol Pot

A Review of his record to date

By Nate Thayer

 

Professor Noam Chomsky is a brilliant man. He is without question the world’s leading scholar on linguistics, a long deserved tenured professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and speaks 32 languages. He so dominates the international field of linguistics, that he created another school of linguistic theory for the purpose of encouraging debate within his specialty.

However Chomsky is best known as a very active political critic. He refuses to attach an ideology to himself, but has described his politics in their past as similar to an Anarchist.

He is too smart to simply not understand the political consequences he has made a career out of  espousing on the issue of culpability for crimes committed during Khmer Rouge rule. And they are nothing less than intellectually intentional, knowing lies designed to mislead people as to the true facts to further a pre-determined ideological agenda, parsing, obfuscating and intentionally deceiving people to wrongly attribute the origins, causes, responsibility and perpetrators of the Cambodian suffering. His writings on Cambodia have done more damage, through its surface logic, to allowing those responsible for mass murder to avoid facing justice, and to misdirect that responsibility on peripheral players in the 40 year old drama. Not only does he deem the architects of Cambodian suffering as the US government, but labels the intenrational independent media as willing accomplices.

In the June 25, 1977 issue of the “Nation” a popular left leaning magazine in the U.S., Noam Chomsky and Edward S. Herman authored “Distortions at Fourth Hand.”

In it, he denied the credibility of information leaking out of Cambodia of a bloodbath underway, and viciously attacked the authors of reportage suggesting many were dying and suffering under the Khmer Rouge. “The technical name for this farce is 'freedom of the press'. All are free to write as they wish: Fox Butterfield, with his ideological blinders, on the front page of the Times (daily circulation more than 800,000)…. that find only 'woes' and distress, reach a mass audience and become part of the established truth. In this way a 'line' is implanted in the public mind with all the effectiveness of a system of censorship, while the illusion of an open press and society is maintained. If dictators were smarter, they would surely use the American system of thought control and indoctrination…."

Chomsky called it "a campaign to reconstruct the history of these years so as to place the role of the United States in a more favorable light. The drab view of contemporary Vietnam provided by Butterfield and the establishment press helps to sustain the desired rewriting of history, asserting as it does the sad results of Communist success and American failure. Well suited for these aims are tales of Communist atrocities, which not only prove the evils of communism but undermine the credibility of those who opposed the war and might interfere with future crusades for freedom."

"It is in this context that we must view the recent spate of newspaper reports, editorials and books on Cambodia, a part of the world not ordinarily of great concern to the press. However, an exception is made when useful lessons may be drawn and public opinion mobilized in directions advantageous to the established order. Such didacticism often plays fast and loose with the truth.” “For example, on April 8, 1977, The Washington Post devoted half a page to 'photographs believed to be the first of actual forced labor conditions in the countryside of Cambodia [to] have reached the West.' The pictures show armed soldiers guarding people pulling plows, others working fields, and one bound man (“It is not known if this man was killed,” the caption reads). Quite a sensational testimonial to Communist atrocities, but there is a slight problem. The Washington Post account of how they were smuggled out by a relative of the photographer who died in the escape is entirely fanciful. The pictures had appeared a year earlier in France, Germany and Australia, as well as in the Bangkok Post.” He suggested that “the series of pictures could have been taken in Thailand with the prime objective of destroying the image of the Socialist parties” before the election.” He continued: “Even if the photographs had been authentic, we might ask why people should be pulling plows in Cambodia. The reason is clear, if unmentioned. The savage American assault on Cambodia did not spare the animal population. Hildebrand and Porter, in their Cambodia: Starvation and Revolution, cite a Cambodian Government report of April 1976 that several hundred thousand draft animals were killed in the rural areas. The Post did not have to resort to probable fabrications to depict the facts.” Hildebrand and Porters book Cambodia: Starvation and Revolution was cited as quoting the Pol Pot Khmer Rouge themselves as to why slave labour under the KR was a myth created to serve American propaganda. “Hildebrand and Porter present a carefully documented study of the destructive American impact on Cambodia and the success of the Cambodian revolutionaries in overcoming it, giving a very favorable picture of their programs and policies, based on a wide range of sources.” Their book was a left wing diatribe that relied entirely on KR official propaganda documents and statements melded with anti--American propaganda. There was nothing remotely acceptable in its scholarship or methodology. Both authors admitted a number of years ago that their book had been discredited and distanced themselves from their own work. “In his Foreword to Cambodia: Starvation and Revolution, Asian scholar George Kahin observes that it is a book from which 'anyone who is interested in understanding the situation obtaining in Phnom Penh before and after the Lon Nol government's collapse and the character and programs of the Cambodian Government that has replaced it will, I am sure, be grateful…' But the mass media are not grateful for the Hildebrand-Porter message, and have shielded the general public from such perceptions of Cambodia.” Here Chomsky blames the media, again, as conspiring en masse to allow the public to hear the truth about the KR. “In contrast, the media favorite, Barron and Paul's Murder of a Gentle Land: untold story of Communist Genocide in Cambodia (their subtitle), virtually ignores the U.S. Government role. When they speak of 'the murder of a gentle land,' they are not referring to B-52 attacks on villages or the systematic bombing and murderous ground sweeps by American troops or forces organized and supplied by the United States, in a land that had been largely removed from the conflict prior to the American attack. Their point of view can be predicted from the 'diverse sources' on which they relied: namely, 'informal briefings from specialists at the State and Defense Departments, the National Security Council and three foreign embassies in Washington.' Their 'Acknowledgements' mention only the expertise of Thai and Malaysian officials, U.S. Government Cambodian experts, and Father Ponchaud. They also claim to have analyzed radio and refugee reports.” In fact Barron and Paul’s book, widely vilified by the left ideologues when it came out, was the first to document widespread starvation, murder, human rights abuses, torture, and harsh central polices where people were dying from being turned into slave labor. It was widely accused for being a CIA funded propaganda tract. Its contents have almost wholly turned out to be remarkably accurate. In fact it relied almost exclusively on interviews with several thousand refugees who had managed to escape to Thailand and were in refugee camps on the Thai border. They were eyewitness accounts from inside KR Cambodia---sourcing that didn’t exist in either Chomsky or Porter and Hildebrand's books.  Barron and Paul also included eyewitness reports from journalists who were held at the French embassy in Phnom Penh and saw the genesis of the transformation of Cambodia into the shocking central controlled policies that left nearly 2 million dead. Chomsky downplays these reports, cherry picking from those that, as journalists are supposed to do, only reported what they could confirm. Their scholarship collapses under the barest scrutiny. To cite a few cases, they state that among those evacuated from Phnom Penh, “virtually everybody saw the consequences of [summary executions] in the form of the corpses of men, women and children rapidly bloating and rotting in the hot sun,” citing, among others, J.J. Cazaux, who wrote, in fact, that “not a single corpse was seen along our evacuation route,” and that early reports of massacres proved fallacious (The Washington Post, May 9, 1975). They also cite The New York Times, May 9, 1975, where Sydney Shanberg wrote that “there have been unconfirmed reports of executions of senior military and civilian officials ... But none of this will apparently bear any resemblance to the mass executions that had been predicted by Westerners,” and that “Here and there were bodies, but it was difficult to tell if they were people who had succumbed to the hardships of the march or simply civilians and soldiers killed in the last battles.” Chomsky neglects to point out that the journalists were held hostage and Schanberg concluded they saw no corpses because the Khmer Rouge made sure they did not. Schanberg was also almost executed himself for seeing what little he did see. In the same article Chomsky cites from Cazaux, he fails to include the detailed account of the French surgeon at Calmette Hospital who came out with the last group of westerners, who said that he saw three hundred bodies with their throats cut in the central market. Chomsky goes on: “(Barron and Paul) do not mention the Swedish journalist, Olle Tolgraven, or Richard Boyle of Pacific News Service, the last newsman to leave Cambodia, who denied the existence of wholesale executions; nor do they cite the testimony of Father Jacques Engelmann, a priest with nearly two decades of experience in Cambodia, who was evacuated at the same time and reported that evacuated priests 'were not witness to any cruelties' and that there were deaths, but 'not thousands, as certain newspapers have written' (cited by Hildebrand and Porter).” Chomsky here refers to an article in the LA Times of May 9 which shows how he distorts, in what can only be intentional, the journalists account: “Phnom Penh was described by many of the returnees as a “dead city,” littered with decomposing bodies, and abandoned household goods and populated by a few forlorn pets and a few Khmer Rouge soldiers. One Frenchman said last Thursday the Khmer Rouge had come to his house and ordered him to leave or be shot. He recalled: “On the way to the embassy I saw several dead bodies rotting in the street. Some of them apparently had been shot, but some had their heads crushed and appeared to have been beaten to death.” "A Swedish journalist, Olle Tolgraven of Swedish Broadcasting, said he did not believe there had been wholesale executions. But he said there was evidence the Khmer Rouge had shot people who refused to leave their homes in a mass evacuation ordered the first day of the takeover. This was corroborated by others. One Cambodian woman said many old people died on the trek out of the City “because it was too hard for them to walk.” Chomsky and Herman continued to shift blame from the KR, tried to discredit reports suggesting KR atrocities, and cited without quotation media that he throughout uses as examples of a conspiracy of propaganda: “Before looking more closely at Ponchaud's book and its press treatment, we would like to point out that apart from Hildebrand and Porter there are many other sources on recent events in Cambodia that have not been brought to the attention of the American reading public. Space limitations preclude a comprehensive review, but such journals as the Far Eastern Economic Review, the London Economist, the Melbourne Journal of Politics, and others elsewhere, have provided analyses by highly qualified specialists who have studied the full range of evidence available, and who concluded that executions have numbered at most in the thousands; that these were localized in areas of limited Khmer Rouge influence and unusual peasant discontent, where brutal revenge killings were aggravated by the threat of starvation resulting from the American destruction and killing. These reports also emphasize both the extraordinary brutality on both sides during the civil war (provoked by the American attack) and repeated discoveries that massacre reports were false.” Citing news reports that “repeated discoveries that massacre reports were false” is an outright fabrication. Just because the closed Cambodian borders made evidence difficult to confirm does not mean anyone was reporting they were outright false, save for Chomsky and his ilk. As Cambodia scholar Sopheal Ear points out: “Of course the respectable magazines that Chomsky and Herman cite (the Economist and the Far Eastern Economic Review) say no such thing, and if there had really been any 'discoveries that massacre reports were false' then Chomsky and the magazine in which his article appeared would have given us chapter and verse in type the size of tombstones." "Chomsky leads the reader to believe that a well informed person, someone who reads prestigious news magazines like the Economist, who reads magazines targeted primarily at the wealthy, someone affluent and cultured, would not believe the stuff about democide, and that that business about democide was just lowbrow propaganda for the ignorant trailer trash masses. Chomsky uses the authority and prestige of these very reputable magazines to contradict reports of vast crimes committed by the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia. He claims that these are 'conflicting reports' that justify disbelief in the alleged crimes of the Khmer Rouge, that these very respectable magazines endorse his position (without actually admitting that that is his position)." There was of course no such evidence, and no such endorsement. When one chases down these citations, one is led to an article by Nayan Chanda, who thought that the guilt of the Khmer Rouge was not proven. Chomsky and Herman leads the reader to believe them in confident possession of evidence proving the innocence of the Khmer Rouge….. When Chomsky and Herman tell us of 'discoveries that massacre reports were false' this leads the reader to expect (from the context that this is a criticism of press reporting) that some of the many horrific massacre reports he has read in the press were discovered to be false, and that the terribly biased press failed to broadcast this news. The reader expects that if he looks up these sources he will find important neglected news, some dramatic newsworthy facts that disproves some of these terrible stories, and thus casts doubt on all these stories of horror, terror and mass murder under the Khmer Rouge.” In fact the Economist wrote an article endorsing Ponchaud's estimates of hundreds of thousands executed, a million or so dying of brutal mistreatment. Chomsky presented the Far Eastern Economic Review as confidently denying the possibility that the killings were vastly higher, but Chanda specifically denies such knowledge and confidence. Chanda's claim was not that he had evidence that the Khmer Rouge were innocent, but that if we ignore all the evidence indicating they are guilty, there is not much evidence that they are guilty — a position that might perhaps have been defensible when Chanda wrote in 1976, but had become untenable when Chomsky and Herman wrote in 1977. The refugee reports of casual murder, massacres, and frequent forgetfulness of the need to feed and water the slaves, were confirmed by massacres on the border. Chomsky then writes:”They also testify to the extreme unreliability of refugee reports, and the need to treat them with great caution, a fact that we and others have discussed elsewhere (cf. Chomsky: At War with Asia, on the problems of interpreting reports of refugees from American bombing in Laos). Refugees are frightened and defenseless, at the mercy of alien forces. They naturally tend to report what they believe their interlocutors wish to hear. While these reports must be considered seriously, care and caution are necessary. Specifically, refugees questioned by Westerners or Thais have a vested interest in reporting atrocities on the part of Cambodian revolutionaries, an obvious fact that no serious reporter will fail to take into account.” In fact refugee reports are highly credible. Refugees are not trained or in a physical or mental state to concoct false political conspiracies that hold water. Refugees are credible because they come across in separate groups or alone from different areas of the border and originating from different parts of Cambodia at different times for different reasons. It would be impossible for them to conspire together to tell a consistent false story. Chomsky uses official KR statements and propaganda as “credible documentation” while dismissing the eyewitness accounts of people fleeing abominable conditions and further states “Washington is the torture and political murder capital of the world.” When it comes to death from disease, Chomsky again blames the Americans: “though there was ‘a big death toll from sickness’— surely a direct consequence, in large measure, of the devastation caused by the American attack.” The American bombing had stopped 2 years prior to KR victory, and he fails to even mention the effect of the evacuation of 2 million people from the cities as a possible contributing factor. As to the toll of central policy of the KR resulting in people killed Chomsky says this, quoting Ponchaud, the French priest: “Here we read the 'Most foreign experts on Cambodia and its refugees believe at least 1.2 million persons have been killed or have died as a result of the Communist regime since April 17, 1975' (UPI, Boston Globe, April 17, 1977). No source is given, but it is interesting that a 1.2 million estimate is attributed by Ponchaud to the American Embassy (Presumably Bangkok).” He continues outright dismissing reports of mass deaths as credible using no sourcing to attribute it to: “a completely worthless source, as the historical record amply demonstrates. The figure bears a suggestive similarity to the prediction by U.S. officials at the war's end that 1 million would die in the next year.” In fact in 1976 Time magazine estimated about six hundred thousand. In 1977 Ponchaud estimated about one million two hundred thousand wrongful deaths, Barron and Paul the same. In 1978 US senator George McGovern estimated two and a half million. The universally accepted figure, after forensic, demographic, and scientific analysis now puts the figure at 1.7 million deaths in the KR 3 year reign. Chomsky doesn’t stop there: “In the New York Times Magazine, May 1, 1977, Robert Moss (editor of a dubious offshoot of Britain's Economist called “Foreign Report” which specializes in sensational rumors from the world's intelligence agencies) asserts that “Cambodia's pursuit of total revolution has resulted, by the official admission of its Head of State, Khieu Samphan, in the slaughter of a million people.” Moss informs us that the source of this statement is Barron and Paul, who claim that in an interview with the Italian weekly Famiglia Cristiana Khieu Samphan stated that more than a million died during the war, and that the population had been 7 million before the war and is now 5 million. Even if one places some credence in the reported interview nowhere in it does Khieu Samphan suggest that the million postwar deaths were a result of official policies (as opposed to the lag effects of a war that left large numbers ill, injured, and on the verge of starvation). The “slaughter” by the Khmer Rouge is a Moss- New York Times creation. Christian Science Monitor editorial states: 'Reports put the loss of life as high as 2 million people out of 7.8 million total.' Again, there is no source, but we will suggest a possibility directly. The New York Times analysis of 'two years after the Communist victory' goes still further. David Andelman, May 2, 1977, speaks without qualification of 'the purges that took hundreds of thousands of lives in the aftermath of the Communist capture of Phnom Penh on April 17, 1975.'” The experts who actually made the study where both the books of Ponchaud and Barron and Paul, which Chomsky condemns as US propoganda and turned out to be an underestimate of the deaths confirmed in the 1990’s up to date in exhaustive research. Chomsky doesn’t seem satisfied dismissing death tolls out of hand, offering no independent evidence, simply attacking the sourcing as politically motivated lies.” Even the U.S. Government sources on which journalists often uncritically rely advance no such claim, to our knowledge. In fact, even Barron and Paul claim only that “100,000 or more” were killed in massacres and executions — they base their calculations on a variety of interesting assumptions, among them, that all military men, civil-servants and teachers were targeted for execution; curiously, their “calculations” lead them to the figure of 1.2 million deaths as a result of “actions” of the Khmer Rouge governing authorities, by January 1, 1977 (“at a very minimum”); by a coincidence, the number reported much earlier by the American Embassy, according to Ponchaud. Elsewhere in the press, similar numbers are bandied about, with equal credibility.” The figures cited, after extrapolation from a broad range of available but limited sources—but qualified by the authors as such--were: Barron and Paul estimate: 400,000 or more during the first exodus; 430,000 or more from disease and starvation during the latter half of 1975; 250,000 or more from disease and starvation in 1976; 100,000 or more in massacres and by execution; and 20,000 or more during escape attempts. While these figures during this period are higher than now believed, they reflect the pattern and, aggregately, reflect the final death toll. Again Chomsky attributed suffering under the DK, not to the KR, but to the American policy toward Cambodia.” It is difficult to convey the deep cynicism of this all-too-typical reporting which excises from history the American role in turning peaceful Cambodia into a land of massacre, starvation and disease. While the editors prate about morality, people are dying in Cambodia as a direct result of the policies that they supported, and, indeed concealed. Hildebrand and Porter quote a Western doctor in Phnom Penh on the mass starvation that resulted from the American war: 'as well as knocking off a generation of young men, the war is knocking off a generation of children'—those who will die from the permanent damage suffered from severe malnutrition, one small part of the American legacy to this “lovely land.”” Here he blames not just any problems in post KR Cambodia on the US, but on a vast conspiracy of silence by the media: ”To appreciate fully the cynicism of the press and editorial comments, it is necessary to recall the role of the American mass media in supporting the “secret war” against Cambodia. Prior to the Nixon-Kissinger administration, Cambodian villages had been subject to U.S. or U.S.-supported armed attack, invariably denied, but on occasion later conceded when it was discovered that Western observers were present. The massive assault against Cambodia began in March 1969, when the “secret” B-52 raids were launched. In the following weeks, the Cambodian Government made repeated efforts to bring the facts to the attention of the international press. Prince Sihanouk appealed to the press to make public these “criminal attacks” on “peaceful Cambodian farmers” and to “publicize abroad this very clear stand of Cambodia” in opposing all bombings on Cambodian territory under whatever pretext.” In January 1970, his government released an official White Book giving details of U.S. attacks on civilians up to May 1969 including names, places, dates; figures and photographs. All of this was concealed by the American press, which was later to claim that it was Richard Nixon who kept the 1969 bombardment from the press and the American people. There was one notable exception, a New York Times report by William Beecher (May 9, 1969), headed “Raids in Cambodia by U.S. Unprotested,” which reported B-52 raids on “Vietcong and North Vietnamese supply dumps and base camps “in Cambodia,” citing U.S, sources and disregarding Sihanouk’s impassioned protest against the murder of “Khmer peasants, women and children in particular”” Here Chomsky belittles comparisons to fascist Germany to the suffering at the time of his writing was underway on a full scale. His argument is that since the source was not the KR themselves, rather an independent newspaper report, it wasn’t credible: “Lacouture does in fact compare the Khmer Rouge to the Nazis. He states that Ponchaud cites “telling articles” from a Cambodian Government newspaper and quotes a paragraph which states that “we will choose only the fruit that suit us perfectly,” as distinct from the Vietnamese, who “have removed only the rotten fruit.” Commenting on this passage Lacouture states “Perhaps Beria would not have dared to say this openly; Himmler might have done so.” And he then concludes that the Cambodian revolution is “worthy of Nazi Gauleiters.” The newspaper report that elicited these judgments, on which the press uncritically relies, does appear in Ponchaud's book. The source, however, is not a Cambodian Government newspaper, but a Thai newspaper, a considerable difference. The quoted paragraph was written by a Thai reporter who claims to have had an interview with a Khmer Rouge official. How seriously would we regard a critical account of the United States in a book by a hostile European leftist based on a report in Pravda of a statement allegedly made by an unnamed American official? The analogy is precise. Why then should we rest any judgment on Ponchaud's account of a Thai report of an alleged statement by an unnamed Khmer Rouge official? What is certain is that the basis for Lacouture's accusations, cited above, disappears when the quotes are properly attributed: to a Thai reporter, not a Cambodian Government newspaper.” Instead, he makes a comparison to the French revolution, adding the suffering in France was considerably less than suffering inflicted by the US. “But if postwar Cambodia is more similar to France after liberation, where many thousands of people were massacred within a few months under far less rigorous conditions than those left by the American war, then perhaps a rather different judgment is in order. That the latter conclusion may be more nearly correct is suggested by the analyses mentioned earlier.” Again, he claims there is a conspiracy by the media in cahoots with the US to deceive the public of the truth, which he cites as more accurately reflected by Porter and Hildebrand—an outright ideological tract with no acceptable scholarly methodology, an apologist tract for communist theory in which both authors later personally disavowed themselves from their own work. ”What filters through to the American public is a seriously distorted version of the evidence available, emphasizing alleged Khmer Rouge atrocities and downplaying or ignoring the crucial U.S. role, direct and indirect, in the torment that Cambodia has suffered. Evidence that focuses on the American role, like the Hildebrand and Porter volume, is ignored, not on the basis of truthfulness or scholarship but because the message is unpalatable.” Ad infinitum:” It is a fair generalization that the larger the number of deaths attributed to the Khmer Rouge, and the more the U.S. role is set aside, the larger the audience that will be reached. The Barron-Paul volume is a third-rate propaganda tract, but its exclusive focus on Communist terror assures it a huge audience.” He concludes the conspiracy chain of propaganda that removes culpability from the Khmer Rouge and puts it on the free press as a willing vehicle of the US government lies: Reports of” large numbers executed gave a 'Left' authentication of Communist evil that assured a quantum leap to the mass audience unavailable to Hildebrand and Porter. Contrary facts are generally ignored or inadequately reported in favor of a useful lesson…The chain of transmission runs from refugees (or Thai or U.S. officials), to Ponchaud, to the New York Review, to the press, where a mass audience is reached and 'facts' are established that enter the approved version of history.” Chomsky has written numerous tracts and books defending his position since, including “Manufacturing Consent”, published alongside Edward Herman in 1988, a work Chomsky boasts is “a rare study that does not contain errors”. He and Herman also wrote “After the Cataclysm,” which said “In the first place, is it proper to attribute deaths from malnutrition and disease to Cambodian authorities?” Both books are on the Cambodian period under the Khmer Rouge and the role of the media in intentionally writing propaganda in the service of the US government.   Other gems: “If a serious study … is someday undertaken, it may well be discovered … that the Khmer Rouge programmes elicited a positive response … because they dealt with fundamental problems rooted in the feudal past and exacerbated by the imperial system.… Such a study, however, has yet to be undertaken.” And: “New York Times' analysis of 'conditions in Indochina two years after the end of the war there.' Nor is there any discussion in the Times of the 'case of the missing bloodbath', although forecasts of a holocaust were urged by the U.S. leadership, official experts and the mass media over the entire course of the war in justifying our continued military presence. The technical name for this farce is 'freedom of the press'. All are free to write as they wish: Fox Butterfield, with his ideological blinders, on the front page of the Times (daily circulation more than 800,000)” Chomsky and Herman use Hildebrand and Porter’s Starvation and Revolution as its most credible source. A brief examination of it reveals it for what it is. Just as Hildebrand and Porter had nothing negative to say about the Khmer Rouge, Chomsky and Herman had nothing negative to say about Hildebrand and Porter. Describing the reports of atrocities in Cambodia as a "systematic process of mythmaking." They assert that reports of starvation in Cambodia are incorrect: "It is the officially inspired propaganda of starvation for which no proof has been produced... Thus the starvation myth has come full circle to haunt its authors." The Khmer Rouge were implementing a "coherent, well-developed plan for developing the economy." On the evacuation of the cities: “"It is the officially inspired propaganda of starvation for which no proof has been produced... Thus the starvation myth has come full circle to haunt its authors." By 1978 Hildebrand backed off from his own work, but Chomsky didn’t. “ON CBS 60 Minutes Hildebrand said: My... my only plea is for some degree of balance in assessing the human suffering that undoubtedly still exists in Cambodia." “In after the Cataclysm” written after the KR fell from power, Chomsky and Herman continued: “"The ferocious U.S. attack on Indochina left the countries [of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia] devastated, facing almost insuperable problems. The agricultural systems of these peasant societies were seriously damaged or destroyed... With the economies in ruins, the foreign aid that kept much of the population alive terminated, and the artificial colonial implantations no longer functioning, it was a condition of survival to turn (or return) the populations to productive work. The victors in Cambodia undertook drastic and often brutal measures to accomplish this task, simply forcing the urban population into the countryside where they were compelled to live the lives of poor peasants, now organized in a decentralized system of communes. At heavy cost, these measures appear to have overcome the dire and destructive consequences of the U.S. war by 1978." They wrote: “"While all of the countries of Indochina have been subjected to endless denunciations in the West for their 'loathsome' qualities and unaccountable failure to find humane solutions to their problems, Cambodia was a particular target of abuse. In fact, it became virtually a matter of dogma in the West that the regime was the very incarnation of evil with no redeeming qualities, and that the handful of demonic creatures who had somehow taken over the country were systematically massacring and starving the population." Ponchaud wrote later of Chomsky’s citing of his work: "Even before this book was translated it was sharply criticized by Mr. Noam Chomsky and Mr. Gareth Porter. These two 'experts' on Asia claim that I am mistakenly trying to convince people that Cambodia was drowned in a sea of blood after the departure of the last American diplomats. They say there have been no massacres, and they lay the blame for the tragedy of the Khmer people on the American bombings. They accuse me of being insufficiently critical in my approach to the refugee's accounts. For them, refugees are not a valid source...After an investigation of this kind, it is surprising to see that 'experts' who have spoken to few if any refugees should reject their very significant place in any study of modern Cambodia. These experts would rather base their arguments on reasoning: if something seems impossible to their personal logic, then it doesn't exist. Their only sources for evaluation are deliberately chosen official statements. Where is that critical approach which they accuse others of not having?" “Referring to Chomsky, Ponchaud writes:"He has made it my duty to 'stem the flood of lies' about Cambodia -- particularly, according to him, those propagated by Anthony Paul and John Barron in 'Murder of a Gentle Land.'" "Mr. Gareth Porter also criticized my book very sharply during a congressional hearing on the subject of human rights in Cambodia, and argued that I was trying to convince people that Cambodia was drowned in a sea of blood after the departure of the last American diplomats. He denied that a general policy of purge was put into effect and considered that the tragedy through which the Khmer people are now living should mainly be attributed to the American bombings. He censured me for lacking a critical approach in my use of the refugee accounts, on the ground that they were not credible because the refugees were deliberately trying to blacken the regime they had fled.In the beginning, I was not opposed to the Khmer revolution... I welcomed the revolutionaries' victory as the only possible means of bringing Cambodia out of its misery. But after making a careful and full study... I was compelled to conclude, against my will, that the Khmer revolution is irrefutably the bloodiest of our century. A year after the publication of my book I can find no reason to alter my judgment." Other Khmer Rouge scholars on the left have refuted their earlier sympathetic writing which Chomsky used and still uses as primary sourcing.  Ben Kiernan reconsidered his position shortly after the publication of After the Cataclysm. In the Bulletin of Concerned Asia Scholars, October-December 1979, the editors of that publication asked him why he had "changed his mind" and had become critical of the Khmer Rouge regime. "I was late in realizing the extent of the tragedy in Kampuchea," he wrote. He continued: "I was wrong about an important aspect of Kampuchean communism: the brutal authoritarian trend within the revolutionary movement after 1973 was not simply a grassroots reaction, and expression of popular outrage at the killing and destruction of the countryside by US bombs, although that helped it along decisively." He echoes this statement in Peasants and Politics in Kampuchea 1942 - 1981. "In analyzing the reasons for continuing violence after the war, I failed to identify the deliberate, if hampered, activities of the Pol Pot group." Leftist scholar Michael Vickery after 1979 revised his pro-Khmer Rouge stance and Chomsky and Herman adopted it. If the Khmer Rouge were bad, it was because the U.S. deliberately made them that way. Thus, they repeat Michael Vickery's claims that US policy in Cambodia was driven by a desire to "'insure that the post-war revolutionary government be extremely brutal, doctrinaire, and frightening to its neighbors, rather than a moderate socialism to which the Thai, for example, might look with envy.'" So even after the KR were overthrown and the evidence was clear of the barbarity they imposed Chomsky continued with his same theme of apologetic excuses and misdirected blame. "If a serious study of the impact of Western imperialism on Cambodian peasant life is someday undertaken, it may well be discovered that the violence lurking behind the Khmer smile…is not a reflection of obscure traits in peasant culture and psychology, but is the direct and understandable response to the violence of the imperial system, and that its current manifestations are a no less direct and understandable response to the still more concentrated and extreme savagery of a U.S. assault that may in part have been designed to evoke this very response, as we have noted. Such a study may also show that the Khmer Rouge programs elicited a positive response from some sectors of the Cambodian peasantry because they dealt with fundamental problems rooted in the feudal past and exacerbated by the imperial system with its final outburst of uncontrolled barbarism." In 1988, Chomsky and Herman published 1988 “Manufacturing Consent”, a tract linking a supine willing ‘free press’ to carry out the propaganda orders of their western governments. "The CIA, in its demographic study in 1980, claims that Pol Pot killed 50-100,000 people and attributes most deaths to the Vietnamese invasion, also denying flatly the atrocities of 1978, which were by far the worst (that's the source of the famous piles of skulls, etc.; these became known after the Vietnamese invasion in 1979, and were certainly known to the CIA). Michael Vickery has written about the CIA study, suggesting that it was tailored to fit the fact that the US was tacitly supporting Pol Pot in '78 and later... Vickery estimates about 700,000 deaths 'above the normal' in the Pol Pot years -- which, if accurate, would be about the same as deaths during the US war (the first phase of the 'Decade of Genocide,' as 1969-79 is called by the one independent government analysis, Finland). For that period, the CIA estimates 600,000 deaths. The Yale Genocide project (Ben Kiernan and others) gives higher estimates, about 1.5 million. In fact, no one knows. No one ever knows in such cases, within quite a broad range. When numbers are put forth with any confidence, and without a big plus-or-minus, you can be sure that there is an ideological agenda, in any such case. Demographic analyses are very weak." They continue:” "US intelligence  took a much more skeptical position than we did on refugee reports, but anyone who is even marginally serious about the matter understands all this -- of course, not those who don't give a damn about the suffering that refugees report, but are merely using it as an ideological weapon, specifically, as a justification for brutal atrocities. Recall that that was exactly the crucial issue at the time, as charges about the KR and the Vietnamese, many of them fabrications at a level that would have impressed Stalin (as we demonstrated), were being used as a justification for US atrocities in Central America and elsewhere. But credible evidence of atrocities existed then, which is why we condemned the brutality and crimes of the Khmer Rouge, and a lot more evidence came to light after we wrote, and after the reports of Ponchaud and State Department intelligence that we cited..." Then they try to ignore some of there now indefensible claims and rewrite their own record.” "You might recall, perhaps, that we were probably the only commentators to rely on the most knowledgeable source, State Department intelligence. Our conclusion at the time was that it was probably the most reliable as well as by far the best informed, and subsequent revelations support that tentative judgment. They were avoided in the mainstream commentary because their conclusions didn't fit the propaganda line that was required to exploit the misery of the Cambodians to justify subjecting millions of other people to comparable misery, in Central America and elsewhere. Presumably that is also why the CIA demographic study of 1980, regarded as authoritative by US government specialists, is totally ignored..." "The accepted view is that Cambodia was a gentle country of smiling Buddhists until the Khmer Rouge swept to power in April 1975. This is a fabrication," said Professor Noam Chomsky, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, author of Manufacturing Consent, a book examining media misrepresentation of world affairs. "There were countless atrocities before 1975, when the Khmer Rouge took Phnom Penh, and after 1979, when the Vietnamese defeated the Khmer Rouge, that are simply not mentioned. Why? Because the West was involved." Chomsky goes on to add that:   "There is a Cambodian Genocide Act in [the US] Congress and it refers to crimes from 17 April, 1975, to 9 January, 1979," said Prof. Chomsky. "That is, it excludes the period when the US was supporting atrocities before and after Pol Pot." To this day Chomsky defends every word he has written: "I am very pleased that there has been such a hysterical reaction to these writings. They've been analyzed with a fine tooth comb to try to find some error, and to my knowledge, the end result is that not even a misplaced comma has been found. True, a lot of errors have been found in fabricated material attributed to me, but that's a sign of the desperation of the apologists for state violence. If you know of an exception, I'd appreciate it if you'd inform me. I haven't yet seen one." He continues in an interview: “"I should add that I don't pay attention to what appears on the internet sites that you are referring to... But if you do find this interesting, I'd suggest that you switch to sites that are at a similar intellectual level but a much higher moral level: I have in mind neo-Nazi and neo-Stalinist sites, which I presume exist. There I suppose you'll find very similar arguments: denunciations of those who condemned Nazi and Stalinist crimes on the basis of the terror and atrocities of resistance forces and the horrible aftermath of the defeat of fascism and the collapse of the USSR... But the neo-Nazis and neo-Stalinists are on a far higher moral level, for the obvious reason: fortunately, they are in no position to exploit the terror of the resistance and the horrendous aftermath in order to justify, and carry out, terrible crimes. That is, they were unable to sink to the depravity of those whose sites you are reading, who exploit the suffering for which they share considerable responsibility in order to impose misery on others, to protect them from 'the Pol Pot left' in El Salvador (priests organizing peasants, for example), or from the 'Communists' elsewhere -- exactly as we wrote in the 70s, and as has been happening since." In October 1990 in a letter to the editor in a British newspaper Chomsky wrote a reply to a criticism: Sir: Douglas Hurd (12 October) writes that as an “apologist” for the Khmer Rouge, I “condemned reports of Khmer Rouge atrocities” as fabrications. There is a particle of truth in his statement: I did expose fabrications as fabrications, as in many other cases, e.g. vast exaggerations of the death toll due to US bombing in Cambodia - an exposure which, for some reason, has never elicited any criticism. The rest is a recurrent fantasy that has regularly been refuted in detail, only to surface in some new version. It is noteworthy that despite the hysteria that these exposures have aroused, no error has ever been discovered in them, a fact noted in the scholarly literature. The facts are easily checked.” As recently as 2006 Chomsky wrote on his 30 years of denial of the Khmer Rouge culpability in crimes against humanity” “I know nothing about Bruce Sharp, and have no time to access the link or in fact anything from the huge torrent of charges about Cambodia that derive from one of many industries of denunciation, from many different quarters. They would take 48 hours a day if I bothered with them. No one does that, or is expected to, in professional life either. It would be an impossible and pointless task, for anyone who does anything in the least controversial. In the case of the Cambodia industry, I did respond to much of the hysteria and deceit elicited by what Edward Herman and I wrote (as did he), but I stopped paying attention years ago because the industry was simply re-cycling charges that we had already answered. However, if someone wants to bring something specific to my attention, I do respond. As I will show below, the one excerpt from Sharp's article below keeps to the standards of extreme dishonestly of the industry. It is interesting that in the reams of industry denunciations brought to my attention, no one has found anything mistaken or even misleading in the 1977 review-article or in our follow-up chapter in Political Economy of Human Rights (PEHR) or in anything else we have written on the matter jointly or individually. If you (or anyone) thinks there is something else in Sharp's comments that merits attention, then I'll be happy to consider it and respond, if you send it to me, either here or privately, and I presume Ed Herman would be too. But no one, ever, can be expected to respond to what is posted somewhere or even appears in print. To repeat, no one ever is expected to do that, whether in professional or political life, and certainly not when it becomes an industry -- in this case, an extremely interesting industry, casting a dazzling light on the deeply rooted imperial mentality and the dedication to serve state power and atrocities. “ There is really not much needs to add to Chomsky’s own indictment of himself. He owes not just Cambodians an apology, but one to the  importance of intellectual honesty itself he has tarnished.

“‘We are the World!’ Who is that singer? Johnny Jackson? Like he says, ‘Let’s join together!”, the Khmer Rouge leader said By Nate Thayer

'We are the World!’

By Nate Thayer

After threatening to assassinate American civilians, the Khmer Rouge leader continued. “Why don’t we join hands in national reconciliation. Join together! We are with you, the West!” he said, growing increasingly animated, half breaking into song. “‘We are the World!’ Who is that singer? Johnny Jackson? Like he says, ‘We are the world!’ Let’s join together!”

(Copyright Nate Thayer. All Rights Reserved. Excerpts from unpublished manuscript “Sympathy for the Devil: A Journalist’s Memoir from Inside Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge.” No republication in whole or part without express written permission from the author.)

By Nate Thayer

A non-descript Khmer Rouge operative, dressed in civilian clothes was standing in the hallway outside my seedy hotel room in the still dark hours before dawn in The Thai border town of Surin. He waved me out urgently, nervously checking to see that the hallways were clear and I accompanied him at a pace too fast to be inconspicuous through the hotel lobby outside to a beat up pickup truck with a Thai civilian in the driver’s seat who refused to identify himself. The truck had Thai civilian license plates. Tuoch, the Khmer Rouge agent, refused to tell me where we were going or with whom I was scheduled to meet. “You will see,” he said solemnly. He probably didn’t even know himself. He would not have had to be instructed to be vague. His mission was only to retrieve me from the hotel and deliver me safely to Khmer Rouge controlled Cambodia without drawing the attention of anybody. In late July 1996, now more than ever, the Khmer Rouge believed that enemies were everywhere and they were right.

Life for the Khmer Rouge by mid 1996 was a far cry from the previous years, where hundreds of millions of dollars of Chinese military hardware was trucked across these borders, coordinated by Thai military intelligence units, and with the political backing of the United States, and more than 120 member countries of the United Nations. Khmer Rouge leaders had compounds in the relative luxury of Thai provincial capitals and travelled in chauffeured cars to Bangkok. Now they rarely got permission from the Thais to leave their isolated jungle hideouts.

The pickup truck was driven by a very nervous Thai civilian with a mobile phone that would ring periodically and he would grunt a few responses and hang up. He insisted he was not a serving military officer and I believed him. He was nervous, grim-faced, eyes darting and reluctant to utter a word, driving way to fast, and clearly uncomfortable.

Thai spooks were much more relaxed. They had carte blanche to travel these border regions still under Thai martial law since it was infested by armed guerrillas of the Communist Party of Thailand only a few years prior, and Thai military intelligence could pull rank with the flash of an ID card, getting a no-questions asked salute, and look of fear at any military checkpoint. I had seen it many times. This fellow I was with had no permission to transport a foreigner through the Thai frontier, and certainly not to smuggle him across national  borders into a zone controlled by an armed Cambodian rebel faction at war with the central government in Phnom Penh of which Thailand had formal diplomatic relations. The Thai government was constantly proclaiming they had no contact with the Khmer Rouge, and now, except for the legitimate national security functions of gathering intelligence, monitoring Khmer Rouge activities, and keeping their options open, they were largely complying.

He drove many miles out of the way through a network of back roads, bordered by endless rice paddies, specifically to avoid Thai military checkpoints. I wrote down every turn, drawing a map in my notebook, in case I needed to find my way back—or was ever inclined to sneak back this way again.

After a couple hours, the pickup turned down a dirt path into a small non-descript Thai village and pulled over at a thatched roof noodle and cigarette stall. The tinted one-way windows of the pickup shielded me from the solemn but prying eyes of the half dozen peasant farmers milling about. This was a village that knew well to look the other way when strangers came through. After chatting with the vendor for a minute, the driver hopped back in and we drove deeper into rice fields down rutted dirt tracks used only by water buffalo and farm equipment.

We pulled over under a lone majestic banyan tree amongst the rice paddies and waited. I was told to stay hidden in the truck. I was given a baseball hat with a Kiss rock-and-roll band logo of an extended tongue for disguise, sunglasses, and told to wrap a checkered traditional Cambodian scarf around my face.

Churning up dust in its wake, snaking through the rice paddies, a battered pick-up truck with no license plate and tinted windows approached from the east out of the jungle shrouded mountain ridge, which marked the natural Cambodian border a couple kilometers in the distance. It pulled next to us and a uniformed Khmer Rouge soldier got out, greeting my companions. With little small talk, I was promptly ordered in the cramped, small rear bench seat behind the driver, my 6-2 inch frame stuffed awkwardly like a sardine, my knees bent up to my chin. The Khmer Rouge soldier was at the helm, his face serious, a Chinese AK-47 propped by the gearshift, young Tuoch, who had knocked on my hotel door that morning, in the passenger seat. We sped toward the tree line. The rice fields devolved into now unproductive, fallow fields. This was always a mark of danger. As we neared the actual ill-defined border, fields were abandoned because of recent fighting. Landmines were everywhere. These were always eerie, peculiar scenes. Stark in their silence, abandoned rice fields are the sign that civilians have fled, giving up their most precious holdings—literally the source of the food on their table. Things have to be pretty bad for rice fields to be abandoned.

Periodically, artillery would fall, or clashes would break out, villagers killed or maimed, and they would retreat from their homes, waiting for the war that each side had nothing to offer them, to end. Hand painted blood-red skull and crossbones signs nailed to trees were everywhere, a crude warning to local peasants of landmines or booby traps. These increased proportionately to the importance of the area—either as a strategic road or military base or village of families of Khmer Rouge soldiers.

We drove for miles down dirt tracks through these abandoned, neglected fields, empty and silent, toward the tree line mountain escarpment on the horizon. Trees always marked the border between Thailand and Cambodia. In these parts of the Thai-Cambodia frontier if there were trees, there were guerrilla soldiers hiding in them.

We had one more obstacle ahead, I was told—an isolated Thai military checkpoint. The Khmer Rouge driver checked that I was sufficiently scrunched up in the back, hat and sunglasses on, traditional Cambodian scarf wrapped around my head, with only my eyes exposed. “Tell them you are visiting your family, if anyone asks,” he instructed, rather preposterously. The checkpoint consisted of a single raw cut log suspended parallel across and above the road, weighted on one end by concrete and tied by rope on a post on the opposite side of the dirt track. A bamboo hut was beside it. Next to it, in the mid morning sun, a single Thai soldier lay asleep in his hammock, his M-16 assault rifle propped against a tree. He didn’t even rise as Tuoch got out of the car to lift the barricade. We had now entered Khmer Rouge controlled Cambodia. The Thai never suspected an American was being smuggled through. The explosions of incoming artillery followed the rumbling of their firing further down the mountain escarpment ahead.

The guerrilla stronghold on a high ridge of northern Cambodia’s Dongruk Mountain offered stunning vistas of tropical jungles and besieged villages encircled by bunkers and land mines. Grim faced Khmer Rouge soldiers, many of them missing limbs and walking on crude hand carved wooden crutches, eyed me suspiciously, trying not to be obvious in the curiosity at the first westerner they had ever seen at their village.

One hut housed sophisticated radio equipment, its roof criss-crossed with antennas. Amputees in pea green Chinese style PLA uniforms, the elderly, and the women and children families of soldiers down the mountain in frontline trenches battling government soldiers, walked the dusty single road through the guerrilla base or squatted smoking cigarettes and boiling rice over open fires around the village.

The rhythmic thud of incoming government artillery elicits no reaction from Khmer Rouge “Minister of Finance and Economy” Mak Ben, as he emerged from a bamboo hut, wearing rimless spectacles and a grey Mao suit buttoned at the collar around his neck. A blackboard on a thatched wall behind him shouted Khmer Rouge slogans in the Sanskrit based Cambodian script, proclaiming “Hate the Communist Vietnamese Aggressor!” and “believe deeply in Guerrilla Warfare!” He walked over to greet me, extending his hand and a smarmy, insincere smile. “Welcome to the liberated zones!”

I, of course, had been given no idea with whom I was going to meet, whether we would continue deeper into the jungle, or whether I would be offered useful new information. I patiently exchanged pleasantries while fresh mangoes, papaya, and rambuttan fruit was served.

Mak Ben wasted no time launching into the lecture he was instructed to give me, denouncing the “Vietnamese puppets and their despicable alliance” who were darkly plotting to “swallow” Cambodia and eliminate the Khmer Rouge.

He saved special vitriol for the Americans. Much of the not very thinly veiled threats were directed at ears many thousands of miles away to official Washington. “If you, the United States, continue to help the Vietnamese and Hun Sen fight us, we will use our right to self-defence. I must tell you that if you continue to aid the Vietnamese and their puppets, we cannot guarantee the safety of Americans in Cambodia,’ he smirked at me, betraying no friendliness. “One thing I should stress is we will never agree to surrender. Never!”

“We are very concerned, very interested in (U.S. national Security Advisor) Anthony lakes meeting with (Thai) Prime Minister Banharn Silp-archa,” he continued.

A French trained engineer and former Khmer Rouge diplomat, Mak Ben held the meaningless title of Minister of Economic and Finance in the Khmer Rouge so-called Provisional Government. “We want to know exactly what Lake means when he says the U.S. wants ‘democracy, stability, and security’ in Cambodia? Is it security through national reconciliation, without the Khmer Rouge?”

I was beginning to seethe at the realization of what was happening. I had been summoned from across the planet, on my own dime, to be lectured by a robotic mid-level Khmer Rouge minion because they, in their isolation-fueled paranoia, were reading dark plots into a routine stopover in Bangkok by a U.S. official. And they wanted me to deliver their pathetic message to my “bosses” in Washington.

Anthony Lake’s comments meant nothing. They were the routine rhetoric of long stated U.S. policy, made on a courtesy stopover in Thailand on his return from Beijing to Washington, which was so short he never left the Bangkok airport.

But Mak Ben hammered on, visions of dark plots having been conjured up in these isolated jungles, attaching ridiculous significance to lakes visit. That was why I had just flown across the world, drove to a remote Thai border town, holed up for days in a 1 star hotel hovel, and smuggled across international frontiers illegally: To meet this bonehead spout delusional rhetoric of a wholly out of touch with reality guerrilla band of murderous thugs caught in a time warp of their own making. They were convinced that Lake’s routine, passing comment was focused on destroying them, and they wanted me to relay to Washington that they would start assassinating American citizens working as humanitarian aid workers in Cambodia if the U.S. didn’t back off.

Mak Ben went on to describe a fanciful geo-political strategy of the U.S. having entered into an alliance with Vietnam—using Cambodia as a theatre—that aimed to undermine Chinese influence in the region. “After the cold war, Vietnam is too weak to carry out its expansionist strategy. But Vietnam will never abandon its strategy—which is deeply rooted among the old and young. Now 4 to 5 million Vietnamese nationals are in Cambodia. Laos is finished. Seventeen northeastern provinces in Thailand will encompass the Vietnamese Indochina Federation. The Vietnamese are breeding like rats. Vietnam is at our door. We cannot afford to be alone. We are with you! Who else if not the U.S., the West?”

He went on to contend that the Khmer Rouge enjoyed wide support in Asian capitals. “Diplomatically, ASEAN, China and Thailand are compelled to recognize the Phnom Penh regime…But morally we enjoy the support of the region,”

Mak Ben went on to downplay the influence of Pol Pot and the rest of the senior leadership, who had long officially retired but in fact remained in complete control. “Cambodia of the past belongs in the past. Let’s not talk about history. Pol Pot and all the Democratic Kampuchea leaders are very old. You can imagine how they are. They have lived 30 years in the forest without medical care.”

He continued to further piss me off. “I would like to tell you that Pol Pot and the other old political leaders are not in the political game anymore. They are finished….I am here to speak on behalf of my colleagues. I tell you that we, our new group, abide and continue to abide by liberal democracy, to be with the western world—the U.S.! I dare to tell you we are with the U.S., the free world! You can believe it or not. I have to stress to tell you that this is our political position and we will never change. For the sake of our country, we cannot go communist…to survive as a nation.”

I had known Mak Ben for many years and always been particularly unimpressed with him. He oozed insincerity. And he had the self conscious, arrogant swagger of a nervous, gangly teenager who you wanted to feel sorry for except he was mouthing such dangerous dribble. His eyes darted avoiding mine from behind his dark glasses. “You have abandoned your children!” he said wagging his finger at me, referring to the American government. “Look at Funcinpec, isn’t it your child? And Sam Rainsy, he is a child of the west. They are all your children. You have given birth to them. You have given them food, milk! You have sent them to school. Are you going to abandon your dying children?” he failed miserably at trying to look intimidating.

I remembered Mak Ben well from 1991 in Phnom Penh. He arrived with the delegation of Khieu Samphan in late November after the signing of the Paris Peace Accords on the Khmer Rouge first return to the capital since the fled the Vietnamese invasion in 19709, leaving behind more than a million corpses under the feet of the broken souls of those who survived.

They were not warmly welcomed back. Immediately upon arrival to their newly rented headquarters in downtown Phnom Penh, convoying in from the airport with armed United nations protection, the Khmer Rouge delegation were besieged by a government sanctioned mob that attacked them, invaded their villa, beat them up, looted the contents, and burned it to the ground.

I invaded the house with the mob. After Mak Ben and the others were trapped, beaten and terrified, he fled for his life through the crowd back to the jungle.

But while the mob was attacking Mak Ben and the other leaders, beating them bloody, I noticed nearby their unopened luggage and immediately began to loot it, rifling through looking for documents. A very happy fellow next to me opened a suitcase with $200,000 American dollars in it. Among many gems, I found Mak Ben’s Yugoslavian passport. And a letter from his daughter. She was a young girl, a refugee herself from the Khmer Rouge killing fields, who found her way from the UN refugee camps in Thailand to Australia as a very young child. She hadn’t seen her daddy in years. It was a heart wrenching letter that begged her father to address rumours that he was a Pol Potist. “They say you are a murderer, daddy, it said.

After fleeing the Phnom Penh mob back to the jungle, other Khmer Rouge made fun of Mak Ban, saying he was terrified of returning to Phnom Penh and being killed. He wanted to stay in the jungle, afraid to face the Cambodian people. Every time I saw him, I saw a bully and a coward.

After lecturing me on the U.S. abandoning their “children”, and threatening to murder American citizens unless Washington knuckled under to these nearly irrelevant delusional, self-important thugs sleeping in the forest, he smiled at me and tried to lighten things up. “America is a liberal democracy. We are nationalists. Democrats, too! So why don’t we join hands in national reconciliation. Join together! We are with you, the West!” he said growing increasingly animated, half breaking into song. “We are the World! Who is that singer? Johnny Jackson” Like he says, ‘We are the world!’ let’s join together!”

Mak Ben blithely ignored the fact that the U.S. government really could care less what happened in Cambodia, and it’s only stated policy towards the Khmer Rouge, in 1996, was funding projects to gather evidence to bring him and his comrades to an international court to face charges for crimes against humanity. Retreating from his absurd and comically ineffective attempt at hipness, he again tried to look menacing. “It is up to you. Our cards are on the table. We can fight for 100 years. We can eat grass if we have to. We have no other choice. We cannot accept that our nation, the great 2000-year-old nation of Angkor, disappears. As patriots, we will use our right to self-defence. It is better to die in the jungle.”

I was very angry by this time. It was clear to me that I had been summoned around the world to be lectured and to be a courier to deliver half empty threats to Washington. I was not to see anyone important and I was not to learn much useful. I asked, of course, to meet Pol Pot and others and to stay in the jungle and travel to guerrilla bases. “The leaders are all busy,” he said dismissively. He told me that I would have to leave that afternoon, before dark. “It is not safe here.” Down the mountain I could see smoke rising after the ground shook from each burst of mortars and artillery.

At lunch, a village elder looked morose. “We moved here last year to get away from government attacks,” he said. “For the people here it is a very hard.’ He eyed Mak Ben to make sure he wasn’t saying something wrong. “We used to have hope that the Paris Agreements would bring peace. We want national reconciliation. In our hearts we want national reconciliation and peace,” he said quietly. “Especially peace.”

The village elder, like I, was fed up. I left shortly afterwards, telling Mak Ben, in a moment of uncontrolled fury and indifference, to pass the message not to invite me back unless they were prepared to let me meet senior leaders. He was insulted. I didn’t care. While he betrayed nothing of the matter that July 30, 1996, as we spoke, the jungles just south of here were simmering with a similar attitude, and rebellion within their ranks was about to erupt into violent mutiny that would later that week deliver the biggest blow to Pol Pot and his loyalists since they were ousted from power by the Vietnamese invasion 17 years earlier.

(Copyright Nate Thayer. All Rights Reserved. Excerpts from unpublished manuscript “Sympathy for the Devil: A Journalist’s Memoir from Inside Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge.” No republication in whole or part without express written permission from the author.)

 

The Night Pol Pot Died: From the Jungles of Northern Cambodia By Nate Thayer

The Night Pol Pot Died: From the Jungles of Northern Cambodia

By Nate Thayer

(Copyright Nate Thayer. All rights reserved. No publication or transmission in whole or part allowed without express written permission of the author. Excerpts from the unpublished manuscript “Sympathy for the Devil: A Journalist’s Memoir from Inside Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge.”)

I was alone in a hotel the night Pol Pot died, in the small, remote Thai border town of Surin, abutting the Khmer Rouge controlled jungles of Cambodia.

I had been urgently summoned by the Khmer Rouge a few days earlier in a phone call which betrayed no specifics of why they wanted to see me, only that it was urgent. General Khem Nuon, the Khmer Rouge army-chief-of-staff and top field commander for Ta Mok had said only: “What you have been asking for we have agreed to.”

I took that to mean that I had been granted another interview with Pol Pot, but I was to learn it was even more significant. They had decided, as I had been pressing them for months, to turn Pol Pot over to the international community to face a trial.

I was summoned to discuss how to actually handle the logistics of handing over Pol Pot. It was an attempt to play their last card to garner international support and stem metastasizing mutinies and all out warfare raging in their jungles which threatened to finish their organization for the final time.

I had spent several days along the Thai-Cambodian rebel held border discussing their plight and interviewing their top cadre. Earlier that day I had filed a story with my magazine, the Far Eastern Economic Review, on the Khmer Rouge decision to hand over Pol Pot. The Review went to press at 6:00 pm Hong Kong time on Wednesdays—this one being that day--the 15^th of April, 1998.

“We have decided to turn Pol Pot over to the Americans. But we can’t get in touch with the Americans. We discussed it again this morning and Ta Mok agreed. So we want to give him to you,” said the guerrilla commander.

I was, to put it mildly, momentarily flummoxed. What the fuck was I supposed to do with Pol Pot? Put him in the back of the pickup truck and take him to the Far Eastern Economic Review office in Bangkok? It was not part of my job description. I suggested they should promptly get in touch with the International Committee of the Red Cross and gave him the appropriate contact details. “That is a very good idea!” Khem Nuon responded. There were other details, but I knew that the decision to turn over one of the century’s most egregious perpetrators of crimes against humanity to face justice was a very good story indeed.

The magazine released the highlights of the story in a press release that night at 5:00 pm Bangkok time—6:00 pm Hong Kong time. It was picked up immediately by the international wire services and broadcast by the VOA at 8:00 pm Thailand time on their Khmer language service, which Pol Pot listened to every evening.

17 minutes after Pol Pot died—at 10:32 pm on 15 April 1998—my mobile phone rang in my hotel room. Reaching past the half-empty bottle of fake Johnny Walker Black whiskey on the bedside table, I grabbed the remote, muted the volume of CNN blaring on the television, and answered the phone.

“My friend, Pol Pot is dead,” said Gen. Khem Nuon, the KR commander and for months my good friend, in an urgent whisper. “He died a few minutes ago.” He was calling on a Chinese military radio phone from the jungles across the Thai border.

While the Khmer Rouge always whispered, they were rarely breathless. Nuon was desperate and looking for guidance. “What should I do?” he pleaded. “You must tell the Americans and you must come here immediately.” It was an example the murky terrain of my role as a journalist and liaison with the rebels in their final days.

As I listened to the Khmer Rouge army commander, Monica Lewinsky splashed across the muted screen of CNN International Headline news, the world news dominated with the criminal punishment and removal from power of the US president for his indiscrete blow job with a young intern, which would continue to tower over the story of the demise of a man who had been one of the century’s most notorious despots.

General Nuon called, mainly, because he knew I would want to know. He was both a killer and my friend. Nuon always tried his best to be helpful. I had spent countless days and nights over the last months with Nuon explaining how the world worked outside the jungles he had called home for thirty years. His appetite for and curiosity for ideas and the new-fangled world was insatiable. It equaled my thirst for knowledge of his movement, its inner workings and history. He had commanded the troops that overthrew Pol Pot the year before, and therefore risen as the top field commander of all Khmer Rouge troops. With his formidable language skills and new role as chief field commander of rebel troops, he was for the first time able to clandestinely leave the jungles he called home and travel for covert meetings in Thailand, where he was escorted by a special unit of Thai military intelligence operatives who closely monitored the routines, movements, and intentions of the outlawed guerrilla faction. Nuon was also receiving medical treatment in Bangkok at a Thai military facility for a cancerous thyroid. He would always come to my house and, over copious amounts of hot tea with lots of sugar, spend hours talking about life and just to be free from the harsh deprivations of the jungle. He had come to rely on me and me on him as we spent countless days and nights sharing thoughts and information. “We will be friends forever!” he would often say to me with a broad, gentle grin, squeezing my hand and hugging me. He was bright, gentle, hard working, kind, and a natural leader of men. He was also the top armed commander of one of the world’s most brutal political movements. He personified the contradictions within the Khmer Rouge movement that allowed them to be such a formidable political force despite their atrocious human rights record. He represented to me the contradictions in my own mind that I had developed for the Khmer Rouge—on one hand respectable and impressive and on the other hand unspeakably brutal and offensive. I was very fond of Nuon and him of me, despite the fact, in truth, I had grown to collectively detest everything that Cambodia had become.

There was symbiosis in my relationship with the Khmer Rouge: They needed me and I needed them and neither of us trusted each other. While competent jungle fighters, these were peasants, mostly rice farmers turned guerrillas, but their ranks were also filled with the best and the brightest of Cambodia who had fled to the jungles as youth 30 years before to join the revolution. Nuon and most others had no exposure to how the world worked outside the jungle, where most had lived there entire adult lives. They had come to largely rely on me to both interpret it for them and take their message to the outside.

After Nuon called with the news of Pol Pot’s death, I knew I wouldn’t have to tell the Americans that Pol Pot was dead. Moments after I hung up, an American intelligence officer charged with following Khmer Rouge developments called from Bangkok. He wanted to know if I had heard “rumours" that Pol Pot was dead. Nuon’s phone was tapped as I assumed mine was and the American spy wasn’t fooling either of us. It was a game whose rules I had long before learned and understood. But he also knew that a monitored phone conversation between a guerrilla commander and a journalist was insufficient to confirm such an historic event. They, as I, needed proof. To be sure this wasn’t some kind of political trick, someone independent and credible needed to go back to the jungle and provide details and evidence of what had happened. The American wanted me to bring Pol Pot’s body back if possible, he said, or some forensic material. “If you can’t do that, maybe you could cut off one of his fingers,” he suggested seriously, in an only fleetingly embarrassed tone. I told him I would do what I could. He needed to get Washington hard evidence of what had happened in these jungles inaccessible to them, and his crude suggestion didn’t faze me at the time at all. He was a top notch military intelligence officer, very bright, spoke fluent Thai, and had excellent relations with the Thai military.

The Americans had political restraints and could not simply show up at Khmer Rouge field headquarters, but I didn’t. I requested he make a phone call to the Thai military to encourage them to let me cross their borders at dawn with direct permission from the highest command, into the Khmer Rouge zones. The American promised to put in an urgent good word to facilitate my crossing through the heavily guarded Thai military checkpoints, through which all unauthorized persons were forbidden to pass. The road to Anlong Veng was a well hidden dirt path set off a remote road that hugged the unpopulated, jungle-clad Thai Cambodian border marked by a steep mountain escarpment. These rutted narrow paths were bordered by a towering jungle canopy and weaved through eerily silent thick tropical forests void of any human presence. It was a no-man’s land for miles after the last Thai checkpoint and before populated areas of the Khmer Rouge controlled jungle bases in Cambodia. The areas between frontlines are always the most dangerous, fraught with vulnerability from roving bandits, landmines, and ambush from a wide potential cast of characters.

While the Khmer Rouge wanted me to come, and Gen. Nuon controlled the troops at his jungle checkpoints, crossing out of Thailand into Khmer Rouge territory required another set of permissions.

A few moments after I hung up with the American spook, the assistant of the Thai army commander-in-chief called. It was close to midnight now. He said I was granted permission personally from the Thai army commander-in-chief, who I had known personally for years since he was a mid level Special Forces commander, to go out of Thailand to find Pol Pot’s body. The general was highly respected for his professionalism and honesty and previously was in charge of Thailand’s important and complicated efforts during the Cambodian covert war. He then headed army intelligence before rising to overall army commander, one of Thailand’s most powerful positions. His aide gave me the name and mobile phone number of the commander of a highly secret Thai military unit who I knew only by reputation. Regiment 16 was based in a remote location along the border and charged with the extremely sensitive task of controlling all access to and liaison with the Khmer Rouge, escorting them on their forbidden trips to Thailand and entering the Khmer Rouge zones with relative free will. Regiment 16 officially didn’t exist and performed functions Thailand officially denied it didn’t engage in. He said the Colonel was already instructed to meet me at a specific gas station at dawn

Neither the Thais or the Americans wanted to be seen as involved in what surely would be an extremely high profile event that would soon, I knew, dominate world headlines and attract scores of journalists to the border area. The Thais had long denied they had direct dealings with the Khmer Rouge, loathed the periodic public fallout from revelations to the contrary, and were under intense international scrutiny and United Nations official directive to not assist them.

My trip across the border from Surin in Thailand to Khmer Rouge zones was not a new scenario. I had made these forays many times before. And both the Thai and American intelligence officers trusted me. I could have burned them all many times over the years, and I never did.

I never revealed how I accessed the guerrilla zones or who assisted me. I knew which secrets to keep and which ones to spill and they appreciated that. One thing I rarely reported was what means and methods of getting to the story I sought or used which might jeopardize a source. The process was usually full of intrigue and would make a good read, but all officials involved operated covertly and therefore were deeply suspicious of journalists. I never betrayed a promise or source from any faction, agency or government.

By the time of Pol Pot’s death in 1998, no governments, even China, who previously appeared unconcerned with international opinion, could be seen as having friendly—or any—relations with the Khmer Rouge.

But everyone knew I still maintained good contacts with the guerrillas, and as a journalist this was wholly legitimate. Beholden to no one, I could hold the mantle of an independent, neutral journalist around my neck, which I defended proudly and without compromise. I had no political problems with associating with international pariahs and murderers. It started as my job. And I rather enjoyed it. Rogue people and states fascinated me. And then it became my obsession.

But the night of Pol Pot’s death, in many ways, marked when that particular episode of my life’s long efforts were finally over. It was midnight now. Pol Pot was dead. I felt numb mainly, but also relieved. I drank straight whiskey from a glass, re-organized my gear to cross the border in a few hours at dawn. I watched Monica Lewinsky play over and over on CNN, flashbulbs sparking, as she fled into a courthouse, to face the full puissance of the American justice system. It did not elude me that it was a twisted reality that the Lewinsky affairs sordid details of superfluous justice was far more newsworthy than that which had been deemed appropriate for pursuit of Pol Pot, who stood accused of crimes against humanity. It was a fact that when he died, 20 years after his regime, which left 1.7 million people dead--1/4 of the population—in 3 years, 8 months, and 20 days in power, Pol Pot had never been charged by any court with any crime anywhere in the world. When he died he was not formally, in the eyes of international law, a wanted man. In fact, it would have been a violation of his rights, sufficient to have any charges dismissed under international law, if he was captured and held against his will anywhere outside of Cambodia.

I knew that soon Pol Pot would be featured, perhaps not eclipsing but along with Monica, in the world press. It would leak to be a world story within hours. Once leaked, scores of journalists would descend on this Thai border town. I wanted to get in and out of the jungle before the circus began…..

To be continued….

(Copyright Nate Thayer. All rights reserved. No publication or transmission in whole or part allowed without express written permission of the author. Excerpts from the unpublished manuscript “Sympathy for the Devil: A Journalist’s Memoir From Inside Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge.”)

What Happened to the Khmer Rouge? They are Back in Power. By Nate Thayer

What Happened to the Khmer Rouge? They are Back in Power.

Some thoughts on the trial of Nuon Chea, Ieng Sary, and Khieu Samphan

(Select excerpts from the unpublished manuscript “Sympathy for the Devil: A Journalist’s memoir from Inside Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge” By Nate Thayer. Copyright Nate Thayer. All Rights reserved. No publication in whole or part without express written permission from the author)

By Nate Thayer

The 1996 “defections” or “surrender” of Ieng Sary and thousands of Khmer Rouge troops in Pailin was actually, more accurately, the beginning of the final reintegration of the Khmer Rouge back into the open legitimacy of mainstream Cambodian society. It also sent shockwaves through Pol Pot’s remaining Khmer Rouge loyalists in the north, and rocked the fragile coalition government in Phnom Penh. The “surrender” of thousands of armed Khmer Rouge did not, as one might expect, strengthen the stability of the central government. Rather, it capsized the precarious political balance of Cambodia itself. It forced to the surface the latent, grave tensions between Hun Sen’s CPP and Ranariddh’s Funcinpec party percolating under the veneer of their government partnership. And marked the irreversible escalation of an inevitable process of the collapse of the government itself.

While Cambodia’s mainstream political factions competed in their anti-Khmer Rouge rhetoric, the truth was far more complicated. For both Funcinpec and the CPP their immediate priority was not the destruction of the Khmer Rouge, but the destruction of each other. In order to achieve this, they each entered into a frenzied competition to embrace the Khmer Rouge as military allies. Each now began a mad rush to woo intact the armed strength of the Khmer Rouge and secure their loyalty to—not the government—but their separate political parties. And the reason for this was nothing less than a strategic plan by each political party to procure an alliance with a strong—not weakened—Khmer Rouge. Whichever party successfully romanced the Ieng Sary faction in Pailin and the Pol Potists in the north would use their new found strength to launch a coup d’état against their government partners. So the push to force the “surrender” of the Ieng Sary faction of the Khmer Rouge in late 1996 was not a harbinger of peace at all: It was, in fact, an irreversible and calculated preparation for war.

It is a mistaken and simplistic premise to assume that any of Cambodia’s mainstream political factions were “anti-Khmer Rouge.” They indeed were frightened, almost obsessed, that the Khmer Rouge would declare allegiance to their political opposition. Everyone recognized that in the perverted priorities of the organization of Cambodian political power, the Khmer Rouge was an impressive and useful military and political organization. The government rhetoric against the Khmer Rouge was as cynical and insincere as it was strident. It was designed primarily for the gullible ears of their foreign benefactors on whose largesse they depended to pay the bills to run the country. In late 1996, each government party, while boasting to the United States and others that they were the architects of the demise of the Khmer Rouge, simultaneously intensified secret negotiations with both the Ieng Sary Pailin-based Khmer Rouge and with Pol Pot’s forced holed up in the north to secure their fidelity.

And from his jungle redoubt, Pol Pot was playing the same game. Like a mistress toying with two jealous suitors, Pol Pot schemed how to best manipulate the government factions to secure his maximum foothold in power. The strategy of all factions were the same—seek maximum power with short term tactical allies to destroy whomever they deemed to be the most immediate threat. These new tactical alliances with other enemies, the thinking went, could then be, when appropriately vulnerable, later targeted and dispatched with similar tactics.

No Cambodian leader had a strategic vision that analyzed the consequences of such an approach. Peace, political stability, economic development, strengthening institutions of government and society, or coherent foreign and domestic policies were too far-sighted theories. And make no mistake: indeed theories they were. It had been centuries since Cambodia had enjoyed any such organization of internal power.

Coalition politics has never been an end game for any Cambodian seeking political power. Power sharing is a distasteful, insincere, and temporary step, part of endless military and political maneuvering serving the only shared strategy: to hold sole and absolute power. Absolute power is demanded not just by a political party, but invariably by leaders within each party. That is why Cambodia’s political parties are always dividing like amoebas. Ambitious leaders, like their God-King predecessors, pursue nothing less than personal and complete hegemony over the country. Until that is achieved, all competition or disagreement, or even policy differences, must be, when the time is appropriate, crushed. This truth is fundamental to understanding why Cambodia is on a seemingly endless roller coaster of internal upheaval. The concept of loyal opposition or coalition politics has no successful precedent in Cambodian history. The primary ramification of this paradigmatic tool of ascension to political power is that Cambodia has remained in a constant state of warfare for generations. The norm of civil war ebbs occasionally to an uneasy temporary political alliance or subjugation between squabbling and scheming enemies, often imposed with force by impatient and frustrated foreign powers. These were the circumstances in late 1996 and 1997 that preceded the reintegration of the Khmer Rouge back into national society and the violent collapse of the UN elected government.

The Cambodian government’s efforts to romance the Khmer Rouge, intensifying in late 1996, would be central to the series of crisis that would rock the country in coming months. It would ultimately culminate with a bloody power struggle among the top Khmer Rouge leadership in June 1997 which ousted Pol Pot from power and days later a bloody power struggle within the Phnom Penh government which ousted Ranarriddh and his Funcinpec from power. The two events were, of course, parcel to each other.

This turmoil collapsed the government and plunged Cambodia back into civil war in July 1997, Hun Sen quickly seizing sole control. Once again, as had happened so many times in Cambodian history, after Cambodians were left to control their own destiny alone—this time with the 1993 withdrawal of United Nations peacekeeping forces—the  country quickly spiraled downward to its sure fate, eventually imploding in an orgy of chaos and violence until one man was left standing. This time Hun Sen—as Pol Pot, Lon Nol, and Sihanouk before him—lorded over his ‘victory”: a political landscape littered with fresh corpses and the surviving opposition humiliated and beaten into submission. In his defense, Hun Sen had simply won the game fair and square by the rules his opponents were all willing participants. But of course it was not a victory, because such an organization of power is, in the end, untenable.

Perhaps most importantly, however, the events of 1997 showed once again, that despite Pol Pot being ousted from the seat of government in 1979 after a short but shocking tenure in power, twenty years later he continued to dictate political developments in contemporary Cambodia. This fact is surely not a reflection of the attributes of the Khmer Rouge, but rather of the extraordinary weaknesses of their opposition: Even after committing crimes against humanity as a central government policy and unspeakable suffering on a horrific scale, the political options to the Khmer Rouge were so unimpressive that Pol Pot’s political movement remained a viable alternative with sufficient popular sympathy to still be a force to be reckoned with decades later. The tenacity of the Khmer Rouge is nothing other than a wholesale indictment of the failures of the entire Cambodian political culture. In a properly organized country, Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge would have utterly collapsed under the weight of its own record. The reasons that it didn’t are an essential prism necessary to view and understand the sad and distasteful realities of the Cambodia that preceded and succeeded the Khmer Rouge.

(Select excerpts from the unpublished manuscript “Sympathy for the Devil: A Journalist’s memoir from Inside Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge” By Nate Thayer. Copyright Nate Thayer. All Rights reserved. No publication in whole or part without express written permission from the author)

For those following the Khmer Rouge Trial of Nuon Chea: Background ambience behind the scenes at the time of the final collapse of the Khmer Rouge. Selected Excerpts from “Sympathy for the Devil” By Nate Thayer

For those following the Khmer Rouge trial of Nuon Chea: Background ambience behind the scenes of the final collapse of the Khmer Rouge. Selected Excerpts from “Sympathy for the Devil: A Journalists Memoir from Inside Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge” By Nate Thayer

(Copyright Nate Thayer. Excerpts from unpublished manuscript “Sympathy for the Devil: A Journalists Memoir from Inside Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge” All Rights Reserved. No publication or citation permitted without author’s express written permission.)

 

By 1994, the Khmer Rouge leadership once again evaporated into the jungle. To my frustration, my methodically constructed stable of Khmer Rouge sources was now deep in hiding. They continued to communicate with me through an elaborate network of underground  agents and Communist party cells. But it was a tortuous web, elaborately compartmentalized to obscure the identity and isolate the location of the guerrillas from their enemies. It would often take weeks, even months for a message from the jungle to get to me in Phnom Penh. Sometimes they would contact me through intermediaries by phone or deceptively postmarked mail. Other times notes would be hand-delivered by well dressed strangers who arrived at my house unannounced, politely exchanged pleasantries, decline to introduce themselves, and hand me a sealed envelope. They would then slip back out into the bustling city through the mazes of armed checkpoints, unpaid government soldiers to busy sleeping or extorting money to look for Khmer Rouge agents.

And I was always organizing my periodic trips across Cambodian government frontlines or over the Thai frontier to the guerrilla bases themselves. Even though it was a war-zone, I felt most relaxed deep in the jungles. I felt much safer under the protection of the disciplined Khmer Rouge than the unpredictable anarchy in government towns. In Phnom Penh, I slept with loaded automatic weapons by my bed and rarely left my house without a pistol and extra ammunition clips. With the guerrillas, I always slept peacefully in my hammock, tied to two trees, a symphony of whooping monkeys and insect’s overhead, surrounded by armed bodyguards who were charged with ensuring no one harmed me.

Messages from my Khmer Rouge contacts were always short and vague, the circumspect handwritten scrawls on ripped out notepaper almost palpable with intrigue and fear. “My Dear Friend, I got your message. If you can get here, we have already agreed to meet you. Ask our Thai friend who gives you this to help. You can trust him We have many difficulties and there are many things I need to talk urgently about,” read one typical unsigned note in its entirety. Even their written messages seemed to rise off the page in a clandestine whisper.

There was urgency to their missives but they always left me unfulfilled, desperate to know more. Their culture of secrecy permeated their every breathing action, their every move the instinctual second nature of a hunted animal. If you read the above message, you will notice, on second reading, there is no clue on why they wanted to meet, where the meeting was, when it would be, who it was with, or what it was about. The notes themselves, when they risked committing to paper, would not even betray whom it was from or that it was intended for me. There was a feeling off stark vulnerability whenever engaging with the Khmer Rouge under such conditions. I never knew where I was going or when I would be back. I always went anyway. All Khmer Rouge communication was like this. It is a fundamental lesson in all clandestine services: reveal nothing that isn’t absolutely necessary to accomplish your mission—and after decades in the jungles the Khmer Rouge had hones it to an art. This succeeded in leaving them firmly in control of all encounters and maximally impenetrable to their enemies.

And make no mistake. They had no doubt I was an enemy agent. Given their historically intolerant view of the likes of me, I was always keenly alert around them. If it was expedient or useful, I never had any doubt my closest Khmer Rouge sources would kill me without emotion. And they often changed their minds of whether one was a friend or foe. Most of those killed by the Khmer Rouge were loyal cadre who had been deemed, almost always out of unfounded paranoia, ‘exposed’ as an enemy agent. For Khmer Rouge cadre, it was, in fact, more dangerous to be a Khmer Rouge loyalist than their enemy. But such political thinking was fundamental to Cambodian political culture and all political leaders and parties operated under such a psychological foundation for pursuing and maintaining power. No one trusted anyone else, including one’s closest comrades. Betrayal and purges had been fundamental to Cambodian politics throughout modern history.

It is rare to meet any Cambodian who has a problem with murdering civilians as a concept. The parameters of the moral debate are simply confined to the merits of the victims. But importantly, in 1992, I had been formally deemed a potentially useful enemy by Pol Pot himself, I was told by a Khmer Rouge cadre close to the top leader. Pol Pot had ordered that a channel be kept open to me. He had deemed me useful to getting their message out in as empirical and neutral manner as they could hope for. His reasoning was that my writings were read by those world figures who were involved in forming Cambodian policy. I was guardedly comfortable with that. In Cambodia, that is the best a foreigner can hope for: A strategic enemy but tactical ally.

In 1993, some of the top cadre with whom I had become close sought permission to communicate with me without prior notification of and approval from the party. When Pol Pot agreed, this was a crucial development in improving my access. All cadre knew it was unwise to question the wisdom of Pol Pot, and followed his orders unquestionably. Pol Pot’s absolute control of all aspects of the organization’s activities presupposed that a Khmer Rouge cadre simply did not have encounters with an American, little less establish a personal relationship, without the clear approval of Pol Pot himself. The penalty for such recklessness was death.

Pol Pot’s sanction of limited access for me was the function of the quality, influence, and reputation of the primary publications I worked for. The far Eastern Economic Review, my primary employer, was the finest newsweekly on Asia—and required reading around the globe for the limited number of diplomats, officials, academics, businessmen, and journalists interested in the region.  It was authoritative and serious and scrupulous and courageous in the quality and accuracy of its in-depth, often exclusive reporting. It covered even the most obscure reaches of Asia comprehensively with depth and persistence and insight. Countries like Cambodia have few readers and advertisers and this was a key reason why most media devoted few full time resources to its coverage. When something happened in Cambodia—or elsewhere in remote corners of Asia—the Review had already provided the context and preludes that preceded the breaking news. It was also in a unique position to have in place people who had the sources and knowledge to provide superior coverage. It was a reporters magazine, driven by an eclectic group of correspondents who often had years of history in the areas they covered. The reporting was backed up by superb editing which ensured its  content was fair, comprehensive, and accurate.

The Phnom Penh Post—the first independent newspaper in Indochina since 1975—was a courageous, scrappy, and detailed bi-weekly newspaper that was read by everyone in Cambodia who was involved in any aspect of policy. It published the details and gave the space that only a local paper can provide. It was started in 1992 by my good friend Michael Hayes, an American who had no newspaper or business experience who had left his work as a humanitarian aid official with the Asia Society, and started the paper with his own life savings from scratch. I lived at the Phnom Penh Post during my years in Cambodia in a three story villa which housed the newspaper offices, production facilities, and the living quarters of Michael, his wife Kathleen, and myself. It was a center of constant hubbub, with a steady 24-hour stream of incoming journalists, varied visitors, sources, and newspaper employees producing the paper.

I also wrote for Jane’s Defence Weekly, the preeminent authority on military matters, and the Washington Post, which was required reading by everyone in Washington. Between them, the Khmer Rouge expected that, in their attempt to spread their message, an honest, accurate analysis that would have a far reaching impact would emerge. They were not often happy with my missives, but also knew that very little could be written which would further blacken their reputation. “ We believe you are serious,” they said to me more than once. They were used to being the target of often inaccurate, speculative, and invariably hostile reporting that focused only on their years in power. In contrast, we covered current issues regarding them as well. I always provided background context that included their atrocious history and current dictatorship, but they were used to this after years of unrelenting criticism. They knew full well that they were culpable, and respected my criticism of their organization as long as it was accurate and comprehensive, regardless of the requisite negative content.

Aside from my forays into the jungle, I was used to meeting more cosmopolitan Khmer Rouge political leaders and diplomats in five-star hotel lobbies and at diplomatic functions. But after 1994, two years after he withdrew the Khmer Rouge from participating in the UN election process, Pol Pot ordered them all back to the jungle. I wasn’t even sure where along the 800-kilometer swath of mountainous jungles over the Thai border my Khmer Rouge sources were hiding. Innumerable times, I travelled for days to remote villages near the Thai frontier on instruction from the Khmer Rouge to meetings. As often as not, a liaison would never materialize. Or I would be guided to an obscure guerrilla base where some mid-level cadre would spout useless propaganda already broadcast verbatim over their clandestine radio. Hungry for gossip, news, or rumour, I relentlessly pursued any source that might offer information. I flew to cities in Asia, North America, and Europe trying to glean information from shadowy sympathizers, relatives of cadre, and former guerrillas who had left the movement, and other underground operatives. I met with spies and diplomats from numerous countries charged with tracking the guerrillas. And I was constantly in contact with Cambodians of all political affiliations, whose agenda I covered equally, and who often knew of activities within the Khmer Rouge through their fellow Cambodians. Each of these encounters, sometimes involving weeks of work, would perhaps produce only a quote or single detail or a rumour to pursue or confirm. I would sort these tidbits of knowledge and carefully piece them together, constructing a portrait of what was happening in the jungle and publish it as an article. It was a frustrating, tedious, and usually fruitless business reporting on the Khmer Rouge: that is why there was effectively on one else who bothered to try. But I enjoyed the methodical challenge and it fit my personality to work alone and focus to fruition on a single task.

But for most of the world, by 1995 the Khmer Rouge leadership had simply slipped silently into the impenetrable forests of northwest Cambodia, contact severed completely, and guerrilla war resumed. Like a disturbed hornet’s nest, they dispatched small, angry squads of troops to attack around the country, emerging from the jungle to strike vulnerable government outposts, massacre ethnic Vietnamese civilians, and blow up trains and bridges. They then immediately evaporated back into the forest.

“The resistance forces are everywhere. We can attack the two-headed, one-eyed puppets and their American bosses everywhere!,” a secret 1995 internal directive by the Khmer Rouge leadership to military commanders said, referring to the fragile UN elected coalition government of co-prime ministers, and to the war wound that left Hun Sen blinded in one eye when he was a loyal lieutenant of Pol Pot. “We can cut the highway anywhere, any bridge and culvert. We are going to cut it over and over until the two headed government…and the Americans turn their tail and run.” The directive instructed: “ Cut the enemies throat! Cut the enemies throat! Cut the enemies blood arteries! Tragic fit, tragic death to all the enemies near and far!”

Nothing was subtle with the Khmer Rouge. This is how they talked in conversation, sputtering vitriol and contempt for the rest of the country who they had dehumanized simply because they weren’t loyal to them.

Westerners who stumbled into Khmer Rouge units after 1993 were regularly kidnapped and brutally executed. They included, as well as many Asian nationalities, Australians, Americans, Belgium’s, French, German, and British citizens. I was involved in every case. They all died an appalling death. I was to learn eventually that their executioners included some of my closest Khmer Rouge friends. Each and every one of their families contacted me, my telephone number given to them by their governments who were unable to assist them. They had been told I might have influence or leverage with the guerrillas and they were desperate for help in saving their husbands, sons, and daughters.

These remain some of my most painful experiences. I was not able to save any of them. I did, often after months of work, gather the grisly details of the demise of each. I remain haunted by the stricken, inconsolable anguish on the faces of their loved ones. They invariably wanted to know every last bit of gruesome information. It is equally true for the millions of Cambodians who were, in some ways, unlucky enough to survive the Khmer Rouge brutal years in power.

But, by 1995, behind the veneer of confidence and aggressiveness, there was a cancer metastasizing at the heart of the Khmer Rouge movement. I knew from the private whispers of grunt Khmer Rouge soldiers on the frontlines and forests, Pol Pot’s 1992 decision to pull out of the Paris Peace Agreements, forego the internationally recognized 1993 UN elections, and break the cease-fire, was considered by many Khmer Rouge cadres as a disastrous, perhaps fatal mistake.

Thousands of rank-and-file felt this way but seethed in silence. Expressing disagreement on such matters was suicide. But the reality was self-evident. Pol Pot and his small group of core leadership were very much like the emperor with no clothes. Instead of bringing them closer to power or peace, the Khmer Rouge were now utterly isolated, opposed by the mass of the peasantry, covert foreign military and material aid severed by China and Thailand, and at war once again. Morale was abysmal.

After two decades of war and unspeakable suffering, the hopes and opportunity for peace that came with the 1991 signing of the Paris Peace Accords had been squandered. Many Khmer Rouge cadre believed that their leaders had failed them and were deeply disappointed. Others were bitter and angry. But expressing opinion or dissent within the Khmer Rouge was unthinkable. And to add to the simmering frustration of the Khmer Rouge, in the eyes of their enemies they were increasingly not viewed  as a serious threat. For an organization that took pride—in the manner of a neighborhood gang of bullies—in forcing others to accommodate their demands through intimidation and sheer terror to be largely ignored by their enemies, was deeply demeaning. And a humiliated Khmer Rouge had the potential to strike back irrationally to demand attention. They were dangerous enough when they were rational.

After the 1993 UN elections, the Khmer Rouge’s biggest threat, in fact, came from within their own ranks. Swatting malarial mosquitoes and eating plain rice seasoned only with salt and sprinkled with dried fish boiled on an open jungle campfire, sleeping in their hammocks slung between trees in the forest, rank and file cadre listened with growing resentment to short-wave radio broadcasts of the international embracement of the government that emerged from the 1993 UN elections. Foreign companies, diplomatic recognition and international aid flooded to their enemies, bolstering their legitimacy and threatening the Khmer Rouge with becoming sidelined as a superfluous political force. The Khmer Rouge, in contrast, remained without electricity, running water, health care, schools, and, increasingly, hope that they would ever taste the fruits of peace, little less victory.

Never willing to address unpleasant realities, the Khmer Rouge went to absurd lengths to put a positive spin on their increasingly desperate conditions. “Our army, our guerrilla forces , are more and more respectable regarding their view, their political knowledge, their economical situation, their welfare, their attitude toward the peaceful relation scheme, their stance on spying activity, and their awareness of the undermining activity,” wrote the top Khmer Rouge leadership to senior commanders in a secret policy and military strategy directive in November 1995. “Thanks to these qualities, the number of our cadre are multiplying; the number of our forces increases; and our forces are more disciplined, more decisive, braver and more resolute to fighting the two-headed national traitors, slaves of the Vietnamese communists and their alliance. The slaves of the Vietnamese communists and their alliance are being swollen, decomposed, and rotten, all devoured by maggots, and having no more flesh.”

The Khmer Rouge, like all Cambodian political factions, seethed in hatred and utterly intractable absolutes. This is the bane of Cambodian political culture—not just the Khmer Rouge—and central to understanding the unending instability in Cambodia. There is no concept of compromise or common good, little less common ground. If you disagreed with the Khmer Rouge, you were a “slave” of the “national traitors.” One did not seek to just defeat the enemy, but preferred to see their bodies not just dead but “rotting” and “devoured by maggots.” You didn’t just execute someone who opposed you, you tortured and humiliated them first, and then murdered their wives and children.

Not only were the Khmer Rouge short of friends and money, but weapons and ammunition. The cessation of foreign and military aid was addressed by boastful self-delusions that they were self sufficient. In 1995, they ordered all soldiers and civilians to meet a quota of carving homemade bamboo stakes and other crude weapons. “The strategic weapons that we now call our ‘main forces’, sharp pointed soldiers, very sharp are punji sticks, and booby traps. These are the strategic weapons we experimented with and the results are highly effective. These forces are located all over, and bamboo, woods, poisons, resins, machetes, axes, and knives are all locally abundant. It can be said that factories making strategic weapons to fight the enemies exist locally and are abundant all over, in lakes and rivers.”

This was the Khmer Rouge leadership’s response to the cutoff of covert military aid from China and the 1994 UN imposed sealing of the border with trade from Thailand. To Khmer Rouge soldiers who had to face the reality of a well-armed enemy in battle, this was not only profoundly insulting, it was life threatening. Their leaders were now asserting that bamboo stakes constituted superior firepower. As a result of such preposterousness, Khmer Rouge cadre increasingly directed their resentment not so much at their enemy as at their own leaders.

Many Khmer Rouge felt their future was passing them by. Defections of frontline troops increased. Morale was abysmal. Soldiers pulled back in battle rather than risk death in a war they now had only a veneer of allegiance to. The blind loyalty of armed cadre long demanded by their faceless leadership, and enforced by fear, was on the brink of dangerously unraveling. And the Khmer Rouge leadership reacted by cracking down on their own loyalists.

Ta Mok, the Khmer Rouge top military field commander and Army chief-of-staff, not so affectionately known as “The Butcher”, lamented that “pacifism has entered our cadres” and that “there is confusion, a blending of our essence and our enemies,” referring to increasing contact with villagers in government run frontline areas and growing sympathies among his troops to end the  war. The Khmer Rouge top leadership ordered all contacts severed with villages not strictly under their control. “We have continued to exist with them, eat with them, peacefully allied with them to the point that some of our own cadres and ranks have repeatedly been put in danger. In some of our units, enemy elements comprise 50-60%.” To be deemed an “enemy element” was a spine chilling accusation.

Their leaders made clear to their subordinates, in a secret internal document distributed to frontline units at the time, that they were being closely watched. “Our first responsibility is we must be clean. Our major responsibility is to clean up our act,” warning not to sympathize with proposed negotiations to end the war which they referred to as “the peaceful relationship scheme.” "Our ranks , our cadre, must be clean, our skin clear, free of smell, no peaceful relationship scheme, no spying activity, no internal undermining, nothing to be compromised at all…”

When, that same year of 1995, the leadership ordered troops to attack and burn to the ground front-line villages in northern Siem Riep province they suspected of not being sufficiently sympathetic, more than 1000 Khmer Rouge troops defected instead of carrying out the order. When I visited, the scene was surreal. Hundreds of Khmer Rouge soldiers in pea green Chinese PLA style uniforms lounged in the markets, flirting with local village girls, their commanders firing artillery they had taken with them, now firing back at their former comrades just past the tree line that marked the border from the rice paddies to the guerrilla jungles they had inhabited for thirty some years until only days earlier. “When we went to fight, we didn’t see other nationalities,” said former Khmer Rouge battalion commander Tung Yun. “ we fought because we were ordered to do so, but in our hearts none of us wanted war anymore.” He spoke for thousands of others still in the jungles.

In an atmosphere that forbids questioning the policies of their leaders, with no outlet to vent their disappointment and debate the merits of returning to war, conditions were ripe for an internal Khmer Rouge explosion of violence.

To be honestly transparent, in retrospect, part of me viewed this growing international and domestic consensus for peace and stability as a fundamental career threat. But while I loved being a war correspondent, this war was now meaningless. The fact was, by 1994, I, too, was tired of this war. I, too, did not want to be the proverbial last person to die in a war which now clearly had no purpose other than each side trying to secure raw and maximum power. After the withdrawal of the Vietnamese occupying troops in 1991 and the United Nations forces in 1993, it was now a war without issues, stripped to the carcass of armed conflict which is simply mans raw excersize of his most primal, uncivilized instinct for power and vengeance through violence and superior force; simply a winner takes all bloody grab for power. And the rank and file on all sides knew it. The soldiers from all the political factions still at war were nothing more complicated than pawns for a few hundred powerful and rich so-called leaders who weren’t courageous enough to wage peace and just wanted all of the pie. Many rank and file on both sides refused to fight seriously when ordered to battle, firing from a safe distance and reluctant to engage in tactics which threatened their lives.

By 1995, I had only one more objective in Cambodia, and that was to meet and speak with and interview Pol Pot. And ask him two simple questions. "Why?" And "Are you sorry?" And then, I told myself, I would leave this wicked society forever.

I viewed brewing dissatisfaction within the Khmer Rouge as creating cracks in their armour, opening up potential new means of access for me. Where there was turmoil, there was increased opportunity I could wangle my way into the heart of the Khmer Rouge central command. I had found that the Khmer Rouge opened up to me when they had difficulties, which often left them with issues they wanted to clarify or explain to outsiders. Turmoil and weakness increased the possibility that they might have to play that card. And I was constantly scheming to see that the vehicle they used to do so would be me. I was always encouraging, maneuvering for, and poised to take advantage of such contacts. I approached it as an endless chess game requiring strategy and patience and an intimate knowledge of one’s opponent. I knew from viewing the chessboard that I was closing in, however slowly, on their King, Pol Pot. Obstacles were being removed and I was advancing.

For years my biggest fear was Pol Pot would die before I was able to meet him. I would wake at night, my stomach in knots, with the thoughts of years of effort being concomitantly extinguished with his last breath. Barring that, I was convinced that one day I would meet him face-to-face and Pol Pot would have to answer the questions that haunted his broken countrymen.

In 1996, through smuggled letters, meetings with their underground operatives, and visits to their guerrilla bases across the frontier Thai borders in the jungles of Cambodia’s north, I pushed harder for them to allow me access to their leadership, arguing plausibly that they clearly had to try something new. The Cambodian government and the international community were perplexed by  the silence of the Khmer Rouge leadership and unclear what they wanted. They had let no one deep into their territory for four years--since my last visit—and they could see clearly they were in a weaker position since disengaging from the outside world.

They didn’t have to be convinced that they needed to do something, but they didn’t know what. They needed to reengage their movement to the Cambodian political process. What they needed rather than their tired, failed tactics of vitriolic rhetoric and terror was, I suggested, to shed light on their internal movement to lessen the blackened mystique that had shrouded their movement and Pol Pot in for forty years. Much of that mystique was not politically threatening to them, but simply allowing access to the personalities and daily life in their control zones. My perennially repeated request was that they allow an independent, credible witness as unfettered access as possible. A fresh look from inside their territory, talking with their loyalists, couldn’t possibly result in them having a diminished reputation in the eyes of the world, I repeated to their cadres. They were already a household name worldwide synonymous with unspeakable brutality and senseless violence. In the eyes of the world and most of their countrymen, they were already the devil incarnate and they knew it. There was certainly nothing I could write that would further blacken their image.

Many Khmer Rouge cadre sympathized and were, to a degree, in awe of the sometimes ridiculous and always relentless lengths I had gone over the years attempting to access their inner sanctums and interview Pol Pot.

My persistence, I think, struck some familiar chord of revolutionary self-sacrifice-against-daunting-odds. Perhaps many of them could relate, having disappeared as eager, patriotic youths into the jungle more than twenty years earlier, waiting for naught the revolutionary victory. If they weren’t impressed, at least they were entertained by this shaved-headed American who wouldn’t go away. And if they weren’t entertained, I had regardless become a kind of fixture, like some half-mad Dennis the Menace to the Khmer Rouge’s Mr. Wilson, with whom they grew resigned to affectionately tolerate.

They had, over time, tried everything to reject me—arrested me at gunpoint, shot at me, ordered me killed, banished me, robbed me, and handed me over the border in disgust to be arrested by Thai authorities. I became rather legendary within the Khmer Rouge army, I was to learn, as this reckless, perhaps insane, rather likeable American who would appear in the oddest of circumstances. Literally nothing dissuaded me. I was fully cognizant and reconciled to the fact that there was s strong chance I would die in these jungles. I always tried to be smart with tactics, having committed to a strategy that required accepting a high level of intrinsic danger. But I never once rejected going into a war-zone simply because it was dangerous.

I continued to show up, uninvited, over the years in virtually every corner of their jungles, often where no foreigner had ever been. I arrived by foot, captured Russian military vehicles, driven by defecting government soldiers during battle, on the back of an elephant, bicycle, dirt bikes supplied by the CIA to non-communist guerrilla allies, by river in commandeered sampans, ox-cart, rented helicopter, accompanied by United Nations troops, guided by my own hired mercenaries, escorted by Thai military intelligence liaisons, with Thai businessmen who traded with the guerrillas, logging trucks, and even by taxi cab ( I can remember more than once the driver of my hired car simply refusing to go any further into the scrub and abandoning me to walk the last few miles). I once traversed the trench lines into Khmer Rouge territory driving a government military officer’s Russian jeep, adorned with full government regalia identifying the vehicle, which I had rented from a corrupt Cambodian general. I remember startled guerrilla troops popping up from bunkers, leaves and branches crudely camouflaging their helmets, as I weaved through frontline trenches and around minefields in abandoned rice paddies. I was advised by unamused Khmer Rouge commanders never, ever to do that again.

Almost always, I arrived under dangerous circumstances, through combat frontlines, from enemy-held  territory, over mountains, crossing national borders, always through a minefield, from north, south, east and west, essentially to be turned away, mainly empty-handed, time and time again. I didn’t mid the rejection. The chase itself was a fun-filled adventure, a young man’s fantasy.

My visits to the Khmer Rouge zones didn’t endear me to the government forces either, who regularly tried to kill me. Spies are ubiquitous in Cambodia. The government would know I was in Khmer rouge zones within a very short time, often within hours. I listened to government field radio reports broadcasting my location to front-line troops. They would then rocket our position. This, in turn, didn’t endear me to the guerrilla troops with whom I was visiting.

In general, I was viewed as a problem. Many had concluded my very presence was simply a pain in the ass. There was often a mood shift which seemed to elicit an inaudible groan when I would arrive.

But I was the only westerner many of the Khmer Rouge cadre  and jungle fighters had ever had contact with.  So there was the ever present animal in the zoo factor. It was not unusual for large crowds of Khmer Rouge civilians and soldiers, some walking for days, to gather at a safe distance and gawk at me for hours. Old ladies would squat and chew betel nut, spitting and exchange raucous commentary with each other. “ Are they all fat and bald?” one toothless old lady asked my bodyguard in a remote village which had never hosted a foreigner before.

I remember clearly one time squatting around a fire late at night deep in the jungle just north of the great temples of Angkor Wat, monkeys crying from the tall canopy of trees. I had walked for two weeks from Thailand with non-communist guerrillas accompanying them on a mission to attack government positions. We often encountered Khmer Rouge guerrillas who shared the jungle with their then coalition partners fighting the common enemy, the occupying Vietnamese army and their installed government in Phnom Penh. A grizzled Khmer Rouge cadre was casually drawing battle plans in the dirt with a stick, explaining to other young fighters the next morning’s attack. He pointed to a small village, thrusting his stick in the dirt and raw hatred flashing from his eyes, hissed “Tomorrow, we will turn it into a rice field!” Several minutes into the preview of the intended assault he looked across at me squatting on my haunches a few feet away from him, locked on my eyes in abrupt recognition, and lept back with a cry of terror. “Joy Marey! Barong moek Howee!” Translation: “Motherfucker! A white foreigner has arrived!” was the totality of his exact words. He literally grabbed an AK-47 assault rifle, jumped to his feet, clutched his heart and paced back and forth, taking deep breaths and cursing for a few minutes to recover. Everyone who fit my description, after all, was the enemy, of whom he had only seen pictures of over the years. And to see a vision of the devil himself, a blue-eyed, bearded, bald one, armed and dressed in combat fatigues staring at him from across the campfire deep in the jungle, was too much for him to process. The poor man never seemed quite to recover. He glared at me for days afterwards, his face furrowed in a queer mix of raw hate and confusion.

To try and keep track of the inner workings of the Khmer Rouge was not just a matter of analyzing information. That was the easier part—a skill developed by following the nuances of their historical methodology and rhetoric. The hard part was getting credible, first-hand information. Elevating secrecy to an art form, the Khmer Rouge obscured and compartmentalized all levels of information so it wouldn’t fall into the hands of the enemy, which by 1995 was a category that included every single nation on earth and most Cambodian citizens. I was keenly aware, each time I went into their territory, it was a category that clearly also included me.

For the time being, however, I continued to be a potentially useful enemy whose channel, by order of Pol Pot himself, remained open. I comforted myself by dwelling on the fact, particularly when I was being glared at by armed Khmer Rouge, that every Khmer Rouge cadre knew that it would be suicidal to harm someone who Pol Pot thought might be useful. My relationship with the Khmer Rouge had evolved in the early 1990’s to include, by default, nothing less than perhaps their primary liaison to the West. They did not think of me as a sympathizer. Indeed, in their perpetual state of rather astounding and logic-muddled paranoia, they had concluded that I was a paid operative of the Central Intelligence Agency. “We have discussed whether you are CIA and decided it doesn’t really matter,” one Khmer Rouge diplomat told me matter of factly once. They politely attempted to maintain the charade that they thought I was an independent journalist, but we both knew they didn’t believe it. They simply did not understand the concept of someone who did not serve the interests of—was under the control of—the government that issued ones passport. They often used the term “you” when referring to the US government or angrily condemned me for some Washington policy. I would ritually correct them. And they would apologize half-heartedly. The irony is US law forbids the CIA from recruiting journalists employed by American owned media, and the Far Eastern Economic Review was owned by Dow Jones—perhaps the most iconic symbol of world capitalism. So, while extensive, my dealings with CIA operatives were often a tortuous process themselves that rivaled the Khmer Rouge, with many having to go through acrobatic lawyer-driven hoops to receive prior permission from Washington before meeting me. Some simply ignored the directive from Langley, and I count many intelligence officials—from a broad range of competing countries—among my friends.

It was helpful that the Khmer Rouge faced a couple of basic problems that worked to my advantage. Even before they retreated back to the jungle in 1992, many governments banned their officials from any direct contact with the guerrillas or their representatives. Even at diplomatic functions and cocktail parties, the Khmer Rouge was shunned. US policy went so far as to specifically prohibit initiating contact at cocktail parties. U.S. government officials were allowed—by written directive—to return, but not offer, a verbal greetings or handshake. This tied the hands of intelligence agents or diplomats  who were on one hand tasked with gathering information on the guerrilla group, and on the other forbidden from dealing with them directly. I, of course, had no such problem.

At cocktail parties, Khmer Rouge officials would often be standing alone, clearly uncomfortable in their western suits, looking grumpy as they held a cocktail they wouldn’t drink, being ignored and eyed simultaneously, not unlike a pedophile relative at a family gathering.

I not only had no problem chatting them up, I  reveled in it. I particularly liked National Day celebrations, held by virtually every countries embassy once a year. By protocol, the entire diplomatic list and other dignitaries and select nationals of the country would be invited, including the Khmer Rouge. Those functions to which I wasn’t invited, I crashed. I have attended scores over the years. The hotel ballrooms and ambassador’s living rooms are filled with people who would normally refuse my telephone calls. It was a diplomat’s nightmare and journalists dream; stuck being chatted up by a journalist he had long tried to avoid. Often the Khmer Rouge diplomat would be found in the corner with the North Korean or some other third world pariah. Afterwards, it wasn’t unusual to be grilled by jealous but thankful diplomats who needed something to write in their cable to the home office on their rare Khmer Rouge encounter.

The second basic problem, after the Khmer Rouge retreated back to their jungle redoubts, was often simply a matter of logistics. Dialogue from the jungle is a pain in the neck. Aside from the issues of safety and political will, physical access was extremely difficult. Normal modes of contact—such as telephone, email, meetings in obscure seedy bars or fancy hotel lobbies were, of course, not possible or practical.

In 1996, I took a sabbatical from reporting from Phnom Penh to be a visiting scholar at a Washington academic think tank. It was not unrelated to a rather incendiary series of articles I had written naming both Cambodian Prime Ministers as being bankrolled by and, in exchange, giving political protection to, a major Asian heroin trafficker and organized crime figure.

One day in 1996, while in my office at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, I got a call from a friend in Europe with a message. The Khmer Rouge wanted to see me urgently. Could I come to the jungle? The message was to go to the remote sleepy Thai border town of Surin, and check into a particular hotel as soon as possible. When I arrived at the hotel, I was to call a particular phone number in Europe and give my hotel room number. I was then to wait for someone to contact me. That was the entirety of the message. It was a typical set-up for a meeting with the Khmer Rouge. No mention of who I was to meet, where I would go, when I would be contacted, or what the subject matter would concern. I didn’t even know who within the Khmer Rouge was contacting me.

The routing of the message was typical in its circuitous layers to obscure any prying eyes or ears. And it was designed for the Khmer Rouge to remain in complete control of the process of me arriving in their territory. It denied me any ability to double-cross them if I was so inclined, or to pass on sensitive information to any foreign intelligence officials. It also left me very vulnerable if something were to go wrong. There was always a palpable undercurrent of dark unease for me with these people.

A Khmer Rouge “former” diplomat in Paris, who was married to a French woman and therefore held French citizenship and was allowed to remain in France, served as one of the guerrillas primary contacts in Europe. The Khmer Rouge “former” diplomat in Paris had been contacted by another Khmer Rouge “former” diplomat living underground in Bangkok (in a safe house maintained by Thai military intelligence). That diplomat maintained human runners who would be dispatched back and forth overland across the Thai border into the jungle. The diplomat in Paris had called my friend. My friend, a Franco-Khmer, was trusted by the Khmer Rouge but not a member of the Party. He, in turn, was known to be close to me. The leadership in the jungle relayed information to me in Washington this way. None of the intermediaries were told more than they needed to know beyond getting a message to me. Even if they were inclined to talk they didn’t have any information. The “former” diplomat in Paris had one fully equipped man, trained in China as a coded communication specialist, who could transmit and receive top secret messages from a counterpart in the jungle in times of crisis.

So, as always, I told my friend to reply I would be departing immediately and to relay the message that I would check into the specific hotel as instructed in Surin, Thailand within 72 hours. I boarded a plane from Washington’s Dulles international airport that night for the 36 hour flight to Bangkok. From Bangkok it was a 10 hour drive to the border town.

From the hotel, I dialed a contact number in Europe and informed my contact simply the number of the hotel room I had checked into. No names were used. No countries were mentioned. Certainly no words intimating any outlawed guerrilla groups culpable for committing crimes against humanity were uttered. Even the name of the hotel was omitted. “How are you, my friend?” I said. “I have arrived fine. I am in number 302. I will wait here.’

“I will let my friends know now. They will contact you. Be careful.” He couldn’t tell me who, where or what to expect or when I could expect to know when I would be contacted to not to be informed, then, either, of any of these details.

Then I waited….for days. I forget how many, but several. Mainly I stayed drunk. I did sit-ups and ran in place. I left the room for one hour each afternoon to swim at a lap pool in the town. I ate rice and noodles from the lobby nightclub, which doubled as a karaoke bar, coffee shop, and whorehouse. I prepared for an interview with Pol Pot I cleaned my camera equipment and read literature and documents on the Khmer Rouge I always kept for distraction. I had read everything at least once before.

I had no idea whether I was to walk through the jungle for days, whether I would meet important leaders, including Pol Pot, or when my contacts would arrive to retrieve me.

All that uncertainty requires contingency preparation: jungle clothes, still cameras, video camera, batteries, film, notebooks, hammock, mosquito net, food, rolls of chewing tobacco, whiskey and Ziploc bags of all sizes to protect against the daily monsoon rains. Everything had to fit perfectly inside a small Khmer Rouge knapsack on my back in case I had to walk for days.

And I couldn’t really leave the hotel room not knowing when the Khmer Rouge operatives would arrive and not wanting to draw attention to myself in a town where there are very few western visitors who aren’t up to no good. The small hotel staff knew me well after years of coming though, and it was no secret what, in general, I was up to. They knew I was going to nearby Cambodia, where there was a war, but they really didn’t want to know any more than that. I would always leave the lobby, usually before dawn, not checking out, dressed in jungle clothing with a backpack and laden with camera equipment. Often, I wouldn’t return for days, muddy and dirty and accompanied by fit men in crew cuts and sunglasses. These were my Thai military intelligence escorts who ferried me across the border through a myriad of Thai checkpoints who didn’t speak much and dressed in civilian clothes. They had a particular ID card that seemed to grip any other Thai official's attention with an immediate positive response and silent accommodation. This had always precluded the hotel staff previously of inquiring who I was or what I was doing.

This time there were no Thai officials to greet me and smooth my egress across national borders.

Then one rainy morning at 0600 there was a firm knock on the door. I asked who it was: First in Thai, then in English, then in Cambodian. After a long pause, a hushed voice replied in Khmer: “It’s me.”

TO BE CONTINUED……….

Copyright Nate Thayer. Excerpts from “Sympathy for the Devil: A Journalists Memoir from Inside Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge” All Rights Reserved. No publication or citation permitted without author’s express written permission.)  

 

Excerpts from unpublished manuscript of book “Sympathy for the Devil: A journalist’s memoir from inside Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge” By Nate Thayer

Khmer Rouge ideology and details of who they murdered--and why. From exclusive, perviously unplublished interviews with top Khmer Rouge leaders with Nuon Chea, Ta Mok, Pol Pot, Duch, and Khieu Samphan By Nate Thayer       (Copyrighted. All rights reserved. No republication without prior permission from Author)

By Nate Thayer

Selected excerpts from unpublished manuscript of book “Sympathy for the Devil: A journalist’s memoir from inside Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge” By Nate Thayer

Although popularly labeled as Communists, evidence from previously unpublished interviews with all the top leadership of the Khmer Rouge show the Khmer Rouge movement and its murderous policies were founded and implemented on an amalgam of ideology and homegrown political theory uniquely Cambodian. The leading all-powerful apparatus of the Standing Committee of the Communist Party of Kampuchea came from disparate backgrounds, political influences, and training that clearly point toward a CPK structure of organized power based on no external models. Their policies drew from the structures of  their Cambodian historical political ancestors, with influences from anti-colonialist movements, extreme nationalism, and various non Cambodian communist parties in Europe and Asia in the 1940's and 1950's. In fact it is more accurate that they had no uniform ideology when they seized power, but rather were dominated by a unique amalgam of loosely allied regional fiefdoms with little uniform central ideology, coordination or control. In effect, in April 1975, six separate armies, long void of a unifying central leadership converged on Phnom Penh, simultaneously overthrowing the Lon Nol government. These loosely coordinated regional armed  Khmer Rouhge factions then struggled against each other for dominace within the framework of the CPK to assert inlufluence and control. Once in titular power, there was a stark absence of predetermined strategy or national leadership that implemented what evolved into a bumbling, delusional, ill prepared and shockingly unskilled cadre of government leaders that was predestined to implode in disaster.

It is useful to introduce a historical overview of the KR movement and its leadership prior to them seizing power in 1975.

Cambodia in the 1960’s offered few conditions that traditionally provided fuel to ignite and sustain a communist movement. It had virtually no industrial base or manufacturing sector from which to recruit a working class base of an exploited labor force by those who owned the means of production. Almost all its peasants—85% of the population—owned their own land, eliminating the issue to recruit based on the exploitation tenant farmers by a landlord class. The country was rich in natural resources, with abundant rice crops and some of the most productive fishing waterways in the world. It was a leading exporter of rice until after the war that engulfed the country in 1970. The population was very small compared to the productive land mass and there was virtually no malnutrition or starvation. Cambodia was at peace and a delicate political neutrality, deftly juggling outside pressures of alliances during the superpower struggles that rendered much of the world allied with one of the three great powers of the era. As a result there were no Cambodian proxy armies fighting for the power interests of foreign nations. Cambodia was almost largely ethnically and religiously homogeneous, precluding racial or religious pretext to foment resentment or strife. The conditions for revolution were not abundant.

While a number of anti-colonialist movements and nationalist armed groups flourished in the 1940’s and 50’s, the signing of the French granting independence to Cambodia in 1953 and the subsequent Geneva accords in 1954, spelled the demise of virtually all the armed underground movements in Cambodia. The Cambodian branch of the Indochinese Communist Party—entirely controlled by the Vietnamese—withdrew their entire ethnic Khmer cadre to Hanoi in 1954. The anti-colonialist Khmer Issarak party evaporated. The leftist Pracheochon party and the anti-Sihanouk Democratic party were neutralized.While leftist sentiments lingered and Sihanouk’s autocratic rule kept alive a movement seeking more democratic rule, it was largely marginalized by his heavy handed tactics.

So to what does one attribute the rise of the ultra radical Communist party of Kampuchea that seized power in 1975 leaving millions of bones stacking the killing fields that testified to the Khmer Rouge unprecedented political experiment which ended with the military conquest of Cambodia by Vietnam that brought a halt to the CPK’s 3 years and 8 months in power? What was the genus of its ideology or origins in political theory that allowed them to burgeon and drove the implementation of its disastrous rule?

On September 30, 1960 a group of 10-15 men gathered at a secret meeting in the Phnom Penh railroad station for the first party Congress and formed the Communist Party of Kampuchea. For three days and nights they hammered out and approved a party line and statutes. A Central Committee was chosen with Tou Samouth as Party Secretary, Nuon Chea as Deputy Party Secretary, Saloth Sar, alias Pol Pot, as member, Ma Mong as member, Ieng Sary as member, Chong as member, and Kaev Meas as member. The more powerful sub grouping of the Standing Committee of the CPK compromised Tou Samouth, Nuon Chea, and Pol Pot. As Pol Pot was a teacher, as was Ieng Sary, (as well as both their wives, who were sisters), they were limited to working from Phnom Penh. Nuon Chea was tasked with travelling to the countryside.

According to the unpublished interviews cited from below with Nuon Chea on three separate occasions in January, February, and March 1998: “ We implemented the principle of absolute party leadership in accordance with the slogan: a protracted, difficult, hard struggle, self-reliance, self-mastery, independence…As for the party statutes, the principles of Marxist-Leninism were used and the principle of Democratic centralism. And the Party had to build from the countryside as the foundation and the towns as following behind.”

Nuon Chea’s reference to Marxist-Leninism as a guiding party principle was the sole reference I heard from any senior or other party figure of the CPK, in extensive and repeated interviews with every surviving member of the party leadership in more than ten years of research from the 1980’s to date. These included interviews with Pol Pot, Nuon Chea, Ieng Sary, Ta Mok, Son Sen, Ke Pok, and Khieu Samphan, the only surviving members of the CPK Central Committee after their internal purges and end of their rule in power. They also included hundreds of interviews with other senior political cadre and military commanders who mostly had joined the movement in 1970 or the late 1960's.

Each of the leaders had their origins as members of other political parties that formed and disintegrated in the 1940’s and 1950’s.

In 1962, CPK Secretary Tou Samouth was arrested while riding his bicycle to get medicine for his sick child in Phnom Penh and taken to the home of then Sihanouk security chief Lon Nol, interrogated to reveal the names of other CPK members, tortured and executed. He had been betrayed by a government double agent, Siev Heng, who was a former Secretary general of the earlier VN dominated Communist party--the Kampuchean People's Revolutionary Party (KPRP).

The KPRP  had effectively dissolved after the 1954 signing of the Geneva Agreements which mandated the withdrawal of armed forces to Hanoi, and the 1953 bilateral agreement of Cambodian independence between France and Cambodia, which returned Cambodia to independence from Colonial French rule.

After Tou Samouth’s execution, another Party Congress was held in 1963, and Pol Pot was named Secretary General. While logically Nuon Chea was slated to be Secretary General, he was the nephew of the traitor Siev Heng, and deep suspicions of his loyalties—given the impossible to minimize influence of family loyalty in Cambodian culture—precluded him from assuming the top post of the CPK.

The 1963 Party Congress elected Pol Pot as Secretary General, Nuon Chea as Deputy Secretary, and Ieng Sary, Chong, Keu (Sophal), Vorn Vet, Ruoh Nhem (Muol Sambath), Ta Mok, Ma Mong, and Sao Phim to the Central Committee of the CPK. The highest ranking body, the Standing Committee of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Kampuchea, was comprised of Pol Pot, Nuon Chea, Sao Phim, and Ieng Sary. Of these ten, six were executed by the KR once they obtained power.

Later in 1963, Prince Sihanouk, in his inimitable style, tauntingly announced that he would name 24 specific people as co Prime Ministers of his government. They were the exact list of all 24 members of the central committee of CPK including Pol Pot, Ieng Sary, Son Sen, Khieu Samphan, and three leftist CPK supporters who were then members of Parliament, Khieu Samphan, Hou Nim, and Hou Yuon. The decision was made that most named would have to flee the city and go underground.

This splintered the party leadership undermining its ability at central organization and implementation of a coherent national policy to be in place when they seized power in 1975. It resulted in the development of essentially autonomous regional fiefdoms without any effective central party leadership. This is key to explaining the confusion and killings after 1975 when essentially six separate Khmer Rouge armies converged on Phnom Penh simultaneously. The struggle for consolidating leadership and consistent national policy cannot be overemphasized, as the political policies and ideological philosophies differed widely on the ground in the different Khmer Rouge regions throughout the country.

The leadership themselves had scarce communication or coordination with each other, with Pol Pot based in the far Northeastern province of Rattanakiri, Ta Mok based in the Southwest, Nuon Chea travelling from Phnom Penh to the countryside, and Sao Phim based on the Vietnamese border to the East.

It is instructive to note, in an analysis of the origins of the political influences of the ideology that drove the CPK policy, that the CPK didn’t fire a shot for 7 years after its founding in 1960. A spontaneous peasant uprising in 1967 in the remote Battambang district of Samlaught over abusive government tax collectors sparked the CPK to make a decision to react in support. On 17 January, 1968, the Khmer Rouge raided a police post in Samlaught, killed a handful of government soldiers, stole weapons, and fled into the jungle. It was the beginning of a nascent armed struggle that would bring Pol Pot and the CPK to power 7 years later.

And it is crucial to recognize that they chose to embark on this guerrilla war after directly rejecting the plea’s not to initiate an armed struggle by both the Chinese and Vietnamese Communist Party leadership, according to Pol Pot, Ieng Sary, Nuon Chea, Khiue Samphan, and Ta Mok in independent interviews with each. “The Chinese and the Yuon (Vietnamese) told us that ‘If you decide to fight, it is like fighting your own father,’” Ta Mok told me in February 1998, referring to Sihanouk. “But we saw that if we didn’t use arms the movement would be finished. Therefore we decided that we had to mobilize the armed movement. And it wasn’t as if there was a proper leadership. The southwest was the southwest, the east was the east, enjoying independence-self mastery.”

This stands as a stark early example of the CPK refusing to follow the leadership or strategy of the international communist movement, even from the countries key to their short term tactical survival

Mok’s analysis that there was no central leadership of the Khmer Rouge forces, contributes to explaining the later purges by Pol Pot and his loyalists of most of the other senior leadership of CPK after 1975.

Of the ten members of the CPK standing committee named in 1963, 6 were executed by Pol Pot after they took power in 1975 and before they were deposed in 1979.

In 1975, when the CPK seized power (although they never publicly announced that the CPK was in fact in power until 1977—instead publicly naming a fictitious group of United Front personalities who held nearly zero internal influence in formulating State policy but represented a broad sector of well known figures, including King Sihanouk, who retained the title of Head of State while under house arrest ), they held another Party Congress and named as their standing committee members, in order of rank, Pol Pot, Nuon Chea, Sao Phim, Ieng Sary, Son Sen, Ta Mok, Vorn Vet, and Nheum. Of those 8 members, 3 were executed during the Khmer Rouge reign in power—Sao Phim, Vorn Vet, and Nhuem. They also named 22 members to the central committee of the CPK. Of these, 18 were ordered executed by the time the Khmer Rouge were ousted from power in 1979. The existence of the Party was never publicly acknowledged until 1977.

Among the first to be purged was Hu Yuon, who as finance minister, objected to the abolishment of markets and the use of currency. He was believed to have been executed in the months after the 1975 liberation of Phnom Penh.

Hun Nim, Minister of Information, was arrested  and executed in 1977. It wasn't the first time Hu Nim had been purged. In 1967, while a member of Parliament, Sihanouk publicly berated Nim as "a little hypocrite" whose "words carry the scent of honey, but hides his claws like a tiger", and he "had the face of a Vietnamese or Chinese." he fled to the Khmer Rouge controlled jungles. Sihanouk sdded Hu Nim would be "subjected to the military tribunal and the execution block". After Sihanouk was overthrown in 1970, and he himself joined in alliance with the Khmer Rouge he called Hu Nim "one of our greatest intellectuals. Hu Nim served as Minister of Information for the Khmer Rouge until arrested and tiortured and executed in Tuol Sleng in 1977. On a Tuol Sleng confession of 28 May, 1977 he wrote: "I have nothing to depend on, only the Communist Party of Kampuchea. Would the Party please show clemency towards me?" He also wrote "I am not a human being, I am an animal."

“You say the enemy was trying to assassinate you, but most of your central committee was executed in Tuol Sleng before your years in power were finished, “ I asked Pol Pot, “ Did they deserve to die, or was it a mistake?”

“You raise this question, but let me clarify this. These people were in the central leadership of Democratic Kampuchea, but they were not the people of Democratic Kampuchea,” Pol Pot responded. “In 1976 and 1977, that group of people you were talking about set up a coup d’état committee, especially against me. In that committee there were Vietnamese agents in the majority.”

“And among the leadership, they included whom?” I asked.

“My memory does not serve me well on that,” he answered rather incredulously, unable to remember the names of his top comrades he had ordered executed. He paused for about 30 seconds and then exclaimed, pointed his finger. “but among those who were in the coup committee were Ya. He was a Vietnamese agent since 1946.”

Ya, alias Maen San was the zone secretary for the northeast appointed in January 1976, the same month he was arrested. He was also a member of the Standing Committee of the CPK.

The confession of Ya is particularly chilling. In an S-21 (Tuol Sleng ) document dated January 10, 1976, Duch wrote a note to Ya’s interrogator that “I reported to Angkar ( a reference used either for Pol pot or Nuon Chea. However Duch said he reported only to Son Sen and Nuon Chea and never directly spoke to  Pol Pot until 1988) at ten to nine on the case of Ya based on the documents that comrade (you) provided…Angkar says that in the case that Ya remains reluctant and continues to hide his traitorous connections and activities, Angkar has decided to have him killed…Angkar has decided it is a case of having him looking down on the Party, not just down on our state security. Therefore for Ya, you can use the hot measures and for a long time. Even if those measures led to his death, comrade will not be wrongful toward Angkar’s discipline” Duch signed off with “warm revolutionary fraternity.” Pon, S-21’s top interrogator, added a note to the document in handwriting designated to be read by Ya. “Brother Ya, read this and think it through thoroughly.” The document was then given back to Ya.

Included among those executed were many top leaders of the Communist party of Kampuchea named in power in 1975. They included Ya, Vorn Vet (ranked #7), Ruo Nheum alias Muol Sambat, Chou Chet alias Thang Si, Sao Phim, Koy Thuon, alias Thuoch (ranked #5), Chey Suon alias Non Suon (ranked  #11) and Ruos Nhim. All were members of the Standing Committee of the party. Among the central Committee members of the CPK who were arrested tortured and executed included pang alias Chheum sak-aok alias Seuang, Chan, Pin, Reran alias So Sarouen, Mon, Meah Tal alias Sam Huoy, Nat alias Im Long, Koe alias Kung Sophal alias Kan, Chong, who was Ta Mok’s chief deputy and an ethnic Thai from Koh Kong whose real name was Prasith, and Phuong.

According to an October 30, 1976 party  document entitled ‘ Decision of the Central Committee on a Number of Problems: the Right to decide on extermination within and outside the ranks.” It named the following; All 6 zone heads, the 22 members of the central Committee of the CPK, the Standing Committee of the CPK, and the top leaders of the Armed Forces. Many of these same leaders would also be arrested and executed.

Duch, the head of S-21 (Tuol Sleng) blamed the genesis of the killings on Pol pot’s 1973 decision to have all leaders come from the peasantry, eliminating educated cadre from positions of influence. “ at that time many things changed, and many people were killed. After liberation in 1975, Pol Pot said        ‘We must protect our country by finding enemies within the ranks of the party. We are not strong enough to attack enemies from the outside, so we must destroy them from within.' First we arrested the people from the North, then the Southwest, then the Northwest, then the east. He used Nuon Chea to do the work. Pol Pot never directly ordered the killings. Nuon Chea was always cruel and pompous. He never explained to the cadre. He only ordered them. For arresting people, it was the everyday job of Nuon Chea and Son Sen. Pol Pot knew about S-21, but did  not direct it personally. He left that job to Nuon Chea as number 2 in the Party and Son Sen as head of the Army and Police,” Duch said. “They arrested nearly everyone by the end…it is a permanent rule,” said Duch. "Whoever is arrested must be killed.”

In May 1978, Sao Phim was ordered  arrested and killed at a secret meeting of select top party leaders. In two weeks of recorded interviews totally 40 hours with Duch, the commandant of the KR security service S-21 (Tuol Sleng) that actually carried out the orders of the top political leadership, he said. "It was brother number one (Pol Pot) who decided that Sao Phim would die…a very secret meeting was held—Pol Pot ordered it. Khieu Samphan was there—He was the notetaker. Three men and especially one man ordered it. Pol Pot, Nuon Chea, Khieu Samphan and Son Sen were at the meeting--not Ieng Sary or Vorn Vet.”

By late 1978, another sweeping purge  was starting to crest. Among high ranking victims was Vorn Vet, a Party Standing committee member who was also the deputy premier in charge of the economy. He was a long time protégé of Pol Pot, who had personally inducted him into the Communist Party. In his “confessions" under torture, he discussed his opposition to Pol Pot’s purges.

When the Vietnamese invaded in late 1978, documents found at Tuol Sleng revealed that another two senior leaders were also targeted for arrest and liquidation. One was a long time Pol Pot associate, Son Sen, the Deputy premier in charge of National Defence, Chairman of the Armed forces general Staff, and  Standing Committee member, he was head of the entire Khmer Rouge Military and Security Services. As such, he was,  along with Nuon Chea, the CPK party representative that was the link between the political leadership and the killing machine itself. He was in fact the direct supervisor of the S-21 (Tuol Sleng) torture and execution center and to whom S-21 commandant Duch reported directly. In Mid-1978, he was dispatched to command the troops fighting the Vietnamese on the eastern front, and relinquished his duties as S-21 liaison with the Party leadership to Nuon Chea. With the war going badly against Vietnam, the CPK leadership blamed not the superior military strength, troop numbers, battlefield experience, and superior firepower and morale of the Vietnamese, but Son Sen as an enemy agent because it was unfathomable that the CPK’s strategy was untenable in itself so it had to be purposeful sabotage of “enemies from within” that it wasn’t succeeding.

Another target for execution found in the files of S-21 from the last days before the Vietnamese overran Phnom Penh, showed that Ke Pok, Party Secretary and commander of the Central zone, also a member of the Standing Committee, was also targeted for arrest and execution. Ironically both were saved by the Vietnamese invasion before their arrests could be carried out.

The remaining five in the years after, all turned against each other.  Ieng Sary broke with Pol Pot in 1996 calling him a “dictator worse than Hitler” and sentencing him to death. Pol Pot and Mok announced that Ieng Sary was a “Vietnamese agent” and in turn sentenced him to death. The irony that both Pol Pot and Ieng Sary had been sentenced to death together in 1979 by the ex-Khmer Rouge installed by the Vietnamese invasion as leaders of the “Pol Pot-Ieng Sary clique” went largely unnoticed. Pol Pot ordered the arrest of Nuon Chea, Son Sen and Ta Mok in November 1996, blaming them for the defection of Ieng Sary. He later ordered the execution of Son Sen and Ta Mok, succeeding in killing Son Sen. Khieu Samphan went on the clandestine radio controlled by Pol Pot calling Son Sen a “traitor and Vietnamese agent.” Ta Mok fought back and captured Pol Pot, Khieu Samphan, and Nuon Chea.  Days after the execution of Son Sen, Khieu Samphan went back on the radio—this time on behalf of Ta Mok—referring to Son Sen as “comrade” and announcing that “Pol Pot” was under arrest as a “traitor.” Asked if he was a hostage of Pol Pot during the internal fighting, he said: "You could call it something like that."

So in the end, all ten of the original members of the 1963 Standing Committee of the CPK had either been arrested, murdered, or sentenced to death by each other as “traitors.” In fact by the end of Pol Pot’s rule in 1979, of the 22 members of the central committee of the CPK that were named in 1975 when they seized power, 18 had been executed or named to be executed as ‘enemy agents” from within the CPK ranks.

Many cadres who fled to Vietnam in 1977 and 1978, including current premier Hun Sen, ruling party president Chea Sim, the titular head of the original  Vietnamese installed government Heng Samrin, Interior Minister Sar Kheng, and Defence Minister Tea Banh fled in 1977 and 1978. Many were loyal officers who remained in power with the Khmer Rouge while hundreds of thousands died  at the hands of the government they were still loyal to, well after the disastrous policies and purges were implemented, not because of objection to Pol Pot’s policies, but rather because they were aware they were next on the list of targets.

During the massive purge of mid 1978 against “internal enemies” in the Party, the Khmer Rouge publicly announced that they were not just preparing for war against Vietnam, but the extermination of the entire Vietnamese race and the reseizing of territory on the Mekong Delta that had been lost centuries before. The Khmer Rouge strategy was clearly tactically, strategically and psychologically delusional. But they were no doubt serious. They announced on State radio that Cambodia, with a population of 8 million, would eliminate the entire Vietnamese population of battle hardened 60 million, and explained their crude strategy. The may 10, 1978 Khmer Rouge radio proclaimed in a public broadcast. “ The party has instructed that we destroy as many of the enemy as possible, and try to preserve our forces to the maximum. We are few in number, but we have to attack a larger force. This is our slogan:  In terms of numbers, one of us must kill 30 Vietnamese. If we can implement this slogan, we surely can win. Using these figures, one Cambodian is equal to thirty Vietnamese. And 100 Cambodians are equal to 3000 Vietnamese. We should have 2 million troops for 60 million Vietnamese. We don’t have to engage 8 million people. We need only 2 million to crush the 60 million Vietnamese, and we would still have 6 million left We must format our combat line in this manner in order to win victory. The entire army, party, and people must be made fully aware of these views, lines, and stands. We must review our history. Have the Vietnamese succeeded in swallowing Cambodia? No, they have not. We must purify our armed forces, our Party, and the masses of people in order to continue fighting the enemy in defence of Cambodian territory and the Cambodian race. If we do not try and defend our territory, then we shall lose it, and then our race will disappear. The Vietnamese will bring in one or two million people into Cambodia every year, and then we will lose our territory, and our race will be completely swallowed up.”

This official Khmer Rouge strategy was not a secret later unearthed internal party document. It was broadcast on their radio for both internal and foreign consumption Their military and political formula was patently delusional, and based on no remotely viable military strategy. It was simply ludicrous.

The “victory” was that the Khmer race would remain, in theory, with 6 million alive, ancient Khmer territory lost centuries ago would be reconquered, and current territory would be saved from fictional delusional, non-existent foreign plots of foreign designs of annexation rooted in age old historical grievances. It was nothing less than the manifestations of delusions of grandeur, still oozing the puss of the deep humiliation, resentment, and fixation for vengeance o the defeats of ancient history seared into the minds of the popular Cambodian consciousness , harking back 800 years to the forever at the forefront of contemporary political agenda of the Great Angkor Empire, which had evaporated by the 14^th century.

Pol Pot’s other major internal central policy focused singularly on the rapid creation of a patently untenable rise in agricultural production. He based his goals on the superior racial abilities of the Khmer peasants. He set unachievable quotas for rice production that were guaranteed to fail. He was obsessed  with an ability to create a superior agrarian utopia based on self-reliance on Khmer resources, which largely didn’t exist. Pol Pot’s domestic policies of agricultural production goals, regional production of rice quotas mandated by the central party, were simply unattainable. Cambodia’s mechanized resources were simply non-existent, its agricultural productive capacity and infrastructure decimated by years of warfare, and its trained human resources and technically skilled cadre with even minimum expertise  miniscule in number and capability. And anyone with foreign training and the skills, who returned from abroad upon victory to build a new society, were deemed suspected spies and most were killed. In addition, local and regional cadre who questioned the ability to meet the quota’s were deemed foreign enemy agents intent on sabotaging the revolution and arrested and executed.    “They fought against us, so we had to take measure to defend ourselves,’ Pol Pot told me in 1997, blaming “enemies from within” for sabotaging the regimes’ policy goals. He blamed starvation that killed hundreds of thousands on “enemies within our ranks” who “withheld food from the people. There was rice but they didn’t give rice to the population to eat.” The list of enemies ranged from officials of the defeated Lon Nol regime, to “internal agents” within the Party and the army, to Vietnamese, CIA, and KGB plots, often working simultaneously in coordination with one another., to his contention of six attempted coup attempts to depose him, to finally the entire nation of Vietnam.

In 1977, Khieu Samphan stressed the rejection of foreign aid as a “science. “ In the old regime did the school Children, college children, university graduates know anything about the true natural sciences? Could they tell the difference between an early crop and a six month rice crop…they relied completely on foreigners, expecting foreign equipment and even foreign experts to do their job for them. Everything was done according to foreign books and foreign standards. Therefore, it was useless and could not serve the needs of our people, nor could it be of any help building our nation. By contrast, our children in rural regions have always had useful knowledge. They can tell you which cow is tame and which cow is skittish. They can mount a buffalo from both sides. They are masters of the herd. They have practically mastered nature. Only this should be called natural science because this type of knowledge is closely connected with the realities of the nation, with the ideas of nationalism, national construction, and national defense.”

In its place he forced thousands of underfed and overworked forced labour to build poorly designed water irrigation systems, planting and harvesting at a pace that resulted in the death of hundreds of thousands from sheer overwork and exhaustion.

The ban on the use of money was also a direct consequence of the CPK hyper focus on foreign enemies trying to destroy Cambodia. "Pol Pot was convinced that only the ban of the use of money could prevent the CIA from carrying out any activity in Cambodia because in his view the CIA used money to buy people and recruit agents,” said CPK Standing Committee member and Pol Pot’s brother in law Ieng Sary after he defected in 1996.” He boasted that if we used money, his regime would not have lasted three months and so far no other country could do the same.”

In July, 1976, the Khmer Rouge embarked on a Four Year Plan in all Fields, 1977-1980.” The document acknowledged “we are extremely weak” in industry and technology, but said “technology is not the decisive factor; the determinign factors of the revolution are politics, revolutionary people, and revolutionary methods.” It also rejected  accepting foreign assistance saying we would certainly obtain some, but this would affect our political line…there would be political conditions imposed on us without fail.” The document concluded that Cambodia “had leaped over the feudalists and capitalists of every nation, and have achieved a socialist state right away.” They even said they had out achieved North Korea, China, and North Vietnam, saying “ we are faster than them…nothing is confused as it is with them…we don’t need a long time for the transformation.”

 

But while modern Cambodia bears no political or geographical resemblance to the ancient political and military and cultural antecedents of the Angkor period, the Angkor empire is crucial to understanding the motives and psychology of Pol Pot and, indeed, the modern Cambodian society that  created the Khmer Rouge rise to power, and to a significant degree the political culture that succeeded it and remains dominant today. Pol Pot’s political contemporaries almost all shifted allegiance in recent decades to serving alternately as military and political allies and adversaries to the Khmer Rouge. Sharing many similar objectives and characteristics, the political leaders succeeding and preceding Pol Pot in power, comprise a consistent modern political culture remarkably still dominated by the same cast of characters from French independence in 1953 to the present. They together share key responsibility to the disaster wrought by the Khmer Rouge and their short tenure in power.

But it reelected the sincere belief of Khmer racial and cultural and political prowess that was superior to all other nations and theories in history and this belief was carried out in all sectors of government policy.

A look at the backgrounds and statements of the leaders of the CPK provides little substantiation of the theory that there murderous policies were inspired by any allegiance to communism, but rather points instead to its roots in traditional Cambodian political themes of nationalism, anti-colonialism, vitriolic abhorrence to foreign domination, sovereignty, retaking territory lost in past centuries to neighboring powers, racial superiority of Khmers and racial hatred for foreigners, particularly Vietnamese. In detailed personal interviews with every living  member of the Standing Committee of the Central Committee of the Communist party of Kampuchea, only once did I ever hear a reference to Communism as an influence in their ideological development

The leadership of the Khmer Rouge was a disparate grouping of individuals with few shared teachings, backgrounds, ideology, or unified vision

*Pol Pot was a failed radio technician student from a rural middle class background influenced by anti-colonialist and nationalist movements who dabbled in leftist politics while a student in France and was inducted into the French Communist party. Upon his return to Cambodia in the early 1950’s he was inducted into the Indochinese Communist Party by the Vietnamese, who held firm control over the communist movement in the three Indochinese countries at the time. Before joining the original formation of the  CPK in 1960, he taught school and wrote articles under pseudonyms signed “The original Khmer” and the “The nation, the People, and the Race.” The later he used to sign his radio broadcasts from the jungles in the 1980’s and 90’s.

“When I asked him about his political influences and what drove his policies during his reign, he said: I would like to say that my conscious is clear. Everything I have done is for the nation the people and the race of Cambodia. I want to tell you, I am quite satisfied with one thing: If there was no struggle carried out by us, Cambodia would have been Kampuchea Krom(a reference to areas of the Mekong Delta in Vietnam which were annexed by Vietnam in the 1700’s) in 1975.” He continued: “ during 1975-78 there were of course some conflicting views, this is true,” he obliquely responded to questions of mass murder under his rule. “There was opposition to Democratic Kampuchea, and, of course, democratic Kampuchea had to do something about that. The Vietnamese carried out activities for some time. Naturally we had to defend ourselves. They wanted kill me.”

“Who is they?” I asked.

“Mainly the Vietnamese." They knew without me they could easily swallow up Cambodia.” Pol Pot saw himself literally as the personal embodiment of the Cambodian nation. Any opposition to him was interpreted as treason against the Khmer race and Cambodian nation itself.

During the trial of Pol Pot in the jungles of Anlong Veng in northern Cambodia, in July 1997, Bang Men, around 50, hobbled up on his amputated leg and one crutch in front of the gathered crowd, Pol Pot only a few feet away, cheeks shaking trying to maintain  his composure. Bang men introduced himself as “a representative of the people.” He spoke with sincerity and passion his voice raised at the crude podium on the dirt jungle floor, into the microphone hooked up to a car battery: “ The people and masses of Anlong  Veng, tens of thousands of people, have abandoned their land, homes, their parents, siblings, children, and grandchildren for close to 20 years, with the aim of solving the problem of the nation, the race….not thinking of the danger, their lives. This struggle is an exceedingly hard and difficult struggle, which has never been encountered before in the history of our nation. In the spirit of loving the nation, of loving the race, we have strived to achieve and express this most lofty and supreme heroism, to continue the struggle. But finally, the result was not in keeping with most of our wishes, our intentions. We have been separated and lost tens of thousands, millions, and then in the period of 1996-1997, we encountered the most terrible, the most barbarous incident of Pol Pot, who continually had us study about the view, the stance, fighting, enduring to fight, the stance becoming even stronger, the situation becoming ever more difficult. They saw enemies everywhere, saw them as rotten flesh, swollen flesh, enemies surrounding them, enemies in front, enemies behind, enemies to the north, enemies to the south, enemies to the west, enemies to the east, enemies in all eight directions, enemies coming from all nine directions, around them, closing in, with no place to breathe…Pol Pot wanted to further strengthen our stance. Strengthen over and over and over, including measures to successfully kill and purge our own ranks, including strugglers in the movement of the same rank….Looking backward, Cambodia was dissolving into nothing…fighting continually and Cambodia steadily dissolving.’

*Nuon Chea was a rural peasant from Battambang province in western Cambodia who was educated in Thailand after they temporarily invaded and annexed that part of Cambodia into Thai territory. He graduated from the prestigious Thammassat University in Bangkok and joined the leftist Thai Democratic Youth League in 1946 and the Thai Communist party in 1950. That same year he joined the Vietnamese controlled Indochinese Communist Party.

*Ieng Sary was born in former Cambodian territory annexed by Vietnam for more than a century in the Mekong delta of Vietnam to a Chinese immigrant to Vietnam and an ethnic Khmer citizen of Vietnam of middle to upper class origins. He received his higher education in France and joined the French Communist Party during his studies there.

*Ta Mok was an uneducated peasant whose family ran a lumber mill in rural Cambodia, trained to be a monk, and joined the anti-colonial Democratic party in 1946 and later the anti-French underground armed movement the Khmer Issaraks.

In several interviews with Ta Mok, he expounded in straightforward detail about CPK politics and theory. He was a military man who, while ranked number three in the party hierarchy, he had no formal schooling, and his more sophisticated comrades in the leadership would cringe when he spoke of politics. But in Cambodia, whoever has the guns has the power, and Mok had just overthrown Pol Pot in a day’s long duel of life and earth.” He acknowledge that “hundreds of thousand s died. Hundreds of thousands yes. Not millions like the Americans say. He contended that the “Communist party had sucked the blood of the people” and that “Pol pot had clearly committed crimes against  humanity. But he was clear in parsing the distinctions of who was legitimately killed. “ I joined the movement when I was 16. I have no theoretical ideology. My ideology is patriotism. Before I joined the Communist party, but I had no idea what communism was!,” he said throwing his arms in the air and chuckling. “ They said the Party was a patriotic one. That is why I joined the party. Later I found out that the Communist party was sucking the blood of the people.” He added that his one regret was working with Pol Pot “whose hands are soiled with blood….each of us has our own lessons to learn from ourselves. Ours is Pol Pot.”

But there was a reason Mok earned the nickname “the Butcher.” ‘I never killed Khmers,” he said. “ Vietnamese yes.” When I asked about the purges of other of his senior KR cadre comrades he was known to have been dispatched to murder, Mok said: “ Sao Phim. He was Vietnamese,” he said bluntly referring to the former number four in the Standing Committee of the CPK who headed the eastern zone military on the Vietnamese border. The tens of thousands of ethnic Khmer soldiers who Mok commanded the killing of who were subordinates of Sao Phim Mok did not view as Khmer. “They were Vietnamese,” he said dismissively/ There is a saying in Cambodian “Kluen Khmer, Kbal Yuon.” It means “To have a Khmer Body but the mind of a Vietnamese.” Mok was deeply implicated in the purges of thousands of civilians and cadre during the KR rule. Including his own deputy who he sent to his death at Tuol Sleng. “he was Vietnamese,” Mok said. Three westerners who ventured to close to his control zone in the months before my visits, were captured and executed—two European humanitarian workers sightseeing near ancient temples and a British former military officer who was volunteering training Cambodians how to unearth buried landmines.

* Son Sen was born in South Vietnam, studied in Phnom Penh and Paris, and returned to teach at the prestigious secondary school of Lycee Sisowath in Phnom Penh. Son Sen, during the KR period was directly in charge—as Army Commander and chief of national security—for the activities of the CPK secret police, including overseeing the Tuol Sleng Torture and extermination  center

*Khieu Samphan was born in the eastern province of Svay Rieng and educated in Paris, receiving a Doctorate of Economics. He returned to Cambodia to be elected to the national Assembly, was widely idolized for his reputation as incorruptible under Sihanouk, and served briefly as his minister of commerce, before fleeing to the jungle in 1967 after public threats by Sihanouk. While serving as the public face of the Khmer Rouge, he was never a member of the CPK most powerful body, the Standing Committee. He never revealed his affiliation with the CPK.

Ina February 1978 meeting in the jungles of Anlong Veng, I sat at a roundtable over fresh fish and warm soda in Ta Mok’s house dining for three hours with Ta Mok, Nuon Chea, Khieu Samphan, and several other Khmer Rouge cadres. I was allowed to film and record the entire event. Mok had by then captured Pol Pot and controlled the army and therefore the power. Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan hated Mok with a passion, considering him a competent military commander but wholly ignorant of political theory and a loud and course peasant soldier.

Ta Mok began to recite the names and ranks of the Party leaders who had been executed. “ That is right, a (“a” is a pejorative Khmer term for ‘”the contemptible’) Nhim was what number> A-Chong was what number?”, referring to their ranks in the Standing Committee of the CPK. “ A-Phong was what number? Why do I want to count them all? Because I want to relate clearly that all of them were what?” he was naming top leaders arrested, tortured, and executed at Tuol Sleng. “ from number One Pol Pot to all of those I mentioned, some of them were Yuon ( a derogatory term for Vietnamese) was Pol Pot Yuon or not? I don’t know, it is not clear. But So Phim is clear. He was Yuon. From the east., he was Yuon through and through, a pure Yuon. Chong was Yuon. He was a person of the Yuon.”

Khieu Samphan and Nuon Chea were seething sitting next to me and Ta Mok. Their loyalties were still with Pol Pot and they despised Ta Mok. They looked like they were about to explode. Revealing Party secrets is an offensive that had always meant certain death, and to do so in front of an American was unfathomable to them. I knew they had already concluded I was a CIA agent, but considered me a useful back channel.

Cor Bun Heng, a young intellectual, asked “ Chong was from where?

Ta Mok replied: “Koh Kong. Or CIA. It is the same.”

Mok then laughed and pointed his finger at me. “ CIA, have you heard of them?”laughing louder and more. I had been told earlier by Khmer Rouge confidantes that Mok was convinced I was Cia. I said nothing. “ So within the leadership, there were Yuon and CIA. And there were Americans. Have you heard of them?”  he asked me again, perhaps trying to be both funny and menacing.

Mok laughed again. “ A-Thuch, what was his original name?” laughing and cackling, clearly enjoying making the whole table very uncomfortable for very different reasons.

Khiue Samphan, who was decidedly not laughing and decidedly annoyed, answered; ‘Koy Thuon.’

“Koy Thuon was an American,” Mok declared.” This is what I want to explain to you, “he said to me.. “it was like this. It was a mess. And it is this that causes the talk of two million or three million killed.” Because internally things weren’t good, they carried on killings. The Yuon group wanted to kill the American group. The American group wanted to kill the Yuon group and kill the Khmers. Internally, there were these three, three parties: The American party, the Yuon party, and the Khmer party. I want to tell you this just honestly, straightforwardly.”

It was the first time Nuon Chea had ever granted an interview in the 50 years since he joined the revolution. And he wasn’t happy. Mok presided and was periodically sarcastic, animated, and demeaning towards his senior colleagues, whose expressions seethed at Mok’s flippant and derogatory remarks.  Mok put down Khieu Samphan, who was seated next to him, saying: “Pol Pot, it is like the Americans say about Khieu Samphan, that he is only a figurehead. Because where are the forces? Who is Cambodia? I am not saying this to boast. Ask the Army. Pol Pot had only himself. The forces were the Southwest,” he said referring to the zone he commanded.

I asked Nuon Chea about the alleged coup attempts against Pol Pot and Nuon Chea between 1975 and 1979. “ During the three years holding power, it was the Yuon and the henchmen of the Yuon, “ Nuon Chea replied through clenched teeth.

“What happened?” I asked. “ this is a historical matter of long past, long ago. There were assassination attempts, there were attempts to poison, from what I could gather,” Nuon Chea replied. “But most of it, some places, it is hard for me to recall. I don’t know what Ta would say,” he continued trying to avoid an answer. “ This I am telling you frankly,” Nuon says. “They accuse us.”

Ta Mok then speaks, offering specific and never before revealed details to the consternation of Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan. “okay, I’d like to tell you. This matter isn’t something that is clear and transparent, it is very difficult, because internally who was it who was in charge, who was responsible? It was Pol pot who was responsible. There wasn’t anyone else who was number one but Pol Pot. Pol Pot was number One.’ Then Mok turns to Nuon Chea, smirks, eyes twinkling in a mixture of menace and mockery.” Brother, you were number two, right?’

Nuon Chea glares, pauses, and answers curtly, “yes.”

“Yes, you were number two,” Mok repeats, “ Ieng Sary was number three. So Phim was number four. And Ta Mok was only number five. And A-Nhim was what number?” Mok goads Nuon Chea.

“don’t know what number, Ta,’ Nuon Chea says.

‘it is the number two individual who knows the most,: Mok laughs referring mockingly to Nuon Chea,” But I didn’t understand much. I just looked from the outside. I observed. I just want to express that opinion.”

END OF PART ONE FROM EXCERPTS OF “Sympathy for the devil” Unpublished book manuscript by Nate Thayer

 

More excerpts will be posted as the trial continues.

Were the Khmer Rouge communists? By Nate Thayer

Were the Khmer Rouge communists?

by Nate Thayer on Wednesday, November 23, 2011 at 1:43am

Although theoretically a communist party, the personal statements of all the Khmer Rouge top leaders who remained alive after 1996 (including the three on trial now), suggest the Khmer Rouge were more accurately characterized as ultra-nationalists and xenophobic racists (with many similarities to fascism) intent on creating their own version of organized power deeply rooted in current Khmer political culture and history based on no external models. Of the 18 members of the central committee of the communist party that took power in 1975, only four spoke a foreign language. Since neither Mao, Lenin, Stalin, Marx, or Engels were ever translated into Khmer, it is hard to argue that the unspeakable failure and suffering that occurred under the KR was a result of communist—or, for that matter, any outside--ideology. The KR movement was in essence very Khmer. It's demand for obsequies loyalty to a single entity; its refusal to allow for even internal debate or opposition political thought or organization; its fixation on being a victim of foreign designs or trickery; its racial hatred towards non-Khmer; its unspoken inferiority complex to that of its more properly organized neighbors; its use of harsh violence as a central tool of consolidating and maintaining power; and its belief that it had only to unleash its unique abilities superior to other nations to achieve a superior society than the world had previously known were all central psychological and concrete ingredients of the feudal monarchies and regimes which had preceded the KR for centuries. These were all tenets in the tradition of their predecessors but allowed the Khmer Rouge, with its Stalinist power structure, to metastasize like an inoperable cancer throughout the body politic. Within three years 18 of the 22 members of the central committee of the Party had been executed or named as targets for execution. The irony is that, the KR so weakened the Cambodian nation and provoked its neighbors, that it guaranteed the requirement of its delusional prophecy come true--a foreign invasion by Vietnam to save the very nation and race from self extermination.

The Khmer Rouge sought the elimination of any vestiges of recent Cambodian political, social, and economic society. They refused assistance, advice, and even diplomatic relations with most every other nation. They demanded absolute obsequiousness to their policies from the citizenry, attempted to create an agrarian utopia based on emptying of the population from urban areas, demanded anti-intellectualism as state policy and demonized all things foreign—particularly Vietnam--as irredeemable historical enemies intent on conquering Cambodia and eliminating it as a sovereign nation.

They families of the entire population were separated, their children taken to live separately in labor brigades in an attempt to destroy traditional loyalties to be replaced by supine and unmitigated allegiance to the party. There was a near total renunciation of foreign trade, and a radical sealing of the borders and all access of information to and from the outside. Their largest manufacturing plant recycled old rubber vehicle tires to make shoes.

Perhaps their primary focus was an impossible to exaggerate paranoia of enemies everywhere, both “internal” from within their own ranks and the external designs of all foreigners as enemies—with a particular focus on Vietnam—who, the Khmer Rouge leadership were convinced, were poised and aggressively intent on conquering and eliminating Cambodia as a nation and the Khmer as a race.

 

In the process of implementation of these policies they combined the failures of Cambodia’s political culture--of which they vowed to eliminate and instead mimicked and exacerbated--with delusional, absurd, ill-planned and technically impossible utopian fantasies of what they deemed the “Super Great Leap Forward” in an economic strategy implemented in 1977. A direct reference to being more capable than China itself (in its Great Leap Forward), it was designed to prove their superior talents and abilities demonstrating they were racially, culturally, and as a nation-state more advanced than any other economic model in world history,  not just rejecting any foreign model but unsupervised by any Cambodian trained cadre. They forced compliance to these policies with rule through the centrally directed harsh use of violence and forced implantation of delusional central agricultural, economic, and social policies. They relied on manual labour, and arrested and executed cadre who suggested that mechanized machines such as tractors would be a superior method than the forced labour of a starving population. When impossible production quotas weren’t met, the KR cadre in the area were deemed as foreign agents intentionally sabotaging the Cambodian nation. These combined to create a recipe destined for disaster. They allowed no internal debate for their policies contributing to the astonishing failures of central policy as a whole, utter collapse of any normal government functions, extraordinary suffering of the population, a petrified and robotic Party rank and file, and finally a war they provoked which ended in the loss of their country to Vietnamese occupation. These dominant features underlined their tenure in power.

These themes are all consistent with the Khmer Rouge absolute policy of what they called “self reliance-self mastery” and their belief that they were capable of alone creating an agrarian utopia that harked back to their glorious Angkorean past. Pol Pot’s “Super Great Leap Forward” was an example that Cambodia could make achievements superior to that of even China, and reflected both the fact they were far from subservient minions of Beijing and a psychological penchant for vengeance against all things foreign which, they believed, had stripped them of their cultural and racial dignity. The fact that Cambodia had been a failed state in the 600 years since the demise of the Angkor empire created an inferiority complex of which they were determined to prove a misconception or a reflection of the rapacious, corrupt, and incompetent rulers that preceded them. In the end, they proved themselves even more incompetent and inhumane than their political enemies. Those who resisted or questioned their impossible vision for a utopia unique in history were often killed with the sincere belief they were enemies of the very Cambodian race, people, and nation.

Do the Khmer Rouge on trial this week uncomfortably reflect mainstream Cambodian views? By Nate Thayer

At the Khmer Rouge trial yesterday, Nuon Chea said that Vietnam intended to “swallow Cambodia and rip Cambodia of her ethnic race” adding “never trust a foreigner.” This came after a litany of testimony of unspeakable torture and violence inflicted by the KR on fellow Cambodians. The ugly truth is that Nuon Chea’s comments have deep roots in mainstream Cambodian politics. Political violence and the humiliation and destruction of political opponents are far from rare in modern Cambodian politics. Nuon Chea’s view of Vietnam, Cambodian political opposition, and foreigners is a common theme in mainstream Cambodia politics.  The unspoken truth is that far too many Cambodian political leaders are not against murder, human rights abuses, and political violence—they oppose them only when they are the targets.

The Khmer Rouge regime was a mixture of paranoia, hatred, intolerance, a deep historical resentment, inferiority complex, desire for vengeance, and an absurd belief to not just defeat and extinguish their historical enemy, but the Vietnamese race itself. This Khmer Rouge intolerance fits not uncomfortably in the belief system of their Cambodian political opponents. The Khmer Rouge hatred of Vietnam and foreign nefarious intentions against Cambodia has a long precedence in mainstream Cambodian political views. They are shared by a majority of Cambodians of all political stripes. Even their focus on “internal enemies” of the KR party is rooted in centuries of Khmer reality. Cambodia has always had one leader who demanded complete loyalty and absolute political power, no history of coalition politics, opposition parties, or any kind of independent judiciary, press, or even thinking. Anything that reflected any of the former categorized one as an enemy that must be crushed, usually after being publicly humiliated. If one was not submissive, then one was a political enemy by definition. This has virtually always been true in Khmer political culture. When Khieu Samphan—also on trial this week—was in parliament and the cabinet of the then Sihanouk government, he was stripped naked in broad daylight by government police and paraded down the street. He soon fled to the Khmer Rouge and jungle amid public threats to assassinate him. Humiliation and abuse of one’s opponents has a long tradition in Khmer politics. Leaders routinely insult each other in public.  And the murder of political opposition is a common method employed by all Cambodian factions. Sihanouk murdered many opposition figures. After seizing power in 1970, the U.S. backed Lon Nol regime, which overthrew Sihanouk ( who then joined and publicly led the Khmer Rouge into power) rounded up and publicly executed tens of thousands of ethnic Vietnamese civilians prior to expelling the remainder. As an example of acceptance of the murder of Vietnamese civilians by today’s mainstream Cambodian political parties and leaders, during the UN elections the Khmer Rouge rounded up and executed 29 women and children of Vietnamese origin who had been fisherman for generations in Cambodia. Not one Cambodian political party, of which there were more than 30 registered with the UN, raised a voice of objection. They knew that they would alienate the views of the population if they did so. Hun Sen, during his bloody coup of 1997, overthrowing the UN elected government, hunted down and executed hundreds of opposition figures, many brutally tortured, their eyes gouged out and their penises severed and stuffed in their mouth while alive, then disemboweled and their liver fried and eaten. Some had their tongues ripped from their mouths with pliers while alive under interrogation. So in many ways Nuon Chea and Pol Pot were an extreme reflection and logical extension of a Cambodian leader, their views a reflection of their predecessors, successors, and countrymen. Just some food for thought.

The long overdue and politicized trial of the three remaining top Khmer Rouge leaders offers an opportunity for an unvarnished history on one of the most unspeakable blights on modern abuse of power, human dignity, human rights, and international rules of law and war. Or it may be squandered, serving to once again whitewash, deflect, and demonize a few for which many others share guilt and responsibility. It is a reality deeply rooted in other mainstream players in current Cambodian political culture, and those which preceded and succeeded the Khmer Rouge. It also deeply implicates the international community and other Cambodian political leaders, in participating, supporting, reacting to, and delaying taking responsibility for their role in this tragedy. The Khmer Rouge were not an aberration. And the responsibility was far from limited to those on trial now. The ugly truth is that the trial reflects a very uncomfortable--but fundamental--psychology that is alive and ignored in mainstream Cambodia today. I will post excerpts from never before published interviews and documents of Nuon Chea, Ieng Sary, Khieu Samphan, Ta Mok, Duch, Pol Pot, the current Cambodian government, and other international players in a small attempt to add some context to the current trial and commentary. They include three recorded interviews with Nuon Chea in the jungles of Northern Cambodia, and a roundtable recorded several hour discussion with Ta Mok, Nuon Chea, and Khieu Samphan on the killings while they were in power, their justifications for them, and the ideology that motivated their policies.  These were conducted in the months and weeks before their capture and surrender.

DEATH IN DETAIL: ‘Duch’ implicates living Khmer Rouge leaders in killings. Says Nuon Chea ran Pol Pot’s Death machine By Nate Thayer

DEATH IN DETAIL: ‘Duch’ implicates living Khmer Rouge leaders in killings. Nuon Chea ran Pol Pot’s Death machine, Duch says.

By Nate Thayer in Battambang province

Far Eastern Economic Review

May 13, 1999

(Authors note: This article was written one week after the REVIEW published a several story package by myself and photographer Nic Dunlop. Dunlop had first located Duch, who was living under an alias doing social work and recognized his face, in a truly extraordinary focus by Dunlop on what was then one of the most notorious and in hiding mass murderers in the world, weeks earlier. While Dunlop took his photograph, he did not, with good reason, broach the subject with Duch of  who he really was. The area was dangerous and Nic wanted to be sure it was indeed Duch, and be prepared for a negative reaction. He returned to Bangkok, contacted me, and we returned to a remote village in western Cambodia and confronted Duch with who he was. It was not a relaxing encounter. If Duch had chosen to, he could have disposed of us and no one would ever prove the details. This was hours from any communication with the outside and the heart of territory still controlled by nominally defected ex-KR. I knew the government had long been aware of Duch's location. And I had closely kept track of rumours of him for years which had him dead, working as a school teacher, a converted born-again Christian, and using a similar name to the alias he had introduced himself to Dunlop with. I had informed the REVIEW office that if I was not in contact in 48 hours, there was probably a serious problem. After a very brief denial when I asked if he "had ever worked for the security services between 1975 and 1979" (he contended he was a school teacher then), Duch took a second look at my business card, paused, and silently stared directly in my eyes for perhaps 30 seconds. He then said: "You are from the Far Eastern Economic Review. You are the one who interviewed Pol Pot and Ta Mok." Those seconds hung in the air far longer than was comfortable. "Yes," I said, " And we know who you are." Duch stared silently again for what seemed like forever, his mind obviously racing with the implications of the encounter, reached over, put his hand on my leg, and said "It is God's will you are here. My future is now in God's hands." And he never  lied again. We brought copies of his own torture and execution documents from Tuol Sleng, many with his handwriting and those of Nuon Chea and others. He meticulously acknowledged and identified each one. I gave him a rough biography I had written of him and asked him to correct or add details. He did so with great focus adding many dates and events. I had contacted several Catholic and Protestant Priests and said I was going to meet with someone who had " perhaps killed many people" and asked which passages of the bible might such a person most relate to. ( The answer was Paul: "chief of the Sinners" who was himself a murderer and converted, confessed his sins, sought redemption, was forgiven, and was granted salvation. It was a passage that Duch knew by memory)  After several days of interviewing him, the story was published in the REVIEW. We warned and made clear to Duch that his life would be in danger at 5:00 pm on that wednesday night, when the Review would send its normal press release of the next issues top storiies. We knew it would be picked up everywhere and broadcast in the VOA Khmer language service at 8:00pm that night. Arrangements were made for a secret arrest warrant to be issued in Belgium, so there would be legal authority to have him smuggled across the Thai border to safety, as many powerful people would have reason to silence him. Amnesty International and the UN Centre for Human Rights were pre alerted to the public release of the fact that Duch had been located. They were prepared to release public statements simultaneously with the story publication calling for the Cambodian government to ensure his safety as his life was in danger and he was a key defendent and witness for any trial on Khmer Rouge crimes against humanity. Duch was given mobile phone contacts for me in Battambang city, about two hours away, and told arrangements were in place for a safe house for him or to be smuggled out of the country if he felt his life was in danger. He chose to initially stay in his village. Within hours of the story being released, the very angry village police chief came to his house and said he was ordered to "come to a meeting.' A well known euphamism to Duch, he fled on foot and contacted me in Battambang. I checked him in under a pseudonym in the room next to mine at an obscure hotel. There, tape recorders were turned on and for a week he spoke in great detail of the entire machinery of the Khmer Rouge movement and specifics of many instances of war crimes and crimes against humanity and who ordered carried out and was involved. During this time, international pressure was significant; Governments called for his arrest, many called for his safety to be ensured by Cambodia authorities. The story was published but Duch had seemingly vanished again. After initial refusal, Hun Sen formally agreed to launch a government search for his whereabouts, and journalists descended on Battambang. As a journalist it wasn't my job to arrest him. It was also my responsibility to ensure he understood the consequences of his public statements and to ensure he wasn't murdered for speaking out to the REVIEW, as he had as much a right to due process of law as that he denied to thousands. I was beseiged by Cambodian government, military, diplomats and journalists demanding to know the whereabouts of Duch, who by this time had been known to have dissapeared from his village. One pro--government paper's front page banner headline was "Is Nate Thayer Hiding Duch?" above photogrpahs of us both. After a week, Duch decided he would seek, like Nuon Chea, Khiue Samphan, Ieng Sary and thousands of other former KR, the protection of  a senior Khmer Rouge military officer who had 'defected' to the government and was now a general in the Hun Sen army. We both left the hotel at the same time, he to the compound of the General and a rather nervous me--with 40 hours of the only copy of tape recordings detailing the Khmer Rouge killing apparatus--by land through a myriad of government military checkpoints over the border into Thailand. Duch was immediately betrayed by his contact and was whisked by helicopter to Phnom Penh where he has been in prison ever since. This story is one of those published after the two weeks spent with Duch.)

This time, it was Duch’s turn to write his confessions. In the weeks since the REVIEW broke the news that the notorious Khmer Rouge security boss was still alive, Kaing Kek Ieu has been in hiding, answering verbally and in writing the magazine’s questions about his role in the movement’s 1975-79 reign of terror.

The revelations about his job as chief executioner were chilling enough. But even more importantly, he recounted in detail how senior Khmer Rouge officials ordered the mass murder of prisoners processed through Tuol Sleng detention centre, which Duch—as he was then known—directed. Notably, he implicated Pol Pot’s number 2, Nuon Chea, who is living freely in Pailin, western Cambodia.

Duch’s testimony, which began with last week’s article, is fueling calls for the arrest and international trial of surviving Khmer Rouge leaders. It has also made Duch the most wanted man in Cambodia, with the United Nation’s warning that his life is in danger from those who want him silenced.

Phnom Penh fears that moving against the Khmer Rouge leaders, who have officially defected to the government but still effectively control the ex-Khmer Rouge guerrillas surrounding Pailin, could plunge the country back into civil war. Only one Khmer Rouge leader—former military chief-of-staff Ta Mok—is in custody.

Duch, now a born-again Christian, said he was ready to testify against his former comrades and answer for his own crimes in front of an international tribunal. “It is Ok. They can have my body, Jesus has my soul. It is important that this history be understood. I want to tell you everything clearly.” And he did.

“I was a technician for the Communist party,” he declared, then went on to describe the inner workings of S-21, the Khmer Rouge security apparatus that he directed from Tuol Sleng, a converted Phnom Penh school where at least 16,000 people—many of them purged Khmer Rouge cadres and their families—were taken for interrogation. Only seven survived.

Duch said the policy of killing all prisoners was ‘an oral instruction of the party since 1971, when we were trying to rid our ranks of the enemy.” The definition of enemy expanded in 1973, when Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot decided that all cadres should come from the peasantry and the educated should be eliminated. “At that time many things changed and many people were killed,” Duch said.

Once the Khmer Rouge seized power, the internal purges widened. “After liberation in 1975, Pol Pot said: ‘We must protect the party and country by finding the enemies from within the Party. We are not strong enough to attack the enemies from outside, so we must destroy them from within.’ First we arrested the people in the north, then the southwest, then the northwest, then the east. He used Nuon Chea to do the work. Pol Pot never directly ordered the killings. Nuon Chea was always cruel and pompous. He never explained to the cadre, he only ordered them.”

Nuon Chea was in direct command of the Communist party’s killing machine, Duch said. “Vorn Vet and Chay Kim Hour were ordered killed by Nuon Chea,” he said referring to two top leaders. Duch said he personally carried out the orders. “I even had to exhume the body of Vorn Vet from the earth to take a picture of him dead because Nuon Chea wanted proof that he was killed.”

Duch said he also killed eight westerners at Tuol Sleng on Nuon Chea’s orders. “Nuon Chea ordered me to burn their bodies with tires to leave no bones.” The victims were from America, Australia, Britain, France and New Zealand, theoretically making their killers indictable in their country of origin. He said the foreigners were held for a month and tortured using electric shocks by chief interrogator Mam Nay, now a police officer in western Cambodia.

Duch’s testimony could also bolster the case against Ta Mok, the one-legged general who was captured in March, but as of early may, the authorities in Phnom Penh had made no effort to summon Duch to give evidence. “Ta Mok had his own prison,” Duch said—a revelation previously unknown to investigators. “It was located at Cherie O’Phnoe in Kampot province. Many were killed there.”

Duch said his technique for killing prisoners was superior to Mok’s. “I knew from experience that if they were only tortured they wouldn’t say anything. So torture had to be accompanied by psychological tactics; so I told them they would be released if they talked. This was a lie, but it worked. Ta Mok didn’t care about the mental state of his victims. He just tortured them and killed them.”

Duch’s execution methods were similarly efficient.” We had no instruction from the party on how to kill them, but we did not use bullets. Usually we slit their throats,” he said, drawing his finger across his aorta to demonstrate. “We killed them like a chicken.”

Asked about the thousands of women and children he killed, Duch turned away as tears welled in his eyes. “It was a fact that everyone in the Communist party knew that everyone arrested must be killed. Ask anybody in the party.”

Now that his past has been revealed, Duch clearly fears for his life. He sometimes spoke only in whispers, referring to Khmer Rouge leaders by their initials so that listeners would not recognize their names. At other times, he asked to be driven to remote areas to speak in a vehicle where he couldn’t be overheard. Over two weeks, the REVIEW conducted over forty hours of interviews that shed unprecedented light onto the workings of the Khmer Rouge.

“The decisions to kill were not made by one man, not just Pol Pot, but the entire central committee,” Duch stressed.

“Nuon Chea, he was the principal man for the killings. Pol Pot was interested in military strategy. Khieu Samphan did not have the right to decide who to arrest and order killed. He was a notetaker.”

“Pol Pot knew about S-21, but did not direct it personally. He left that job personally to Nuon Chea as No. 2 in the party and Son Sen as head of the army and police.” Then, shaking his head, he added: “They arrested nearly everyone by the end.”

The decision to purge thousands of cadre in the eastern zone in 1978 was taken at a secret meeting of top leaders, Duch said. “Pol Pot ordered it. At the meeting were Nuon Chea, Khieu Samphan, Pol Pot, and Son Sen.”

Duch said the purge reached its worst in the last weeks of 1978. “My prison was full. Nuon Chea ordered 300 (Khmer Rouge) soldiers arrested. He called to meet me and said, ‘Don’t bother to interrogate them—just kill them.’ And I did.”

The purge didn’t save the movement. Angered by repeated cross-border attacks by the Khmer Rouge, Vietnam invaded Cambodia in December 1978 and captured Phnom Penh within two weeks. “It is true that the last days before the Vietnamese came I personally killed the remaining prisoners” at Tuol Sleng, Duch said. “I was called by Nuon Chea to his office and he ordered me to kill all the remaining prisoners.”

“I asked Nuon Chea to allow me to keep one Vietnamese prisoner alive to use for propaganda on the radio and he replied, ‘Kill them all. We can always get more and more.’”

“I was like a waterboy for Nuon Chea. He didn’t tell me that the Vietnamese were invading so I had no time to burn the documents. When I met Nuon Chea in 1983, he told me, ‘All the papers from the Party were burned except for yours. You are stupid.’”

Thousands of forced confessions bearing notations that Duch identified as his own, or those of Nuon Chea and others, were left behind at Tuol Sleng. The documents, including orders to torture and kill prisoners, would serve as key evidence in any trial of Khmer Rouge leaders.

“I think a trial is a very good idea. It is a good thing to arrest Ta Mok and Nuon Chea. And if Pol Pot and Son Sen were still alive, they should be tried as well. Ieng Sary and Khieu Samphan did not have the right to decide the killings by themselves,” Duch said.

Pol Pot committed suicide in 1998, a year after ordering the murder of Son Sen. Khieu Samphan lives in Pailin with Nuon Chea and Ieng Sary, the former Khmer Rouge foreign minister.

Duch, who worked for several years for foreign aid organizations under various aliases, is uncertain about the future. “I guess that I will have to go to jail now, but it is OK. The killings must be understood. The truth should be known.”

Additional excerpts from Thayer’s interviews with Duch will be posted on May 7 on the REVIEW’s Web site. www.feer.com

 

End of Story?: Last Khmer Rouge defections don't bring closure - yet By Nate Thayer in Bangkok

End of Story?: Last Khmer Rouge defections don't bring closure -  yet

By Nate Thayer in Bangkok

Far Eastern Economic Review

December 17, 1998

After 28 years and more than 2 million dead, the war in Cambodia ended on December 4. That was the day the last remnants of the Khmer Rouge agreed to lay down their guns and accept the authority of the government in Phnom Penh.

   Conspicuously absent from the deal, however, were the names of the
three most senior Khmer Rouge leaders: military supremo Ta Mok, political
leader Khieu Samphan, and former party No. 2 Nuon Chea. International investigators want to see all three indicted for crimes against humanity for their role in the Khmer Rouge's brutal 1975-79 rule over Cambodia.

  The REVIEW has learned that Thai authorities are detaining all three at the request of the United States. Thai and Khmer Rouge sources say U.S. officials have requested that Thailand hold the trio until an international tribunal is created to try the architects of Cambodia's "killing fields."

     Senior Khmer Rouge and government military commanders negotiated the Khmer Rouge defection in a series of secret meetings at the temple ruins of Preah Vihear, in the remote northern jungles near the Thai border, Khmer Rouge Gen. Khem Nuon told the REVIEW on December 4. Phnom Penh confirmed the agreement the next day.

     The guerilla military commanders, who defected with as many as 5,000 soldiers and up to 30,000 civilians from the Thai-Cambodian border, will be integrated into the government and armed forces, according to Nuon and Cambodian government officials. In exchange, the guerillas have vowed to lay down their arms, don the government uniforms, and recognize the new government and constitution. They will in effect be given an
autonomous zone where the central government wields little influence.

     The decision follows two years of steady defections from the Khmer Rouge, who have been weakened by bloody infighting, a halt to foreign assistance, low morale and the evaporation of popular support. Though Khmer Rouge leaders say they still oppose Hun Sen's government, they have recognized the futility of further armed struggle. "We all agree to join the government. We are tired of war. We will fight politically for the peasants
from now on," says Khem Nuon.

     Ta Mok, Khieu Samphan and Nuon Chea - the top three Khmer Rouge leaders following the April death of Pol Pot - were not among the defectors. According to Nuon, they are "retired and play no role."

A source close to the guerilla leaders says Thai authorities are holding the three, separately, in Sisaket province near the Cambodian border. "They are in a bad position," the source says. Thai and Khmer Rouge officials add that U.S. officials, who want to see the three tried for crimes against humanity, asked that they be detained. (U.S. officials refused to comment, and the Thai government denied that the Khmer Rouge leaders were on Thai soil.)

     There's no guarantee that they will be brought to trial, however. Both guerilla and government sources say they expect that Khieu Samphan,  a former Khmer Rouge diplomat who has at times been the public face of the movement, is likely to be granted amnesty by the Cambodian government in coming months.

     Even more significantly, an appropriate international tribunal has yet to be created, and doing so may be difficult. Prime Minister Hun Sen has said that such a tribunal should be held in Cambodian territory and controlled by Cambodian authorities. The major democracies, which want to maintain a policy of engagement with Hun Sen, may be reluctant to confront him on the issue. "The U.S. wants to influence and guide the leader, not alienate him," says a U.S. diplomat.

     However, the United Nations sent foreign experts to Cambodia in November to assess the prospect for creating an effective tribunal -  and they are not likely to be so diplomatic. They say Hun Sen's proposal would be unacceptable, as any tribunal would have to be controlled by an independent judicial process, like the war-crimes tribunal in The Hague for the former Yugoslavia. "We will not be party to a judicial farce," says a foreign expert close to the UN team.

     Hun Sen's reluctance to see the creation of an independent tribunal is understandable. He is a former Khmer Rouge commander, and his government is filled with former Khmer Rouge; some defected when he did, in 1977, and others defected in recent years. They include the ministers of defence, interior, justice, finance and foreign affairs, as well as hundreds of officers in the military, security service and civilian administration.

     Among the most notorious is Keo Pok, a former senior Khmer Rouge cadre who became a government official after defecting in March. In charge of purges in the 1970s that killed at least tens of thousands, his role is detailed in documents captured from Tuol Sleng, where the Khmer Rouge tortured and executed more than 16,000 people.

    Mam Nay, another defector, served as chief interrogator at Tuol Sleng and is implicated in the murder of thousands. His signature is on scores of documents detailing the torture and killing of political opponents. He currently grows corn in western Cambodia.

     The demise of the Khmer Rouge began in earnest in July 1996, when thousands rebelled against Pol Pot and other leaders who wanted to return to open warfare against the government formed after the UN-sponsored 1993 elections. The government backed the rebellion, led by Ieng Sary and senior field commanders. Pol Pot and other leaders holed up in the northern jungles deemed the Khmer Rouge rebels traitors and "worse
than excrement." "We want to make one thing clear. We will never
surrender," one senior cadre, Mak Ben, told the REVIEW at the time. "As long as there is grass, we can eat the grass." He defected to the government in July 1997.

     In June 1997, Pol Pot's paranoia about traitors from within peaked. He ordered the assassination of his long-time comrade and defence minister, Son Sen, brutally murdering 16 of his family members in the process. Also targeted was Ta Mok, the one-legged military commander known as "the butcher," who escaped, mustered his troops and overthrew Pol Pot.

     But under Ta Mok's leadership, little improved. By March 1998 he was losing many of his troops to mass defections. An offensive by former loyalists then forced Pol Pot, Ta Mok and thousands of troops and civilians to retreat to the jungles near the Thai border.

     On April 15, Pol Pot died - of a "broken heart," his wife told the REVIEW -  and a livid Ta Mok continued to demand all-out warfare against defectors. "They are traitors who will all die," he said. Ta Mok's interpreter that day was Tep Kunnal, a senior political official and former UN diplomat. During the interview, he turned and whispered grimly: "This movement is finished."

     Later, as he plotted his own escape, Tep Kunnal sent a letter that revealed the bizarre idealism of a movement responsible for one of history's worst mass murders. "How great our sorrow is when we lose someone that we nourish and love dearly," Kunnal wrote. "But here it is not only the loss of someone's life, but the life of a movement that involves hundreds of thousands of human lives that have perished. You can imagine our grief." [End]

The Resurrected: The Khmer Rouge Haven't Disappeared-They're in Power By Nate Thayer

The Resurrected: The Khmer Rouge Haven't Disappeared-They're in Power

By Nate Thayer

Far Eastern Economic Review

Bangkok, April 16, 1998

It was a crime that earned Cambodia's ousted prime minister a 30-year prison sentence. "Norodom Ranariddh negotiated with the Khmer Rouge," the Phnom Penh military court judge intoned on March 18, at the end of a trial orchestrated by his rival co-premier, Hun Sen. But on the day Prince Ranariddh was convicted, Hun Sen's men were holding secret talks with the same Khmer Rouge rebels--cutting a deal remarkably similar to the one for which Ranariddh was being condemned. As a result of the negotiations, hundreds of Khmer Rouge guerrillas emerged from the northern Cambodian jungle the following week, armed with amnesty from prosecution, money and ranking positions in Hun Sen's government. Similar scenes have been repeated all over the country since 1996, when the Khmer Rouge--the ruthless organizers of the 1975-78 reign of  terror that left more than 1 million Cambodians dead--began fragmenting through infighting and defections. Instead of being brought to justice before an international tribunal, some of the movement's top commanders have gained senior positions in the government and security forces, while the Khmer Rouge rank and file have been quietly reintegrated into Cambodian society by the thousands. They are the beneficiaries of the bitter rivalry between Hun Sen and Ranariddh, whose political factions are vying for the allegiance of the guerrillas to strengthen their troop numbers. It's a raw power play that makes Hun Sen's condemnation of Ranariddh's negotiations ring hollow: Hun Sen justified his July 1997 coup by charging that Ranariddh was conspiring with the Khmer Rouge to overthrow the government.

Hun Sen's embrace of longtime Khmer Rouge cadres also undermines the premise of the international community's tacit backing for the Cambodian strongman, which is rooted in the pragmatic belief that his regime is a bulwark against the return of the murderous faction. Preventing the guerrillas from returning to power has been a goal of major Western countries ever since the Khmer Rouge government was overthrown in 1979 by the Vietnamese, who installed a puppet regime of Khmer Rouge defectors in Phnom Penh. After the Vietnamese army pulled out in 1989, this regime remained under Prime Minister Hun Sen. He and his Cambodian People's Party strong-armed their way into an uneasy coalition with Ranariddh's Funcinpec party after contesting elections sponsored by the United Nations in 1993. The factor that has persuaded foreign governments to back Hun Sen and the CPP is the party's control over Cambodia's administrative apparatus, which gave it credibility as the only force capable of blocking a Khmer Rouge comeback. Far from suppressing the Khmer Rouge, however, Hun Sen has courted the rebels as fervently as he accused Ranariddh of doing. He has appointed their leaders to his government despite overwhelming evidence that many of them were involved in torture and murder in the Khmer Rouge's killing fields. In late March, for instance, Hun Sen greeted several thousand Khmer Rouge troops in the latest mass defection. Declaring that he "warmly, movingly and joyfully" welcomed these "compatriot officers," he promised that they would be "inducted into the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces, the national police, the military police and the civilian administration."The leader of the breakaway faction, Keo Pok, told journalists: "We all oppose and separate from the control and leadership of the murderous hard-liners . . . and would like to return to live with the Royal government." Pok's own murderous past as a long-time member of the Khmer Rouge's Central Committee was forgotten. Indeed, the Cambodian government continued its public condemnation of the rebels without missing a beat. Less than a week later, the government appealed to the Friends of Cambodia--an informal group of countries including the United States, Japan, France and Australia--to bring "the Khmer Rouge to trial for crimes of genocide and crimes against humanity." The U.S. has given more than $1 million to finance the gathering of evidence for an international tribunal to try the Khmer Rouge for such crimes. But in reality, Washington and other "friends of Cambodia" have turned a blind eye to the fact that thousands of Khmer Rouge cadres--many of them suspected mass-murderers--have been brought back into the corridors of power. On April 6, a State Department spokesman told the REVIEW: "The United States has supported the reintegration into Cambodian society of Khmer Rouge defectors . . . Many former members of the Khmer Rouge, including some in Cambodia's current leadership, have renounced that organization's murderous policies." Former Khmer Rouge cadres now in the government include Hun Sen himself, the defence minister, the interior minister, the finance minister, the head of the national assembly, and thousands of others in the provincial and local administrations. Some had been targets of  the Khmer Rouge's 1978 purges and fled to neighbouring Vietnam. After Vietnam invaded Cambodia in December 1978, they returned to Phnom Penh to be installed as the new government. But many have joined the government only in the past two years. The Khmer Rouge began disintegrating in earnest in August 1996, when almost half its forces in western Cambodia made a deal with the government. The rebels were enticed by promises that they would be allowed to keep their territory, exploit its rich timber and mineral resources, and hold senior posts in the government and armed forces. These areas are now autonomous zones controlled by the same Khmer Rouge figures who administered them before defecting. They and other Khmer Rouge commanders now hold government office despite abundant evidence that they were guilty of committing atrocities during the movement's three years in power.

Some examples:

-  Keo Pok, the 68-year-old senior cadre who led the mass defection in late March, played a leading role in some of the Khmer Rouge's worst killing sprees. His role is detailed in captured Khmer Rouge documents being compiled by Yale University. According to documents taken from Khmer Rouge torture and execution centres, Pok was involved in the execution of people associated with the Lon Nol government, which was toppled by the Khmer Rouge in1975. In the same year, he led the massacre of thousands of Cham Muslims in eastern Cambodia, the documents show. As head of the northern zone in 1977, he supervised the rounding up of "internal enemies, "including at least 112 civilians who were later killed, according to documents from the Tuol Sleng torture centre, known as S-21, that are cited by Cambodia historian Ben Kiernan and other scholars. "Pok's fingerprints are all over the S-21 archives," says Cambodia scholar Stephen Heder at London University's School of Oriental and African Studies. "The evidence is indisputable." Later in 1977, he took charge of the central zone, ordering the local leaders tortured and killed. Pok's worst atrocities came in 1978, when he led massacres in the eastern zone along the Vietnamese border in which tens of thousands of people were killed and hundreds of  thousands forcibly relocated, according to documents left at Tuol Sleng by the Khmer Rouge after they fled the 1979 Vietnamese invasion. "The guy who was in charge of the killing was Pok," says Heder, who has analyzed the documents.

nIeng Sary, the Khmer Rouge's former foreign minister, now controls an autonomous zone in western Cambodia. He broke from Pol Pot in August 1996, and the following year held a press conference in Phnom Penh to publicly pledge loyalty to Hun Sen. Shortly afterwards, he was given the rights to sell 178,000 cubic metres of logs from the timber-rich zone, worth an estimated $75 million. His lucrative deals were signed by Hun Sen on January 7 and 11 this year, according to copies of the official contracts obtained by the REVIEW.

n-- Mam Nay, another notorious Khmer Rouge figure, lives near Ieng Sary and now grows corn for a living, according to Cambodian military sources and human-rights investigators. Mam Nay was chief interrogator at the Tuol Sleng torture centre, where 16,000 people, including women and children, were put to death. His signature is on scores of documents detailing the torture of political opponents. He is implicated in "hands-on torture and execution and would almost certainly be convicted in any international tribunal," says Heder of  London University. Cambodian authorities know where he lives, but have made no attempt to detain him.

n-- Pech Chheang, a long-time ally of Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, defected to the government in late March along with his Khmer Rouge troops. Gen. Chheang and his troops are now fighting remnants of the Khmer Rouge in northern Cambodia. Chheang was the Khmer Rouge government's ambassador to Beijing from 1975 to 1984. In 1994, Khmer Rouge radio named him as the movement's defence minister.

n-- Nuon Paet also was made a general in the Cambodian army after he defected from the Khmer Rouge in 1996. He is a convicted murderer. He was found guilty in a Cambodian court for killing three Western tourists who were kidnapped and held hostage for six weeks in 1994.

-  Sam Bith was Nuon Paet's commander at the time of the Westerners' murder. He switched allegiance last August, denouncing his former Khmer Rouge comrades at a Phnom Penh press conference. He is now a two-star general in the government army. Bith was the commander of Khmer Rouge troops who invaded Ha Tien in Vietnam in 1978, according to Heder and other scholars. Those troops slaughtered thousands of  Vietnamese women and children during the cross-border raids, which provoked Vietnam's subsequent invasion of  Cambodia.  Bith was one of nine younger leaders chosen by Pol Pot in 1985 to be groomed to take over the Khmer Rouge. Of those, six have joined Hun Sen since 1996 and now hold senior ranks in the Cambodian army. Since then, most of at least 15 Khmer Rouge army divisions have joined Hun Sen after offers of amnesty, money and government positions. The defections have left the guerrilla movement with a demoralized rump of a few thousand still fighting the government in the jungles in the north. The bulk of the Khmer Rouge are now members of Cambodia's government. That raises the question of who is to be defined as Khmer Rouge and who can be brought before an international tribunal if it were ever to be held.

THE CAMBODIAN CONUNDRUM:U.S. drug policy and U.S. foreign policy interests collide By Nate Thayer

THE CAMBODIAN CONUNDRUM

Cambodia represents a case study of what can happen when U.S. drug policy and U.S. foreign policy interests collide

FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL

March 2002

By Nate Thayer

(This article details the way the U.S. war on drugs is actually played out in the real world, the hypocracy betwwen the rhetoric to hunt down and the reality of giving political protection to the powerful narcotics kingpins. U.S. policy is rarely implemented when the high level drug dealers have politcal protection from governments the U.S. has other wise good relations with. While billions are spent going after the small fish, making the U.S. have the highest percentage of people in prison than any other nation in the world--those in charge of narcotics trafficking are not just untouchable, but protected, and, too often,  given the red-carpet treatment by the American government)

On April 8, 1997, Theng Bunma, Cambodia’s most powerful tycoon, upset at “rude” treatment from airline personnel, marched out onto the tarmac of Cambodia’s Poechentong International Airport, pulled out a Russian K-59 automatic pistol and shot out the tires of the Royal Air Cambodge Boeing 737-400 he had just arrived in from Hong Kong.

Bunma complained that the national airline had lost his luggage and refused to adequately reimburse him: “So I said, ‘If you do not pay me that, I will shoot your airplane—for compensation.’” He added: “If they were my employees, I would have shot them in the head.”

Yet Theng Bunma is no bombastic, small-time thug: He is arguably the most powerful man in Cambodia. “In Khmer we say, ‘He makes the rain. He makes the thunder,” said a senior Cambodian official. “Everybody knows that Theng Bunma can do what he wants.”

Theng Bunma intimidates every Cambodian, from noodle vendors to the Prime Minister. As well as, the record shows, the government of the United States.

“We have reliable reporting that he (Theng Bunma) is closely and heavily involved in drug trafficking in Cambodia,” a state department spokesman, Nicholas burns, said in July 1997.

But that public admission by the United States government was years in coming, and came only after an overwhelming and embarrassing mountain of public evidence emerged through the press, forcing Washington to acknowledge the reality it had long tried to suppress: Cambodia has become a classic narco-state.

Theng Bunma is a poster child for the weakness of America’s so-called war on drugs in narco-states like Cambodia. The record shows that the United States government has gone through years of acrobatics to turn a blind eye to Theng Bunma and his benefactors in the Cambodian government.

The U.S. dilemma is simple: successive administrations have been reluctant to implement strict “zero tolerance” policy directives against governments that protect, abet, and benefit from narcotics traffickers. U.S. law requires that they “decertify” these nations as being cooperative in fighting the drug trade, thus cutting off bilateral aid and, potentially, multilateral aid to these governments. But decertification might, officials argue, derail concomitant attempts to develop otherwise good relations with governments they are trying to nurture as “emerging democracies.” So, in Cambodia, the United States has avoided the mandate on the war on drugs.

It’s not that the United States isn’t aware who Bunma is. “Theng Bunma is a well known figure widely reported to be involved in drug trafficking,” a State Department official said in December 2001. But he also noted that Cambodian “cooperation with the Drug Enforcement Administration remains excellent” and said the U.S. government was pleased with “the reorganization of anti-narcotics coordination” within the Cambodian government.

“Cambodia has taken a number of positive steps,” the official said, citing $460,000 that the U.S. government gave in 2001 to the United Nations Drug Control Program to help Cambodian authorities combat drug trafficking.

Still, the U.S. reluctance to recognize the impunity with which Bunma conducts his international criminal enterprises provides a colorful case study of how organized crime, narcotics trafficking and political corruption, when left unchallenged, undermine fundamental tenets of democracy.

By 1997, Bunma represented the height of political and economic legitimacy in Cambodia. He had twice been elected president of the Cambodian Chamber of Commerce. His Cambodian diplomatic passport described him as “economic advisor” to the head of the ruling Cambodian People’s party. And because of his beneficence to royal charities, he held the high honorific title of “Okna,” bestowed upon him by King Sihanouk.

He is also the country’s single biggest taxpayer and landholder and owns its biggest newspaper. His Thai Boon Roong holding company owns banks, airlines, tobacco concessions, logging concessions, shipping fleets, hotels, casinos, and credit card concessions—among many other legitimate businesses.

With offices in Phnom Penh, Bangkok, and Hong Kong, his company is the single biggest corporate entity in Cambodia. Financial records put his net worth in the billions of dollars.

But that is not the source of Theng Bunma’s power. He is a narcotics trafficker. He runs a multi-billion dollar international criminal syndicate that lavishes money and gifts on Cambodia’s leaders. In turn, he is given political protection by the Cambodian government to do just about anything he wants.

Booming Business

Before the 1990’s, Cambodia was not involved in any significant narcotics activity. It was neither a producing country nor a transshipment route. But in 1991, the DEA began noticing—though not yet intercepting—shipments that left Cambodia and headed into a maze of fishing boats. The first drug shipment abroad identified as having originated in Cambodia, according to international investigators, was in 1993.

“In the last two years, we have seen a dramatic increase in Cambodia being used as a heroin smuggling point,” a senior Bangkok-based DEA official said in 1993. “Our intelligence is now picking up four to six shipments a year” of high grade refined heroin with “a minimum of 300 kilograms. The largest we have detected so far is 800 kilos.” (An interception of 300 kilos—660 pounds—of heroin would rank in the top ten drug busts from the Golden Triangle.)

Regarding Cambodian government anti-drug efforts, the DEA official scoffed:” The only thing hampering them is the weather.”

The formula is simple: Criminal syndicates involved in narcotics trafficking seek out week governments that, through the exchange of corruption money for political protection, allow them to conduct their criminal activities. Cambodia in the early 1990’s was just such a case, and organized crime descended to set up shop.

Bunma came to prominence in Cambodia in the late 1980’s. Though born in Cambodia, he carried fake passports and identity cards that identified him as a citizen of Thailand. And he had plenty of money for Cambodia’s political leadership, including both Prime Minister Norodom Ranariddh and Second Prime Minister Hun Sen, political enemies who shared power in an uneasy alliance as the result of United Nations-sponsored democratic elections held in 1993.

In February 1994, U.S. Ambassador to Cambodia Charles Twining invited Finance Minister Sam Rainsy and another senior government official to a private luncheon at his residence. In his living room, Twining turned up the music and lowered his voice. According to Rainsy, Twining offered this warning:”Please tell Ranariddh not to get involved with Theng Bunma because we Americans have evidence that Theng Bunma is involved in drug trafficking.”

Twining, when asked to confirm the conversation, said through an embassy spokesman: “We don’t comment about confidential conversations with a host government.”

Airplanes and Limousines

The United States had reason to worry about penetration of the highest levels of the Cambodian government. Bunma’s many gifts to officials were legendary. In 1993, he paid $1.8 million for Ranariddh’s personal King Air-200 plane and gave Hun Sen the Mercedes limousines that ferried him to official functions. When the government was low on funds in 1994, Bunma underwrote the state budget with several million dollars interest-free “loans.” He paid the entire salary of the Cambodian army during their 1994 dry-season offensive against the Khmer Rouge.

According to one American narcotics official, Cambodia in 1994 was a place where criminal syndicates were “using government planes, helicopters, military trucks, navy boats and soldiers to transport heroin.”

It was also in February 1994—the same month that Twining warned the Cambodian government o distance themselves from Bunma—that the U.S. embassy did the opposite: Bunma was issued a U.S. visa so he could attend the Congressional Prayer Breakfast, with president Clinton the keynote speaker.

Bunma was accompanied by Interior Minister Sin Song, a former Khmer Rouge officer who eight months earlier has led a coup attempt. The two Cambodians were given the red-carpet treatment in Washington. They asked for and were granted a meeting with U.S. officials.

Attending the meeting at the Pentagon, were officials from the CIA, the State Department, the Department of Defense and other agencies. Sin Song, to the shock of the Americans, asked formally for U.S. support for another coup d’état. Bunma identified himself as the “financier” of the effort, according to three officials at the meeting.

In July 1994, a coup was indeed launched, but it too failed.  Sin Song was arrested. So were 33 Thai officials, connected to powerful figures within Thai military circles, who had flown in from Bangkok. Their airline tickets on Cambodian International Airlines were all booked under the credit card of Bunma’s Thai Boon Roong holding company, according to the head of the airline. While dozens were jailed, no action was taken against Bunma.

In August 1994, the opposition newspaper Voice of Khmer Youth published a front-page profile of Bunma, accusing him, among other things, of having been arrested for drug smuggling in 1972. The report said he bribed his way out of jail and fled to Thailand. Less than a week after the article appeared, men in military uniforms gunned down its editor in broad daylight on a busy Phnom Penh street. No one has ever been arrested.

A Fine Line

In March 1995, the U.S. government issued its Narcotics Control Strategy Report, in which the State Department walked a fine line regarding Bunma and Cambodia: “Involvement (in the drug trade) of some leading businessmen with access to the highest levels of government is a known concern. There are indications that some high-level businessmen who give financial support to politicians are involved in heroin smuggling.” No names were given, however.

The report, ironically, outlined the effectiveness of “public diplomacy” in the U.S. war on drugs: “It is in the drug trade’s interest to remain behind the scenes working through corrupt government officials who can maintain a façade of probity and respectability. One of the best ways of routing out drug corruption is to expose it to public scrutiny. Corruption is a threat to any nation’s security, for it allows criminal elements to undermine the legitimacy of the state from within.”

Despite these concerns, the U.S. embassy issued Bunma another visa the following month, this time to accompany the Cambodian head of state, Chea Sim, and his official delegation to Washington. Chea Sim dined with U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Winston Lord, held talks with National Security Council officials and met—at the personal request of Ambassador. Twining—Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif., among others.

The entire Cambodian government delegation’s rooms at the Willard Intercontinental Hotel in Washington during this visit were reserved for and paid in the name of Theng Bunma, according to the hotel.

Just prior to the U.S. visit, the State Department formally, but secretly, put Bunma on the visa ban list, according to department documents, but decided to issue a de facto waiver so that Bunma, described in his diplomatic passport as an “economic advisor,” could accompany Chea Sim. “We did not want to create problems at the start of what was an important bilateral visit,” said one embassy official.

Grounds for Exclusion

Placing Bunma on the visa blacklist, according to the U.S. government document, was based on State Department provision P2C, which cites section 212 of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Act: “ Controlled substance traffickers…who the consular or immigration officer knows or has reason to believe (are) or (have) been illicit traffickers…(are) excludable.” Bunma was also banned from entering the United States under another State Department provision (code “00”) covering other unspecified “derogatory information.”

“According to our records he (Bunma) does not hold a U.S. visa,” a State Department official said in December. “No determination regarding his eligibility to enter the U.S. can be made prior to his application, but we would obviously take all relevant facts into account.”

In June 1995, after Bunma and Chea Sim had left the United States, State Department spokesman Nicholas Burns reiterated longstanding official U.S. policy toward nations who fail to move against drug traffickers: “Governments that reward corruption and that allow trafficker influence to penetrate the highest levels of authority will have difficult relations with the United States.” But he was referring to events in Columbia, not Cambodia, and U.S. officials continued to avoid confronting the Cambodian authorities.

In November 1995, the Far Eastern Economic Review published a cover package entitled “Cambodia: Asia’s New Narco-State?” It detailed Bunma’s involvement in drug trafficking and criminal syndicates. A few days later, Hun Sen, a primary beneficiary of Bunma’s largesse, threatened that “a million demonstrators” might take to the streets to protest foreign interference in Cambodian affairs.

“Diplomats should stay indoors,” he warned. “I cannot guarantee their safety.” The United States sent a special envoy, Kent Wiederman, to try to calm the situation. Wiederman, then deputy assistant secretary for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, emerged from a private meeting with Hun Sen commending his “commitment to human rights and democracy.” The French ambassador, who had just ordered the destruction of sensitive documents because of Hun Sen’s threat, reacted to Wiederman’s praising of Hun Sen by commenting: “What planet did he arrive from?”

On January 7, 1996—at the dedication of the new “Hun Sen park” on the Mekong River, paid for by Bunma—Hun Sen announced his government would “never abandon “ Bunma, “who has helped our party.” On the VIP dais were both Bunma and U.S. charge d’affaires Robert Porter.

Our Intelligence Was Clear

Several months later, a U.S. government regional drug conference was held in Bangkok, with attendees from State, the CIA, the DEA and other agencies. The Phnom Penh embassy official who supervised narcotics issues argued with representatives from other U.S. embassies and agencies who questioned why the U.S. embassy in Cambodia was refusing to acknowledge—let alone confront—Bunma as a drug trafficker.

“Our intelligence was clear and overwhelming that Bunma was a major player,” said a U.S. government official from another embassy who attended the conference. “We couldn’t understand what the Phnom Penh embassy was doing.”

The Phnom Penh embassy cited “suspicions but no proof.” Other American officials involved in narcotics policy were outraged.

On March 1, 1997, in its required annual report to Congress on narcotics, the State Department noted that “Cambodia made significant efforts towards taking control of the drug trafficking and transit problems” in 1996.

But according to Cambodian and Interpol records, the seizure by foreign law-enforcement authorities of drugs originating in Cambodia increased by more than 1,000 percent in 1996 over 1995.

The State Department report added that promises by the Cambodian government to crack down on officials involved in narcotic trafficking or corruption: have thus far yielded no concrete indictments or results.”

Yet they again officially “waived” Cambodia from being decertified as a nation that failed to move against drug trafficking.

The FBI Investigates

Later that month, a terrorist grenade attack targeting Cambodia’s main opposition leader, Sam Rainsy, killed 19 and wounded more than 120 on a bright Sunday morning in a peaceful gathering outside the parliament building. Rainsy was long a vocal critic of Bunma and Hun Sen, publicly linking them to the narcotics trade.

Because an American citizen, and employee of the congressionally-funded International republican Institute, was wounded in the attack, the FBI sent a team to Cambodia to assist the investigation.

A state Department spokesman told me on April 14, 1997, that with regard to drug money supporting the Cambodian government, “we are actively looking into reports that corrupt elements of the military and government may be facilitating drug trafficking, but we are not in a position to comment on those reports.”

By May, the FBI’s preliminary findings had concluded that the terrorists were linked not only to Bunma but to Hun Sen himself. They informed U.S. ambassador Kenneth Quinn that their investigation pointed to some of the prime minister’s top aides, including the head of his personal bodyguards.

Further, the FBI told Quinn, the grenade throwers appeared to be part of a paramilitary unit of assassins who were on the payroll of both the government and Bunma and operated out of one of Bunma’s hotels.

The next step, the FBI said, was to interview Hun Sen and give him a polygraph test. Quinn was not pleased at the potential diplomatic ramifications. Within days, he ordered the FBI team to leave Cambodia, citing “threats” to their safety from the Khmer Rouge. The source of the threats? Hun Sen.

“There is no question our investigation was halted by the highest levels because it was leading to Hun Sen,” said one American law enforcement official directly involved.

Quinn and others in the U.S. government privately argued that Cambodia’s stability was already teetering on the brink of civil war. To continue the FBI investigation to its logical conclusion would push the country over the edge, they contended. (Quinn did not respond to my request for comment).

The departure of the FBI team from Phnom Penh, didn’t, of course, help calm things down. It further bolstered those in the Cambodian government who felt, correctly, that they were capable of intimidating the United States and could act with impunity without harmful diplomatic consequences.

Between the growing fractious deterioration within the Cambodian coalition government, the rising international scrutiny focused directly on Hun Sen from the high-profile grenade attack on Sam Rainsy, and the very public international calls for increased pressure to stem the influence of organized-crime syndicates and drug traffickers over the corrupt Cambodian government, the pressure mounted—and the government imploded.

A bloody coup d’état occurred in early July 1997. The 2.8 billion dollar U.N peacekeeping effort, which began with the signing of the 1991 Paris Peace Accords and culminated in the 1993 elections, was now formally a failure. Civil war had returned. The winners of the election—Ranariddh and his supporters—were ousted from power and in exile; the losers—backers of Hun Sen—had full control. The Khmer Rouge, now allied with the ousted government leaders, was fighting from the jungle. And parliament, the press, opposition politics, a coalition government, and other tenets of the “emerging fragile democracy” had collapsed.

Perhaps no one was happier than Theng Bunma. In an interview shortly after the coup, he boasted of having given millions of dollars in cash and gold to Hun Sen to finance it. “For the clash of 6 July 1997, I called Mr. Hun Sen and I talked to him. I gave him one million dollars to do whatever the control the situation,” said Bunma. “He asked me whether I had the money in Cambodia….I said I would send one hundred kilograms of gold in a plane to Cambodia.”

“I say what Hun Sen did was correct,” Bunma said. “Why? One reason. Take the example of my hotel.” Hun Sen “put three tanks and soldiers around to protect it.”

No Formal Linkage

A few days after this interview appeared in the Washington Post, the U.S. government publicly stated, for the first time, that Theng Bunma was a drug trafficker. But State Department spokesman Nicholas Burns hastened to add that the United States “does not have evidence that links Hun Sen himself, personally, to these accusations of drug trafficking.”

“We think the Cambodian government can do a lot more to purge itself of obvious corruption in the government, of obvious linkages between…members of the government and narco-traffickers,” Burns said.

Burns careful separation of Bunma from Hun Sen was no coincidence. It allowed the State Department to avoid the conclusion that the Cambodian government itself was involved in drug trafficking. Such a conclusion would require the United States to decertify Cambodia, with all its implications—including cutting off bilateral aid and voting against loans from the IMF, the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank and other multilateral aid. That would have been the death knell for a government that derived almost half its budget in 1996 from such sources.

It was the same reason the U.S. government refused to label the “events” of July a coup d’état. That also would require a cessation of aid to Hun Sen’s government.

In June 1998, the Thais issued an arrest warrant for Bunma, who was charged with fraud for allegedly providing false information to obtain a Thai identity card and passport under two different names. In 1999, criminal charges were brought against Bunma in Hong Kong for falsifying immigration documents. Later the prosecution dropped all charges after the Cambodian Foreign Minister, Hor Nam Hong, presented a diplomatic note citing Bunma’s “top honors and ranks” to the Hong Kong court. “Mr. Theng Bunma has claimed diplomatic immunity through his lawyers. The Royal Government of Cambodia has claimed diplomatic immunity on his behalf,” the court said, “The administration has carefully considered the claims and has concluded that Mr. Theng is entitled to immunity from criminal jurisdiction. In those circumstances, the prosecution has decided to drop the charges,” said the Hong Kong government spokesman

And while the Thai arrest warrants remain open, Bunma’s connections in powerful circles in Thailand have prevented any movement to touch him.

On June 18, 2000, Bunma’s daughter was married to a Thai army officer in a lavish ceremony in Phnom Penh. It was hardly a quiet affair.

The Thai military’s Supreme Commander, Gen. Mongol Ampornpisit, chartered a military plane from Bangkok full of top army officers. Hun Sen’s wife was guest of honor and a witness to the engagement ceremony. Cambodia’s defense Minister Gen. Tea Banh, served as the bride-to-be’s sponsor. The Interior Minister, Sar Kheng, also attended. The Bangkok Post reported that “diamond jewelry and stacks of cash” were presented to the bride and groom.

A “Transit Route”

After the coup of 1997, under pressure from Congress, the United States suspended most of its bilateral aid to Cambodia. According to the State Department’s Narcotics Control Strategy Report released in March 2001, “U.S.-Cambodia bilateral narcotics cooperation is hampered by restrictions on official assistance to the central government that have remained in place since the political disturbances of 1997” and “remained suspended in 2000.”

“Cambodia’s principal involvement in the international narcotics trade is as a transit route for Southeast Asian heroin to overseas markets, including…the United States,” the report says.

The report cites Cambodia’s National Authority for Combating Drugs (NACD) as “playing a central role, provid(ing) more effective measures” and said the NACD had the potential “to become an effective policy and coordination tool for the government.”

The same report also noted that in 2000 the deputy police commissioner had alleged that four senior Cambodian government officials—including the former and current heads of the NACD and a deputy commander-in-chief of the Cambodian military—had accepted bribed from narcotics traffickers.

Nevertheless, a few months later, President Bush removed Cambodia from the list of “major Drug-Producing or Transit Countries.” According to the White House,” The only change in the list from the previous year is the removal of Cambodia.”

“I have removed Cambodia from the major’s list,” said President Bush in a prepared statement dated November 1, 2001. “Cambodia was added to the Majors List in 1996 as a transit country for heroin destined for the United States. In recent years, there has been no evidence of any heroin transiting Cambodia coming to the United States.”

Could it be that no one really wants to look for evidence?

 

Foot Soldiers from Rival Armies Share cynicism About Leader By Nate Thayer

Foot Soldiers from Rival Armies Share cynicism About Leader

By Nate Thayer

Phnom Penh Post

Friday, 07 August 1992

NORTH OF HIGHWAY SIX, Cambodia--From a trench in abandoned ricefields in Kompong Thom province, young conscripts of Phnom Penh's army peered wide eyed from their foxholes as two journalists and a score of heavily armed guerrillas emerged from enemy controlled jungles and approached them.

Popping up from camouflaged foxholes, they grabbed automatic rifles, and curiously approached the group. The soldiers-from rival factions-greeted each other warily.

For the guerrilla fighters, it was the first time they had spoken to the enemy in more than 13 years of war, although some knew each other by reputation.

A soldier was dispatched to seek a superior's approval for a request for the journalists to pass into Phnom Penh territory. While waiting, the young men exchanged cigarettes and asked about each other. It turned out a guerrilla and his government counterpart came from the same village in the far away province of Prey Veng.

"You see what the war has done to us," said Meas, a guerrilla fighter, pointing to the Phnom Penh soldier. "We could be related and we wouldn't know it."

Meas had fled Cambodia's turmoil to the Thai border more than a decade before, eventually joining the guerrilla faction led by Prince Norodom Ranariddh. The Phnom Penh soldier had been drafted into the army some three years earlier and sent to the jungle.

Another Phnom Penh soldier said that he had recently found out that his brother, who had been missing since the Vietnamese invasion in l979, was a soldier with the guerrillas.

"Do you know my brother and if he is well?" he asked the guerrilla.

Another young fighter said, "Now in Cambodia, a whole generation must ask our elders if we are related, because we don't even know who we are since the war split us apart."

"In Cambodia, all our leaders are getting rich while we suffer," another soldier added. Everyone nodded in agreement. It was a theme we heard everywhere.

A photographer from Impact Visuals photo agency and I had rented a Soviet jeep in Phnom Penh and set off alone on a 15-day journey that would take us through nine provinces, across dozens of minefields and frontlines to territory under the control of all four Cambodian factions.

Many Cambodians living under the control of, or working for each of the four factions expressed deep cynicism and resentment towards their leaders whom they blame for incompetence, corruption, and continuing a conflict largely for personal gain. Soldiers from all four factions said they had not been paid for months, and worried about what would happen to them in a post-war Cambodia.

No commanding officer could be found that day, and after some debate, we were allowed to pass, for the 100 kilometer trip back to Kompong Thom city.

Soon after our arrival, two Phnom Penh interior ministry police officials arrived at our guesthouse. Initially, they were not happy.

"My job is to protect the party," the young intelligence officer announced rather cheerfully. "You have no permission to be here and I have to ask you some questions."

After an hour of interrogation, the intelligence officer asked whether we could talk as friends. "I hear that maybe I will not have a job after cantonment and demobilization," he said, "Is journalism a good job? How is the pay? I think we have similar jobs. We both have to ask a lot of questions and find out what is going on."

In Banteay Meanchey province, large tracts of land have been made uninhabitable by mines planted during heavy fighting for control of the area.

Soldiers guided us through oxcart paths snaking through mined ricefields, across frontlines, delivering us to forward checkpoints of their erstwhile enemies.

During more than a score of such transfers, we would request a couple of soldiers from a forward position to accompany us for security until we reached another faction's base.

There was never a shortage of volunteers, most eager for a break from the boredom of isolated outposts. Because of the abundance of mines and bandits, it was good to have guides with weapons who were familiar with the terrain.

Killings and robberies were daily events in the area where rogue bands of former soldiers from each of the four factions routinely ambush anyone with valuables.

The young fighters in the guerrilla zones would pepper us with questions: Are there a lot of Vietnamese in Phnom Penh? Are there jobs for people like me? Do you think we will be safe and welcomed back now that the war is over?

It was not unusual for our Soviet jeep, which we rented from an army officer in Phnom Penh, to be filled with a half dozen fully armed uniformed soldiers from different factions. We would discuss politics but mostly their fears for the future and being able to provide for their families after years of living in the jungle.

In scrubland north of the district capital of Banteay Meanchey, we drove to isolated villages under the control of the Khmer Rouge, where villagers and Khmer Rouge cadre spoke about their hopes for the future.

"We must rid the country from the Vietnamese first before the war can stop," said one Khmer Rouge cadre. "But we all want peace. Everyone has suffered enough."

"I don't know why so many people died when we were in power," said one young Khmer Rouge fighter, who seemed genuinely perplexed by the issue.

A Khmer Rouge medic we met at a Khmer Rouge division headquarters near the Dongrek mountain escarpment asked if we could give him a ride south so he could pick up some medical supplies.

"You are American," he said cheerfully. "Do you know my sister? She lives in New York." He said that he had spent three years in China training as a medic, and was proud of his skills.

"I can do any kind of operation, but mostly amputations," he said.

I asked him how many amputations he had performed. "Oh, too many to count," he said, "At least 200."

In the bustling market town of Tmar Pouk, under control of the Khmer People's National Liberation Front, government soldiers in uniform mingled easily with their former enemies.

"We don't have any problems with each other," one said. "We are just regular soldiers. It's our leaders who can't get along."

One KPNLF soldier asked whether he could accompany us back to Phnom Penh controlled town of Sisophon. He could not cross the frontlines by himself, but he said with foreigners he had a chance. He wanted to catch a bus from Sisophon to visit his mother near Siem Reap, whom he hadn't seen in ten years.

"I left home to join the KPNLF when I was 12," he said. Quickly removing his jungle fatigues and switching to civilian clothes, he got in the back of the jeep, sharing the seat with an elderly woman who was returning to her government-controlled village after visiting her son, a KPNLF officer.

A guerrilla fighter guided us to an oxcart path. "Just drive along the tracks of the oxcart," he said, "Don't leave the path. Both sides are mined."

Further down Highway 69, where hundreds died in recent years' fighting for control, rogue soldiers piled mortars on the road in a crude roadblock. Soldiers with grenades in one hand and assault rifles in the other, stopped the rare vehicle demanding money.

"They don't get paid enough to eat," said the soldier in the back, after we passed.

"I'm glad I'm with you," the mother said, "They would have taken everything I had if I was alone."

We left the two passengers in Sisophon. "I don't even know if my mother is still alive," the soldier said.

 

Lighting the darkness: FULRO's jungle Christians:Vietnam Era Renegade Army Discovered By Nate Thayer

(Two story package in Phnom Penh Post. An earlier cover story appeared in the Far Eastern Economic Review. PPP publisher Michael Hayes and I travelled to the remote NE Cambodian jungles near VN by helicopter to find an army literally lost in time. Eventually all 398 FULRO fighters and families were given political asylum in the U.S. and settled in North Carolina)

Lighting the darkness: FULRO's jungle Christians

By Nate Thayer

Phnom Penh Post

Friday, 25 September 1992

MONDULKIRI - Accompanied by a chorus of crickets and the steady drumming of rain on the leaf roofs of their huts, scores of Montagnard fighters and their families gather in the jungle darkness each night to pray and sing.

Having long ago fled ideological restrictions in Vietnam for a religious sanctuary deep in the forest, the soldiers are members of FULRO-the United Front for the Liberation of Oppressed Races-which has fought for a separate homeland in Vietnam for their hilltribe people since 1964.

Lamps fueled by chunks of slow-burning tree resin give light to the few shared tattered bibles and hymnals as Christian songs of worship echo through the otherwise uninhabited forest. Familiar gospel hymns are sung in the tribal dialects of the mountains.

For many at FULRO's scattered guerrilla bases, the ability to pray freely was a main motivation to flee their villages in Vietnam's central highlands 17 years ago.

"The communists will not let us pray. They say that Christianity is an American and French religion, so we came to live in the jungle," said Lt.-Col. Y Hinnie. "In our land under the communists, people pray at home secretly or in the ricefields. They cannot worship together like we do in the jungle. Here we are free."

Each of the five jungle encampments in the FULRO rear base area have an Evangelical church, while there is a lone Catholic church in the main guerrilla camp. Nearly 40 people share a single bible for the daily Catholic Mass and at weekend services. The church consists of pews of wooden logs lined neatly in a clearing, a towering rough-hewn cross behind the altar.

Similar Evangelical churches, cut into clearings surrounded by 30-meter high hardwood trees, are packed with more than 350 worshippers for the daily two-hour evening service and brief early morning prayers. Each church has its own pastor, and worshippers bring large green leaves as hassocks to kneel on the damp forest floor.

These believers are the legacy of Christian missionaries who lived in the Central Highlands until 1975, when the last of them were expelled by the current government in Viet-nam. Many of the missionaries had mastered the local dialects, translating Bibles and hymnals into the region's Rade, Jarai and Koho languages.

The guerrillas also tune into weekly radio sermons delivered in their native languages by a powerful shortwave radio station in Manila operated by the Christian Missionary Alliance.

A guerrilla congregation reels off the names of "their" missionaries like a litany: "In Pleiku, Mr. Long and Mr. Fleming and in Dalat, Helen Evans, she is from America too. Ken Swain from Darlac, he preaches in our language on the radio every Saturday now."

FULRO officials say some of the missionaries' involvement with the Montagnards went beyond simply bringing the scriptures to the area. They said some of them were active in the waning days of U.S. involvement in the early 1970s in running guns to the guerrillas.

Following the collapse of the South Vietnamese regime in 1975, FULRO leaders say, the communists set about systematically dismantling Christian churches. Many of the Montagnards' religious leaders were arrested and killed after the communist victory in 1975, they say.

"They take our pastors, preachers and Christians and put them in jail," said FULRO's military Commander-in-Chief Col Y Peng Ayun. "We don't hate any one man because we are Christians, but we can never trust the communists," he added.

Two prominent Montagnard pastors from Ban Me Thuot, Y Ham Nic Hrah and Y Lico Nie, died in the early 1980s after many years of harsh conditions in prison, according to the guerrillas. "Here, we worship no matter what," said Pastor Budar Su Khong, 52, from Dalat. "Jesus said 'Come to me whoever is tired, and I will bring you rest.' We are very tired. Please take a message to Christians in other countries to pray for us, and we will pray for them."

(On Sept. 19, UNTAC deployed three soldiers from Sector IV headquarters in Stung Treng to FULRO' encampment. They will be permanently based there to provide protection until the U.N. decides how to respond to FULRO's requests for help.)

Montagnard Army Seeks U.N.Help:Vietnam War Era Renegade Army Discovered In Mondulkiri

By Nate Thayer

Phnom Penh Post

Saturday, 12 September 1992

MONDULKIRI, Cambodia-Abandoned for years by their own leaders and former foreign military backers, an anti-Hanoi Montagnard army based in northeast Cambodia has approached the United Nations with a plea for protection.

The military combatants of FULRO-the United Front for the Liberation of Oppressed Races-have waged a lonely battle for a separate homeland in Vietnam for their hilltribe people since 1964.

The recent discovery of the Montagnard army in Mondulkiri province prompted Phnom Penh's Interior Ministry to inform U.N. peacekeeping forces that unless the group-formerly given sanctuary by the Khmer Rouge-is disarmed they would attack them.

On Sept. 4 a joint mission of officials from the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the U.N. Transitional Authority in Cambodia (UNTAC) met with the fighters to discuss their request for sanctuary.

"We have to be very cautious because they may be in danger," said UNHCR Press Officer Annick Roulet.

Previous discussions with UNTAC military officials at their remote jungle camp near the Vietnamese border have resulted in conflicting impressions as to whether or not FULRO troops want to give up their struggle and apply for refugee status or continue to wage war against Vietnam.

Under threat from the Phnom Penh regime, expelled by the Khmer Rouge, and a thorn in the side to Vietnam, FULRO is presenting an interesting if not painful dilemma to U.N. officials in Phnom Penh.

UNTAC-mandated to verify the withdrawal of all foreign forces in Cambodia-may be obligated to ensure the return of the group to Vietnamese soil if they insist on continuing to wage war.

But UNHCR-responsible for protecting people with a "well founded fear of persecution"-may have to offer asylum to the fighters if they are in danger of being sent back to Vietnam, where they certainly would face imprisonment.

That, in turn, could open the floodgates to thousands of requests for political asylum from Vietnamese living in Cambodia.

"We have enough problems in Cambodia dealing with the four factions, and now this army we never even heard of turns up," said one UNTAC military official.

American diplomats in Phnom Penh and U.N. military officials in Cambodia are urging that UNHCR grant the group refugee status to begin the process of third country asylum, and give them temporary protection from military attack.

But FULRO Commander-in-Chief Y Peng Ayun and his forces are reluctant to accept giving up their fight without first getting U.N. protection.

"If we give up our weapons, they will take us back to Vietnam or the Vietnamese will come get us," Ayun said. "If I go to the U.S., I don't want to stay a long time there, because I have responsibility to liberate my country."

Frozen in Time

When two correspondents from the Phnom Penh Post visited FULRO's remote guerrilla headquarters last month, they found an army unaware of the world around them and desperately seeking instructions and resupply from their leadership.

Col. Ayun and his lieutenants gathered around the Post reporters, hungrily seeking information.

"Please, can you help us find our president, Y'Bham Enuol?" Colonel Ayun asked. "We have been waiting for contact and orders from our president since 1975. Do you know where he is?"

Neither Ayun nor his troops, who gathered around to meet the first journalists to find them since they fled to the jungles after the American defeat in Indochina in 1975, knew that their leader was executed 17 years before by the Khmer Rouge.

They fell silent when informed; some wept quietly.

Situated in a string of five villages carved out of dense forest along a raging river, the group of 407 guerrillas and their families have no access to even the smallest luxury items except from fighters returning from Vietnam.

There is no medicine or schools, and many of the soldiers and their families have only the clothes they wear and rifles. Bamboo huts with roofs of leaves provide shelter.

"The food we get from the forest. The forest belongs to FULRO." said Lt. Col. Y Hinnie. "We don't have food or medicine, so it is difficult. But with food and medicine the jungle is a very nice place. We are used to it."

The rivers nearby abound with crocodiles, huge catfish, and fresh water porpoises and the surrounding jungle-thick with mosquitos-is home to elephants and a host of deadly snakes.

The combatants and their families are traditionally rice eating people, but they are unable to farm rice here with the enemy constantly forcing movement.

A staple of corn, with jungle cucumbers, pumpkins, and hot green peppers are all they have. For part of the year they survive on poisonous potatos that must be carefully processed for five days to extract a deadly toxin.

"We must eat it slowly until our bodies get used to it or it will kill you," Hinnie said, "But the poison is also the medicine we use to cure snakebites." Nearby a soldier lay paralyzed from a snakebite he received three months before.

"This tree has the medicine we use for malaria and this one here we can use to treat diarrhea," Hinnie said, pointing.

The army has no maps or compasses. "But we can guide ourselves by stars and winds of the seasons. We can tell by which side of the tree is wet during different months exactly which direction we are going," he said.

Hinnie spoke credible English from his days as a young boy with Christian missionaries, as well as Khmer, Vietnamese, and French, and several tribal dialects, and translated for others who spoke in Rade. His skills have given him the title of "the FULRO Military Delegation's Representative of Foreign Affairs."

But his knowledge of world events is spotty. "We would like you to take a message to U Thant," he said, referring to the former U.N. Secretary-General. Asking about the cold war, he said, "I hear that President George Bush now contacts with the Russians."

He is charged with listening to the shortwave radio each morning, tuning in VOA, BBC, Christian radio, and Radio Vietnam to keep the group abreast of foreign developments.

Hinnie told amazed fighters of the fax machine: "You take a letter and put it in a telephone and it comes out in one minute in America," he explained.

The Forgotten Army

A number of soldiers appeared to introduce themselves in English as having fought with the Americans.

"You are the first foreigner I have seen since 1975," said Bhong Rcam, 47, "The Americans usually call me Tiny."

Like many of the fighters of FULRO, he worked with the U.S. Special Forces during the Vietnam War. After the U.S. withdrawal he was jailed by Hanoi, before joining FULRO in the jungle in 1976.

During the Vietnam War FULRO was supplied with millions of dollars of U.S. equipment, and before that, used as allies to further the objectives of the French and various Vietnamese regimes.

When the North Vietnamese launched decisive offensives in March 1975, FULRO leaders say that senior U.S. officials in Saigon promised continued support for the Montagnards and pledged to covertly support their fight.

Well equipped with American weapons and promises of more as South Vietnam crumbled in the spring of 1975, FULRO waited for the Americans who never returned, eventually re-grouping in the jungle.

"The Montagnard people and the Americans are like one family," said Lt. Col. Hinnie. "I am not angry, but very sad that the Americans forgot us. The Americans are like our elder brother, so it is very sad when your brother forgets you."

FULRO continued to launch attacks on Vietnam for four years after the U.S. withdrawal, fielding a fierce army of 10,000 fighters. But by 1979 they were running low on ammunition and had suffered huge casualties, with more than 8,000 of their fighters killed or captured.

In 1979 FULRO abandoned their bases in Vietnam and moved to the jungles on the Cambodian side of the Vietnamese frontier, switching to underground networks and small guerrilla strikes in their four regions of operations in Vietnam-Quang Duc, Darlac, Pleiku, and Kon Tum.

Previously given sanctuary by the Khmer Rouge in areas under their control, FULRO was expelled from Khmer Rouge zones in January to a remote area of Mondulkiri province. Khmer Rouge officials in Phnom Penh say they had given FULRO sanctuary since 1979, despite having fallen out with their leadership in 1986.

"They had no political vision. Their fighters are very, very brave, but they had no support from any leadership, no food, and they did not understand at all the world around them," said one senior Khmer Rouge official.

Jungle Christians

Col. Ayun complained bitterly of the treatment of his people by the Hanoi government.

"My people suffer terribly under the Vietnamese communist regime," he recounted from a thatched hut in the forest. "They came and took our land, and made it theirs. They try to erase our language and force us to speak Vietnamese. They have taken our fertile land and forced us to the bad land.

"They say they have come to build progress for my people, but they have come to kill, arrest, and oppress my people."

For many at FULRO's scattered guerrilla bases, the ability to pray freely and practice Christianity was a main motivation to flee Vietnam. Each of the five villages in the FULRO area have an evangelical church, while there is a lone Catholic church in the main guerrilla camp.

"The Communists will not let us pray," Col. Hinnie said. "They say that Christianity is an American and French religion, so we came to live in the jungle."

Col. Ayun requested to meet with the American ambassador to seek advice on whether his group would get the aid he said was long promised and to seek proof of the death of their leader.
"We are the troops of President Y Bham Enuol," he said.

"If he has died, we want proof from the United Nations. The Americans had a whole plan for Indochina. I want to meet face to face with the American ambassador. I have a plan for the future, and they should know clearly our position for the revolutionary struggle. We want to know whether they will help us or not."

But the chances of U.S. support for Ayun and his forces are dim, and FULRO faces a whole new series of difficulties.

Montagnard leaders now living in the U.S. appealed to Col. Ayun to give up the fight. "Due to unfavorable circumstances, I suggest it is time to stop fighting, to find different ways to reach our ultimate goal," said Pierre K'briuh in a recent message to the FULRO fighters.

K'briuh is a leader of the former FULRO troops now in the United States and he himself was jailed by Hanoi until the early 1980s.

"President Y-Bham Enuol and his entourage were executed by the Khmer Rouge in 1975," he wrote.

"Therefore, based on common sense, lay down your weapons and appeal at once to the U.N. for political asylum to join us here. We don't have any other choice."

Col. Ayun and his troops say that if they have proof that Y Bham Enuol is indeed dead, they will consider going to the U.S.

"But even if we go to another country, our resistance will continue until we get our own land, until we get back the land that belonged to us before," Ayun said.

"I don't want to go to a free nation," he added. "I want to stay here because this is my battlefield. It is my responsibility. But I have no supplies or help from free countries."

- Michael Hayes contributed to this report.

Expat Returnees pose legal questions for the West By Nate Thayer

Expat Returnees pose legal questions for the West

Phnom Penh Post

Friday 10 March 1995

By Nate Thayer

Some come back for the best of reasons, some are "less than altruistic." Expat returnees are posing hard legal questions for their adopted homelands. Nate Thayer reports.

WHEN Sok Chenda Sophea returned to Cambodia in 1992 after nearly two decades in exile in France, he came with a vision of doing his part to help rebuild his shattered homeland. The 38 year old Chenda, now an under secretary of state for the Ministry of Tourism , cuts a sharp figure with his European tailored suits, fluent French and English, and university and professional background in advertising and tourism promotion. His government salary is the equivalent of US$27 a month.

Likewise, Samnang Siv, 39, quit her US$90,000 a year job working for a biotechnology firm in Massachusetts in the US in April 1994 and returned to Cambodia. Leaving behind her husband and 20 year old son, she now serves as an advisor to the Minister of Tourism, and, with fluency in three languages and her dynamic personality, has been instrumental in assisting foreign companies to come to Cambodia and invest.

"I have been given 40 liters of petrol for my car," she says, and no salary yet. "I just want to contribute my knowledge, my skills, and help my government. I think they need people like me."

In a country whose most decimated commodity after decades of warfare is it's human resources, Sok Chenda and Samnang Siv are exactly what Cambodia needs to get back on it's feet. And there are hundreds of Khmers like them who have brought back their technical expertise, leaving behind "the good life" for reasons that are explained in terms little more complicated than a patriotic commitment to their native lands. "I just want to help my country and people," says Chenda.

But along with the good has also come the bad. Cambodia is choc-a-bloc with scores of corrupt and rapacious ethnic Khmers, many holding foreign citizenship and passports, who have returned since the fall of communism and are now officials in the new government. According to many businessmen and other Cambodian officials, the ranks of government are filled with foreign citizens lining their pockets with kickbacks.

"Oh boy," says Chhang Song shaking his head, "We were puritans compared to these guys."

Chhang, a former Minister of Information in the notoriously corrupt, US-backed Lon Nol regime that fell to Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge in 1975, is an American citizen from Washington, DC who recently returned to serve as an advisor to the current government.

The recent phenomena of foreign citizens returning to participate in the rebuilding of their countries since the collapse of communism and the cold war has raised a new set of legal and other complexities for the mostly western governments that the returnees hail from. While Cambodia stands out as a particularly stark example, it is also increasingly common in Eastern Europe, the former Soviet Union and the Baltic states.

A recent Prime Minister of Bosnia Herzogovina is an American. And in 1992, when an American citizen was chosen as defence minister of the newly independent Lithuania, the U.S. government forced him to make a choice between his passport or the job. A recent Foreign Minister in Armenia was also an American. A Wisconsin politician, Rudy Perpich, was considering accepting the post of Prime Minister of Croatia in 1991. But when U.S. authorities informed him they could not guarantee that he could maintain his American citizenship, he declined the position, according to U.S. diplomats.

But nothing compares to Cambodia. Senior officials who are citizens of foreign countries include the Queen, the First Prime Minister, the Ministers of Foreign Affairs, Interior, Education, Agriculture, Rural Development, Women's Affairs, Tourism, Information, and even Culture.

As well, the head of the powerful Cambodian Development Council, at least 30 members of Parliament, numerous provincial governors, secretaries and under secretaries of state, civil servants, ambassadors, and military generals hold foreign citizenships.

The bulk of these officials hold French, American, or Australian passports, but Canada, New Zealand, Japan, and Switzerland are also represented. Most fled on the heels of the communist victory in 1975 or through refugee camps on the Thai border set up after the Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia in late 1978.

"On the one hand we want to encourage them to come back to help reconstruct their country," says a US diplomat, "This is a good thing. But there are complications."

While American law states that a US citizen cannot take an oath of allegiance to a foreign government, the law is rarely enforced. "The policy has shifted over the years since the end of the cold war," said a US government lawyer familiar with the issue. "We now approach these on a case by case basis."

One reason, say diplomats from several governments, is that many of the senior officials in the newly emerging democracies would not return to help reconstruct their homeland if forced to give up their foreign citizenship. " The political situation remains unstable during the transition period in many of these countries. They fled for their lives to exile once before, and they want to keep that option open," said a Phnom Penh based diplomat.

A US government internal cable sent to all embassies in February offered instructions on how to deal with U.S. citizens serving foreign governments. It cited several "potentially expatriating acts" which include "joining another country's armed forces" or "taking an oath of allegiance to another government". Scores of Cambodian-Americans fit that bill. It also requires embassies, under section 349 of the US Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 , to inform Washington of any "high level official in a foreign government in a policy making position" who is an American citizen.

But US diplomats say that the courts have now interpreted that Americans can serve in foreign governments as long as they had "no intent of relinquishing citizenship." In effect, it is largely up to the American citizens, according to current US government legal interpretation, whether they choose to give up their citizenship when they join the ranks of a foreign government.

Indeed, foreign governments find benefits in having their citizens in positions of influence. It does not hurt Australia, for instance, to have the Cambodian Foreign Minister hold Australian citizenship. Nor is it detrimental for Australia-which dominates the telecommunications industry in Cambodia-to have Australian citizens in charge of the Ministry of Post and Telecommunications.

The French, who have campaigned strongly for the reemergence of Francophone in Indochina, can only be pleased to have the Cambodian Minister of Culture a French citizen. And the Americans have used Cambodia's top cop, an American citizen, You Hokry who hails from Maryland and serves as minister of interior, to get US citizens in a pickle extra attention.

But there are numerous potential minefields in this new post cold war phenomena. It is well known that many Cambodian government officials who hold dual nationalities are lining their pockets with kickbacks, and their reasons for returning to Cambodia may be less than altruistic. Some Cambodian officials believe that many are here to cash in and have little interest in remaining in Cambodia.

But if they are US citizens, they must file US taxes. "The law is clear. You must declare all your income, whether illegal or legal," said a spokesman for the United States Internal Revenue Service. The US tax laws are often used to collar bad guys involved in more difficult-to-prove criminal activities, such as drug running. As an example the IRS spokesman cited Al Capone, the famous US gangster of the 1930's, who was ultimately jailed for tax evasion. It is common practice for Cambodian government officials to receive kickbacks, and rumors abound of the millions of dollars being pocketed by various officials.

Current Finance Minister Kiet Chhon, estimated that lost revenues from corruption is about US$100 million a year-or more than one-third of internally generated revenue.

"It is shameful," he said.

Senior government ministers privately grouse about a number of their colleagues who are on the take. One example is over a recent US$1.3 billion contract awarded to a little known Malaysian firm, Ariston, for gambling casinos and related development projects in the seaside resort of Sihanoukville. Two senior government officials say they have "proof" that another senior government official-who holds an American passport-received a US$10 million kickback for awarding the contract to Ariston. They say that other companies, including the American hotel firm Hyatt, who bid for the contract "never had a chance" and the corrupt process did "immeasurable damage to our reputation among investors."

Former Finance Minister Sam Rainsy, sacked last fall, and the country's most aggressive anti-graft fighter, said on March 2: " I have spoken with one of the other bidders which did not win the contract...They have been asked ten million dollars in cash. They (were told ) that 'if you give us 10 million US dollars the contract is for you.'" Senior government sources say the official who received the kickback is an American citizen and the company in question which was denied the contract was an American firm. American companies are prohibited by American law from paying bribes to foreign governments, but it is unclear whether American citizens working for foreign governments can receive them without breaking American law.

"In the last few months, the Royal Government of Cambodia has signed a number of contracts with foreign private companies in circumstances which are, to say the least, dubious. These dubious contracts are seriously harmful to the country, the administration of which has become more chaotic and less transparent," said Rainsy. He himself is a French citizen, an elected Member of Parliament, and regularly rates as one of the Kingdom's most popular politicians in public opinion polls.

Furthermore, it remains untested, say legal experts, whether foreign nationals holding senior government portfolios could be charged under criminal and civil laws that apply to the country they hold citizenship in. Of particular concern could be such positions as Minister of Interior or senior officers in the Ministry of Defence who hold American or other passports and ultimately are responsible for the conduct of their subordinates, human rights lawyers point out.

In Cambodia, both the police and military have been repeatedly implicated in human rights abuses including torture and murder in recent years. Rarely, despite cases with overwhelming evidence, are the offenders arrested or prosecuted. The U.S. Torture Victims Protection Act does allow for American authorities to prosecute American or other citizens implicated in torture overseas.

Amnesty International, in a report to be released on 14 March, a copy of which has been obtained by the Post said "members of the armed forces and police are able to impose their will on the civilian population with impunity, committing acts of violence including deliberate and arbitrary killings and extra judicial executions....the Cambodian authorities appear to lack the political will and ability to bring these violators to justice." The report, and an earlier one released by the United Nations Center for Human Rights, cite numerous cases of torture, including military officers involved in eating the livers and gall bladders of their prisoners, and cutting off the heads of prisoners who are alive and under interrogation. The government has, to date, refused to arrest the officers involved.

"Theoretically, they could be charged with, say, conspiracy to obstruct justice," said one human rights lawyer, citing superior officers - who hold foreign citizenship - of subordinates involved in torture. The Cambodian Co-Minister of Interior and scores of senior officers in both the national police apparatus and the military hold US passports.

But "There would have to be some act committed on American soil," insisted a US government lawyer responsible for analyzing such issues. "In general, U.S. law does not follow them around."

But Cambodia's reputation for political thuggery has even spilled over to American soil. Last year, a Cambodian general-an American citizen- was back in California and allegedly threatened a California-based, Khmer language newspaper editor with arrest and death if he returned to Cambodia because of articles critical of the new government, according to complaints filed with U.S. authorities by the newspaper.

U.S. government sources say the general was back in the U.S. to take care of his annual tax obligations, when he read the articles that offended him.

And last month, when an American relief worker in a remote province suffered a heart attack, an official of the Civil Aviation Authority refused to allow an emergency medical airplane run by a non-profit Christian relief organization to take off from Phnom Penh until "fees" were paid. The Civil Aviation official is an American citizen. Could an American citizen be charged with relevant criminal or civil complaints-such as extortion-committed against another American citizen, even though the criminal act was committed on foreign soil? Such questions are largely, so far, in uncharted territory.

"To tell you the truth, we don't like to talk about it. It's a headache," said one American diplomat.

POL POT: UNREPENTANT An Exclusive Interview By Nate Thayer

POL POT: UNREPENTANT

An Exclusive Interview

Cover Story

Far Eastern Economic Review

October 30, 1997

(Three story cover package)

The world holds Pol Pot responsible for the deaths of more than 1 million Cambodians. But the former Khmer Rouge leader, now a jungle captive of ex-comrades, expresses no remorse. In an historic, exclusive interview with Nate Thayer he defends himself as a patriot. His two-hour exposition ranges over the notorious killing fields, atrocities, party intrigues and his own early life. Plus:The first ever interview with Khmer Rouge strongman Ta Mok

Day of Reckoning: Pol Pot breaks an 18-year silence to confront his past. In defending his murderous rule, he sheds new light on the dark secrets of the Khmer Rouge 

By Nate Thayer in Anlong Veng

Far Eastern Economic Review

October 30, 1997

P OL POT is dying. He's helped slowly out of the backseat of a blue four-wheel drive truck, then stands unsteadily in the dust of the narrow road, smiling shyly and raising his clasped hands to his face in a traditional greeting.

He needs to grasp my arm to walk the 25 meters to an open-air hut, in a clearing hacked out of the dense jungles of the Dangrek mountains. His breathing labored, he eases himself down at a simple wooden table.

A deferential young KR cadre places a plastic bottle of water and a coffee jar filled with salt in front of him. Pol Pot adjusts his traditional peasant scarf, his face drawn and eyes blinking rapidly, and looks sadly across the table at the nearest thing to an interrogator he has ever faced.

The man who presided over the Cambodian holocaust is about to give his first interview in 18 years. It's his chance to make some kind of peace with his bloodstained past, to try to atone for a four-year reign of terror that left a million or more of his countrymen dead.
He refuses.

"I came to carry out the struggle, not to kill people," he rasps, his voice almost a whisper. He pauses, fixing his interviewer with an almost pleading expression. "Even now, and you can look at me, am I a savage person? My conscience is clear."

In a two-hour interview, Pol Pot is chillingly unrepentant about the horrors of his 1975-1978 rule over Cambodia. His humanity shows only when he talks about himself or his family; he describes in detail his youth, the origins of his political ideology, his health problems and his 12-year-old daughter's difficulties in school.

Grilled on his culpability for the mass murders, disease and starvation of the late 1970s - when his regime tried to turn Cambodia into a collectivist agrarian utopia - he comes back time and again with the same basic line: The KR made "mistakes," but without their unrelenting struggle Cambodia would have been swallowed by Vietnam.

"I do not reject responsibility - our movement made mistakes, like every other movement in the world. But there was another aspect that was outside our control - the enemy's activities against us. I want to tell you, I'm quite satisfied on one thing: If we had not carried out our struggle, Cambodia would have become another Kampuchea Krom in 1975," he says, referring to the Mekong Delta region, seized by Vietnam from the Khmer empire in the 17th century.

Pol Pot even claims that the notorious Tuol Sleng prison in Phnom Penh, where the KR meticulously documented their torture and execution of 16,000 suspected "enemies," was a Vietnamese propaganda exhibit.

Yet the rare trip into the KR stronghold of Anlong Veng yielded some stunning revelations. The KR commander who ousted Pol Pot in June, Ta Mok, acknowledged in his first interview ever that "hundreds of thousands" of people had died during the group's time in power. Neither he nor other KR leaders interviewed would admit personal responsibility; instead, they point fingers at Pol Pot or one another.

Pol Pot does admit that he ordered the killing of his longtime comrade-in-arms Son Sen, slain on June 10 along with 14 family members, including grandchildren. "You know for the other people, the babies, the young ones, I did not order them to be killed. For Son Sen and his family, yes. I feel sorry for that. That was a mistake that occurred when we put our plan into practice. I feel sorry. You asked me to say something." Then he says abruptly: "Now I want to talk about the present situation in Cambodia."

It was Son Sen's killing that brought about Pol Pot's ouster from the helm of the revolutionary movement he led for 37 years. Ta Mok, who was also targeted but escaped, arrested Pol Pot on June 19. Five weeks later, Pol Pot was brought before a "people's tribunal" in Anlong Veng and sentenced to life imprisonment for Son Sen's murder.

The KR decided to make Pol Pot's ouster public, hoping to win international support for their battle against the government of Premier Hun Sen. They allowed this journalist to witness the July 25 tribunal, the first time Pol Pot had been seen by a journalist in 18 years. But an interview with the deposed leader took months more to arrange, through intensive contacts with a series of secret operatives both inside and outside of Anlong Veng. It took place on October 16.

For now, that's as far as the KR will go. Pol Pot is not going to be turned over to an international tribunal to face charges of crimes against humanity, Ta Mok said in a separate interview. "I will turn Pol Pot over no problem, if you bring Hun Sen and they go together," he says, setting an unrealistic condition.

Trial or no trial, Pol Pot's line of defence is the same: His youthful, inexperienced movement made "mistakes" under pressure from its enemies, but they saved the country from Vietnamese annexation. Asked whether he wanted to apologize for the suffering he caused, he looks genuinely confused, has the interpreter repeat the question, and answers: "No."

"We had no other choice. Naturally we had to defend ourselves," he says. "The Vietnamese... wanted to assassinate me because they knew without me they could easily swallow up Cambodia."

The anti-Vietnamese rhetoric isn't surprising: the ultra-nationalism of the KR became evident when they started raiding the territory of their erstwhile Vietnamese communist allies in Vietnam in the years after seizing power. But Pol Pot reveals that distrust between the two communist movements dates back to at least 1970, when Le Duan and other Vietnamese leaders tried to persuade him to take nominal command of a combined Cambodian-Vietnamese-Laotian army to fight the American-backed governments in Phnom Penh and Saigon.

"Le Duan and Le Duc Tho, they told us: 'You don't have to fight. You should wait until the Vietnamese victory then the Vietnamese will come and liberate you'," Pol Pot says.

Instead, he raced to beat the Vietnamese to victory. He says that by capturing Phnom Penh on April 17, two weeks before the communist victory in Saigon, the KR saved Cambodia from Vietnamese communist occupation. And immediately, he contends, he took steps to balance Vietnamese influence in Cambodia. "In May 1975, I sent my foreign minister to Thailand because I knew that the east is very savage... what I wanted was to have a friend in the West. Vietnam was furious at me."

There may be truth in Pol Pot's claim that Vietnam had designs on Cambodia. But he goes on, outrageously, to blame even the mass starvation during his rule on the Vietnamese. Nobody knows the precise figure, but during their 1975-1978 rule the "Democratic Kampuchea" regime killed perhaps 200,000 people, many from its own ranks. For every person executed, perhaps seven more died of starvation or disease as a result of the KR's inept central policies.

"To say that millions died is too much. Another aspect you have to know is that Vietnamese agents, they were there. There was rice, but they didn't give rice to the population," Pol Pot claims.

Even more outrageous is Pol Pot's claim that Phnom Penh's notorious Tuol Sleng prison was a "Vietnamese exhibition" set up for propaganda purposes after Vietnam invaded Cambodia in December 1978 and drove the KR from power. Scholars say the KR documented each of the 16,000 people whom they tortured and executed, often on Pol Pot's direct orders.

In fact, admissions he makes in the interview link Pol Pot directly to Tuol Sleng. He acknowledges that he ordered the arrest and murder of political enemies, accusing them of collusion with Vietnam. These included Vorn Vet, Hu Num, and Hu Yuon, fellow standing committee members killed after the KR took power. "Those people were in the central leadership of Democratic Kampuchea, but they were not the people of Democratic Kampuchea," he says. "In 1976... that group of people you were talking about, they set up a coup d'etat committee, especially against me. In that committee there were Vietnamese agents in the majority." He names "Comrade Ya" - the nom de guerre of Men San, who commanded the northeast region - as chief conspirator.

KR documents obtained by the Post show that Ya was tortured to death on Pol Pot's orders at the Phnom Penh prison. In a handwritten September 1976 note accompanying a "confession" extracted from Ya under torture, notorious Tuol Sleng chief Duch writes that he "reported this morning at 0910 to the Organization about Ya." The Organization is how Pol Pot was officially known.

"The Organization decided that if this guy continues stubbornly to hide his traitorous linkages and activities, that he should be executed and not allowed to play games any more ... Therefore, with this Ya you can forcefully use the hot method and for prolonged periods, even if you slip and it kills him." The document ends with a chilling addendum: "Ya to read so that he can think it over carefully."

Pol Pot demonstrated that same willingness to turn on his closest comrades 21 years later, when he ordered the killing of Son Sen, his longtime defense minister. In a soft monotone that contrasts starkly with the subject matter, he tried to justify the murder, saying that he had discovered proof that Son Sen was conspiring against him. The principle evidence? "The brother of Son Sen, Son Chhum... even let his daughter marry people who worked with Hun Sen. So the connection has been established."
Pol Pot's paranoia may have helped him survive as a guerrilla fighter, but it ultimately led his movement to self-destruct, fracturing into rival factions. It's a process that began soon after the group took power, and resumed with new intensity in mid-1996. As a result, separate KR groups are now scattered throughout the country, many of them aligned with Funcinpec or the CPP - whose premier, Hun Sen, himself defected from the KR in 1978.

"Pol Pot's stance got even loftier, and our territory got even smaller," says an elderly Anlong Veng villager. "He saw enemies as rotten flesh, swollen flesh. He saw enemies surrounding. Enemies in front, enemies behind, enemies to the north, enemies to the south... leaving us no place to breathe."
Indeed, only six of the original 22 members of the Democratic Kampuchea party central committee survived their years in power unscathed, according to documents obtained from Tuol Sleng. The rest died, or survived only because they were rescued from Tuol Sleng, ironically, by the invading Vietnamese army.

After that, the KR rose from the ashes, with military or political support from China, Asean and Western powers opposed to Vietnam's occupation of Cambodia. They capitalized on the animosity towards Vietnam that permeates Cambodian society.

But since the 1993 UN-run elections, which the KR boycotted, the movement's cannibalization has resumed. Of the nine younger military commanders chosen in 1985 to form the new generation of leadership, six have defected to the Cambodian government and two were arrested for killing Son Sen. In August 1996, senior leader Ieng Sary and more than half of the KR fighters in the northwest broke with Pol Pot, Son Sen, Ta Mok and Khieu Samphan, rallying around the town of Pailin.

While Khieu Samphan is officially head of the KR remnant in Anlong Veng, Ta Mok is clearly the strongman. In fact, Khieu Samphan seems to retain sympathy for Pol Pot. On June 12, in a clandestine radio broadcast, he called Son Sen a "traitor." Asked if he was a hostage of Pol Pot when he made that broadcast, Samphan replies unconvincingly: "You could call it something like that." He refuses to elaborate.

The turmoil has shaken the movement to its core. "All of us - our parents, our children - are poor peasants. We agreed to abandon everything for many years to join the struggle," says Khem Nuon, Ta Mok's chief-of-staff. "And ultimately, in order to kill each other? How can that be?"

So has the KR movement truly turned on its master, Pol Pot? Certainly Ta Mok says so: "Pol Pot's hands are filled with blood." And from Pol Pot's own words, the answer also seems yes. "For me it is over. Over politically, and over as a human being."

Since his sentencing, Pol Pot says he has been confined to a wood-and-thatch hut, where he's virtually bedridden and sometimes on oxygen. When he discusses his health problems he becomes animated, a contrast to the implacable way he discussed those who died under his rule. "You look at me from the outside, you don't know what I have suffered. If you allow me, I would like to tell you about my sickness.

"One night around 2 a.m. I woke up to go to the bathroom," he says, describing an apparent stroke he suffered in late 1995. "My left eye was closed. I thought that maybe nothing was wrong. But when I came back my eye just did not work any more... Now my left side from my head to my toe does not work. And my left eye is 95 percent blind. That is why when I walk it is not normal."

As the interview nears its second hour, Pol Pot often licks his parched lips and sips from his glass of water. Sometimes he becomes annoyed when he is interrupted or his answers are challenged. But he never raises his voice. And he seems eager to elicit sympathy. "In Khmer we have a saying that when one is both quite sick and old there remains only one thing, that you die."

Pol Pot says his days are bleak. His books have been confiscated, and he rarely gets out of bed. "I have nothing to do now," he says, adding that the hut is plagued with mosquitoes.

He listens to the radio every morning: both the clandestine Democratic Kampuchea radio and the Voice of America. "I want to listen to VOA every night as well, but sometimes I fall asleep," he says, complaining that the morning broadcast isn't as interesting as the evening one.

"I feel a little bit bored, but I have become used to that. You know, I can't even play with my daughter or my wife any more because in the morning, even after I wake up, I can't get out of bed. I stay still while my wife occupies herself with gardening and sewing. My daughter gathers wood and works in the kitchen. But we are together for dinner... We dine together at a small table."

He speaks with fatherly affection of his only child, aged 12. "She is a good daughter, a good person. She gets along with the others quite well. "But he says she isn't doing as well in some school subjects as others. On that score, "she is like me." When she grows up, will she be proud to say she is the daughter of Pol Pot? "I don't know about that. It's up to history to judge," he responds.

Then Pol Pot, with an engaging smile, apologizes and says he needs to go back to the hut and lie down. "I feel very, very tired," he says.

He is helped to his feet, unable to rise on his own. As he's assisted down the steps and along the jungle path, he pauses to offer pleasantries to hovering cadres, who remain grim-faced. Then he raises his hands together again in a polite farewell. Before climbing back into the truck, he turns to one of his captors and says softly: "I want you to know that everything I did, I did for my country."

 

On the Stand

By Nate Thayer in Anlong Veng

Far Eastern Economic Review

October 30, 1997

There are good reasons to be worried when coming face-to-face with the man responsible for one of the worst mass murders in history. But Nate Thayer was most worries that Pol Pot wouldn’t talk, or would cut off the interview after a few minutes. So from the outset he hit Pol Pot with the big question: Does he admit guilt for his murderous 1975-78 rule? It was a question that Thayer pressed again and again. Because Pol Pot is more likely to die than be turned over to an international tribunal, the jungle interview may be as close to a courtroom as he ever gets.

Thayer’s interpreter, a senior Khmer Rouge cadre, tried to beg out of his translating duties, perhaps anticipating the tone of the questions. Thayer speaks conversational Khmer, but he prevailed upon the interpreter to translate both the questions and answers while a tape recorder and television camera rolled. Here are excerpts, starting with Thayer’s opening questions.

 

Q Nate Thayer: He knows he is accused of leading and organization that has killed hundreds of thousands of people and that he has been condemned by most of the world for it. Is he a mass murderer, or what has he contributed to his country?

A Pol Pot: I think that you can raise all of the questions at one time, and some questions I think that I can answer connecting one to another to simplify things. But it's up to you...

Q: I'm interested in the issues of the time he was in power between 1975 and 1979. The millions of people who indeed did suffer during that time, and whether he feels that he's fairly accused. That's one question, let's start with.

A: Yes, I want to reply. Your question is not unfamiliar. That question has been raised time and again: I would like to say first that my conscience is clear. Everything I have done and contributed is first for the nation and the people and the race of Cambodia.

[Pol Pot then spoke about how the Vietnamese wanted to take over Cambodia, adding "they wanted to assassinate me because they knew without me they could easily swallow up Cambodia".]

Q: I would like to hear all of that, and if he's willing to stay here for hours, I am too. But if we could please deal with this first. As you know, most of the world thinks that you're responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent Cambodians who didn't deserve to suffer. Could you answer that question directly? Do you feel that you were indeed responsible for crimes against humanity, against your own people?

A: I'm going to reply. I want to tell you clearly. First, I would like to tell you that I came to carry out the struggle, not to kill people. Even now, and you can look at me, am I savage person? My conscience is clear... As I told you before, they fought against us, so we had to take measures to defend ourselves...

Q: You have an opportunity here, a historical opportunity. You know well that during your years in power, your policies - agrarian experiments, social and political organizations, the direct executions of many thousands of people - that many families suffered. The country itself also suffered because of your policies. Your fellow Cambodians want to know whether you feel any remorse, whether you acknowledge that you made very serious mistakes while you were in power?

A: There are two sides to it, as I told you: There's what we did wrong, and what we did right. The mistake is that we did some things against the people - by us and also by the enemy - but the other side, as I told you, is that without our struggle there would be no Cambodia right now.

Q: But for all those hundreds of thousands who suffered - not just died but suffered from forced labor, from lack of food, from what were clearly failed central policies while you were in power - don't you think that they deserve an apology?

A: For the wrong things of our struggle, as I told you, for the wrong things, it has been written in the book. This is a testimony before history.

Q: Which book?

A: The book is the "The Right and Wrong of Democratic Kampuchea". [Pol Pot was apparently referring to a political tract released by the Democratic Kampuchea movement, as the Khmer Rouge calls themselves, in the late 1980s.]

Q: But that acknowledged only 30,000 deaths. All independent scholars, from all political ideologies, acknowledge a minimum of hundreds of thousands of people who died as a result of failed central policies while you were in power...That is a fact. While you were in sole power-and all the other members of your standing committee say you were in full power-thousands of people died because of failed social policies of your government. Are you willing to acknowledge that fact?

A: As I told you, that was written in the book, and I'm tired of talking about it...

Q: Let's talk about Tuol Sleng. There is overwhelming evidence that you had overall responsibility for Tuol Sleng. Sixteen thousand people who signed confessions were executed, including women and children who were suspected CIA, KGB, Vietnamese agents. Were you responsible for Toul Sleng and do you really believe that those 16,000 - including women and children - were agents of a foreign government?

A: I was at the top. I made only big decisions on big issues. I want to tell you - Tuol Sleng was a Vietnamese exhibition; a journalist wrote that. People talk about Tuol Sleng, Tuol Sleng, Toul Sleng, but when we look at the pictures, the pictures are the same. When I first heard about Tuol Sleng, it was on VOA [Voice of America]. I listened twice. And there are documents talking about someone who did research about the skeletons of the people... They said when you look closely at the skulls, they are smaller than the skulls of the Khmer people.

Q: Are you saying that you never heard of Tuol Sleng before 1979?

A: No, I never heard of it. And those two researchers, they said that those skeletons, they were more than 10 years old.

Q: Sir, let me say that there is overwhelming scientific evidence, overwhelming proof that thousands of people, Cambodians, were executed at Toul Sleng while you were in control of Phnom Penh. There is no dispute among anybody else in the world outside of Anlong Veng, perhaps, that it is true.

 A:[No response.]

 

Forbidden City: New strongman Ta Mok Reaches out of isolation

By Nate Thayer in Anlong Veng

Far Eastern Economic Review

October 30, 1997

 

TA MOK, the one-legged Khmer Rouge general known to the outside world as "the butcher," smiles and chuckles warmly as he welcomes the first journalist he has ever met.

During a three-hour interview over a luncheon of fish and Pringles potato chips specially imported for the occasion, the man who overthrew Pol Pot speaks with a peasant's directness and the ease of a man in total control.

His words, though, are sometimes as chilling as his laugh is warm. In an unprecedented admission by a KR leader, he says "hundreds of thousands" died during the revolutionary regime's 1975-78 rule, though he blames their deaths on Pol Pot.

As for the thousands of fellow KR that his forces killed during the purges of 1978, he shrugs. Their leader, he explains, had been discovered to be Vietnamese.

The new KR strongman can seem a study in contradictions. He has earned a fearsome reputation as a military chief, but in person he comes across as grandfatherly. He is clearly revered by many of the approximately 60,000 people living under his control around Anlong Veng. It's and area almost completely isolated by mountains and dense, land-mine-strewn jungles, but Mok's development projects seem to have turned it into one of the more prosperous swaths of countryside in Cambodia.
But for Mok, 71, there's no contradiction. He's a peasant leader who defends what he sees as the interests of his people. And like Pol Pot, that includes an obsession with the perceived threat of Vietnamese domination. Mok would kill a Vietnamese intruder with the nonchalance with which a farmer plucks a leech off a bare leg.

Mok believes that what his people need now is international support for their guerrilla war against Premier Hun Sen. To that end, he has agreed to an unprecedented interview. Sitting in a wooden pavilion freshly painted with revolutionary slogans, he talks about supporting "liberal democracy." It's not clear if he really understands the term, but since he ousted Pol Pot in June, cadres say he has allowed new freedoms in the guerrilla zone.

The potential benefits of world acceptance are plainly evident form the hard-packed dirt logging road that snakes down the Dongrek escarpment from Thailand to Anlong Veng. Millions of dollars' worth of logs lie by the roadside, blocked from going anywhere by an international agreement that bars the export of timber without central government permission.

That permission isn't about to come: The central government is at war with the KR. Evidence of past battles is everywhere: The few concrete buildings in Anlong Veng are pockmarked by bullets and shrapnel, and government tanks disabled during intense fighting two years ago sprawl in the roadway, political graffiti now adorning their turrets.

Yet Anlong Veng is more than a battlefield. A two-day tour shows a wealth of agricultural projects, making it one of the more developed rural areas in Cambodia. Sophisticated dams, irrigating systems and other water projects are everywhere. Tractors and earth-moving vehicles imported through Thailand work the land.

Water spills over new concrete dams into rivers where dozens of villagers, many missing limbs from mines, haul in large fish with nets.

"The people here love grandfather because he cares very much about the well-being of the poor," says Noun Nov, a cadre in his 40s. Like many others in Anlong Veng, Nov has followed Mok since his mid-teens.

Indeed, Mok says it was his passion for rural development projects ("My hobby is agriculture") that cost him his leg. He stepped on a mine when building a road. "I was inspecting a road project. I was behind a bulldozer," he recalls, shifting his artificial limb.

Is this the one place where the KR's ideology, which caused the death of perhaps one million Cambodians in the 1970s, actually works? Hardly. Mok denies that he ever embraced communism. "I was a monk," he says, and when he was just 16 he was recruited into the resistance. "When I joined the Communist Party of Cambodia, I did not know what communism was," he says with a burst of laugher. "They told me the party is a patriotic one. That is why I joined the party. Later on I found that the Communist Party was sucking the blood of the people.

"When we talk about economic life, I have no theoretical ideology," says Mok. " What is policy? When we talk about life we talk about land and water. For the people, having these is having freedom and democracy."

Actually, KR cadres say Mok has introduced new freedoms in Anlong Veng in the four months since he ousted Pol Pot. Previously, there were no schools, while now scores of brightly dressed schoolchildren carrying notebooks can be seen casually returning home from lessons. Listening to radio other than the clandestine guerrilla station was forbidden; now they can listen freely to foreign broadcasts. "We can even watch TV," one cadre exclaims proudly.

Ironically, there are signs that opening up has spawned social problems the puritanical KR never faced before. Mok has responded in a characteristically KR way: "No Gambling" has been added to revolutionary slogans such as "Defeat for the Contemptible Yuon Enemy Aggressors" adorning the walls of Anlong Veng.

That's not the only new slogan. "Defeat for the Traitor Pol Pot Whose Hands Are Stained With Blood," "Long Live the Emerging Democracy," and "Cambodians Don't Kill Cambodians" are all freshly painted. Mok, who has basically spent his entire life in the jungle, seems to think the appearance of the new slogans will be enough to inspire Cambodians to rally in support of is movement.

"Reports reach me everyday saying that the new policy that 'Cambodians Don't Kill Cambodians' is a magic slogan indeed," he says.

Of course, killing Cambodians was exactly what the KR did during their years when Mok was at the very core of the leadership. Mok denies personal culpability for the mass murder of those years - a denial that scholars say is patently untrue. But in an unprecedented admission by a senior KR leader, he does admit that the regime committed wide-scale abuses.

"It is clear that Pol Pot has committed crimes against humanity," he says. "I don't agree with the American figure that millions died, but hundreds of thousands, yes."

Mok's venom for Pol Pot seems genuine and personal. Yet his denials of personal responsibility ring false, scholars say. For example, he claims no involvement in the Tuol Sleng prison. "Pol Pot alone was in charge of the prison," he insists.

Academics who are analyzing documents seized at Tuol Sleng, including 16,000 signed "confessions" of people who were tortured and executed there, say there's no doubt that Mok both ordered arrests and viewed " confessions". "His fingerprints are all over the place. The proof is irrefutable," says Stephen Heder, a professor at the University of London.

Mok's "butcher" nickname may have been earned in 1978. As commander of the southwestern zone of Cambodia and fifth-ranking party leader, he was ordered by Pol Pot to purge KR cadres from the eastern zone who were accused of conspiring with Vietnam. Zone commander Sao Phim and thousands of his loyalists were killed.

Asked about this brutal purge, Mok makes clear that he believes anyone associated with the Vietnamese is a fair target for murder. "I learned from documents produced by Pol Pot that Sao Phim was Vietnamese," he says of the fourth-ranking party leader.

Mok shrugs again in reference to two other leaders, Hu Num and Hu Yuon, who were killed under torture. "Sao Phim I can understand. This man was Vietnamese," he says, but he then adds that the deaths of "Hu Nim and Hu Yuon I do not understand."

Mok's virulent anti-Vietnamese statements come as no surprise. In 1993, his troops carried out numerous massacres of Vietnamese. "I have never taken a nap in my life, in order to go faster than the Vietnamese, to beat the Vietnamese, to not allow the Vietnamese to attack us," he says. He considers anyone working with Hun Sen or the CPP to be Vietnamese and thus a legitimate target for murder.
That may explain why the straight-talking guerrilla chief seems to feel no guilt for his role in the horrors of 1975-78. Asked about the deaths of those years, he laughs and waves his hand dismissively. "If my hands were stained with the blood of my compatriots, why would the people love me? Go ask them yourself."

Mok says that if he had the chance to live life differently, he would not have joined with Pol Pot, whose "hands are soiled with blood".

Yet his rejection of the long-time KR supremo seems rooted not in the crimes of the 1970s but those on June 1997, when Pol Pot ordered the killing of Son Sen and attempted to murder Mok in a power struggle.

Since the 1993 UN-sponsored elections, the KR had been fracturing, and Pol Pot had moved his base of operations, first from Trat in the southwest, to Pailin, then to Phnom Chhat in the northwest, Mok says. "From Phnom Chhat he came to ask me to stay here. Then....he tried to kill me and the people of Anlong Veng. How can I trust him?"

After nearly three hours talking about the revolutionary movement that has been his world for more than half a century, Mok says Pol Pot has been taken to a mountainside location and is waiting to be interviewed. "Ask Pol Pot whether he recognizes his faults. Ask him why he has assassinated his fellow Cambodians. After all that he has done, what more does he want?" Mok says, scoffing at the man he served for decades. He then asks the interviewer: "Can you still say that Pol Pot and I are not estranged?"

 

 

My Education: How Saloth Sar became Pol Pot

By Nate Thayer in Anlong Veng

Far Eastern Economic Review

October 30, 1997

The bones stacked in the Killing fields dotting Cambodia testify to the results of Pol Pot's 1975-1978 experiment in radical agrarian reform. Until now, however, the ideology that drove it has been left largely to the realm of speculation. Some scholars have described Pol Pot as a Cultural Revolution-style Maoist, while others have conjectured that a youthful grape-picking trip to Tito's Yugoslavia planted the seeds for his later break with the mainstream Marxists of the Soviet Union and Vietnam.

But Pol Pot tells his own story differently. He claims that as a student in France in 1949-53, he was influenced by a range of progressive movements-including, ironically, that of non-violent Indian independence leader Mahatma Gandhi.

In his first interview with a foreign journalist in 18 years, Pol Pot may have refused to repent for the horror of his rule, but he was clearly concerned with what the history books say about his personal life. He became animated in talking about his youth and family, after remaining impassive during questioning about the abuses of his rule.

Historians haven't even been able to agree on the ultra-secretive Pol Pot's birthday: Some say May 25, 1925, while others put it on the same day in 1927. Pol Pot said neither was correct: He was born in January 1925. "January-I remember, because my mother wrote it in chalk on the wall of the house, next to the cupboard," he said in Khmer, adding "janvier" in French to make sure there was no mistake. He had lied about his age, he said, to remain eligible for a scholarship.

Born Saloth Sar in Kampong Thom province, he attended secondary school in Phnom Penh and won a scholarship to France in 1949. Clearly defensive of his status as an "intellectual," Pol Pot volunteered that biographer David Chandler was "not entirely accurate" when characterizing him as a poor student. "I was not a bad student. I was average . . . I studied just enough to keep my scholarship. The rest of the time I just read books," he said.

It was those books, as well as the leftist student movements brewing in Europe in the years after World War II, that gave Pol Pot his early political education. "I looked at the second-hand books that were on sale along the Seine River, the old books that I loved to read," he recalled. "When I got money from my scholarship, I had to spend it on rent and food, so I only had 20 or 25 francs left to spend.

But I got a lot of books to read. For example, La Grande Revolution Francaise. I did not understand it all, but I just read. At the same time I saw the movement in India of Mahatma Gandhi. He was well known and I was very pleased with that. And later on Nehru.

"I started as a nationalist and then patriot and then I read progressive books. Before that time, I never read L'Humanite [the French communist party newspaper]. It scared me, " he smiled, "But I got used to it because of the student movement."

Pol Pot said there was nothing political about his trip or trips to Yugoslavia in the early 1950s. "I went to Yugoslavia because it was vacation time and I had no money. They organized a brigade... I paid just 2,000 francs, including everything. It wasn't influenced by any ideology. We just went for pleasure.

The next year . . . I went camping. So I cannot tell you of any single influence. Maybe it's a little from here, a little from there."

Pol Pot said his real political awakening, though, came upon his return home to Cambodia. "Before I went to France, my relatives, they lived comfortably. They were middle peasants. When I came back, I went to my village by bus. When I got off the bus, I met someone with a wagon. He asked my name and he said: 'Ah- you've come back!' And I look at him and see he's my uncle. And he asks me 'Do you want to go home?' I was shocked. Before he had a piece of land and a buffalo, now he had become a rickshaw-puller... I met and talked with the relatives who used to have land and buffaloes and had nothing now... What influenced me most was the actual situation in Cambodia."

The secrecy that made the Khmer Rouge so effective was, Pol Pot said, second nature to him. "Since my boyhood, I never talked about myself ... That was my nature. I was taciturn ... I'm quite modest. I don't want to tell people that I'm a leader ... I didn't tell anybody, not my brother, not my sister, because I didn't want to worry them. If anything happened to me, I didn't want them to have any connection to it. So some people think that I don't care about them. But on the contrary, I respect, I love my relatives. But I never revealed my political thinking to them."

Pol Pot said that it was as much "by chance" as anything that he became leader of the Cambodian communist party in 1960, when Tou Samouth disappeared. "There was nobody else to become secretary of the party, so I had to take charge," he said.

He vehemently denied that he had killed his "best friend", explaining in detail how Tou Samouth had been betrayed and arrested when he left his safe house in Phnom Penh to fetch medicine for his sick child. Tou Samouth was taken to the house of Lon Nol - the military commander who would later lead Cambodia- and interrogated for a week, Pol Pot said. "At that time I was his aide. If Tou Samouth had talked, I would have been arrested. He was killed at Stung Meanchey pagoda. We loved each other."

POL POT: THE END By Nate Thayer

POL POT: THE END

COVER STORY

Far Eastern Economic Review

By Nate Thayer

August 7, 1997

In a stunning journalistic achievement, REVIEW correspondent Nate Thayer comes face-to-face with the elusive Pol Pot, architect of Cambodia’s killing fields. In a story packed with exclusive photos, Thayer describes Pol Pot’s jungle “trial,” and reveals the turmoil within the Khmer Rouge. Separate stories profile Pol Pot, introduce the new Khmer Rouge leadership, and shed new light on Cambodia’s deadly July coup and the suspected drug baron who financed it.

BROTHER NUMBER ZERO

On Other Pages:

19: Pol Pot Unmasked

21: New Face of the Khmer Rouge

22: Casualties of Hun Sen’s Coup

23: The Money Man Behind the Coup

24: On History’s Front Line

Pol Pot caused the deaths of more than a million Cambodians. But when he turned on his longtime military commander, Ta Mok, that was one Cambodian too many

By Nate Thayer in Anlong Veng, Cambodia

After a series of furtive rendezvous, using coded messages over mobile phones, I slipped into one of the most impenetrable, malarial-ridden and landmine-strewn jungles of the world: Khmer Rouge-controlled northern Cambodia. I was hoping to interview Pol Pot, one of the century’s most notorious and elusive mass murderers.

What I did not fathom, as I entered the Khmer Rouge stronghold of Anlong Veng at 12:12 p.m. on July 25, was that I was about to witness nothing less than history.

“Long live! Long live! Long live the new strategy!” hundreds of voices chanted in unison. The clenched fists of the crowds pumped toward the sky, as a smiling middle-aged Khmer Rouge cadre led me toward an open-air mass meeting hall. Old artillery pieces and a captured Russian tank stood nearby.

“Crush! Crush! Crush! Pol Pot and his clique!” shouted the crowd on cue as we approached, their fists striking down towards the ground.

There, slumped in a simple wooden chair, grasping a long bamboo cane and a rattan fan, an anguished old man,  frail and struggling to maintain his dignity, was watching his life vision crumble in utter, final defeat.

This was how the “people’s tribunal’ began for Pol Pot, reviled around the world for personally orchestrating a reign of terror that left more than a million human beings dead and shattered the lives of many millions more.

The crude podium held a microphone, and crackling loudspeakers—powered by a car battery lying on the earthen floor—began to spew humiliating public denunciations of the long-time Khmer Rouge leader.

A shocking number of participants stood on crude wooden stumps, sat in home-made wheelchairs, or were missing eyes—sacrifices to the revolutionary cause of Pol Pot. Others, their arms blown off by landmines, were unable to join the frequent clapping as speaker after speaker denounced the man once venerated as “Brother Number One.”

“Our ultimate goal today is that the international community should understand that we are no longer Khmer Rouge and we are not Pol Potists!,” roared Ta Neou, the governor of the approximately 60,000 civilians who live in the area, which was under Pol Pot’s control until weeks ago.

The carefully orchestrated performance evoked the image of a grainy, black-and-white film clip from China’s Cultural Revolution. But the message was starkly different. “Long live the emergence of the democracy movement!” shouted individuals in the crowd, periodically interrupting leaders offering carefully crafted speeches at the microphone. A chorus would repeat the slogan, followed by prolonged applause by the roughly 500 participants. “Crush! Crush! Crush! Pol Pot and his murderous clique!”

Pol Pot sat alone, near three other manacled loyalists. Many in the crowd of women, children, and uniformed guerrillas seemed more interested at gazing at the first Westerner they had ever seen than in watching the traumatized old man sitting alone in a chair.

Each speaker, seemingly chosen to represent a sector of society—a farmer, an intellectual, a soldier, a woman—got up to denounce and humiliate Pol Pot “and his clique.”

Pol Pot often seemed close to tears as the vitriol was unleashed. In contrast,  three  younger army commanders put on trial alongside him had menacing, almost arrogant expressions, staring coldly into the eyes of the speakers, the crowd and the visiting reporter.

“We have sacrificed everything for the sake of the movement,” Ta Neou continued, “Our parents and all of us are children of peasants and farmers, we have sacrificed everything for the sake of the movement, but at the end we kill each other.”

Pol Pot, who ruled Cambodia for more than three years and ruled the Khmer Rouge for more than three decades, is genuinely finished. He has been denounced and imprisoned by his own movement. Not for the 1975-1978 Cambodian genocide, but for turning on his own comrades in an attempted purge in June, according to speakers at his trial.

Those commanders, led by longtime military commander Ta Mok, struck back and took Pol Pot prisoner after the purge failed. The tribunal sentenced Pol Pot to life imprisonment, but ruled out turning him over to international courts, where he could face charges of crimes against humanity.

The Khmer Rouge of Anlong Veng have good reason to try and distance themselves from the notorious Pol Pot. They want to attract international support for their struggle to unseat Cambodian premier Hun Sen. That is why they let a foreign reporter witness the show trial, the first time a journalist had entered Anlong Veng and left alive.

Yet lengthy interviews with Khmer Rouge cadre left little doubt that his ouster was authentic. Still, the cadres clearly saw it as a tragedy, and continued to treat the 72-year-old Pol Pot with Gentle respect.

The fall of Pol Pot underlines the view that the Khmer Rouge movement that ruled Cambodia in the 1970’s essentially no longer exists. The original leaders have largely been replaced by younger ones less steeped in communist ideology, and the movement has fractured into numerous factions, many of whom are allied with the mainstream political parties contesting power in Phnom Penh.

“It no longer makes any sense whatsoever to call whatever remains a Khmer Rouge movement,” says Stephen Heder, a Cambodian Scholar at the University of London’s School of Advanced International Studies. “Because of the realignment of forces over the last several years, the concept of a Khmer Rouge movement as we know it no longer has any meaning.”

But that doesn’t mean the Khmer Rouge have become irrelevant in Cambodia. The aggressive courting of Khmer Rouge factions by Cambodia’s rival premiers, Hun Sen and Prince Norodom Ranariddh, was central to the July 5-6 coup in Phnom Penh. In fact, the REVIEW has learned, the Khmer Rouge finalized their alliance with Ranariddh’s Funcinpec party on July 4. Worried that the balance of power would be tipped in his rival’s favour, Hun Sen ousted Ranariddh the next day.

 

Photo: Nate Thayer

Pol Pot also opposed those negotiations, and it led to his downfall, according to Khmer Rouge cadre interviewed in Anlong Veng. Virtually the entire leadership favoured a political deal with the royalist Funcinpec, but Pol Pot was opposed, said Gen. Khmer Nuon, who is now the Khmer Rouge’s army chief of staff.

“Domestically and internationally, Pol Pot has his own personal problems to take care of,” Khem Nuon said, referring to Pol Pot’s blood-soaked reputation. “He has no way out. That is why he keeps dragging this movement toward the darkness.”

The visit to Anlong Veng opened an unprecedented window into the inner workings of one of the world’s most secretive guerrilla movements. The Khmer Rouge have splintered dramatically since July 1996, when forces in western Cambodia, representing almost half the movement, broke with Pol Pot’s northern forces headquartered at Anlong Veng. The western split was headed by Ieng Sary, Pol Pot’s brother-in-law and longtime comrade-in-arms.

Khem Nuon said the western split was aimed against Pol Pot himself, but the 72-year-old leader blamed his top leaders—Ta Mok, Nuon Chea, and Son Sen—for losing the west by failing to heal the rift. “ So Pol Pot asked Mao—over there,” Khem Nuon explained, pointing to a young Khmer Rouge cadre standing listening to the interview,” to shoot Ta Mok and burn him—last October—to leave no evidence.”

The grim-faced young cadre, who looked capable of such a deed, nodded in agreement with his commander. But he didn’t carry out Pol Pot’s order. Because Ta Mok, who is known to the outside world as “The Butcher,” is immensely popular with the troops and civilians under his control. So Much so, Khem Nuon said, that Pol Pot saw him as a threat. “All the combatants here are under Ta Mok and they really like him a lot because he is so helpful to them in terms of standard of living. He built roads, bridges, dams within this area,” Khem Nuon said. “This is the reason Pol Pot wanted to get rid of Ta Mok.”

Pol Pot turned to two senior military field commanders, Gen. Sarouen and Gen. San, and attempted to consolidate power against Ta Mok. He called a mass meeting on February 25 of this year, and had them declared the new political and military leaders, replacing Ta Mok, Khem Nuon said. “What is the main cause that steered our people to rise up against Pol Pot? One, the leadership and the grip on power by Pol Pot was so long. All the power was within his hands,” Khem Nuon said. “Pol pot took decisions without even consulting the top leadership.”

About the same time, according to Cambodian government sources and diplomats, secret negotiations accelerated between envoys of Prince Ranariddh and elements of the Khmer Rouge in Anlong Veng. Most of these efforts were conducted by Ta Mok loyalists—often behind Pol Pot’s back—and the top royalist military commander, Gen. Nyek Bun Chhay. By May, the faction agreed in principle to join in alliance.

Increasingly isolated, Pol Pot launched a desperate attempt on June 9 to scuttle the peace deal by purging Ta Mok and other top leaders. That night, longtime defence minister Son Sen and 14 of his relatives, including a five-year-old child, were shot dead by Sarouen’s men, according to both Khmer Rouge and intelligence sources. “On the 9^th of June at 12:15 a.m., Pol Pot issued a direct order to take two Toyota pick-up trucks loaded with 20-30 soldiers to kill Mr. Son Sen,” said Khem Nuon.

The killings sparked several days of turmoil, with commanders fleeing into the jungle in disarray. But they rallied behind Ta Mok and trapped Pol Pot and his band of 300 remaining supporters on June 15, Khem Nuon said. Four days later, they had surrendered.

With Pol Pot neutralized, the remaining Khmer Rouge leadership moved rapidly forward to finalize a secret, tactical, political and military alliance with Ranariddh’s political faction. The two factions were allies against Hun Sen’s Phnom Penh government in a decade-long guerrilla war before Cambodia’s 1991 peace treaty.

The deal was closed July 4 in Anlong Veng. Hun Sen, learning about Funcinpec’s new alliance through his agents, launched his deadly coup the next morning, according to Cambodian political cadres and Asian intelligence sources. It has tipped Cambodia, which enjoyed four years of relative peace after 1993 United nations-sponsored elections, back into the throes of the warfare that seems to define this nation of 10 million people.

Hun Sen has claimed the entire tribunal was stage-managed by Pol Pot himself. Khem Nuon paints a very different picture, but he did say that Pol Pot had ‘consented’ to having a foreign reporter witness the mass meeting, as a way of acknowledging his guilt for moving against his comrades.

“ Pol Pot did himself confess to me clearly, after his arrest,” Khem Nuon said. “ When I met him the first time, he embraced me and burst into tears and said: ‘It is the right thing comrade that this has happened,’ and then he cried. It was on June 21, 1997, and he told me: ‘I am wrong, comrade, all the mistakes were made by me, alone,’ and then he cried.”

“ Pol Pot told me that this is the end of his life, he has nothing left, but he begged me to allow him to live,” Khem Nuon continued. “ I also want to make clear that if Pol Pot was vested with any credibility or respect, he would not have shown up and let you see him like you just did today.”

: I told him this morning that you were going to be here,” to witness his condemnation, Khem Nuon told the REVIEW. “ I told him that we want to prove to the world that we no longer want to associate ourselves with him. Then he consented.”

As the “People’s Tribunal of Anlong Veng” continued into its second hour, the new leaders somberly paced on the outskirts of the crowd, concerned by the deteriorating health of a now clearly weak and traumatized Pol Pot. Guerrilla officials acknowledged that Pol Pot suffered from serious heart disease and high blood pressure long before the events of recent days.

Khem Nuon said relatives and friends of those killed on June 9-10 wanted the blood of Pol Pot and his co-defendants San, Khon, and Sarouen—said to have carried out the murders on his orders. “ You notice that here today nobody was allowed to carry a weapon to this meeting, otherwise they would have been killed by the mob already,” Khem Nuon said.

But the cadre who overthrew Pol Pot seemed anguished as they watched the white-haired old man, who was dressed in loose cotton clothes with a blue-and-white Cambodian scarf looped around his neck. Confusion and sadness were etched on men who had spent their entire adult lives following Pol Pot from Cambodia’s jungles to its capital and back again.

“ We have put an end to the leadership which has betrayed our organization and the people,” Mak Ben, a bespectacled French-educated economist, dressed in a green Chinese-style military uniform, said from the podium. “ They are completely gone, as of right now, the Pol Pot regime has ended.”

“ Having acknowledged the betrayal of our group in recent months by Pol Pot and his clique,” the loudspeaker roared into the nearby forest, then Pol Pot’s crimes were read out. They included the murder of Son Sen, the attempted murder and ‘detention’ of Ta Mok and Nuon Chea, and “destroying the policy of national reconciliation,” a reference to the attempt to block the Funcinpec deal.

“These are the criminal acts—the betrayal by Pol Pot and his clique—against the people, the armed forces, and our cadre. In conclusion, we all decide to condemn and sentence this clique to life imprisonment.”

He immediately was helped up, unable to walk unassisted, by a guard in Chinese-style military fatigues. “ get someone under his other arm, get him more help,” Khem Nuon ordered. Patting his heart, Khem Nuon added: “ I am worried that he may die from the stress.”

Some people respectfully bowed, as if to royalty, as Pol Pot walked 25 meters to a waiting vehicle. “ I said what I said with a very heavy heart,” said Tep Kunnal, an emerging political leader, as he walked slowly away with his head bowed after denouncing Pol Pot. “ It is very, very difficult for me, but it had to be done. Before there were two dangers for Cambodia. Pol Pot and the Vietnamese puppet Hun Sen. Now there is only one.”

The cadres suggested that I ask Pol Pot questions while he was led away, but balked at translating when told the questions I wanted to pose. “ I cannot ask such a question to the leaders. You must ask them in Khmer yourself. It is better.”

Pol Pot, perhaps never to be seen alive again, was helped into a Toyota Landcruiser with tinted windows—captured booty from UN peacekeeping soldiers prior to the 1993 elections. Seconds after the trial ended, a torrential rain began.

 

POL POT: THE END

COVER STORY

 

POL POT UNMASKED: He was obsessed with secrecy and total control

By Nate Thayer in Bangkok, Thailand

Far Eastern Economic Review

August 7, 1997

Pol Pot, whose name is synonymous with the Cambodian genocide, exercized total control over the Khmer Rouge for more than three decades from behind a wall of impenetrable secrecy.

By putting him on trial, his former comrades-in-arms have unmasked a man who shunned exposure, even when he was premier of Cambodia. They have also broken the vice-like grip on the movement he retained through a combination of charisma and utter ruthlessness.

Born to a peasant family in Kampong Thom on May 18t, 1925, Saloth Sar—Pol Pot’s real name—was educated at a Buddhist monastery before entering technical school in Phnom Penh. His clandestine life began in his teens, when he joined the anti-French resistance movement in Indochina during World War ll.  By 1946, he was a member of the underground Indochinese Communist Party.

In 1949, he won a scholarship to study radio electronics in Paris, where he was active in radical student politics. His studies, apparently, took a back seat and he failed his exams three years in a row. He spent one summer picking grapes in Tito’s Yugoslavia, where he may have acquired his radical communism that challenged Soviet-style orthodoxy.

It was also during his sojourn in France that he charmed Khieu Ponnary, whose sister was married to Ieng Sary, another future Khmer Rouge leader.

Returning to Phnom Penh with no degree, Pol Pot taught at a private secondary school and wrote articles for left-wing publications that he signed, “The Original Khmer.” His underground activities went farther than that, however. He became a senior member of the Cambodian Communist Party at its founding congress in 1960, and was named secretary in 1963 after the mysterious death of Tou Samouth.

It was then that his secret life became his whole life. Prince Norodom Sihanouk, no longer content to belittle the Cambodian communists as “me Khmer Rouges”—“My Red Khmers”—was stepping up police pressure. Pol Pot and his comrades fled into the jungle, leaving no trace. “When a secret is kept secret, 50% of the battle is won,” Pol Pot once said.

Twelve years later, after fighting first Sihanouk’s army and then American-backed troops of Gen. Lon Nol, the battle was won. On April 17, 1975, Pol Pot’s army of peasants, clad in simple black-cotton uniforms, marched into Phnom Penh. Finally, Pol Pot could put his ideas into action.

The result was one of the most brutal and disastrous social experiments in history. After emptying the capital at gunpoint, Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge tried to transform Cambodia into a communal agrarian utopia, but instead turned the country into a vast slave-labour camp. More than one million Cambodians—out of a population of some 7 million—were executed, tortured, or starved to death under the Khmer Rouge reign of terror.

The educated were the first to be slain. But later, as the reign of terror turned on itself, waves of purges decimated the ranks of Khmer Rouge cadres. Anyone who could pose a threat to Pol Pot was killed.

Through it all, Pol Pot stayed behind his mask. When it was announced in 1976 that Pol Pot had been named premier of “Democratic Kampuchea,” as the country was renamed, American intelligence officials—who had been fighting the Khmer Rouge for years—could not figure out who he was.

“Secret work is fundamental,” Nuon Chea, the party’s number 2, told a visiting Danish delegation in 1977, the only time Nuon Chea was seen in public.

Nevertheless, a personality cult started to spring up around him in May 1978, pushed by cadres eager to show their loyalty as purges spiraled. Tens of thousands of Khmer Rouge cadres were executed as Pol Pot eliminated competition. His power was clearly growing, Chandler says: whereas he was addressed as ‘Elder Brother Pol” or “Brother Number One” soon after taking power, that gradually changed to “Uncle Secretary” or “party centre” to “Leading Apparatus” to, finally, the “High Organization.”

Pol Pot’s radical ideas were nourished by a five month sojourn in China in 1965-66, when the country was in ferment leading up to the Great proletarian Cultural Revolution. His admiration for the Gang of Four was mutual: Pol Pot went to China after his 1975 victory and met Mao Zedong, who congratulated him on his speedy revolution.

While Pol Pot’s thinking may have been influenced by his foreign experiences, at its root it is deeply Khmer. And in Pol Pot’s case, that means a visceral hatred of Vietnam, the much larger neighbor that seized the Mekong Delta from the medieval Khmer empire. Egged on by that HATRED, Khmer Rouge guerrillas carried out raids into southern Vietnam, triggering the December 1978 Vietnamese invasion.

Pol Pot again fled into the jungle, after ruling for three years, eight months, and 20 days. Reverting to form, he took the code name “81.” Until July 25, 1997, he hadn’t been seen by foreign journalists since 1979, when he was filmed by Naoki Mabuchi, a Japanese photographer with close ties to the Khmer Rouge.

Pol Pot officially retired from his official posts in 1985, but there was never any question that remained in total control of the movement. Cadres who have heard him speak say he is an amazing orator, making speeches so resonant in revolutionary and patriotic spirit that they bring his listeners to tears. Yet he refrained from appearing publicly.

Now, it appears Pol Pot has lost both his mask and his powers. That doesn’t auger well for the movement he helped found, and which is now in danger of segmenting further. As Nuon Chea said in his 1977 interview: “The leadership apparatus must be defended at any price…as long as the leadership is there, the party will not die.”

 

POL POT: THE END

COVER STORY

NEXT GENERATION: Khmer Rouge put on a new face

By Nate Thayer in Anlong Veng, Cambodia

Far Eastern Economic Review

August 7, 1997

A tiger, according to Gen. Khem Nuon, can indeed change its stripes. And if foreigners doubt that the Khmer Rouge movement has  done just that, he said, they should come and see for themselves in the jungles of Northern Cambodia.

That is the message that the movement’s new military chief-of-staff wanted to send in an unprecedented interview at his headquarters of Anlong Veng. “ From now on, we are going to open this area free for foreigners, so they can see the real facts about our movement,” he said.

Anyone who accepts that invitation will find a mixed picture. Clearly, the purge of Pol Pot and a generational transfer of leadership has profoundly changed the secretive movement. In the interview, Khem Nuon spoke with openness about the past “crimes” and future plans, and he showed no interest in communist ideology.

At the same time, however, the group continues to sound the drum of rabid anti-Vietnamese ultra nationalism, and remains bent on the overthrow of Cambodian premier Hun Sen. Some of the older leaders who orchestrated the 1975-78 Cambodian reign of terror still wield influence, and younger cadres talk of “democracy” rang hollow against the backdrop of a Cultural revolution-style show trial.

The movement is opening up for a reason: It wants to build alliances both within the country and overseas for its crusade against Hun Sen and the “Vietnamese aggressors” that it claims are still occupying the country. Specifically, it wants to join forces with Funcinpec—whose leader co-Premier Prince Norodom Ranariddh, was ousted by Hun Sen in a July 5-6 coup—as well as with other political parties opposed to Hun Sen.

But Khem Nuon and other new leaders are aware that if they’re going to have any hope of winning Western support, they have to break with the movement’s blood-soaked past. “ The reason we put an end to the Pol Pot regime is because we want the international community to see and help us in our struggle with other movements in order to fight against Hun Sen and the Vietnamese,” Khem Nuon said.

To an international community that equates the Khmer Rouge with genocide, it’s going to be a hard sell. But Khem Nuon says the Khmer Rouge—or, more precisely, Pol Pot’s Democratic Kampuchea Party—no longer exists. The movement is now called the National Solidarity Party.

“ If they still call me Khmer Rouge they haven’t seen what I have just done. I am the one who destroyed Pol Pot, who has been in power for many years,” he said after the group’s longtime leader was publicly denounced. “ Even the United States and the Vietnamese failed to get rid of him, but I can. So how can you call me the Khmer Rouge?”

In an unprecedented admission, he said that “crimes” had been committed during the Khmer Rouge’s nearly four year rule of Cambodia. But even when pressed, he would not go much farther, Blaming individuals rather than the group. “ We do condemn those who have committed crimes, which were not right,” Khem Nuon said. “ At the time I committed no crimes, only Pol Pot and some of his close people. Now they are gone, while Pol Pot is arrested. Some of them have defected to the Vietnamese side, and the rest I don’t know where they are.”

According to Khem Nuon and other Cadres, the movement is now led by a nine-member standing committee that includes only one member of the old guard: Khieu Samphan, the head of the committee, a diplomat who for years has been the public face of the Khmer Rouge. Khem Nuon, who’s aged about 50, is the second-ranking member, but his power is bolstered by his being the top military figure.

Yet Khem Nuon freely acknowledges that older leaders such as Gen. Ta Mok and Nuon Chea, who were key members of the murderous 1975-78 Khmer Rouge regime, still have a say in “all important matters.” Khem Nuon, who did military training in China, is the right-hand-man of the one-legged Ta Mok. “I’m the one who is in charge of the armed forces right now, but I keep consulting him all the time,” he said.

Once Hun Sen is driven out, the National Solidarity party would be happy to participate in democratic elections, Khem Nuon said. Tep Kunnal, another top-ranking standing committee figure, also spoke of liberal democracy as desirable. It seems that the new generation is driven less by communist ideology than by the ultra nationalism that has long under laid politics in a country squeezed between more powerful neighbors.

Khem Nuon claims there are 10,000 guerrillas and 60,000 civilians loyal to the movement around Anlong Veng. “Our movement is pure and clean,” he said. “ I hope the international community will help us.” For starters, he urged, “ Please ask them to stop calling us ‘Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge.’”

 

====================

POL POT: THE END

COVER STORY

Harrowing Tales: Hun Sen’s forces torture and kill former allies

By Nate Thayer in Samrong, Cambodia and Bangkok

Far Eastern Economic Review

August 7, 1997

 

At the jungle hide-out along the Thai-Cambodian border, Gen. Serei Kosal, stuttering and wide-eyed with fear, relates five-days of flight from Phnom Penh through the Cambodian countryside. He was one of the top military officers targeted for arrest by Hun Sen, Cambodia’s second prime minister, who deposed the first prime minister, prince Norodom Ranariddh, in the July 5-6 coup.

Gen. Serei fled the capital on the morning of July 5 by commandeering a military aircraft to the western city of Battambang. From there, he travelled three days by foot with no food until he reached resistance-controlled zones along the Thai border. Claiming 700 troops under his command, he vowed to organize guerrilla war.

He was lucky to have escaped: The coup left scores dead, including two of his fellow generals, and hundreds arrested. Thousands of others are fleeing or in hiding.

“ We need a safe haven to protect our people from killing and arrest,” said Serei, dressed in borrowed shorts and shoeless. “ Hun Sen is hunting down our people, killing them, arresting them. Why hasn’t the world condemned the coup makers and acted in support of democracy and against the dictators?”

His bewilderment is shared by other Ranariddh loyalists who are flocking to north and northwest Cambodia to seek sanctuary and organize guerrilla resistance. They are joined daily in these jungles and remote villages near the Thai border by opposition-party members, journalists, and other civilians. Many relate harrowing tales of witnessing summary executions, atrocities, and the arrest of anyone suspected of affiliation with Ranariddh’s Funcinpec party.

From their accounts and evidence gathered by human rights officials, a grim picture is emerging of torture and summary execution by Hun Sen and his cohorts, many of whom are former Khmer Rouge soldiers who took part in the “killing fields” of the late 1970’s. Equally disturbing are allegations that foreign embassies refused help to Cambodians who feared for their lives in the first days after the coup when many of the killings occurred.

International human rights officials in Phnom Penh say they had confirmed 36 executions by mid-July and were verifying a dozen others. “ We have had many cases of bodies found, hands tied behind their back, with bullets in the head. But sometimes we arrive too late for the bodies and there are only ashes. They are literally incinerating the evidence,” said a senior Western human rights investigator in Phnom Penh. United Nations officials say they know of another 30 Funcinpec supporters who were tortured and forced to drink sewage.

Investigators say at least 617 people have been detained in Phnom Penh and another 271 are known to have been arrested outside the capital. They say the evidence beginning to trickle in is “only the tip of the iceberg,” but includes specific information linking Hun Sen’s top lieutenants to unspeakable acts of torture and murder.

Gen. Chau Sambath, a military advisor to Ranariddh, was captured while trying to flee the capital by motorcycle. According to human rights officials and Cambodian intelligence officers, Sambath was taken to Hun Sen’s personal compound on July 8 where he was tortured, then executed. The sources say his fingernails were pulled off and his tongue ripped out before he was killed by Gen. Him Bun Heang, chief of security for Hun Sen and head of his personal bodyguard. “ They wanted to know the military radio frequencies of Funcinpec leaders, so they tortured him at Hun Sen’s house,” said a senior Cambodian military intelligence officer. “ They pulled his tongue out of his head with pliers when he wouldn’t talk.”

Another Funcinpec general, secretary of state at the Ministry of Interior Ho Sok, was executed on the grounds of the ministry by the bodyguards of National Police Chief Gen. Hok Lundy, a loyalist of Hun Sen. According to Amnesty International, Ho Sok was arrested “ while attempting to find a country that would give him asylum.” He had taken refuge at the embassy of an Asean country, but was expelled at the request of Hun Sen’s aides and arrested as he drove to the luxury Cambodiana hotel, where many foreigners and Funcinpec officials had fled in the days after the coup. A Ministry of Interior spokesman confirmed the killing, saying it was done by “people who were angry with him.”

At least five bodyguards of Gen. Nyek Bun Chhay, the commander of Funcinpec forces, had their eyes gouged out while they were under interrogation, then executed, according to Western human rights officials and Cambodian military sources. After 14 days of flight through the countryside Nyek Bun Chhay has since arrived at the jungle headquarters and commands the resistance army.

Hundreds have already arrived in Thailand, including scores of Funcinpec officials, at least 24 members of parliament, journalists associated with independent newspapers, and officials of other political parties.

“The soldiers came to my house with rocket launchers looking for my steering committee members, putting their pictures on TV and posted in military offices,” said Sam Rainsy, Cambodia’s most prominent opposition politician and head of the Khmer Nation party. “ There is a campaign to destroy the KNP. The soldiers told people at my office ‘ We will not even let a baby asleep in a hammock stay alive.’ This is real Khmer Rouge language We cannot operate anymore. Democracy is finished.” More than 1000 of his party workers are now amassed at a jungle encampment along the Thai border under the protection of Funcinpec troops still loyal to Ranariddh.

“Killing and repression are going on on a very large scale. Hun Sen is a murderous prime minister,” Ranariddh told the REVIEW in Bangkok on July 20. “ I hope that the U.S. congress will call for a cessation of all aid to Hun Sen.”

But international condemnation of the coup has been decidedly muted, with the major donor countries still considering whether to support a government controlled by Hun Sen. If he maintains a credible coalition by co-opting ministers from Ranariddh’s Funcinpec party, he may win that support.

The ambivalence of major Western governments was foreshadowed by the reaction of their embassies in Phnom Penh during the coup—a response that has been criticized bitterly by Cambodian and human rights officials. They say the American and Australian embassies refused entry to Cambodian government officials who sought refuge on embassy grounds. The U.S. embassy also “flatly refused” requests of political asylum for some members of parliament or to issue them with emergency visas.

“We begged visas from Western embassies. We begged them to open their gates for people who were clearly targeted for persecution, and the Americans, the Australians, flatly said no,” said a foreign human rights official in Phnom Penh. “ These are the embassies who have pushed people to exercise their rights, have said they supported human rights and free expression and opposition politics, but when these very values are trampled upon and those who exercised their  rights were targeted, they did nothing to help.”

American embassy sources said they had no clearance from Washington to offer political asylum and claim they were not approached directly by any Cambodians for sanctuary on embassy grounds.

The U.S. also set up a sanctuary on the grounds of the Cambodiana hotel in downtown Phnom Penh during the fighting that raged in the city. Some Cambodian parliamentarians who have since fled the country said they were denied access to the sanctuary in the hotel’s ballroom. The correspondent for Voice of America, Cambodian citizen Som Sattana, was refused access to the ballroom by embassy personnel, despite having received death threats, according to human rights workers. He has since left the country.

“We set up a U.S. embassy reception centre at the Cambodiana hotel early on Sunday (July 6) for American citizens,” said an embassy spokeswoman, who added: “ We were not open for visas during the fighting.”

The able to flee are regrouping in newly formed resistance zones in northern Cambodia. Several thousand heavily armed troops backed by tanks and artillery control a swath of territory across several provinces abutting the Thai border, including the contested northwestern provincial capital of Samrong.

Hundreds of Funcinpec members, exhausted from days of trekking across the country to reach Funcinpec-controlled areas, spoke of being hunted by Hun Sen’s forces. “ They are arresting people in their houses, in the jungle, along the road—anybody they think works for Funcinpec,” said Sok Nuon, a policeman who fled from Kampong Chhnang province.

Gen. Long Sereirath, formerly deputy commander of the 5th Military Region in the north, fought his way out of Siem Riep city four days after the coup. He said he went without food for three days before reaching Samrong. “ We will blow up key bridges to keep them from coming north with artillery,” he said, but added that his forces were desperately low on ammunition.

His commander, Lt. Gen. Khan Savouen, who is now leading resistance forces, appealed for foreign assistance from his front-line command post near national Route 6 in Siem Riep province.” We will fight even if we don’t get foreign assistance,” he said, surrounded by Russian T-54 tanks, armoured personnel carriers, heavy artillery and anti-aircraft guns. Heavy fighting raged a few kilometers away and his position was overrun the day after the REVIEW interviewed him.

 

POL POT: THE END

COVER STORY

DUBIOUS DONOR

Money man: Theng Bunma sent cash and gold for Hun Sen’s coup

By Nate Thayer

Far Eastern Economic Review

August 7, 1997

How much does it take to buy a coup? In Cambodia, the going rate seems to be $1 million. Suspected drug baron Theng Bunma said he gave that much in cash and gold to Second Prime Minister Hun Sen to fund the putsch which toppled co-premier Norodom Ranariddh.

“For the clash of 6^th of July, 1997, I called Mr. Hun Sen and I talked to him. I gave him $1 million dollars to do whatever to control the situation,” said Bunma in an interview with Australian Channel 7 television.” He asked me if I had the money. I said no, but I would send 100 kilograms of gold in a plane into Cambodia.’ In return for his generosity, Bunma, reputed to be Cambodia’s richest businessman, enjoyed a perk of being a big-time coup financier: More than 300 hundred of Hun Sen’s troops, backed by tanks, were dispatched to protect Bunma’s property during the coup.

“ I say what the second prime minister did was correct. Why? One reason, take the example of my hotel. The other side wanted to destroy it, the government put three tanks and soldiers around to protect it,” he said. Asked whether Bunma had given the government the money, Cambodian Secretary of State for Information Khieu Kanharith replied:” Why would he give us a million dollars? I do not know what we are supposed to do with this money—it’s nothing, we need $100 million to finance the redevelopment of the whole country.”

Bunma also said he gave $50,000 dollars each to three leaders of a renegade faction of Ranariddh’s Funcinpec party “to encourage them”—Siem Riep governor Toan Chhay, Banteay Meanchey provincial governor Duong Khem and Minister of State Ung Phan.

The tycoon has denied allegations by the United States that he is involved in heroin trafficking.

Cambodia: Asia’s New Narco-State? Medellin on the Mekong By Nate Thayer

Cambodia: Asia’s New Narco-State?

Far Eastern Economic Review

COVER STORY (Three story package below)

 23 Nov 1995

Has Cambodia become a mafia state? Nate Thayer reports that in the two years since UN-run elections, criminal syndicates protected by high-ranking have turned the country into a major centre for heroin trafficking and money laundering. Doubly disturbing, some of the same military units accused of killing government opponents are implicated in drug smuggling and other crimes. Western aid donor countries are alarmed. Also: A profile of Theng Bunma, a businessman who has bestowed millions of dollars on the Cambodian regime.

(Authors note: The Review and I were sued by Theng Bunma for this story and I was forced to leave Cambodia for a short while because of serious threats to my life as a consequence of its publication. The U.S, government refused to go on the record that they had identified Bunma as an organized crime figure and drug trafficker, despite innumerable U.S. sources privately, in detail, saying he was. Thailand and Hong Kong, after publication of the below stories, both banned him from entry to their countries and issues criminal warrants for his arrest. Over drinks one night, in what will remain an unnamed remote Asian country, I was expressing frustration to a resident American diplomat at the U.S. refusal to acknowledge publicly Bunma’s status as banned from entry to the U.S. having been formally designated a drug trafficker. I was being sued by Bunma at the time causing considerable distraction. The diplomat responded: “Fuck that. Come to the embassy tomorrow morning. I’ll give you the documents.” I told him I wanted them to give to the Hong Kong court and he—the diplomat-- would be technically committing treason by giving me the classified documents. “Fuck it. You are a U.S. citizen. It is my job to protect American citizens.” I carried with me at the time a copy of Bunma’s Cambodian diplomat and civilian passport as well as his Thai passport under an alias. The next morning, I arrived at the embassy and the very accommodating American diplomat took the passport numbers, punched them into a computer, and up came Bunma’s classified designation as banned from entry to the U.S. based on his designation under two U.S. Immigration criminal classifications: (1) drug trafficker, and (2) “Undesirable person”—which often refers to an organized crime figure. “Which documents would you like?” asked the diplomat. “All of them,” I answered. He pushed print and out spit a U.S. government document, on embassy letterhead, stating Bunma was banned from entry to the U.S. that would appear on any immigration computer on entry to the United States. I turned it over to my lawyers, who turned it over to the Hong Kong court, who turned it over to Bunma’s lawyers. They dropped the lawsuit. I then wrote a follow up story based on the document and the Review printed a graphic photocopy of the official U.S. government document to emphasize the point.  End of story)

CAMBODIA: Medellin on the Mekong:

 

The UN spent $3 billion to lay the foundation for peace and democracy in Cambodia. Now the country's fragile democratic institutions are being subverted by the wealth of drug lords. The REVIEW's Phnom Penh correspondent, Nate Thayer, researched these stories over a four-month period in Cambodia, Thailand, Hong Kong, France and the United States.

It wasn't your typical diplomatic luncheon. In February 1994, U.S. Ambassador Charles Twining invited Cambodian Finance Minister Sam Rainsy and another senior official to dine at his residence in Phnom Penh. Leading them into the living room, Twining turned up the music and lowered his voice.

Then, according to Rainsy, Twining asked him to convey a message to Prime Minister Norodom Ranariddh: "Please tell Ranariddh not to get involved with Theng Bunma because we Americans have evidence that Theng Bunma is involved in drug trafficking." The other Cambodian official confirms the account.

The United States ambassador had just named Cambodia's wealthiest businessman, but the allegation didn't shock his listeners. Western governments, international law-enforcement officials and Cambodian sources say businessmen engaged in criminal activities have amassed immense power in Cambodia in the two-and-a-half years since United Nations-run elections. Protected by senior government officials, they've turned Cambodia into a major centre for drug trafficking, money laundering and smuggling.

Although Theng Bunma denies any wrongdoing (see story on page 27), his company has been fined at least twice since 1993 for attempting to smuggle gold and other goods into Cambodia. Yet Bunma holds a Cambodian diplomatic passport issued in January that identifies him as special adviser to National Assembly President Chea Sim. He's a benefactor of both prime ministers: He paid $1.8 million in August 1993 for Ranariddh's Kingair-200 plane and gave Second Prime Minister Hun Sen the Mercedes limousine that ferries him to official functions. He even helped underwrite the 1994 state budget with interest-free loans of several million
dollars--effectively funding the dry-season offensive against the Khmer Rouge, the REVIEW has learned.

Cambodia is a place where, one American official charges, criminal syndicates "are using government planes, helicopters, military trucks, navy boats, and soldiers to transport heroin." Doubly disturbing, some of the same military units involved in drug trafficking have been implicated in political violence, pointing to dangerously close links between crime syndicates and political figures.

The allegations have far-reaching implications for Cambodia, which receives 44% of its $410 million annual budget in aid from Western donor countries. U.S. officials told the REVIEW that Cambodia will join 29 other countries on the Major Narcotics Country list in coming weeks, which could lead to a cut-off of aid.

France has already put Phnom Penh on notice that unless top officers it believes are involved in crime syndicates are removed from the national military police it will stop aiding the force. Australia, meanwhile, is worried by evidence that the navy--which it is assisting--is directly
involved in shipping heroin.

The revelations could cause additional embarrassment to U.S. diplomats, whose government has officially made the fight against drug trafficking a top foreign-policy priority. In late April, Twining's embassy issued a visa to Theng Bunma--the same businessman the ambassador had alleged to be a drug smuggler. Bunma visited the U.S. as part of a delegation headed by Chea Sim, who was acting head of state.

Asked whether he had informed Rainsy of U.S. suspicions about Theng Bunma, Twining said: "We don't comment about confidential conversations with a host government." But his employer, the U.S. State Department, has publicly voiced its worries about Cambodia. In a report on narcotics and Cambodia issued in March, it said "involvement of some leading businessmen with access to the highest levels of government is a known concern. We are not aware of any prosecutions for narcotics-related corruption. There are indications that some high-level military officials and powerful businessmen who give financial support to politicians are
involved in heroin smuggling."

Cambodian sources, international law-enforcement officials and diplomats say numerous senior military and police officers are involved in transporting heroin through Cambodia or protecting the traffic. The drug, originating in the Burmese segment of the Golden Triangle, arrives by
land from Thailand and Laos, or aboard small boats from Thailand. Then most of it is shipped out of Cambodia through ports in the southwestern province of Koh Kong, destined mainly for the U.S. About a third departs through Phnom Penh's Pochentong airport, often destined for Europe.

"It is clear that Cambodia is a new and rapidly increasing trafficking route," says Bengt Juhlin, deputy head of the UN International Drug Control Project regional office in Bangkok. He points to the absence of an effective legal system, lack of resources to combat drug smuggling, and
official corruption. "The presence of the three makes Cambodia very vulnerable."

An added attraction for international criminals is the ease of laundering money in Cambodia. A confidential report prepared this year for the Interior Ministry says that 19 of Phnom Penh's 29 banks are suspected of being fronts for cleaning tainted cash. As the BCCI scandal showed a
few years ago, crooked banks pose a special risk to the international financial system. But it doesn't take a bank to launder--in Cambodia's cash economy, it's easy to unload dirty dollars at restaurants, nightclubs, luxury-goods dealerships and the casino.

"Cambodia is now a mafia state because there are a group of businessmen who consider themselves above the law, who have infiltrated all spheres, all aspects of government, the judiciary, the parliament," says Rainsy, who was sacked from his government post in September 1994 and has just formed an opposition political party. "These people--these politicians--are at least protecting and at worst working for the mafia."

It's a sinister symbiosis. When the influence of crime bosses permeates the apparatus of state, then elements of the security forces can become their tools. Critics say that's happening in Cambodia, compounding the climate of fear created by the government's increasingly heavy-handed treatment of its political opponents. In fact, the two units most frequently cited in connection with political violence and other human-rights abuses--the Defence Ministry's intelligence force and the national military police--are also deeply implicated in smuggling and other crimes, according to international law-enforcement officials and diplomats (see
story on page 30).

That means those who highlight the links between crime bosses and government officials are doubly at risk. In August, after Phnom Penh's popular Morning News published reports about military complicity in heroin smuggling, a hand grenade was thrown in the house of the paper's publisher.

A year earlier, the editor of The Voice of Khmer Youth was shot dead at midday at a busy Phnom Penh intersection. The attack came just days after the newspaper published a detailed biography of Theng Bunma, accusing him of heading a large criminal syndicate whose activities included drug trafficking.

"Cambodia is now like Noriega in Panama. Nobody dares to speak out because they will be killed," says a senior officer in one of Cambodia's security services.

Police Gen. Nouen Souer, the former head of the national police anti-drug unit, is one of the few Cambodian officials to have spoken out publicly about government corruption and the drug trade. After his remarks were published in an August newspaper interview, he received death threats. He has been silent since then.

In the August interview, though, Souer claimed that 600 kilograms of heroin a week were coming through Phnom Penh. "I knew about this, but I couldn't do anything," he said. "The smugglers are rich and have high-ranking officials behind them." Asked who the high-ranking officials were, he replied: "I can't tell you or I will die."

Cambodian sources, international law-enforcement officials and diplomats name several wealthy and well-connected Cambodian businessmen as suspected heads of criminal syndicates. But none is better connected than Theng Bunma, a master at playing both sides of the fence.

In addition to bestowing gifts on the prime ministers, the magnate was linked to a failed July 1994 coup that attempted to shore up the power of some former communist officials who were being marginalized under the new regime. Cambodian and Thai officials say the 33 Thai nationals implicated in the coup plot arrived in Phnom Penh on air tickets booked by Bunma's holding company, the Thai Boon Roong Group. The invoice remains unpaid, however, and Bunma contends the order was unauthorized.

Until this year, Bunma seemed to be content to operate from behind a veil of enforced silence. But on October 15, he was elected president of the Cambodian Chamber of Commerce by a vote of 21-1. That shocked Western donor countries, who were well aware of Bunma's unsavory reputation. "This time they went too far," one Western ambassador in Phnom Penh quoted his U.S. colleague, Twining, as saying.

Twining's discomfort was understandable. His embassy had issued Bunma a visa so he could visit the U.S. in May as part of Chea Sim's delegation. That was 15 months after Twining's warning to Rainsy.

Twining and other U.S. officials refused to comment publicly on why suspected drug traffickers were issued visas, but one U.S. embassy source defends the decision: "We had no firm proof, only suspicions," he says.

But other U.S. government sources close to the issue reject that defence. "The decision was mainly political. We did not want to force a confrontation with a government that we have good relations with," says one official.

When several Thai MPs were put on the U.S. immigration "watch list" last year, barring them from entering the country because of suspected links to drug trafficking, the diplomatic and political fallout was heavy. Yet this time, the effort by diplomats to avoid controversy may have backfired.

To start with, letting suspected Cambodian drug traffickers into the U.S. appears to directly contradict post-Cold War U.S. foreign policy, which calls for "public diplomacy" to expose foreign officials who participate in or protect international crimes such as drug trafficking.

"It is in the drug trade's interest to remain behind the scenes working through corrupt government officials who can maintain a facade of probity and respectability. One of the best ways to routing out drug corruption is to expose it to public scrutiny," says the U.S. Government Narcotics Control Strategy report released by the State Department in March. "Corruption is a threat to any nation's security, for it allows criminal elements to undermine the legitimacy of the State from within."

When Chea Sim came to the U.S., his delegation's rooms at the Willard Intercontinental Hotel in Washington on May 8-10 were reserved and paid for in the name of Theng Bunma.

Chea Sim dined with U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Winston Lord, had talks with National Security Council officials, and met Sen. John McCain of Arizona and Rep. Dana Rohrabacher of California, according to his official schedule prepared by the State Department. Teng Bunma didn't accompany Chea Sim on his official rounds in Washington, but Rohrabacher was incensed when he learned afterwards that U.S. officials suspected a member of the Cambodian delegation of involvement in the drug trade.

"If Chea Sim was accompanied to the United States by major drug dealers, I would be very upset. Not only upset with the drug dealers, but upset with my own government for not tipping me off," says the congressman, who met Chea Sim on May 10. "The Cold War is over. We have no more excuse to turn a blind eye to this kind of behavior by governments."

President Bill Clinton seems to agree. In a speech marking the 50th anniversary of the UN, he announced that the U.S. was identifying and putting on notice countries that tolerate laundering of drug money, and threatened economic sanctions against governments that failed to crack down.

"President Clinton's speech . . . represents a significant new conception of U.S. foreign policy," Zoe Baird, a member of the president's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, wrote on October 25. "The U.S. may stop supporting a leader who is tolerant of a drug cartel though it
previously supported him because he was a staunch anti-communist. The U.S. may risk embarrassing or destabilizing a government that is weak in rooting out--or protects--terrorists or organized crime."

The Cambodian government protests that it is doing what it can to fight crime. On September 15, it set up a special committee chaired by the prime ministers to combat drug-related crimes. Already, it says it's "closely cooperating with international organizations--such as the UN and  Interpol and with countries such as the U.S. and France--in implementing measure aimed at ferreting out and apprehending criminals, seizing drugs and sending them to the court."

But unless concrete results are visible soon, it may be too late to protect U.S. aid to Cambodia. American officials say it's only a matter of weeks before Cambodia is placed on the Major Narcotics Country list. Once that happens, U.S. law will require that Phnom Penh demonstrate that it has "taken legal and law-enforcement measures to prevent and punish public corruption--especially by senior government officials--that facilitates the production, processing or shipment of narcotic drugs, or that discourages investigation or prosecution of such acts."

If Cambodia cannot satisfy these terms, the U.S. is obliged to consider halting most forms of bilateral assistance, and voting against multilateral assistance programmes such as those of the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the Asian Development Bank--the financial lifeblood of the Cambodian government.

In several cases, countries that failed to meet the criteria were issued U.S. "national-interest waivers" by the White House, sparing them from the full force of sanctions. But Cambodia, which lacks the strategic importance of a country like Pakistan, could conceivably end up on a short list of the countries that have been "decertified" by the U.S: Afghanistan, Burma, Iran, Syria and Nigeria. That would give it virtual outlaw status.

"You don't want to be on that list," says one U.S. official. "Its significance is the loss of assistance, but it's also political. It's like being on the terrorist list."

 

 (Story two)

Sugar Daddy

Businessman emerges as pillar of the regime

 

His name is a household word to Cambodians, from noodle vendors to civil servants. It is synonymous with wealth and power on the streets of Phnom Penh. “In Khmer, we say ‘He makes the rain, he makes the thunder’,” says a senior Cambodian official. “Everybody knows that Theng Bun Ma can do what he wants.”

Theng Bun Ma, a 54-year-old ethnic Chinese, is Cambodia’s richest businessman. But his aura of power doesn’t come from his October 15 election as president of the Cambodian Chamber of Commerce—it comes from his close connection to the country’s political and military elite.

With interests ranging from cigarette distributorship to a casino, Bunma’s company, the Thai Boon Roong Group, is Cambodia’s biggest taxpayer. But he has also showered the leadership with gifts and even helped underwrite the military budget.

Clearly, Bunma has come a long way from the eastern province of Kampong Cham, where he started out as a driver’s assistant on a rural bus line and moved into small trading. “I was young, then I traded rice and ran buses,” he said in a rare interview with a Phnom Penh journalist, “I had contact with Thai’s selling beans, sugar, cement.”

That wasn’t all he traded, according to a detailed biography published in a Phnom Penh newspaper in August 1994. The Voice of Khmer Youth alleges that in 1972, Bunma was arrested in the western city of Battambang, when he tried to smuggle 20 kilos of opium in from Thailand under the hood of his car.

Sentenced to twenty years in prison, Bunma bribed a guard and escaped, it charged. “Using a bamboo stalk as a ladder, he crawled out a prison window (and)…hid in a rice loft. The court issued an arrest warrant for Bunma. From this point on, Bunma took refuge at the Khmer-Thai border,” the newspaper said.

Less than a week after the newspaper printed the biography, its editor was gunned down by men in military uniform in broad daylight on a busy Phnom Penh street. No one has been arrested for the murder.

Bunma said he moved to Thailand in 1972 simply because Khmer Rouge guerrillas were disrupting trade. Whatever the reason for the move, Bunma received a Thai citizenship card on July 8, 1975. The next month he registered Thai Boon Roong as an import-export company with capital of $100,000. “I did business through waterways using ships to transport goods to sell in Vietnam,” Bunma said in the interview.

It was a tumultuous time to be trading with Vietnam, where the south had just fallen to the communists. The Voice of Khmer Youth report said that Bunma used boats to smuggle everything from palm oil to tobacco into the country, returning with Vietnamese girls and well-off Sino-Vietnamese refugees.

Smuggling made Bunma a rich man, the newspaper said. That charge incenses the tycoon, who prepared for the October interview by having an aide tape a patch of traditional Chinese medicine to his chest. “You’ll be asking questions so I am putting this patch on for fear that my energy is not strong enough,” he said. “My heart is not strong.”

Then he lashed out at public accusation that “I am mafia, that I deal in drugs.” Bunma said he made his fortune during the Thai property boon of the 1980’s. “Can the people who do dirty business be equal to me? I sold a piece of land on Sukhumvit (in Bangkok), which I’d bought for $400 million, and I sold it for than $800 million. I bought another piece of land, also in Thailand, for $100 million and I sold it for $470 million. Do people dealing in drugs make that much money?”

Bunma didn’t explain, however, where the initial capital came from. Nor did Thai Boon Roong’s move into real-estate mean an end to smuggling: Cambodian customs officers have fined the company at least twice in recent years for illegally importing goods: One incident in 1993 involved 104 kilograms of gold.

Bunma, who is managing director of the Thai Boon Roong group, said it was a desire to “reconstruct the Khmer nation” that made him one of the first major investors in Cambodia after the country started opening up in 1992. Actually, Bunma was already trading with Cambodia on a massive scale by the late 1980’s, and he helped the army meet its payroll when Soviet and Vietnamese aid ended.

In the early 1990’s, he snapped up hundreds of hectares of property in Phnom Penh and the deep-water port of Sihanoukville. When the government began privatizing its assets, He became a major contributor to the formerly communist ruling party, the Cambodian People’s Party, in the run-up to the 1993 UN-run elections.

Bunma now has major stakes in a wide range of legitimate businesses in Cambodia, including the Mekong bank, the Holiday International casino, the Regency Park hotel-office complex, a daily newspaper and a plywood factory. Thai Boon Roong is partnered with Intercontinental Hotels in building Phnom Penh” first five-star hotel. It also has exclusive distribution rights for Jet brand Indonesian cigarettes in Indochina; business associates say the monopoly nets at least $4 million a month on sales of 100,000 cases.

In the interview, Bunma also talked about owning three Boeing 737 aircraft and “49 pieces of land in Thailand, but I have not had time to construct.”

Bunma’s business skills have earned him his share of admirers. Says one Overseas Chinese Businessman in Phnom Penh: “he keeps his word. There is not a lot of paperwork in the traditional Chinese way of doing business, and he always pays his bills.”

Says another associate: “He is a very shy person, quiet, dignified. There is a physical presence, but he doesn’t swagger. For what it is worth, he is a very doting grandfather.”

One Asian intelligence agency, which has an extensive file on Bunma, mentions that he suffers from diabetes. He speaks Khmer, Thai, and Chinese, but no European languages.

“He is very demanding—he only eats dishes prepared by his wife,” said the newspaper biography. He has been married twice and has ten children—eight sons and two daughters. One son is the director of the Mekong bank; the other runs Sharaton Hotel in Phnom Penh, which houses the casino.

The casino business is perhaps most emblematic of the man, who used to spend his free time gambling on card games even as a small-time trader in sleepy Battambang. Now, according to an Asian intelligence official, “every time he gambles it’s not less than $1 million.”

 

(Story three)

The Storm Troopers

Abuses prompt donor countries to reconsider aid

It wasn’t exactly a clean getaway. When confronted by Phnom Penh’s anti-drug squad early this year, a gang of suspected heroin traffickers opened fire on police and to sanctuary inside a compound belonging to military intelligence on the western edge of the capital.

Was that a sign that the Cambodian Defence Ministry’s feared intelligence force was abandoning its security role for more lucrative pursuits? No, apparently it was just diversifying: On July 13, dissident politician Sam Rainsy’s bodyguards were dragged to the same compound, where they were beaten and threatened.

Diplomats, international law-enforcement officials and human-rights advocates who monitor Cambodia say a disturbing pattern has emerged: The same military and police units responsible for violence against opponents of the government are also the most deeply implicated in criminal activities. These include military intelligence and the national military police, or gendarmerie.

The way crime permeates the apparatus of state is problematic for Western aid donors. It is particularly awkward for France, which is aiding the military police. French officials say they notified the Phnom Penh government in October that unless the commander of the military police—Gen. Kien Savuth—is purged, France will halt its multimillion- dollar programme to train and equipt the force.

Formed during the 1979-1989 Vietnamese occupation and still essentially controlled by the same men, military intelligence and the military police both adapted quickly to life after communism after the signing of the 1991 Cambodian peace agreement. “From the very beginning, these people, in addition to arresting, held people for ransom,” says a former top official of the United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia (Untac), which organized the 1993 elections. “They have been involved in both extortion arrests and political arrests.”

Untac documents implicate the current head of military intelligence, Maj-Gen. Chhum Socheat, in a number of incidents of political intimidation and violence during the run-up to the 1993 election, including the abduction and execution of four opposition-party activists in Battambang, in western Cambodia.

Military intelligence troops have been enforcing a reign of terror in western Cambodia since at least 1991, according to a 1994 report from the UN Centre for Human Rights. The confidential UN report said intelligence units were “making use of wide and uncontrolled powers they enjoy in the province to arrest, detain, interrogate, torture, and execute to carry out, concurrently to their military intelligence work, more lucrative activities.”

Socheat was responsible for the 5^th military region, which covers western Cambodia, at the time.

One UN official assigned to investigate a murder committed by senior military intelligence officers, vented his frustration with their impunity in a March 13, 1993 memo to his superiors: “Is someone going to escape going to trial for cold-blooded murder merely because he is a high-level military figure?” he said. “If so, this Human Rights Officer would prefer someone else tell the sister of the victim.”

The record of the military police, which answers directly to the two prime Ministers, isn’t much better. From 1985 through 1993, Gen. Kien Savuth’s 820-man unit was responsible for Phnom Penh’s security. It was called in by the Prime Minister to put down anti-corruption demonstrations in December 1991. According to the former top Untac official, the unit was directly “implicated in the killings of unarmed demonstrators during the unrest” and “was responsible for numerous cases of ill-treatment of peasants” during other operations.

“because of its record, recommendations were made during the Untac period that it be made among the first units to be demobilized because its very existence was antithetical to the creation of a neutral political environment,” the former official says.

Instead, the unit survived the Untac period and was transformed into a military police force after the election. In October, the gendarmes were used to break up an opposition-party meeting that had been banned by Hun Sen. Earlier, grenades were thrown and more than 30 opposition officials and supporters were hurt.

The nationwide networks of military intelligence and military police give them the means to traffic contraband, Nguon Pen, deputy governor of Stung Treng province, charged in September that planes controlled by the military were flying heroin from the province, which borders Laos, to Phnom Penh. “Who can fight them if some of the crimes are committed by those in the army themselves,” he said.

Military intelligence’s Gen. Socheat and the gendarmerie’s Gen. Savuth have something else in common: links to powerful businessmen. Uniformed and plainclothes gendarmes guard Theng Bunma’s residence in Phnom Penh, and also handle security at the Holiday International casino, which Bunma controls.

In February 1994, gendarmes forcibly evicted hundreds of families from a property owned by Bunma near Phnom Penh and slated for development. Gen. Savuth personally directed the operation, during which scores of villagers were beaten, one child shot to death, and one man taken into custody and executed, according to foreign human-rights investigators.

A record like that has made France balk. “We have officially told the Cambodian government already that if Gen. Kien Savuth is not dismissed, removed as head of the military police, we will not support them anymore. We will be forced to halt our gendarme programme,” a senior French official in Phnom Penh told the REVIEW. “We know very well the truth about this man. We cannot continue to support him.”

Australia, another key donor country in Cambodia, is faced with a similar dilemma. Much of Australia’s military assistance programme is focused on helping Cambodia rebuild its navy. But law enforcement officials say some elements at the navy are deeply involved in criminal syndicates, using naval vessels to transport or protect shipments of heroin and marijuana. “We are very disturbed by some of what we know,” says an Australian official in Phnom Penh.

Cambodia’s main drug export route is the southwestern coastal province of Koh Kong, where former navy chief Adm. Tea Vinh, the younger brother of Defence Minister Tea Banh, wields immense influence. A foreign narcotics official says that since 1991 “our intelligence began picking up four to six shipments a year” of high-grade refined heroin through Koh Kong, with each shipment weighing at least 300 kilograms. That is probably just the tip of the iceberg, he adds. “The only thing hampering them is the weather.”

Not that there isn’t the occasional raid. A combined force of police and customs officials swooped down on a speedboat off Koh Kong on August 11, seizing 71 kilograms of heroin. But two of the arrested smugglers were cops, who quickly fingered their superior officer. “The province of Koh Kong is completely under the control of the mafia,” charges a senior Cambodian government official. “Virtually the entire political structure is involved in illegal activities.’

 

Frantic calls from Regent's Rm 406-Cambodian coup 1994 By Nate Thayer

Frantic calls from Regent's Rm 406

Phnom Penh Post

By Nate Thayer

Friday, 15 July 1994

The Post's Nate Thayer describes how he shared Prince Chakrapong's final hours in Cambodia after receiving a dramatic 6:30 am phone call.

Loyalist troops had taken positions throughout the capital on the night of July 2 as rumors swept the city that a coup attempt was imminent. Heavily armed soldiers were positioned outside the homes of government leaders and military installations by dark, and the children of senior officials were ordered to stay out of the city nightclubs.

Officials confirmed "there will be trouble tonight" and spoke of a coup attempt.

At 3:00 am government forces surrounded the houses of the alleged putsch leaders, who they named as former Interior Minister Sin Song and former Deputy Prime Minister Prince Norodom Chakrapong.

Their houses were invaded, and weapons and communication equipment seized. Sin Song was arrested and allegedly confessed to his role in launching a coup. Chakrapong had fled his house hours before security forces arrived.

At 6:30 am a call to this reporter said "call this number" and hung up. A jittery voice answered after I dialed the mobile phone. "This is Prince Chakrapong. Please, please help me," he said in a frightened broken whisper, "Come right away to the Regent hotel. They have surrounded me. They are trying to kill me."

In the 20 minutes it took for me to arrive, the Prince called me seven times begging for me to come quickly. "I am alone. Please, before they kill me, come now. Call the American Embassy and tell them my life is in danger."

He was obviously hoping that a foreign presence might prevent the security forces from harming him.

Government troops and security forces armed with machine guns, rocket launchers, and carrying walkie talkies were positioned on the street corners and entrance ways around the hotel near Monivong Boulevard when I arrived on the otherwise quiet early Sunday morning. But no one tried to stop me, probably thinking I was a hotel guest.

Inside, hotel workers, white with fear, stared blankly in response to my inquiry of where the alleged coup leader was staying. But maids hovering in an upstairs hallway, opened Room 401.

A disheveled, barefoot, and petrified son of King Sihanouk was found emerging from a crawl space above the ceiling of his hotel room, begging for help.

"Please, they are trying to arrest me. They will kill me. I am innocent. Please tell the American Ambassador to come right away. I need protection," the wide-eyed Prince said, near tears, and jittery from lack of sleep. He was alone. The bed was still made, and the curtains were drawn. A ceiling panel was removed revealing a small dark crawl space. A chair was under it to allow one to climb up. He said troops had been surrounding him since 3:00 am.

"I hear the rumor that I plan to make a coup d'etat. I am innocent. I have nothing in my hands. I have no political influence now. I have no troops," he said. "Please don't leave me."

So began a four-and-a-half-hour drama that, after scores of frantic phone calls and negotiations, ended with the Prince being whisked to the airport by military escort and forcibly exiled via a scheduled Malaysia Airlines flight to Kuala Lumpur.

Frightened hotel staff hovered in hallways and peeked out of rooms in the otherwise completely silent hotel.

Realizing that there was no press or diplomats aware of the developments, and I was alone with a hunted, hated alleged coup plotter. Surrounded by troops clearly prepared to invade, I opted to rent my own room down the hall, with a better view of the troops, street, and hotel entrance way.

I went downstairs to the front desk asked for Room 406 and handed over cash. The desk clerk stared with a furrowed brow look of fear and alarm, said nothing, and handed me the key.

I thought that it might diminish the incentive of the troops outside to act precipitously if I was in a room rented under my own name, and buy time to interview the Prince. The Prince thought it was a great idea and came over to Room 406.

I made a quiet call to senior government contacts and diplomats informing them of the situation, hoping that they would get the message to the troops downstairs - quickly.

My phone rang a few minutes later, saying that Co-Prime Minister Ranariddh was aware I was with the man who allegedly was trying to topple his government and assassinate top officials.

The three mobile phones in my room rang constantly. More than 40 calls came in within the first two hours, as Chakrapong desperately tried to delay the troops from arresting him, and attempted to convince US Ambassador Charles Twining to give him political asylum.

Chakrapong repeatedly denied to me that he was involved in any coup attempt, cursed the leaders of the government, begged for my help and asked me not to leave him if the troops invaded.

He fielded phone calls constantly on his two phones, often listening silently and hanging up, speaking in English, French, and Khmer.

King Norodom Sihanouk rang from Beijing. "I am alright Papa, but the situation is bad. They have surrounded me," he said at one point.

As more calls came in he broke down and again moist-eyed. He looked dejected as Queen Norodom Monineath Sihanouk kept him up to date from Beijing with the state of her negotiations with government leaders over allowing him exile.

"It is not the Queen, but as my parents. It is not politics, it is as a son," he told me when asked whether King Sihanouk and Queen Monineath supported him.

For the first two hours, he was in fear of his life, convinced that if arrested he would be killed.

"They tell me that if we criticize the government, we are serving the interests of the Khmer Rouge. If I am arrested, the embassies must stay with me, to keep looking for me. Please don't let them take me anywhere. Please don't leave me alone," he said to me.

The Prince asked me to contact the US Embassy to request political asylum. I give him the mobile telephone number of the US Ambassador Charles Twining. He calls and Twining is put on the phone. "I ask your protection, your excellency. It is a human right. If you don't come to protect me I prefer not to go outside. I prefer to die here. I will stay here in the room. How can I trust them if they bring me somewhere?", he says to Twining.

Prince Chakrapong's face shows that the American Ambassadors response is not positive. "Please your excellency, if they bring me outside, if they arrest me, they will kill me."

Chakrapong hung up from Twining and went to look outside. The street was quiet save for troops standing guard. "Twining says 'you are not an American citizen, we cannot help you,' " he said.

"They say this is a liberal democracy," staring from behind the curtain down at the soldiers, "They are silencing all opposition now. We will all be accused of serving the interests of the Khmer Rouge. The whole world must know that this regime accuses me without proof. If the free world helps this regime it is the end of democracy."

Another American diplomat called my phone: "Tell Chakrapong he is not a US citizen. As long as the government proceeds in a legal fashion regarding his human rights, there is nothing we can do to interfere in a sovereign government."

But the American message of rejection of official protection was clear.

Crying young hotel maids burst into the room at one point: "The soldiers are coming. They are inside now."

A disheveled Prince - barefoot, shirt unbuttoned, sleepless, and dejected-began to put on his shoes. He handed me his wallet and mobile telephones and asked me to give them to his daughters. "Please make sure my daughters are alright. The soldiers invaded my house last night and they were there."

But the soldiers didn't come in. And the phones rang incessantly, sometimes three at the same time. At one point, Chakrapong had King Sihanouk on the line in one hand, and Twining on the other.

The Queen was still negotiating for safe passage out of the country.

Finally Prime Minister Ranariddh - Chakrapong's nemesis and half brother - agreed to allow the Prince to leave the country. "If I am allowed to join my family in Malaysia, I will accept," he said at one point.

By 10 am we saw Twining, other diplomats, and press begin to gather on the street, to the great relief of the Prince.

"I have given ten years of my life for my country for nothing. They are looking for a plane for me," he said after hanging up from a call from the queen.

"I want you to tell them I am innocent. I am a military man. I know how to make a coup. Now, I have no power and no forces. How can I make a coup? If I was to do something would I stay here in Phnom Penh?

"I left last night with no bodyguards to come to the hotel because I felt something was wrong. Like when I was in the jungle. I knew on the battlefield when something bad would happen. But I was not afraid because I was innocent."

The military called from downstairs to say that the troops were coming to our room now and that the Prince would be allowed to leave the country.

He turned to me: "Please do not leave me. I will only leave if you go with me to the airport in the same car. They may not take me to the airport."

There was a strong knock on the door and I went to open it. A score of heavily armed soldiers and security police waited in the hallway as Twining and Co-Minister of Interior You Hockry entered alone. The four of us sat down.

Hockry asked me to leave. Prince Chakrapong asked that I stay. I said nothing.

"We will promise your safety to the airport. I promise there will be no guns on the plane. The best thing for us it to bring you safely to the airport," Hokry told the Prince.

Men were sent to get passports and luggage at Chakrapong's house. A Malaysian Airlines plane was held on the tarmac at Pochentong as Chakrapong was assured that he would be allowed to safely leave the country.

The behavior of several Ministry of Interior police, who were poised to arrest the Prince until minutes before, now went through a bizarre somersault. They entered the room crouched on their knees and hands clasped to their heads in deference to Royalty as they went about their business preparing to send him to exile.

The Interior Minister said that Chakrapong's alleged collaborator, Sin Song, had confessed. "I think that one or two people cannot do this kind of thing. There will be more arrests," he said. Chakrapong stared blankly, with a mixed expression of anger and fear.

At one point, while, we waited for the motorcade and luggage downstairs, Twining turned to Hockry.

"I just remembered, there will be a fireworks display this afternoon at the fourth of July celebration," he said, suddenly realizing that, as a jittery city emerged from an attempted coup, explosions in the city might not be timely.

"Do you have authorization?" the Minister shot back to the Ambassador, with an alarmed look on his face.

When the mobile phone rang to say that the motorcade of troops was ready, we left the room to walk to the street. Hotel staff and soldiers clasped their hands and knelt in respect as Chakrapong was led by a bevy of sunglassed, automatic weapon-toting officials through a throng of cameras waiting on the street.

Shoved into a sleek Toyota with black tinted windows, we were whisked to the airport in a convoy of a score of cars, including one with Twining. Streets were blocked off and hundreds of people lined them to watch the motorcade pass. The plane was waiting at the airport, full of curious passengers, as Chakrapong was whisked on board and the flight departed.

He called several hours later from Malaysia saying: " I want to thank you sincerely for saving my life. They would have killed me if you had not come. I am innocent. I was not involved in anything. Tell them I am innocent."

Dying Breath: The inside story of Pol Pot's last days and the disintegration of the movement he created-By Nate Thayer

Dying Breath: The inside story of Pol Pot's last days and the disintegration of the movement he created

------------------------------------------------------------------------
By Nate Thayer in Preah Vihear province

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Far Eastern Economic Review
April 30, 1998

As Pol Pot's body lies bloating 100 metres away in a spartan shack, exhausted Khmer Rouge leaders gather in a jungle-shrouded ammunition depot filled with home-made mines and crude communications equipment. Explosions of heavy artillery and exchanges of automatic-weapons fire echo in the mountains as the Khmer Rouge's remaining guerrillas hold off government troops.

Ta Mok, the movement's strongman, vows to fight on, and blames his longtime comrade-in-arms for the Khmer Rouge's desperate plight. "It is good that Pol Pot is dead. I feel no sorrow," he says. Then he levels a bizarre accusation against the rabidly nationalistic mass murderer: "Pol Pot was a Vietnamese agent. I have the documents."

A young Khmer Rouge fighter, his leaders only metres away, leans close to a visiting reporter and whispers in Khmer: "This movement is finished. Can you get me to America?"

Besieged in dense jungles along the Thai border, the remnants of the Khmer
Rouge are battling for survival in the wake of three weeks of chaotic
defections and the loss of their northern stronghold of Anlong Veng. Having
lost faith in the harsh leadership of Ta Mok, several commanders are
negotiating to defect to the guerrilla forces loyal to deposed Prime Minister
Norodom Ranariddh.

Ta Mok's growing paranoia and isolation were only some of the revelations to
come out of an exclusive tour of shrinking Khmer Rouge-held territory north of
Anlong Veng the day after Pol Pot's death. Khmer Rouge cadres and Pol Pot's
wife recounted the last, ignominious days of his life, as he was moved through
the jungle to escape advancing troops.

There was no visible evidence that the former Cambodian dictator was murdered.
Cadres say he died of a heart attack on the night of April 15. In the days
after his death, Khmer Rouge envoys held secret peace talks in Bangkok with
Cambodian Defence Minister Tea Banh, and had their first direct contact with
U.S. officials in more than two decades. Yet at the same time, Khmer Rouge
holdouts were joining up with Ranariddh's rebel forces, making it likely that
the insurgency will continue as Cambodia prepares for crucial elections in
July.

The Khmer Rouge weren't trying to expose their shaky future when they allowed a REVIEW reporter to enter their territory, but to prove to the world that the architect of Cambodia's killing fields was indeed dead. Leading the way to Pol Pot's house to display the ultimate proof, a cadre warns against stepping off the path. "Be careful, there are mines everywhere."

The sickly-sweet stench of death fills the wooden hut. Fourteen hours have
passed since Pol Pot's demise, and his body is decomposing in the tropical
heat. His face and fingers are covered with purple blotches.

Khmer Rouge leaders insist that Pol Pot, aged 73, died of natural causes.
Already visibly ill and professing to be near death when interviewed by the
REVIEW in October, he had been weakened by a shortage of food and the strain of
being moved around to escape the government offensive. "Pol Pot died of heart
failure," Ta Mok says. "I did not kill him."

That night, Ta Mok had wanted to move Pol Pot to another house for security
reasons. "He was sitting in his chair waiting for the car to come. But he felt
tired. Pol Pot's wife asked him to take a rest. He lay down in his bed. His
wife heard a gasp of air. It was the sound of dying. When she touched him he
had passed away already. It was at 10:15 last night."

There are no signs of foul play, but Pol Pot has a pained expression on his
face, as if he did not die peacefully. One eye is shut and the other half open.
Cotton balls are stuffed up his nostrils to prevent leakage of body fluids. By
his body lie his rattan fan, blue-and-red peasant scarf, bamboo cane and white
plastic sandals. His books and other possessions have been confiscated since he
was ousted by his comrades in an internal power struggle 10 months earlier. Two vases of purple bougainvillea stand at the head of the bed. Otherwise, the room is empty, save for a small short-wave radio.

Pol Pot listened religiously to Voice of America broadcasts on that radio, but
the April 15 news on the Khmer-language service may have been too much to bear. The lead story was the REVIEW's report that Khmer Rouge leaders--desperate for food, medicine and international support--had decided to turn him over to an international tribunal to face trial for crimes against humanity. "He listened to VOA every night, and VOA on Wednesday reported your story at 8 p.m. that he would be turned over to an international court," says Gen. Khem Nuon, the Khmer Rouge army chief-of-staff. "We thought the shock of him hearing this on VOA might have killed him."

A week earlier, Nuon had said that Pol Pot knew of the decision, but now he
says the ageing leader had not been fully informed. "We decided clearly to send
him" to an international court, says Nuon, "but we only told him that we were
in a very difficult situation and perhaps it was better that he go abroad.
Tears came to his eyes when I told him that."

Perched nervously by the deathbed is Pol Pot's wife, a 40-year-old former
ammunition porter for the Khmer Rouge named Muon. Clutching her hand is their 12-year-old daughter, Mul. A peasant woman, Muon says she has never laid eyes on a Westerner before. She corroborates Ta Mok's account of Pol Pot's death. "Last night, he said he felt dizzy. I asked him to lie down. I heard him make a noise. When I went to touch him, he had died."

Pol Pot married her after his first wife went insane in the 1980s as the Khmer
Rouge tried to survive in the jungle after their reign of terror was ended by
invading Vietnamese troops. Muon seems oblivious to her husband's bloodstained past, caught only in the anguish of the present.

"He told me a few weeks ago: 'My father died at 73. I am 73 now. My time is not far away,'" she says. "It was a way of telling me that he was preparing to
die." Reaching down to caress his face, she bursts into tears. "He was always a
good husband. He tried his best to educate the children not to be traitors.
Since I married him in 1985, I never saw him do a bad thing."

Asked about his reputation as a mass-murderer, her lips quiver and she casts a
terrified glance at senior Khmer Rouge cadres hovering nearby. "I know nothing about politics," she says. "It is up to history to judge. That is all I want to say."

She has reason to be terrified. "As to what I will do with his family, I
haven't decided," says Ta Mok. "If I let them go, will they say anything bad
about me? Maybe they might be used by Hun Sen," he says, referring to his
nemesis, the Cambodian premier.

Outside the front door is a small vegetable garden tended by Pol Pot's wife and
daughter; next to it, a freshly dug trench where Pol Pot and his family were
forced to cower as artillery bombarded the jungle redoubt in recent weeks.

Pol Pot's last days were spent in flight and fear of capture--a humiliating end
for the man who ruled Cambodia from 1975 to 1979. According to his wife and
Khmer Rouge leaders, he dyed his hair black on April 10 in a desperate attempt
to avoid capture by mutinying Khmer Rouge troops as he fled to the Dongrek
mountains north of Anlong Veng. "Pol Pot feared that he could be caught. By
dying his hair he was trying to disguise himself. For such a person to do that,
it showed real fear in his mind," says Gen. Nuon.

The guerrillas had been unable to provide their ousted leader with sufficient
food since being forced from their headquarters in late March. "For the last
few weeks he had diarrhoea and we haven't had much food because of the fighting with the traitors," recounts Ta Mok.

As Pol Pot fled, the remnants of the movement he created 38 years ago crumbled before his eyes. A few days before his death, he was being driven with his wife and daughter to a new hideout by Gen. Non Nou, his personal guard. From his blue Toyota Land Cruiser, Pol Pot saw Khmer Rouge civilians--cadres say around 30,000--who had been forced from their fields and villages by government troops and Khmer Rouge defectors.

"When he saw the peasants and our cadres lying by the side of the road with no
food or shelter, he broke down into tears," says Non Nou. His wife echoes the
account, and quotes Pol Pot as saying: "My only wish is that Cambodians stay
united so that Vietnam will not swallow our country." Pol Pot never expressed
any regrets, she says. "What I would like the world to know was that he was a
good man, a patriot, a good father."

Asked how she wanted her father remembered, Pol Pot's only child stands with
her head bowed, eyes downcast and filled with tears. "Now my daughter is not
able to say anything," interjects Muon. "I think she will let history judge her
father."

History will have to, because death has deprived the world of the chance to
judge the man responsible for the deaths of more than 1 million people.

Although Pol Pot has cheated justice, other leaders of that regime remain at
large, including Khieu Samphan and Nuon Chea, who are sheltering with Ta Mok. Others, such as Keo Pok, Mam Nay and Pol Pot's former brother-in-law, Ieng Sary, have defected with their troops to the government side since 1996.

Although Pol Pot's life will stand as the darkest chapter in Cambodian history,
his death is likely to be just a historical footnote. What's more likely to
affect Cambodia's future is the continuing disintegration of the Khmer Rouge.
This is prompting desperate attempts by what's left of the movement to find
security.

The day after Pol Pot died, senior Khmer Rouge officials travelled to Bangkok,
where they held secret negotiations with Cambodian Defence Minister Tea Banh.
There, they offered for the first time to cooperate with elements of the
Cambodian government. "Yes, we are prepared to negotiate. We are in the
process," says Ta Mok. "But I am not going to be a running dog of Vietnam like
Ieng Sary. In a nutshell, we want to dissolve the Hun Sen government and
establish a national government that includes all national forces."

Interviewed on April 18, one of the chief Khmer Rouge negotiators, Cor Bun
Heng, said of the unprecedented meeting: "It was a good beginning and cordial.
But these things take time." Added the other senior negotiator, Gen. Nuon: "We
believe that the only way out is national reconciliation between all the
parties. We know that the entire Cambodian population wants peace."

What's more, Nuon and Cor Bun Heng said they met secretly on April 17 with
American officials in Bangkok, and laid out their demands for a political
settlement. It was the first official, direct contact between the United States
and the Khmer Rouge for at least two decades. U.S. officials wouldn't comment.

In the jungles, Ta Mok knows that his capture and trial is sought by the
international community. He wants to use Pol Pot's death to wipe the slate
clean. "The world community should stop talking about this now that Pol Pot is dead. It was all Pol Pot. He annihilated many good cadres and destroyed our movement. I hope he suffers after death," he says. He then asks a visiting
reporter to get hold of a satellite telephone for him, sketching a collapsible
phone he has seen. "I want a good telephone. One that I can call anywhere in
the world."

But working the phone will not prevent Ta Mok from rapidly losing the loyalty
of his own commanders. Privately, many of his top officers and cadres hold him responsible for the collapse of the movement since he seized control from Pol Pot last July. "He is very tired," says a senior Khmer Rouge official. "No man can shoulder all the political, diplomatic and military burdens by himself." Others are less kind. "He has no more support from many of his own people," whispers one cadre. "But we don't know where to go. Cambodia has no good leaders."

Fear was in the faces of many leaders and cadres still holed up near the Thai
border--and for good reason. "There may be more traitors, it is normal. But in
the end they will all die," Ta Mok says. He's a man of his word: Three top
commanders arrested with Pol Pot last year were executed in late March because some of the fighters who mutinied were loyal to them. "It was a decision made by the people," Ta Mok shrugs.

He gives the impression of being increasingly out of touch with reality, seeing
enemies everywhere and unwilling to compromise. His brutal tactics are also a
source of unease among his remaining loyalists. "Our movement will only get
stronger. We have sent our forces close to Phnom Penh and they have carried out
their tasks successfully," he says. The "task" he boasts of was the recent
massacre of 22 ethnic Vietnamese, including women and children, in a fishing
village in Kompong Chhnang province.

The REVIEW has learned that many of the estimated 1,600 guerrillas still
nominally under Ta Mok's command have pledged allegiance to the forces loyal to
Ranariddh's Funcinpec party, who occupy nearby jungles. Cadres say that in
negotiations with Funcinpec's Gen. Nyek Bun Chhay, they have pledged loyalty to
Ranariddh's party and agreed to force Ta Mok into "retirement."

Scores of uniformed Funcinpec troops, including senior commanders, are fighting
alongside Ta Mok loyalists north of Anlong Veng. Gen. Meas Sarin, a Funcinpec
commander and governor of Preah Vihear province before Hun Sen's coup in July,
is present at Khmer Rouge headquarters. He says 600 Funcinpec troops are
fighting government forces alongside Ta Mok's commanders. The heavy fighting
nearby is audible during the interview.

This presents a political dilemma for Ranariddh. He has pledged to abide by a
Japanese peace plan that aims to create conditions for Funcinpec to campaign
freely ahead of the July elections--something Hun Sen has resisted. The
Japanese plan specifically calls for the severing of links between Funcinpec
troops and Ta Mok's guerrillas. For the moment, Ranariddh is choosing denial.
"I do not have any cooperative relations with the Khmer Rouge," he said on
April 17. "Rumours currently circulating to the effect that forces loyal to me
are supporting the Khmer Rouge forces in Anlong Veng are not true."

That's not the only obstacle facing Japan and Asean as they try to find a
formula that would allow Ranariddh to return home to campaign for the polls.
The job was already hard enough for the Thai, Philippine and Indonesian foreign
ministers who met King Norodom Sihanouk in Siem Riep in mid-April. But then
Sihanouk made it harder by telling them Ranariddh should pull out of the
elections--and Cambodian politics altogether--and instead prepare to be king,
according to furious Funcinpec members.

Meanwhile, Cambodia's neighbours are becoming increasingly exasperated by the
seemingly endless war. Interviewed in Bangkok, Thai Foreign Minister Surin
Pitsuwan expresses optimism that elections could be held in Cambodia, but also
voices a warning. "Without a resolution to the Cambodian conflict, the region
is being perceived as insecure, unstable. That prevents further cooperation and
development for Asia," he says, pointing to plans to develop the Mekong basin
that are now delicately poised.

China, previously hesitant about taking part in the Mekong's development, is
now willing to participate, Surin says. That means that Cambodia, at the heart
of the Mekong Basin, is now the major remaining obstacle. "The region is being
denied this development by the existing Cambodian conflict," says Surin.
"Certainly, there is a sense of Cambodia fatigue in the international
community. Cambodians should realize that."

KR HARDLINERS- DOWN BUT NOT OUT-By Nate Thayer

KR HARDLINERS- DOWN BUT NOT OUT

Phnom Penh Post

By Nate Thayer

Friday, 04 October 1996

The Khmer Rouge split has brought much attention to the mysterious rebel group's inner workings. Nate Thayer analyses the break-up and assesses where the Pol Pot faction now stands.

AFTER the raw drama and spell-binding intrigue of the unprecedented Khmer Rouge break-away, one thing remains sure: thousands of hardcore troops and commanders remain loyal to Pol Pot. These hardliners, who have long warned against dealing with the enemy, have likely been hardened by recent events.

The schism has pitted Ieng Sary - former Khmer Rouge foreign minister, brother-in-law of Pol Pot, and former No. 4 in the all powerful Standing Committee of the Party - and a group of powerful younger military field commanders, against the old guard leaders and their loyalists. Not since the purges and open warfare of 1978, that led to the Vietnamese invasion and the fall of the KR regime, has the movement's inner-circle been so rocked.

Remaining intact, however, is virtually all of the important KR political leadership and most of its military command structure. These include party supremo Pol Pot, his second in command Nuon Chea, chief of the general staff Ta Mok, and Defense Minister Son Sen.

Mok, who opposed the Paris peace agreements and advocates an aggressive military posture, has seen his power significantly rise as a result of the internal strife. He now directly commands at least 80 percent of the KR troops, though the rank and file remains split, with final alliances not expected to clarify themselves for months.

Though Sary has taken as much as 20 percent of the KR's fighting force, he has not gone over to the Royal Government. Sary's faction has effectively set up an autonomous command with a tenuous agreement of a truce with government forces.

But the rebel faction has removed a major stronghold and leadership base, as well as control of rich gem and timber territory that provided desperately needed cash to the movement's central coffers - a major economic and political blow to the leadership.

In addition, for the first time in 30 years the KR loyalists find themselves without foreign or domestic allies that have been critical to it's survival.

The United Nations, the United States and ASEAN, who all backed the KR-led guerrilla movement prior to the 1991 peace accords, are all now firmly behind the Cambodian government. China halted all support in 1991, and Thailand has gone to lengths to stop cross border traffic and covert assistance to the guerrillas. In addition, their former battlefield allies - the two non-communist factions - are now part of a coalition government and formally at war with the KR.

Pol Pot, known as a brilliant military strategist, saw the writing on the wall in 1992, and warned his comrades of impending danger: "While Democratic Kampuchea has indeed now become strong, without others to be with it, Democratic Kampuchea cannot be strong all on it's own. When these guys...leave Democratic Kampuchea on it's own, it is possible for us to be weakened. Once that happens, they will attack the DK and drag the other forces into joining with Phnom Penh. It would become an alliance between the West, the Youn [Vietnamese], the contemptible puppets and two of the three parties. If this were to be the situation, then the Chinese, the Thai, and ASEAN would all accept it whether they liked it or not...the forces sustaining us would be enfeebled, which would lead to our being isolated and attacked." He termed it "a life and death struggle".

The scenario that Pol Pot described as his faction's worst nightmare is precisely the situation they face now, many analysts say, and is key to the pressures which contributed to his movement's implosion.

Since 1992, when the KR pulled out of the UN-sponsored election they have attempted to become self sufficient, relying on timber and gem trading for new resources. The breakaway faction has taken with them control of the most lucrative area. In 1993, at least 57 Thai companies were operating over 1,000 earth moving vehicles in KR-controlled ruby regions of Pailin, with more than three billion baht invested, according to then Thai MP Thanit Traivut. Western intelligence and Thai businessmen put the guerrillas' monthly gem profits at $10 million from Pailin alone, until the early 1990's.

In a speech to senior cadre before the peace agreement, Pol Pot explained the importance of Pailin: "Our state does not currently have sufficient capital either to expand its strength or enlarge the army. We are spending many tens of millions of baht to augment the assistance of our foreign friends, but that is still not enough and there are many shortages. It is thus imperative that we find ways to develop the natural resources that exist in our liberated and semi-liberated zones as assets to be utilized in the fight the aggressor enemy."

ORIGINS OF THE CURRENT CONFLICT

It was a centrally-ordered directive by the senior leadership in recent months to re-seize control over resources in Pailin that sparked the crisis.

Importantly, KR radio - still in the hands of the loyalists - and the rebel radio provided important and accurate details of the origins of the split.

While often used for propaganda, KR radio also serves as a vital communication link to the rank and file. References to its importance are often cited in internal KR documents.

Between radio broadcasts, intelligence reports, and guerrilla and loyalist sources, the origins of the split are relatively clear. There are several important factors.

Firstly, there are long personality disputes among the leadership that have simmered for years. Particularly, Ieng Sary was in fact purged from all positions of political importance within the organization more than six years ago. While he continued to live in DK zones, he was in many ways a minor figure. It was the younger field commanders, Y Chhien in particular, who held the real power.

Secondly, the KR, in the aftermath of the failed Paris Agreements, the cut off of foreign assistance, and the loss of their former Cambodian allies to a government coalition, are suffering from an increase in "regional fiefdoms". In areas like Pailin the large amount of trading in valuable resources has made many ordinary KR cadre, soldiers and civilians relatively wealthy - and reluctant to go back to the times of warfare and central control by the DK leadership.

Thirdly, because of the cut-off of foreign assistance and pressure on cross border trade with Thailand, the KR leadership increasingly is in need of cash and was trying to consolidate central control of resources and political loyalty.

Furthermore, the massive trading with Cambodians from government territory and Thais has left sectors such as Pailin vulnerable to infiltration by enemy operatives. Senior KR sources say they have been suspicious of locating important bases at Pailin since at least 1990, when they began detecting radio emissions not under their authorization. The brief government military capture at Pailin in 1994 was blamed by senior KR officials on government special forces units and other "spies" posing as businesspeople.

The split erupted publicly on 6 August when KR radio called for the arrest and "destruction of the traitors", naming Ieng Sary, 450 Division commander Sok Pheap and 415 commander Y Chhien.

Ieng Sary, in a rebuttal broadcast over government radio, called Pol Pot "the cruelest and most savage murderer", and also condemned Ta Mok and Son Sen.

On 7 August, the DK radio again denounced Sary as a traitor, accusing him of embezzling millions of baht from the movement to lavish on himself and his family.

On Aug 8, the loyalist radio called for the arrest of Chhien for spying and stealing party coffers.

Importantly, the radio also said "this Chhien and a couple of his thugs, such as the named Nhoek, Lanh, and Khieu, threatened to arrest, in a pseudo coup, the NADK supreme command representatives... This open offense and threat to arrest the supreme command representatives took place on the morning of 6 August."

The rebel faction shot back, announcing loyalty "to support our leader" Ieng Sary and "deny[ing] our support to Son Sen who is not our leader who confiscated possessions, such as ox-carts".

The rebel broadcast also referred to Son Sen accusing "patriotic fighters...such as the late comrade in arms Hoem and Mich, of being traitors.."

Many aspects of the radio reports were confirmed by Khmer Rouge loyalist and rebel sources, and the radio was used, during this crisis, as a means to communicate with the rank and file to attempt to explain the events and halt the erosion of unity within the ranks.

The spoils of rubies and timber sparked an internal party conflict that has escalated to what we have today. In essence, the Khmer Rouge military leadership, including Ta Mok, Son Sen and Nuon Chea, attempted in recent months to re-assert central control over elements in the army in control of the Pailin sector. These forces, particularly Chhien and his allies, balked, and the confrontation escalated.

Furthermore, the rebels' reference to the "late comrade in arms" Mich of being a traitor suggest a purge was under way prior to the open split. Mich served as a senior military chief of Front 250, elements of which joined the rebels.

The government reference to Chhien and a "couple of his thugs" attempting to arrest the leadership is a direct reference to younger field commanders seeking to arrest Ta Mok, Nuon Chea, Son Sen, and Nikon after the attempt to seize control over the area in early August.

What is clear is that the rift had virtually nothing to do with politics, and even less to do with factions of the KR defecting to the royal government, which was decidedly a spectator - although beneficiary - to the events.

IENG SARY AND LEADERSHIP CONFLICTS

Ieng Sary - a long-standing member of the Communist Party standing committee, foreign minister and deputy prime minister during the DK years in power, and the key liaison for all Chinese military and financial aid throughout the guerrilla war of the 1980s - was stripped of power in a bitter break with the organization many years ago.

His fall came after years of friction, much of it based on personality conflicts.

As foreign minister during the KR rule, most of the intellectuals who came back to Cambodia after the KR victory in 1975 were under his charge. Hundreds perished, and many more were kept in reeducation camps or were forced to do menial work in state ministries.

When the KR retreated to the jungle in 1979 after its overthrow by the Vietnamese, Sary caused a major rift within the leadership by acknowledging to a reporter the existence of the Toul Sleng torture center in which at least 16,000 people were interrogated and executed - mostly party cadre and their families. Sary was denounced in internal party meetings for violating a key tenet of the KR - to never make public statements not sanctioned by the leadership.

But Sary had the support of the Chinese, who insisted that all their assistance be passed through him. As a result, he was effectively in charge of distributing weapons and money throughout the 1980s, a role which gave him concrete power. But he is known to have had several disputes with Pol Pot, and to have angered field commanders and political cadre with his autocratic style and abrasive personality. When the signing of the Paris agreements ended all Chinese covert aid in 1991, his influence effectively ceased.

Ousted from the Standing Committee of the Communist Party around 1989, Sary was no longer invited to high level meetings, according to KR officials. In a late 1992 meeting between Pol Pot and another senior official, Pol Pot agreed with criticism of Sary, saying "I have known for a long time that Ieng Sary was a bad leader", according to sources close to the faction.

KR sources say that serious rifts between Sary and the leadership began in 1986, "when one guy who was in charge of security for Ieng Sary organized a bandit attack with some Thais at Pailin and stole millions of dollars," according to one source.

Many Khmer Rouge intellectuals complained bitterly about Ieng Sary's abrasive personality. "We have a saying in Cambodian that people had to 'walk like a duck' around Ieng Sary and his wife. If they dropped something, someone else picked it up. They complained about the quality of the food. Their servants were nervous and obsequious, like around a king. It was very feudalistic," says one source close to the KR leaders.

"In 1993, Ieng Say still lived in Thailand in a very nice home built with DK money. That was denounced by the leadership. While others suffered in the jungle, he lived in a nice home in Thailand."

During the 1980's, most of the KR intellectuals were based at Phnom Malai, in areas under Sary's influence. But in the early 1990's, almost all of the political leadership, including the foreign affairs staff, young intellectuals, and Khieu Samphan and the office of the president of Democratic Kampuchea, moved north to the base of Phnom Chhat. Under the control of So Hong, commander of sector 102 and the nephew of Pol Pot, it served as a major base for the leadership until it was overrun by government forces in a surprise attack in August 1993.

While Sary is held responsible for the deaths of many intellectuals during his tenure as DK foreign minister, Cambodian scholar Steve Heder points out that some of the only ones who survived were those directly under his charge. Department heads in the Foreign Ministry during the Khmer Rouge rule included Suong Sikoeun (who joined Sary's breakaway in August), Kiet Chhon (who defected in 1993 and is the current Finance Minister), Thionn Prasith (former KR ambassador to the UN through the 1980s until his retirement), Long Norin (who is with Sary's breakaway), Ok Sokhun (KR ambassador in Paris until the embassy was turned over to the government after the Paris agreements), Pech Bun Ret (who remains with the loyalists), and Chan Youran (the current DK "foreign minister"). Such survival rates among these intellectuals, who had all been named to the security services at Toul Sleng as traitors, suggests that Ieng Sary was able to protect them from the purges that claimed many of their colleagues.

THE REAL POWER

Many KR sources say that by far the most important defector, rather than Sary, was military commander Lt. Gen. Y Chhien, who, as officer in charge of Pailin, controlled crack troops and the lucrative gem and logging trade with nearby Thailand.

"Officially Chhien should be under Ieng Sary, but many believe that Chhien now controls Ieng Sary," said one source close to the KR. "He controls concrete forces - troops and money."

Chhien "was said to be a protégé of Pol Pot", says scholar Heder. "He was responsible for the personal security of both Pol Pot and Nuon Chea," according to the confession of senior Khmer Rouge official executed at Toul Sleng prison in 1977. In 1977, he accompanied then Foreign Minister Ieng Sary on an officials visit to Rangoon, in the capacity of "bodyguard".

By 1981, he was identified as Division 415 commander, and in 1991 promoted to overall Pailin sector commander - equivalent of a governor, civilian administrator, military commander and economic czar.

It was a role that gave him great influence, and one that would be bestowed on someone with the total confidence of the leadership, including Pol Pot. Chhien was viewed as one of a rising group of six or seven younger commanders being groomed for taking over the movement.

Sary's daughter, a graduate of the State University of New York at Stony Brook in the late 1980s, is married to a top lieutenant of Chhien.

"Both Sok Pheap and Chhien had a high degree of interaction with the international community. They had extensive contact with Thais and other foreigners," said Heder. "Elements of both Divisions voted in the UNTAC elections, against the directive of the leadership."

On the other side of the KR, perhaps the most key military man is Ta Mok

The number three on the standing committee and Chief of the General Staff of the army, has seen his influence considerably enlarged since the UN peace agreements. He increased his control from 6 to 12 divisions in 1992, and is responsible for troops from the northwestern Thai border throughout the north and the entire east of the country on the Vietnam border.

This gave him control of perhaps 70 percent of the Khmer Rouge army. But one of the consequences of the recent split is the marked rise in influence of Ta Mok in the wake of the loss of Pailin. Now more than 80 percent - and perhaps as much as 90 percent - of the remaining troops are under his direct command.

Ta Mok, otherwise known as Chhit Choeun, studied Buddhism when young, and reached the status of "Lok Kru Achhar". He took over his father's lumber business and was described as "bright".

According to a senior KR official in 1977, Ta Mok "made vital contributions...by building up a solidly reliable base. He was able to build up military strength in every sector", "throngs of people supported him" and "he was able to build up massive armed forces rapidly" and "went down personally to lead the military". But, continued Non Suon, who was later executed at S-21, Ta Mok had "shortcomings"; "he thinks only his zone is important" and "is quick to become angry, even furious...his attitude is displayed in loud rages and cursing. A lot of other cadre have been cursed out by him". Non Suon continued to say Mok has a "boastful personality and clings stubbornly to his understanding of things. Whatever he says has to be done, is to be done. If this is not curbed in time he could be transformed into an authoritarian strongman."

THE NUMBERS GAME

While Prime Minister Hun Sen said in August that the two commanders Chhien and Sok Pheap would bring 3,000 troops to defect to the government, analysts urged caution, and the intelligence figures suggest otherwise.

In August 1991, the NADK formally submitted military organization charts to the UN, in accordance with the agreements reached in Paris. They said that 415 division had a strength including combatants, guerrillas (militia), and porters of 1,200 men and women. In 1992, UN military intelligence put the real number under arms at about 400. In internal documents of the RCAF's 2nd bureau responsible for military intelligence dated June 1995 put the troop strength at 350.

For division 450, the August 1991 NADK official figure was 1,635 (of which the DK said about 65 percent were under arms). UNTAC estimates in 1993 put the figure at 400, and the later RCAF internal intelligence documents reported about 300 under arms.

Whichever way one analyses it, the figures bandied about by the government of late can be dismissed as propaganda.

For overall figures of DK armed strength, their formal submissions to UNTAC in August 1991 was 25,175 combatants and porters plus 2,510 guerrillas, of which 65 percent - or about 18,874 - under arms. These figures are consistent with the upper ranges of State of Cambodia and Vietnamese intelligence estimates at the time. In the mid-1992 UNTAC's "guestimate" was about 10,000 KR under arms. But after the DK's withdrawal from the peace process, they began a central directive of remobilization of troops. By December 1992, UNTAC had increased their estimates to 15,000 under arms. In June 1995, RCAF intelligence put the KR strength at 4,750 regular forces, with militia bringing the total to 8,500.

Using the government own intelligence figures, the two divisions comprise approximately 800 soldiers, or between 10 and 20 percent of the entire KR fighting force.

But the KR leadership is not only short of friends and money, but also ammunition. The group has ordered all soldiers and civilians to meet a quota of homemade bamboo stakes and other crude weapons since last year. In an internal strategy document from the leadership to cadre earlier this year, the leadership spoke of "The strategic weapons that we call our main forces, sharp pointed soldiers, which are punji sticks, poison punji sticks, and booby traps...machetes, axes, and knives are locally abundant."

THE FUTURE

While the internal split within the movement has caused concrete damage and is a major propaganda victory for the government, it is much too early to count the KR out.

Virtually the entire KR political leadership, and much of its military command, is intact. The entire northern command structure - which has successfully defeated all government attempts to destroy it in recent years - is largely unaffected. It is this area that the leadership moved its political operations several years ago.

It is cogent to remember that the Sary's forces have given no sincere indication that they are willing to join the government, or indeed that peace and national reconciliation was ever their aim in breaking away.

In scores of interviews with defectors by this reporter in recent years, few cited political disagreements with the KR as a motive for leaving. Most said that they were treated well by the commanders and were proud of their role in defending the country against the Vietnamese threat. That is the case with those loyal to the Pailin commanders.

It is likely that, for the time being, the Pailin rebels will remain a "third force" - with a shaky tactical alliance with the government - unless a confrontation between the new "allies" is forced.

For the rest of the KR, many government officials acknowledge that they have little to offer in the eyes of the average guerrilla, and that life in the "liberated zones" is often better than that of his counterpart across government front lines.

Hardline KR elements - who have long advocated no contacts with the enemy and who support an increase in guerrilla warfare and terrorism - are now in greater control of their faction.

In a 1994 KR document issued to northern forces, Ta Mok warned: "We have continued to exist with them, eat with them, peacefully allied with them to the point that some of our cadres and ranks have been repeatedly put in danger... in some of our units, enemy elements comprise 50-60 percent."

Ta Mok warned that "pacifism has entered our cadres" and that "there is a confusion, a blending our essence and our enemies."

He reminded cadre of "our absolute duty to smash and sweep away the enemy."

An October 1995 internal KR military strategy document outlined their emphasis on avoiding "tricks of the enemies", especially the "peaceful relationship scheme".

The document also urged the KR to target foreigners, particularly Americans.

"The resistance forces are everywhere. We can attack the two heads and their American boss everywhere. We can cut highway four anywhere, any bridge, any culvert on the road. We are going to cut it over and over until the two-headed government will not be able to use it and until the Americans and their construction on highway four turn their tails and run back to Phnom Penh...the short reminder of historical events is nothing more than a desire to caution that the strategic supply lines are the life and death key to winning or losing a war...cut the enemy' throat! Cut the enemy's throat! Cut the enemy's blood arteries! Tragic fit, tragic death to all enemies near and far!"

The US Army has detachments of military engineering units involved in road construction on Route 4 and special forces units training Cambodian deminers elsewhere in Cambodia. Western intelligence sources say they have information that the KR are targeting Westerners in Cambodia, and have issued at least three confidential "threat alerts" in recent months.

Similarly, other internal documents and references on radio push the same line: that the KR must guard against all enemies, and remain at a distance from corrupting influences.

One document said: "Our first responsibility is we must be clean. Our major responsibility is to clean up our act. We must be clean. Our ranks, especially our cadre, must be clean, our skin clear, free of all smell, no peaceful relationship scheme, no spying activity, no internal undermining, nothing to be compromised at all..."

With the recent events, those elements of the KR who have been warning of the "peaceful relationship scheme" are likely to be saying "I told you so" - and be that much more intent to strengthen their hands with the remaining ranks.

 

(Nate Thayer, correspondent for the Far Eastern Economic Review, is currently a Visiting Scholar and Fellow at the School of Advanced International Studies, Foreign Policy Institute, Johns Hopkins University in Washington, DC.)

Editor's death rattles press By Nate Thayer

Editor's death rattles press

By Nate Thayer

Phnom Penh Post, Sept 23-Oct 6, 1994

        The Sept 7 assassination of Non Chan, a well-known editor of a
popular Khmer newspaper, came as little surprise to local journalists and
human rights groups.
        The newspaper's staff, which had been openly critical of the
government, had received numerous death threats in recent months.  Its
previous editor resigned in late July after being warned he would be
killed.  The newspaper, Samleng Yuvachun Khmer (Voice of Khmer Youth), had
been officially warned by the government on at least three occasions since
June, and its journalists threatened with arrest, lawsuits, and
confiscation of their equipment if they continued writing articles critical
of the government and its leaders.
        The newspaper, formerly sympathetic to the ruling Funcinpec party,
had been openly critical of Funcinpec leader Prime Minister Norodom
Ranariddh in recent months, accused high officials of corruption and called
for a political solution with the Khmer Rouge to end the civil war.
        Investigators say that the broad daylight killing near Wat Phnom by
uniformed men on a motocycle remains unsolved, but comes amidst a general
crackdown against critics of the government, particularly human rights
groups and journalists.
        Prime Minister Norodom Ranariddh has ordered his government to put
a stop to criticism which he says is harming its image and the ability of
the country to attract foreign investment, tourism and vital military and
other aid from donor countries.
        Two high level US delegations arrived last week to discuss military
and other support to Cambodia, which the government views as critical to
waging a fight against the Khemr Rouge and strengthening the government,
which is still wracked with internal disputes after an aborted coup attempt
in July.
        The Post has learned that Prime Minister Ranariddh and Second Prime
Minister Hun Sen have drawn up plans for a major government reshuffle
expected to be announced in coming weeks.  The final details of the
reshuffle have yet to be decided but it could affect more than two dozen
ministers, governors, and military commanders in a shake up designed to
strengthen the hand of the two Prime Ministers after the coup attempt and
to reorganize a military that has proved ineffectual in dealing with the
Khmer Rouge on the battlefield.
        But many of the changes are opposed by the Cambodian People's Party
leadership, which is now deeply split between Hun Sen loyalists and a
strong faction loyal to Party boss Chea Sim and Interior Minister Sar
Kheng.
        Government sources say that Foreign Minister Prince Norodom
Sirivudh, Finance Minister Sam Rainsy, and the commanders of all five
military regions are targeted for removal from their current positions.  A
number of other ministers may also be shifted, senior government sources
say.
        But all sides agree that any shifts will have to be approached
delicately and with some degree of prior consensus between the factions
that make up the goverment to avoid provoking another coup attempt.
        While Ranariddh and Hun Sen are attempting to construct a formula
to consoldiate power and ease tension within government ranks, they are
also threatening key foreign support by cracking down on government
critics.
        "The question of the murder of this jouranlist is something which
shocked us and we deplore it.  It's been the topic of meetings I've had
here from the top to the bottom,"  US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State
Peter Tomsen said on Sept 14.  His visit came on the eve of a senior US
military delegation which is tasked with recommending the nature of US
military support now under consideration by Washington.
        "A free press is absolutely essential to a democracy.  If you don't
have a free press then a democratic process is just not possible," Tomsen
said.
        Another editor was killed under mysterious circumstances in June, a
further eight papers have been warned by the government, one editor jailed
for writing articles "causing social unrest" and "dissension that threatens
the solidarity of the leadership", and the government says it is now
preparing lawsuits against five others.
        Minister of State for Information Khieu Kanharith said the day
after Chan's murder:  "If he hadn't been killed, we would have sued him."
        Amnesty International had a different response in a Sept 9
statement. "The unexplained death of this man, and other acts of
intimidation, add to the pressures on journalists to exercise self
censorship.  The right to freedom of expression is at stake in Cambodia, as
journalists have come under increasing pressure in recent months not to
criticize the government."  It added that Non Chan "apparently had no
enemies, personal or financial disputes, [and] might have been killed
because of the articles he printed in his publication."
        Four newspapers have elected to stop printing since the killing and
many of their staff have gone into hiding.  "In this country now, you
cannot say the truth.  If you say the truth you are the enemy," said one
journalist with Samleng Yuvachun Khmer.  "The government is afraid of the
truth."
        Two well-known human rights groups have been threatened by the
government with closure or legal action since the killing of the editor for
insinuating that the killing may have been politically motivated.
        A letter this week signed by the chief of the cabinet of Prime
Minister Ranariddh, Ly Thuch threatened to take action against the
Cambodian League for Defence and Promotion of Human Rights, Licadho.
        The group had signed a joint statement by local human rights
organizations calling for an investigation on whether the assassins were
connected with the government.
        "Your action can be brought to court as it can be considered an
inducement to public disorder and to provoke anarchy,"  Prince Ranariddh's
office said.
        Last week, another well-known human rights group, the Khmer
Institute for Democracy, was threatened with closure after it released a
statement calling for an end to harassment of local jouralists in the wake
of the killing.
        Two days after the murder of Non Chan, the five-year-old daughter
of an official of the United Nations Center for Human Rights was kidnapped,
shot, and dumped in the street near Phnom Penh's Royal Palace.
        Investigators say that the act may have been a simple car robbery,
but privately UN officials have their doubts.
        They say that the center had been receiving threats for recent
investigations over military human rights abuses and were actively
investigating the murder of local journalists.
        They say that the girl Marica Oliveros, a Spanish national, was
shot point blank through the thigh, without any obvious motive or
provocation, after she was kidnapped.
                   

 

"Pol Pot, I Presume." Nate Thayer, Wall Street Journal

"Pol Pot, I Presume."  

Nate Thayer, Wall Street Journal

August 1, 1997

Nate Thayer, a reporter for the Far Eastern Economic Review, garnered
world-wide attention after becoming the first Western correspondent in almost
20 years to see former Cambodian dictator Pol Pot. What follows is his own
account, condensed from the Aug. 7 issue of the magazine, which, like The Wall
Street Journal, is owned by Dow Jones & Co.

After a series of furtive rendezvous, using coded messages over mobile phones,
I had slipped into one of the most impenetrable, malaria-ridden and land
mine-strewn jungles of the world: Khmer Rouge-controlled northern Cambodia. I
was hoping to interview Pol Pot, one of the century's most notorious and
elusive mass murderers.

As I entered the Khmer Rouge stronghold of Anlong Veng on July 25, hundreds of
voices chanted in unison: "Long live! Long live! Long live the new strategy!" The clenched fists of the crowd pumped toward the sky, as a smiling, middle-aged Khmer Rouge cadre led me toward an open-air meeting hall. Crackling loudspeakers, powered by a car battery lying on the earthen floor, began to spew denunciations of the longtime Khmer Rouge leader. "Crush! Crush! Crush! Pol Pot and his clique!" shouted the crowd on cue as we approached, their fists striking down toward the ground.

Final Defeat

A shocking number of the participants stood on crude wooden stumps, sat in home-made wheelchairs, or were missing eyes--sacrifices to the revolutionary cause of Pol Pot. Others, their arms blown off by landmines, were unable  join the frequent clapping as speaker after speaker denounced the man once venerated as "Brother Number One."

The carefully orchestrated performance evoked grainy film clips of China's Cultural Revolution. But the message was starkly different. "Long live the emergence of the democracy movement!" shouted individuals in the crowd. A chorus would repeat the slogan, followed by prolonged applause from the roughly 500 participants. Each speaker, seemingly chosen to represent a sector of society--a farmer, an intellectual, a soldier, a woman--got up to denounce and humiliate Pol Pot "and his clique."

Pol Pot sat alone, near three manacled loyalists, and often seemed close to tears as the vitriol was unleashed. In contrast, the three younger army commanders on trial alongside him had menacing expressions, staring coldly into the eyes of the speakers.

Pol Pot, who ruled Cambodia for more than three years and ruled the Khmer Rouge for more than three decades, was denounced and imprisoned by his own movement. Not for the 1975-78 Cambodian genocide, but for turning on his own comrades in an attempted purge in June.

The Khmer Rouge of Anlong Veng have good reason to distance themselves from Pol Pot: They want to attract international support for their struggle to unseat Cambodian Premier Hun Sen. That's why they allowed a foreign reporter to witness the show trial, the first time a journalist has entered Anlong Veng and left alive. Still the cadres clearly saw Pol Pot's ouster as a tragedy, and continued to treat the 72-year-old former leader with gentle respect.

The fall of Pol Pot underlines the view that the original Khmer Rouge movement which ruled Cambodia in the 1970s essentially no longer exists. But that doesn't mean that the Khmer Rouge have become irrelevant in Cambodia. The aggressive courting of remaining Khmer Rouge factions by Cambodia's rival premiers, Hun Sen and Prince Norodom Ranariddh, was central to the July 5-6 coup in Phnom Penh. In fact, the Khmer Rouge had finalized their alliance with Ranariddh's Funcinpec Party on July 4. Worried that the balance of power would be tipped in his rival's favor, Hun Sen ousted Ranariddh the next day.

Virtually the entire Khmer Rouge leadership favored a deal with Funcinpec, but Pol Pot was opposed, said Gen. Im Nguon, who is now the Khmer Rouge's army chief of staff. "Domestically and internationally, Pol Pot has his own personal problems to take care of," he said, referring to Pol Pot's blood-soaked reputation. "He has no way out. That's why he keeps dragging this movement toward the darkness."

The Khmer Rouge had splintered dramatically since July 1996, when forces in western Cambodia, representing half the movement, broke with Pol Pot's northern forces headquartered in Anlong Veng. The western split was headed by Ieng Sary, Pol Pot's brother-in-law and longtime comrade-in-arms. Im Nguon said the split was aimed against Pol Pot himself, but the 72-year-old leader blamed his top leaders--Ta Mok, Nuon Chea and Son Sen--for failing to heal the rift.

"So Pol Pot asked Mao--over there," Im Nguon explained, pointing at a young Khmer Rouge cadre, "to shoot Ta Mok and burn him--last October--to leave no evidence."

The grim-faced young cadre, who looked capable of such a deed, nodded in agreement with his commander. But he didn't carry out Pol Pot's order. Ta Mok, who is known to the outside world as "the butcher," is immensely popular with the troops and civilians under his control. So much so, Im Nguon said, that Pol Pot saw him as a threat. "They really like him a lot because he is so helpful to them in terms of standard of living. He built roads, bridges, dams within this area," Im Nguon said.

Pol Pot turned to two senior military field commanders, Gen. Sarouen and Gen. San, attempting to consolidate power against Ta Mok. On Feb. 25 he had them declared the new military and political leaders, replacing Ta Mok, Im Nguon said. About the same time, according to both Cambodian government sources and diplomats, secret negotiations accelerated between envoys of Prince Ranariddh and elements of the Khmer Rouge in Anlong Veng. Most of these efforts were conducted by Ta Mok loyalists--often behind Pol Pot's back--and the top royalist military commander, Gen. Nyek Bun Chhay. By May, the faction agreed in principle to join in alliance.

Increasingly isolated, on June 9 Pol Pot launched a desperate attempt to scuttle the peace deal by purging Ta Mok and other top leaders. That night, longtime defense minister Son Sen and 14 of his relatives, including a five-year-old child, were shot dead by Gen. Sarouen's men, according to both Khmer Rouge and intelligence sources. The killings sparked several days of turmoil, with commanders fleeing into the jungle in disarray. But they rallied
behind Ta Mok and trapped Pol Pot and his band of about 300 remaining supporters on June 15, Im Nguon said. Four days later, they had surrendered.

With Pol Pot neutralized, the remaining Khmer Rouge leadership moved rapidly to finalize a secret political and military alliance with Funcinpec on July 4. Hun Sen, learning about Funcinpec's new alliance through his agents, launched his deadly coup the next morning.

Hun Sen has claimed the tribunal I witnessed was stage-managed by Pol Pot himself. Im Nguon paints a very different picture, but he did say that Pol Pot had "consented" to having a foreign reporter witness the mass meeting, as a way of acknowledging his guilt for moving against his comrades. "Pol Pot did himself confess to me clearly, after his arrest," Im Nguon said. "When I met him the first time, he embraced me and burst into tears. . . . He told me: 'I am wrong, comrade; all the mistakes were made by me, alone,' and then he cried."

"Pol Pot told me that this is the end of his life, he has nothing left, but he begged me to allow him to live," Im Nguon continued. "I also want to make clear that if Pol Pot was vested with any credibility or respect, he would not have shown up and let you see him like you just did today."

Life Imprisonment

As the "People's Tribunal of Anlong Veng" continued into its second hour, a loudspeaker roared into the nearby forest: "These are the criminal acts--the betrayal by Pol Pot and his clique--against the people, armed forces, and our cadre. In conclusion, we all decide to condemn and sentence this clique to life imprisonment."

Pol Pot, unable to walk unassisted, was helped up by a guard in Chinese-style military fatigues. Some people respectfully bowed, as if to royalty, as Pol Pot walked 25 yards to a waiting vehicle. The cadres suggested that I ask Pol Pot questions while he was led away, but balked at translating when told the questions I wanted to pose. Pol Pot, perhaps never to be seen alive again, was helped into a Toyota Landcruiser with tinted windows--captured booty from United Nations peacekeeping soldiers prior to the 1993 elections. Seconds after the trial ended, a torrential rain began.

A Live Report From Baghdad: The Road From Baghdad-Nate Thayer

A Live Report From Baghdad

By Nate Thayer

Posted Friday, March 28, 2003, at 11:38 AM ET

The Road From Baghdad

Last night my room at the Palestine, the hotel where journalists are staying in Baghdad, was ripped apart by Iraqi secret police. They found an illegal satellite phone and told me to be out of country by 7 a.m. today. Though I've been ordered out before, they made very clear that this time I would be arrested if I didn't go.

To get out of Baghdad is not easy. Along with Marco DiLauro, an Italian photographer who was also being expelled, I managed to rent a GMC 4-wheel drive. A little after 7 a.m., we set off on the road that leads west toward both Jordan and Syria. We were going to make our decision about which border to head for depending on the military situation we encountered.

In Baghdad, nearly all the men on the streets are armed. But after passing Iraqi military positions on the way out of the city, we saw no Iraqi forces whatsoever. At first, we couldn't tell who was in control of the highway. But less than 50 miles on, we ran into what looked like American forces. We stopped the car and got out, waving white handkerchiefs. We walked 100 yards to a position of what turned out to be Australian special forces, armed with artillery and about a dozen Humvee-type vehicles.

Despite the fact that they surrounded us, making us get down on our hands and knees as they searched us, we were delighted to see them. Once the Australians determined we were friendly, they were happy to see us too—and interested in how little military presence we'd seen exiting Baghdad. Then they sent us on our way toward Jordan.

The desert road was surreal, littered with the carcasses of dozens of burnt-out vehicles, including Iraqi armored personnel carriers with incinerated bodies inside. We saw ruined bridges and what looked like the skeleton of a Syrian tourist bus. Red Crescent vehicles passed in the other direction, ferrying medical supplies toward Baghdad. At one point a U.S. Black Hawk helicopter bore hovered above, but it left us alone after making out the letters "TV," which we'd applied to the roof of our truck with black duct tape.

For 350 miles, we saw no Iraqi military presence at all. But at the border, Saddam loyalists were still in control of the Iraqi side—200 feet from our nominal allies the Jordanians. Customs officials elaborately searched our bags and stamped our passports. They checked to see that the serial numbers on our computers matched those indicated on our entry documents—as if we were leaving some normal country.

City of Grief and Rage- By Nate Thayer, SLATE.COM

March 24, 2003

The following article by an American journalist still in  Baghdad
gives a bit different take on things than the TV coverage.  He
reports a great deal of anger against the Americans, rather than
people jumping up and down looking for liberation.

His account may well be biased -- we have no way of knowing.
But here's a what if.  What if when the Coalition finishes off the
regime they are stuck with a nation of angry and highly resentful
people?  What then?

http://www.msnbc.com/news/889982_asp.htm?0cv=CB10

City of Grief and Rage
By Nate Thayer, SLATE.COM

March 24, 2003

Today, for the first time, the bombs fell and the missiles struck in
daylight. The assault lasted all day. And it came not only from
long-range missiles but from coalition planes that are flying over our
heads and dropping their payloads in the neighborhood of the Palestine
Hotel, where most of the foreign journalists remaining in Baghdad are
staying.

TODAY IS ALSO the first time that I am truly frightened. It is not the
American bombs I am primarily afraid of. What frightens me and Mary -
the name I'll give a photographer with whom I've become inseparable -
is the mood of the people. The city is thick with anger and defiance,
and we are Americans.
Every day since Mary and I arrived by road from Jordan, we have been
threatened with expulsion. This morning, once again, we were ordered
out. "You have two choices-you can be a human shield or you can leave
the country," said my government minder. He offered this without his
usual smarmy smile.

"But what about my visa?" I asked.

"Your visa is now to heaven," he said, forcing a laugh.

BOMBS AND BLOOD TESTS
I talked my way out of it once again. My minder said we could obtain
visa "extensions" provided we take HIV tests. I brought my own
syringes, and I swabbed Mary's arm and extracted a vial of blood in my
room. She did the same for me. We then went to the so-called HIV
center together, with bombs dropping around us, to submit our blood to
the Iraqi government. Of course, they insisted on taking their own
samples. Cruise missiles launched 900 miles away exploded around us,
incinerating government buildings as we partook in this ridiculous
charade.

This absurdity over, we returned to the Palestine, where we are as
prepared as we can be for whatever may come next. We have 300 bottles
of the water and have filled the bathtubs in each of several rooms for
reserve. We've stockpiled enough food for weeks. Should the power
fail, we have a generator and jerry cans filled with petrol purchased
on the black market. If a bomb blows out our window, the duct tape
we've covered it with should protect us from flying glass. All of our
electronics-computers, cameras, communications devices-are wrapped in
aluminum foil against so-called e-bombs that will destroy all the data
of electronic devices.

A SEARCH FOR AIRMEN
At 4 p.m. Baghdad time, an American fighter jet dropped its payload so
close that the concussion sucked the air out of our lungs. Mary and I
got in our car and drove toward the site of the explosion.

As we crossed one of the four Tigris bridges, there was an enormous
traffic jam. Hundreds of armed men and civilians were looking down to
the river below. Scores of cars had stopped in the middle of the
bridge. We grabbed our gear and got out.

The rumor was that an allied plane had been shot down. Word spread
through the crowd that two pilots had parachuted from the downed plane
and were floating down the river. One had supposedly already been
captured. Whether there were any pilots in the river, I don't know.

Small boats with heavily armed soldiers searched among the reeds. From
the banks, people took pot shots at objects in the river. Under the
impression that the airman had been captured, thousands of cheering
Iraqis chanted and clapped, shooting AK-47s in the air for joy. People
in both uniform and civilian clothes eyed us with hostility during
this celebration.

"Where are you from?" demanded an armed Iraqi, looking at me.

"Germany," interjected my government guide, abruptly grabbing me by
the arm and yanking me away.

"Do not tell them you are American," he whispered as he rushed me to
the car. "We must leave. It is very dangerous here."

ROAD TO BABYLON
Then we were on the western side of the Tigris, where the coalition
bombardment has struck hardest. The sounds of imams on speakers
reverberated through the streets-calls for the people to kill all the
Americans. We raced through Baghdad's most dangerous area, passing
Saddam's palaces, now piles of burnt rubble. The Foreign Ministry was
a concrete shell with no windows and only sullen soldiers at the
entrance. Apartment buildings recently filled with civilians were
charred, burnt, collapsed, and empty. Hundreds of apartments and no
people-where did they all go? Western medical sources have reported
some 300 civilian injuries in Baghdad but very few killed.

The Iraqi military had now closed all the Tigris River bridges. Mary
and I were stuck. We had to drive north for an hour as bombs continued
dropping around us. "This is the road to Babylon," said our government
minder. It felt like Babylon. We then took another road-the road to
Kuwait, our guide said. We had to drive north of the city, then west,
and then south to enter Baghdad on the east bank of the Tigris and
return to our hotel.

Explosions are rocking my computer as I write. For the first time,
small-arms fire can be heard throughout the city. Anti-aircraft
emplacements are set up around the perimeter of our hotel. It's not a
good sign. Yesterday those 500 meters from us were destroyed,
completely destroyed, by American missiles.

Nate Thayer is covering the war for Slate.

"North Koreans trained to hate U.S. from childhood"- By NATE THAYER

North Koreans trained to hate U.S. from childhood

By NATE THAYER

The Associated Press

Friday, April 24, 1992

PYONGYANG, North Korea — At a kindergarten in Pyongyang, children take turns firing wooden machine guns at an effigy of a U.S. imperialist soldier. The teacher then pulls a string and the hinged head collapses.

The scene is no distant memory from the darkest days of the Cold War. It is a snippet from daily life in this hard-line communist state, where anti-American propaganda is everywhere. From beginning classes to diatribes in the state-controlled press, there is no escaping anti-U.S. propaganda.

It depicts Americans as wolves and urges North Koreans to remain vigilant against supposed U.S. plans to launch a war. Annual mass rallies throughout the nation bring hundreds of thousands of people together to condemn the "U.S. imperialists."

"Yankees are wolves in human form" is one sentence found in a popular book to teach English-language sentence structure. "Let's mutilate the American imperialists!" is an entry in an English phrase book.

"Of course I think the United States will start another war," said Kim Due Sun, 77, speaking in this capital city, which was virtually flattened by U.S. bombs during the Korean War. "Even the children in kindergarten know that the United States wants to bring war again. Even the babies hate the American imperialists."

Foreign residents from North Korea's former socialist allies say that even at the worst of times, anti-U.S. sentiments espoused by their governments could not compare to those encouraged by the North Korean regime.

Most of the North Koreans interviewed cited the stationing of U.S. soldiers in rival South Korea and annual U.S.-South Korean war games as reasons to fear a U.S. attack. "We are still in a state of war with the United States," Maj. Kim Song Nam said in an interview at Panmunjom, the truce village that straddles communist North and capitalist South Korea. "Of course, I am very hostile to them. We have done nothing wrong to them, but they have unilaterally given us suffering and misery. That is why we all call the Americans wolves."

His hostility was on display when he conducted a Western reporter through the Panmunjom neutral zone as American soldiers watched silently a yard away. "This is where we negotiate with the American bastards," he said evenly through an interpreter. Despite the rhetoric, President Kim II Sung appears ready for a thaw in relations with Washington, in part because the fall of his socialist allies has created a domestic economic crisis.

North Korea is desperate for hard currency to purchase items such as fuel and spare parts for factories. This month, Kim called for opening of diplomatic relations with the United States. Washington, which accuses Pyongyang of trying to build nuclear weapons and of engaging in international terrorism, has held meetings with North Korean officials since January in search of improved relations. The annual Team Spirit war games between the United States and South Korea were canceled this year, but fear of the United States instilled by a generation of relentless propaganda may be hard to erase.

A guide assigned to interpret for a U.S. reporter said his wife was frightened for his safety during the weeklong assignment, and his 2-year-old asked fearfully if the "Yankee was really a wolf."

"N. Korea courts the U.S." AP By Nate Thayer

N. Korea courts the U.S.

By Nate Thayer

April 17, 1992

The Associated Press

PYONGYANG, North Korea— North Korean dictator Kim Il-sung, who celebrated his 80^th birthday on Wednesday, was quoted as saying it is time for better relations with the United States. "There is spring between the people of our country and the people of the United States, spring begins," Kim was quoted as saying in the Washington Times. "My wish is to establish (a U.S. Embassy in Pyongyang) as quickly as possible." He also reportedly said North Korea would turn over more remains of U.S. soldiers from the 1950-53 Korean War.

Tens of thousands North Koreans danced in Pyongyang's streets to celebrate Kim's birthday. Fireworks lasted more than two hours, and neon signs flashed socialist slogans.

Meanwhile, a senior official of the North Korean Ministry of Atomic Energy said Tuesday that international inspection of North Korean nuclear facilities could start any time after the end of May. At that time, "when they come for a first inspection, it is their decision; not ours," said Choe Jung-sung. He was referring to the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, with which North Korea has concluded a safeguards agreement.

Khmer Rouge smell victory Cambodian rebels enjoy strong backing by China-By Nate Thayer

Khmer Rouge smell victory

Cambodian rebels enjoy strong backing by China

By Nate Thayer

July 21, 1990

The Associated Press

SIEM REAP PROVINCE, Cambodia — Khmer Rouge guerrillas have seized large areas deep inside Cambodia in recent months and say they will fight as long as needed if they are shut out of a political settlement.

A recent five-week, 450-mile trip through the country's north by this reporter found the Khmer Rouge have strong Chinese support and have stockpiled caches of weapons, ammunition and funds in case foreign aid is cut. The United States announced Wednesday it was withdrawing recognition of the guerrilla coalition dominated by the Communist Khmer Rouge. The coalition also includes the non-Communist forces of Prince Norodom Sihanouk and Son Sann.

The U.S. move was prompted by fears of a return to power of the Khmer Rouge. The Communist group killed hundreds of thousands of people in forced agrarian reform in the 1970s until Vietnam invaded and installed a new government in early 1979.

The 30,000-man Khmer Rouge army already controls hundreds of villages in the country's south, west and north, and it operates in virtually all parts of the country.

In their jungle command posts, senior Khmer Rouge commanders said recently they were stepping up the fight to force the Vietnamese-backed government into political concessions. "The Khmer Rouge have everything they want from China. They don't need any more guns or money," said Col. Khan Savoeun, a commander of Sihanouk's army. "U.S. support for the non-Communists is very important psychologically for the non-Communist resistance. But it means nothing to the Khmer Rouge."

Ta Pok, a Khmer Rouge brigade commander in this northwestern province, said he listened to the Voice of America and Radio Free Asia for news on peace and hoped for progress. But he said the guerrillas cannot wait around for documents to be signed. "The Vietnamese will only listen to strength, and if they don't listen they will lose everything," he said.

The guerrillas have seized large quantities of weapons in recent fighting. Dozens of hidden jungle bases are full of ammunition, and captured heavy weapons were seen in the north.

The Chinese aid is channeled through the Thai border. But as the guerrillas push deeper into the country, they rely on the hidden caches and food from recently seized villages. Thousands of soldiers and civilian supporters were seen moving freely through newly seized areas. Heavy fighting between Khmer Rouge and government troops holed up at several key forward outposts defending Siem Riep city was heard every day. The guerrillas mined roads, attacked supply convoys and overran government artillery bases.  “ We are winning more easily than we expected. There is nothing that can stop us," said Khmer Rouge division commander Mit Lot, in charge of areas around the ancient temples of Angkor Wat in Siem Reap province. "If (Cambodian Prime Minister) Hun Sen is not flexible, we will fight and for sure we will win," he said.

The guerrillas appear to have substantial popular support. Many villagers say the Khmer Rouge are not forcing them to fight, and that they pay those who help carry ammunition and supplies. The guerrillas also pay a high price for rice. However, some villagers said they were afraid to refuse guerrilla requests for help.

As part of preparations in case foreign aid is cut, the Khmer Rouge have seized large gem-mining areas in the south and collect more than $500,000 monthly in taxes from miners, said Western intelligence analysts in Bangkok. In the north, they have created a sophisticated logging operation, trucking teakwood to Thailand. The guerrillas now have a network of thousands of miles of roads snaking from areas under their control to new front lines deep in the interior.

A young rebel relaxes near Ankor Wat: Photo: Nate Thayer

Refugees con Americans with MIA information: AP by Nate Thayer

Refugees con Americans with MIA information

Editor's note: The writer has lived for more than two years along the Thai-Cambodian border, and has been offered numerous artifacts and data about alleged American MlAs in Indochina.

By Nate Thayer

July 21, 1991

Associated Press Writer

BANGKOK, Thailand -"I have bones from dead American pilots," the Cambodian refugee whispered to this reporter, handing over a small packet of teeth, bone chips and a serviceman's identification number. "Is it true I can get $1 million from the Americans?" he asked.

The episode took place recently at a refugee camp along Thailand's eastern border with Cambodia, and the identification turned out not to belong to any of the 2,274 U.S. serviceman missing in action, or MIA, from the Vietnam War. But the offer illustrates the rumors —some based in fact — that have spread for years through rebel-held camps bordering Communist Laos and Cambodia, of huge rewards awaiting those who can show that U.S. servicemen are imprisoned in Indochina or those who can lead to their bodies.

The release of a photo this week purporting to show three U.S. prisoners of war has renewed debate over whether Americans are still held 16 years after the Vietnam War. Families of the three missing men say the men are in the photo. The three countries strongly deny they are holding prisoners. Numerous refugees and guerrillas have emerged from the jungles carrying bones, maps, letters purported to be from U.S. prisoners, and "dogtags" — military identification neckchains. They also talk of foreign captives in jungle hideouts. Refugees are often keen to provide stories about Americans in hopes of enhancing their chances of being resettled in the United States. Guerrillas are eager for cash.

The information is usually passed through relief officials or other foreigners to the U.S. Joint Casualty Resolution Center office at the U.S. Embassy in Bangkok. Most is immediately dismissed as fraudulent or irrelevant. The packet which the reporter received at Site 2 was sent to the center, but the identification number did not belong to anyone on the Pentagon's list of Americans missing in action.

Most of the "evidence" turns out to be scams engineered by hucksters and conmen, although some is credible. But none has been proven. No prisoners have been brought out.

Still, many remain convinced that Americans remain captive. Teams of privately funded Americans have offered huge rewards, set up safe houses along the Thai border, and sent agents into remote jungles in efforts to obtain remains or bring back Americans alive.

Billionaire H. Ross Perot in 1986 offered $4.2 million to obtain a videotape purportedly showing POWs in Laos. Many of the private American teams' investigating reports accuse their government of dragging its feet, ignoring. evidence and conspiring to stifle efforts to bring back prisoners.

DEPT OF SCOOPS: Where’s the Committee to Protect Journalists from each other?-"Talk of the Town"-The New Yorker

DEPT OF SCOOPS

Where’s the Committee to Protect Journalists from each other?

The New Yorker

May 25, 1998

Talk of the Town

By Philip Gourevitch

A George Foster Peabody Award is the broadcasting world’s version of the Pulitzer, and until last Monday, when the fifty-seventh annual awards ceremony was held, at the Waldorf-Astoria, nobody who was honored with a Peabody had ever spurned the distinction. Then Nate Thayer came to town. Thayer is the thirty-eight-year-old Bangkok-based journalist-adventurer who, last July, obtained one of the great scoops of our time by trekking into the Cambodian jungle, attending the show trial of Pol Pot, and trekking out into Thailand with the whole bizarre spectacle on high-quality videotape. Much of that footage was promptly aired by ABC’s “Nightline” in a three-part series, which went on to win one of this year’s Peabody’s for “distinguished achievement and meritorious public service.” And Thayer went from being the first journalist to meet up with Pol Pot in nearly twenty years to being the first to turn down a Peabody.

 

In a letter “formally and unequivocally” rejecting his share in the award, Thayer wrote, “Ted Koppel and ‘Nightline’ literally stole my work, took credit for it, trivialized it, refused to pay me, and then attempted to bully and extort me when I complained. They should not be rewarded for this kind of behavior and I under no circumstances want my name associated with these egregious violations of basic journalistic ethics and integrity.” So last week’s gala luncheon became a split-level ceremony: upstairs, in the Waldorf’s Grand ballroom, Koppel accepted the trophy—the sixth Peabody of his career—while downstairs, in one of the Waldorf’s many saloons, Thayer pleaded his case to the barman, who set up his double scotches for free, explaining, “I like a man with principles.’

Thayer has no quarrel with the series Koppel anchored, or with the fee of three hundred and fifty thousand dollars that, a month ago, ‘Nightline” finally paid him for the use of his footage. But the deal—which he originally negotiated with Koppel over the phone—was for a one-week exclusive on North American television rights only. As Thayer understood it, that meant that he could sell the remaining world broadcast rights and the potentially lucrative still photographs from his encounter with Pol Pot, and that he retained the print-media exclusive to the story, which he had promised to his longtime employer, the far eastern Economic Review, a Hong Kong-based weekly. Thayer says that he chose to work with Koppel “because of his reputation for integrity” and yet “within twenty-four hours the pictures and the story were all over the place. ABC’s public-relations just took it over.”

 

Even before the first “Nightline program on Pol Pot aired, the network’s promotion teams were shipping out photographs made from Thayer’s footage, and video clips were available on the ABC web site, where anybody could simply download them. “Nightline” also allowed a writer from the Times to preview ten minutes of the footage, with the result that Thayer’s scoop—text and photographs appeared on the paper’s front page before his own article for the Review had gone to press. According to a spokeswoman for ABC, this sort of pre-broadcast publicity is normal, and the network did nothing to violate its agreement. If Thayer thinks otherwise, the spokeswoman says, “It might be that he had no idea that this is what happens when you deal with a large news organization.”

 

Thayer does think otherwise. “My main objection is that the industry has taken control of journalists, and part of our job is to fight for the integrity of our profession,” he said last week over more double scotches in a midtown bar. “I’ve just become incredibly disillusioned over the last year.” Sadly, Thayer’s sense of himself as something of a dinosaur is not inaccurate; in the dangerous pursuit of his stories that have made him famous, he has often needed to trust verbal agreements—even with Khmer Rouge cadres—as a matter of life or death. And nobody in the news business seems to recognize that fact better than Ted Koppel. Last October, at the same Waldorf podium where he would claim his latest Peabody award, Koppel addressed a banquet for the Committee to Protect Journalists, paying homage to reporters who risk “ death, or torture, or imprisonment” in violent places under repressive regimes, and he warned that American journalism was equally endangered.—but “more insidiously”—by “the trivialization of our industry.” He said, “We struggle to be first with the obvious…we’re afraid of the competition; afraid of earning less money; afraid of losing our audience.”

Last week, with the ghost of those words hanging in the hall, Koppel kept his Peabody acceptance speech brief. “Nate has chosen not to accept this award, because he has some profound differences with ABC news, with “Nightline”, with me. I’m sorry about that, genuinely sorry,” he said, adding, “While he rejects this award, I don’t want to reject the enormous contribution he made to bringing the world this story.”

 

It was odd hearing Thayer spoken of as having made a “contribution” to the story that he alone had brought out of the Cambodian Jungles. Finding Pol Pot was his biggest scoop, but for ten years, in one groundbreaking story after another, Thayer has not only chronicled Cambodia’s treacherous political history but also done a good deal to shape it. Early last month, for instance, he got word that the Khmer Rouge leaders who had purged Pol Pot, and were keeping him captive, wanted to turn the aging and sickly boss of the killing fields over to “the Americans” for trial; before an international tribunal. “But they didn’t know any Americans,” Thayer recalled. “Just me. I went back in, and spoke with them, and reported their wishes. The Voice of America’s Khmer-language service led the eight-o’clock news with the story on April 15^th. Pol Pot was listening, and a few hours later he was dead.” Thayer grinned, and ran a big hand over his shiny shaved scalp, his narrow eyes seemed to brighten. “ That’s my award,” he said, and laughed. “ I killed Pol Pot.”---Philip Gourevitch

Ousted Cambodian Prince Seeks Foreign Supporters; Ranariddh Criticizes U.S. Response to Coup - The Washington Post

Ousted Cambodian Prince Seeks Foreign Supporters; Ranariddh Criticizes U.S. Response to Coup

The Washington Post

August 15, 1997 | Nate Thayer

As Cambodian leader Hun Sen consolidates his power in Phnom Penh following a successful coup there last month, the rival he ousted is stepping up efforts to rally international opposition to the takeover and is openly criticizing the Clinton administration's response.

Prince Norodom Ranariddh, whom Hun Sen deposed as first prime minister in the coup on July 5 and 6, called on the United States to take a tougher stand on Cambodia and reveal what it knows about possible terrorism, drug trafficking and human rights violations by Hun Sen's supporters.

In an interview here on Monday, Ranariddh said Hun Sen's takeover of the shaky coalition government will not lead to greater stability in Cambodia, as some U.S. officials have theorized, but to a renewal of that nation's long-running civil war and a new lease on life for the notorious Khmer Rouge guerrillas. "I have clearly warned the U.S. if you do not help me put pressure on Hun Sen, you will have civil war -- a bloody civil war -- and you cannot help but have the participation of the Khmer Rouge," Ranariddh said at the house of Cambodia's ambassador to Thailand, a member of the prince's royalist party, known as Funcinpec. "The Khmer Rouge are coming back, but they are coming back as nationalists, as patriots, not as killers." While Hun Sen's coup was aimed at scuttling a political alliance between Funcinpec and remnants of the Khmer Rouge, it has driven the royalists and the rebels together militarily as they try to defend territory in northwestern Cambodia from attack by Hun Sen's forces. In response to the coup, the Khmer Rouge has stepped up its condemnation of Hun Sen as a "puppet" of neighboring Vietnam, which installed him in power after the Vietnamese invaded in 1979, ending nearly four years of bloody Khmer Rouge rule under Pol Pot. Because of Cambodians' widespread fear and resentment of Vietnam, a historical adversary, the Khmer Rouge propaganda appears likely to strike a more responsive chord in the wake of the coup, particularly since the group formally broke with Pol Pot in a show trial on July 25. In the interview, an emotional Ranariddh accused Washington of ignoring human rights violations by Hun Sen, notably a March 30 grenade attack that killed at least 17 people and wounded more than 100 at an opposition political rally in Phnom Penh, the Cambodian capital. Because the injured included an American, Ron Abney of the Washington-based International Republican Institute, an FBI team was sent to investigate. It has produced an internal report that implicates a bodyguard unit loyal to Hun Sen, government sources have said. However, according to other sources close to the investigation, the report is not being released because of U.S. concerns that it would upset internal political stability in Cambodia. "We have to talk about the grenade attack," Ranariddh said. "President Clinton must release the FBI investigation. They know Hun Sen is a terrorist, but why are the Americans hiding the information, protecting Hun Sen?" Ranariddh also accused Washington of concealing connections between Hun Sen and suspected drug traffickers who have bankrolled his projects and helped fund last month's coup. "We should bring Hun Sen to an international trial," Ranariddh said. "They are terrorists, they are drug traffickers, and they have committed crimes against humanity." At least 41 of Ranariddh's supporters were tortured and executed following the coup, and hundreds more are missing, according to international human rights groups. Soldiers have taken scores of bodies to Buddhist temples and incinerated them, the groups say. "My priority is a political struggle, but the people will not let such a regime last," Ranariddh said. "With or without Ranariddh, Cambodia will have a resistance. It is not a problem between Hun Sen and Ranariddh. It is a problem between dictatorship and democracy." He added, "It will be a big mistake if the world community thinks strengthening Hun Sen will mean stability." Ranariddh's Funcinpec party "is now in the process of reorganizing militarily and politically," he said. Facing an arrest order by Hun Sen if he returns to Cambodia, Ranariddh vowed to go to Funcinpec-held territory in the country's northern jungles if the fighting continues. When his military commanders call him, he said, "I will not hesitate for one second to go back to lead the resistance."

Cambodians Describe Atrocities By Hun Sen's Forces, Vow to Resist; Supporters of Ranariddh Flee to Jungle Stronghold - The Washington Post

Cambodians Describe Atrocities By Hun Sen's Forces, Vow to Resist; Supporters of Ranariddh Flee to Jungle Stronghold

The Washington Post

July 28, 1997 | Nate Thayer

After a two-week cross-country trek by motorcycle and on foot, Gen. Nhek Bun Chhay, the most hunted man in Cambodia, straggled into this jungle stronghold with tales of atrocities by government forces and vows to resist the recent coup by co-prime minister Hun Sen.

Wearing flip-flops on his badly swollen feet and Buddhist amulets around his neck, Nhek Bun Chhay held court in shorts last week as he and other royalist commanders laid plans to lead a resistance army against what they described as Cambodia's new dictatorship. Surrounding their conclave near Cambodia's northern border with Thailand were soldiers loyal to the royalist party, known by its acronym, Funcinpec, as well as tanks and artillery.

In the three weeks since Hun Sen deposed Cambodia's other co-prime minister, Prince Norodom Ranariddh, and effectively annulled the results of a 1993 U.N.-sponsored election won by Funcinpec, thousands of refugees have fled here, to Funcinpec-controlled areas near the Thai border, to seek sanctuary and join a political and military resistance. Many have come with horrific tales of massacres and torture. Some, including senior opposition officials, were denied refuge in the U.S. Embassy and other embassies, human rights workers said. In an interview here Friday, Nhek Bun Chhay, formerly the deputy armed forces chief of staff and a top Ranariddh aide, said Hun Sen's forces captured five of his bodyguards and gouged out their eyes under interrogation before killing them. Western human rights officials in Phnom Penh, the capital, confirmed the atrocity. At least 30 of Nhek Bun Chhay's soldiers were executed after surrendering and their bodies were burned with gasoline and tires, the general said. He said he believes about 500 of his troops have been killed. "There are people hiding in the jungle in just about every province," Nhek Bun Chhay said. "I have never seen in my life this kind of violence. The killing is still going on." He said that during his flight, he and his followers fought eight major battles with about 3,000 pursuing troops and that leaflets bearing his picture and offering a $50,000 reward were dropped on villages along the way. "Hun Sen is hunting down our people, killing them, arresting them," said another general, Serei Kosal, who arrived in borrowed shorts and shoeless a week before Nhek Bun Chhay. "Why hasn't the world condemned the coup-makers and acted in support of democracy?" Nhek Bun Chhay and Serei Kosal were among four top Funcinpec officials targeted by Hun Sen's forces during the coup. The two others were captured and summarily executed, one of them after being tortured in Hun Sen's residential compound, according to human rights officials and Cambodian intelligence officers. Serei Kosal said the scattered Funcinpec forces are "fighting for democracy" and desperately need supplies such as hammocks, mosquito nets, canned fish and walkie-talkies. But he vowed to battle on in any case. "If the international community abandons us," he said, "we will fight even if we all die, because we are fighting against dictatorship." During a trip of more than 120 miles through resistance-controlled zones abutting the border with Thailand, other Funcinpec commanders regrouping in the north and northwest expressed similar determination to rally their forces, which now include about 10,000 troops backed by tanks and artillery. Before the coup, Funcinpec was estimated to control about a third of the 87,000-member Royal Cambodian Armed Forces. "We won the elections, but the communists have gone against the will of the people," said Lt. Gen. Khan Savoeun, a Funcinpec loyalist who headed Cambodia's Fifth Military Region before the coup by Hun Sen and his formerly communist Cambodian People's Party. Khan Savoeun spoke surrounded by Russian-made T-54 tanks, armored personnel carriers, heavy artillery and antiaircraft guns -- an arsenal that was not enough to prevent his position from being overrun the next day. While the extent of the killing by government forces since the coup remains uncertain, refugees here and human rights officials in Phnom Penh painted a grim picture of torture and summary executions. They said some atrocities may have been ordered by the coup leaders, many of whom, like Hun Sen, are former members of the radical communist Khmer Rouge movement. Human rights officials said more than 40 senior Funcinpec officials have been executed and that hundreds of other people have been killed in fighting. "We have many cases of bodies found, hands tied behind their back, with bullets in the head," said a Western human rights investigator. "But sometimes we arrive too late for the bodies and only have the ashes. They are literally incinerating the evidence." In a statement from Beijing, where he is undergoing medical treatment, Cambodian King Norodom Sihanouk, Ranariddh's father, denounced "unimaginable cruelty" by Hun Sen's forces. "A certain number of so-called `extremist' Ranariddh supporters had their eyes gouged out before they were put down like rabid dogs," he wrote. "Many others were tortured to death in especially diabolical ways." Gen. Chau Sambath, a top military adviser to Ranariddh, was captured while trying to flee the capital by motorcycle. According to human rights officials and Cambodian intelligence officers, he was taken to Hun Sen's personal compound on July 8 on the outskirts of the city and tortured before being executed. The sources say his fingernails were pulled out and his tongue yanked from his mouth with pliers before he was finally killed by Gen. Him Bun Heang, the chief of security for Hun Sen's personal bodyguard unit. Another senior Funcinpec official, Ho Sok, the secretary of state for the interior, reportedly was executed on the grounds of the Interior Ministry by the personal bodyguards of Gen. Hok Lundy, the national police chief and a top Hun Sen loyalist. According to Amnesty International, Ho Sok was captured "while attempting to find a country that would give him asylum." He had taken refuge at the Embassy of Singapore, but was expelled at the request of Hun Sen forces and arrested as he attempted to drive to the luxury Cambodiana Hotel, where many foreigners and Funcinpec officials had sought sanctuary in the days after the coup. An Interior Ministry spokesman confirmed the killing, saying it was committed by "people who were angry with him." "They {government forces} are arresting people everywhere," said Sok Nuon, a policeman from Kompong Chhnang Province. He had shed his uniform and said he had come from central Cambodia the day before and had not eaten in four days. Speaking at this mountain redoubt, where several thousand new refugees have massed, he added: "They are arresting people in their houses, in the jungles, along the road -- anybody they think works for Funcinpec." Several hundred Funcinpec officials, at least 24 members of parliament, journalists for independent newspapers and officials associated with other political parties have fled to Thailand by air, land and sea. Many journalists have received death threats and have left the country or escaped to newly created resistance areas. At least 19 newspapers have ceased publishing. "Soldiers came to my house with rocket launchers looking for my steering committee members," said Sam Rainsy, Cambodia's most prominent opposition politician and head of the Khmer Nation Party. "All my people are in hiding, have fled to the jungle or are out of the country. . . . The soldiers told people at my office, `We will not even let a baby asleep in a hammock stay alive.' " He said the warning reminded him of the language of the Khmer Rouge, whose brutal rule in the late 1970s left more than 1 million Cambodians dead. "We cannot operate any more," Sam Rainsy said of his party. "Democracy is finished." In the wake of the coup, human rights officials and Cambodians opposed to Hun Sen have criticized the response of Western governments, notably those of the United States and Australia, whose embassies in Phnom Penh reportedly refused requests for asylum from some government officials and members of parliament who feared for their lives. U.S. Embassy officials said they had no clearance from Washington to offer political asylum to anyone and claimed they were not approached directly by any Cambodians for sanctuary on embassy grounds. Officials said Ambassador Kenneth Quinn personally sought out senior Funcinpec officials during the height of street battles to offer assistance and that embassy cars were used to ferry some officials to the airport to board evacuation flights. But human rights workers asserted that the embassy rejected their pleas for emergency visas for legislators who were in danger. "It is an absolute disgrace the way Western embassies have reacted," said a Western human rights official in Phnom Penh. "We have begged them to open their gates for people who are clearly targeted for persecution, and the Americans, the Australians, flatly said no. These are the embassies that had pushed people to exercise their rights, have said they supported human rights and free expression and opposition politics. But when these very values were trampled upon and those who exercised their rights were targeted, they did nothing to help." According to human rights workers, among those refused sanctuary in a Cambodiana Hotel ballroom, which the U.S. Embassy rented as a haven for Americans, was Som Wattana, a Cambodian correspondent for the Voice of America, who received death threats in the aftermath of the coup. He has since fled the country. "Our primary concern was to protect the safety and welfare of American citizens," said an embassy spokeswoman. She added, "We were not open for visas during the fighting." Ranariddh, in an interview in Bankok, said, "Hun Sen has ordered the mass execution of members of our elected government. He is responsible for the killings of hundreds of innocent people. . . . Before recognizing this government in Phnom Penh, before shaking their bloody hands, the United States should . . . investigate the killings." Some Western embassies "think that Cambodia is not ready for democracy," said Stephen Heder, an American Cambodia specialist who teaches at the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London and who was in Phnom Penh during the coup. "They don't seem to fathom how extraordinarily unpopular Hun Sen is."

In Mongolia, a GOP-Style Revolutionary Movement; Republican-Inspired `Contract' Helped End Communist Rule - The Washington Post

In Mongolia, a GOP-Style Revolutionary Movement; Republican-Inspired `Contract' Helped End Communist Rule

The Washington Post

April 6, 1997 | Nate Thayer

On a stool in his portable felt and canvas yurt, Yadamsuren, a 70-year-old nomadic sheepherder, offered a visitor chunks of sheep fat and shots of fermented mare's milk to ward off the unspeakable cold. Seventy miles of bleak desert northeast of Ulan Bator and many miles from the nearest neighbor, he spoke glowingly of the work of House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) and the Republican Party.

"I read the `Contract With the Voter' closely. Everybody did," he said, explaining why he decided to vote for a new government in Mongolian elections last June. "In the contract, they clearly say what society and the people can do for each other."

American hordes, led by the Republican Party, have invaded the steppes of Mongolia in recent years. Instead of cavalries, they have comprised teams of election strategists and campaign organizers, who mobilized a once ragtag Mongolian opposition to achieve victory in national elections last June 30. In what was once an impenetrable Soviet satellite, a remarkably young democratic government has taken power, creating Asia's first successful transition from communism to democracy. A key element behind the victory, say Mongolia's new leaders, was a carefully engineered strategy by American Republican political operatives to end 75 years of Communist Party control. And the tool that the Mongolian Democratic Union credits for victory was none other than the "Contract With America," the platform used in 1994 by revitalized Republicans to sweep into control of the U.S. Congress. "This form of signing a contract with the people is a new achievement of the Mongolian political system, even of political science," said Prime Minister M. Enkhsaikhan in a recent interview, smiling in his drab Soviet-built office in the main government square in Ulan Bator. But today the halls of government in Ulan Bator could be mistaken for a university campus. Of the 50 new Democratic Union coalition legislators who gained power in the elections, 36 are in their twenties or thirties; the prime minister is 41, the parliament speaker is 43, and the minister of defense is 38. "It is an unqualified success of political transformation," said a Western diplomat here. "But the 50 Democratic Union MP's and new government have virtually no previous political experience. The phrase `complete chaos' has been used." When the Russians built a capital for their first satellite country, populated by nomadic herdsmen, they named it Ulan Bator, which means "red hero" in Mongolian. But the winds of political change have swept again across this isolated but strategically important corner of northeast Asia. Mongolia's new freewheeling democracy has scores of newspapers, dozens of political parties and vigorous debate within the government, achieved without bloodshed or resistance from the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party, the once-Stalinist Communist Party in uninterrupted power since 1921. Under the pressure of demonstrations in 1990, the government promised political and economic reforms, and the first multi-party parliamentary elections were held in 1992. The disorganized opposition only garnered six seats, leaving the other 70 -- and the government -- firmly in the hands of the Revolutionary Party. In the wake of the crushing defeat, the Mongolian opposition began to work together with Republican advisers to transform itself into a unified force with formidable campaigning skills. Such peaceful transformation stands in stark contrast to the turmoil that has beset Russia and many former Soviet satellites after the collapse of communism. "For decades Mongolia was under the domination of foreign countries," Enkhsaikhan said. "So really Mongolia itself is a new nation." Republican Party help to the fledgling Mongolian democratic opposition began in late 1991. "It was a personal request from Secretary of State {James} Baker. He called us up when he returned from {an official visit to} Ulan Bator and said, `I think you need to do something there to help the democratization process,` " said Kirsten Edmondson, the Washington-based International Republican Institute (IRI) program manager for Mongolia. IRI -- the Republican wing of the congressionally funded National Endowment for Democracy -- dispatched staff members to Mongolia. They convinced squabbling groups of opposition forces -- political parties, students, activists, nongovernmental organizations, intellectuals and businessmen -- to form a united coalition. IRI then trained candidates and supporters from the newly created National Democratic Union in the science of targeting voters with relevant messages, grass-roots party development and membership recruitment. As the campaign season began in late 1995, Gingrich sent the authors of the Contract With America to Ulan Bator. Working with the Democratic Union, they drafted the "Contract With the Mongolian Voter." Even the new Mongolian election law was lifted verbatim from the election law manual of Texas, Mongolian and IRI officials said. The Contract with the Mongolian Voter called for private property rights, a free press and the encouragement of foreign investment. It became the most widely distributed document in Mongolian history, according to Mongolian officials, with 350,000 copies printed in 1996. The Americans convinced the opposition candidates of the importance of hitting the campaign trail -- a concept previously unheard of here -- personally taking their message to the far-flung corners of this country of 2.5 million people just under the size of Alaska. And it was voters such as Yadamsuren, who like many Mongolians uses only one name, who put the new government in power. A herder like more than half of Mongolia's population, he owns 50 cows and sheep, which grazed nearby in minus 22 degrees Fahrenheit weather. While his wife melted snow on a coal stove for drinking water for the livestock, he talked of giving the young opposition forces a chance to change Mongolia: "People understood that this new government wanted to put Mongolia on the same footing with other countries. We decided to give them the power to do it." And it was the contract that persuaded him to vote out the Communists, he said. "We knew before the elections there were promises in the contract that could not be fulfilled, like raising the pensions. But in general, in a strategic sense, {the new leaders} are doing important things. We decided to give the younger generation a chance." In dozens of interviews with ordinary Mongolians during a one-month trip through the country, all were familiar with the contract. On June 30, 1996, dressed in their finest traditional clothing, and traveling by horse, camel and on foot, 91 percent of the Mongolian electorate turned out to vote -- -the biggest turnout by far in Mongolian history. The result stunned everyone, including the victors. Baker was on hand to witness the victory, having returned as a private citizen to serve as an official election monitor. Diplomats and Mongolian officials agree that the Communists grossly miscalculated voter sentiment and the opposition's organization. All 50 of the newly elected legislators were trained by IRI, according to government leaders. IRI and Mongolian officials said the Communist candidates were offered training and assistance in campaign strategy by the Americans, but turned it down. But diplomats and Mongolian officials are quick to credit the Communists for the smooth transition. "In many ways they are the unsung heroes. They had the army and the power. They could have just refused to turn it over," said an American diplomat. In a July letter, two former leaders of the democratic opposition who suddenly found themselves head of parliament and the majority leader praised IRI and "all of our friends in America": "The victory of democracy in Mongolia demonstrates that the values of life, liberty, freedom of speech and respect for human rights and justice are not just American values, but universal values inherent in all peoples, including the people of Asia," they said. "We want to thank our American friends who worked so hard to make this possible. The International Republican Institute stood side by side with us."

Thai troops advance on protest camp; Standoff takes another turn At least eight injured amid tightened security

Thai troops advance on protest camp; Standoff takes another turn At least eight injured amid tightened security

The Washington Post

May 19, 2010

By Andrew Higgins and Nate Thayer   

After weeks of escalating confrontation, soldiers backed by armored vehicles deployed in force early Wednesday in the center of the Thai capital, moving toward the fortified encampment of anti- government protesters entrenched behind bamboo barricades in this modern Asian metropolis.

The operation, which also included armed police, appeared to mark the start of an attempt by Thai authorities to dislodge "red shirt" protesters from an upscale shopping and diplomatic district and end an increasingly volatile standoff in the heart of Bangkok.

But a government spokesman suggested that the military was not making a final push to evict the demonstrators. Panitan Wattanayagorn said that the operation's goal was to tighten the security cordon and that it would take the rest of the day.

Troops armed with American M16 rifles skirmished with militant elements of what began more than two months ago as a peaceful protest movement. Clouds of tear gas and smoke from burning tires drifted over a garbage-strewn boulevard leading to the heart of the red shirts' zone. Gunfire crackled and helicopters clattered overhead.

Troops broke through a barricade in the south of the territory occupied by the protesters but by mid-morning had not pushed into the core of the zone. Protest leaders called on their followers to stay put. At a stage decked with a banner reading "Not Terrorists," protesters sang a Thai folk song called "No Problem."

An estimated 3,000 people, including women and some children, remained inside the protesters' encampment, and a full-scale operation to force them out would carry grave risks for America's closest ally in Southeast Asia. Heavy casualties would likely only stoke political passions further and could escalate Thailand's worst crisis in decades.

Initial casualties appeared to have been modest, with news agencies reporting at least eight people injured.

The stakes are also high for Washington, which risks severe embarrassment if the military push produces major bloodshed. The United States has long-standing and intimate relations with Thailand's armed forces. The two countries hold regular joint exercises, the most recent of which, a naval exercise off the Thai coast, began late last week -- just as the Thai authorities declared parts of Bangkok a "live firing zone."

Approaching red shirt territory, soldiers beefed up their presence on a street where a billboard advertising BMW cars declared, "Joy is here, there and everywhere." Soldiers also took positions outside the U.S. Embassy, on the edge of protester territory, and moved on foot along an elevated rail line over the center of the camp.

Red shirts first moved into the capital nine weeks ago to press demands that new elections be held to replace a government they denounce as undemocratic. Since then they have steadily expanded territory under their control, paralyzing the center of a capital city of more than 9 million people. As troops moved in last week to choke off supplies to the protest area, militant elements took up arms and fought running battles with the Thai military in which at least 39 people have been killed.

Kobsak Sabhavasau, a senior aide to Thailand's Oxford-educated prime minister, said on Thai television that the government was still open to negotiations, but only if the protesters withdraw first. "I believe it is not too late," he said. His remark suggested that the government still wanted to avoid an all-out offensive and was ratcheting up pressure the protesters in the hope that the protesters might finally pull back.

Washington, in public comments, had tried to remain aloof from what it termed a domestic political crisis. But behind the scenes, U.S. diplomats in Bangkok worked to find a peaceful settlement. They held informal talks with both government officials and red shirt representatives, diplomats familiar with the discussions said. It was not clear whether the United States was informed beforehand of the Thai military's advance Wednesday.

[email protected]

Nate Thayer contributed to this report.

Four missing Western journalists may be still detained by Iraq authorities, friend says

AP Worldstream

April 1, 2003

By Shafika Mattar         

00-00-0000
Dateline: AMMAN, Jordan A colleague of four Western journalists and another American who entered Iraq without visas at the start of the war said Tuesday he believed they were being detained by Iraqi authorities.

Nate Thayer, an award-winning freelance journalist from Washington, D.C., said Iraqi authorities arrested him and his photographer, Molly Bingham of Louisville, Kentucky, at their hotel on March 24.

"After five hours of detention and questioning, I was released, but Molly did not come out with me," Thayer told The Associated Press. "I believe she is with the others, although I did not see their detention and no one else did."

He drove out of Baghdad to Jordan last Friday with an Italian photographer who was also being expelled.

"We believe they were detained by the Iraqi security forces, who believe they are something other than what they are," Thayer said. "We want to correct this misunderstanding and get those people back to their homes."

In addition to Bingham, Newsday correspondent Matthew McAllester, 33, Newsday photographer Moises Saman, 29; Danish freelance photographer Johan Rydeng Spanner, and an American peace activist, Philip Latasha, are unaccounted for in Iraq.

Thayer said that he, Bingham, Spanner and Latasha entered Iraq during the first hours of the U.S.-British bombing of Iraq and claimed they were tourists because they couldn't get press visas. McAllester and Saman went on the same day but with another group, he said.

Journalists expelled from Iraq have told Newsday that security officials came last Monday to the hotel where McAllester and Saman were staying and questioned reporters. No one saw McAllester and Saman removed, but their room was empty when a friend went to check on them, Newsday reported.

Spanner's photos of damaged official buildings in Iraq were printed in Denmark's Jyllands-Posten. The newspaper said Monday that Spanner was being held by Iraqi authorities on suspicions he could be a spy.

"Johan is an independent photographer and innocent," Thayer said. "He wanted to show the world the horror of the war."

ESCAPES: The Living Fields; Cambodia's Most Famous War Reporter Retreats to Dorchester County, Md.

 

ESCAPES: The Living Fields; Cambodia's Most Famous War Reporter Retreats to Dorchester County, Md.

The Washington Post

November 8, 2000 | Steve Hendrix

"If I were writing about this area," the war correspondent says with one arm draped over the steering wheel of his pickup, "that would be my lead right there."

The war correspondent is squinting down the sunny main street of Cambridge, Md.--a rank of blank storefronts and shabby 1960s siding. Specifically, he's pointing at a digital clock that glows feebly on the side of a two-story corner law office. "That clock has been six hours slow since I got here. It's the perfect emblem for this place."

This place is Dorchester County, Md., a working Chesapeake borough less than two hours from Washington where it sometimes seems the digital age has progressed no further than a half-bright digital clock overlooking a sleepy downtown. The war reporter--who has a hard time looking at any scene without mentally crafting a paragraph about it--is Nate Thayer, a hard-eyed, trouble-hunting journalist who has infiltrated some of the bloodiest jungle strongholds in Southeast Asia. To the surprise of his family, colleagues and readers, the 40- year-old Thayer recently retreated to placid Dorchester after more than 15 years of chasing danger around the world. Last spring, he bought a capacious old farmhouse and 70 acres on Church Creek, less than a mile as the heron flies from Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge. He's quietly writing a book and tending the fields with his longtime sweetheart, Carol Bean, and Scoop, a scrappy mutt they rescued from the slums of Bangkok. After a long adrenaline ride through hot spots and hellholes, Thayer says he came to Dorchester for a little peace. Reluctantly.

"I was the world's most unmotivated buyer," he laughs, walking across the street to his frequent breakfast spot at the counter of Doris Mae's Restaurant. "I looked at waterfront property all over the world, Thailand, France. When I finally came over here, everyone said, 'Don't even look in Dorchester, there's nothing there,' which immediately intrigued me. The overwhelming sentiment here is not to change things. That's why I like it."

A white-haired woman at the griddle looks up as Thayer enters. He's an imposing figure in any setting, but particularly in a small- town egg joint with Navy recruitment posters on the wall. He's tall, lithe and swimmer-strong (from daily laps at the Cambridge YMCA). With a shaved head, a natural scowl and an ever-present pinch of black snuff under his front lip, Thayer looks downright piratical. It's a broke-nose mien that serves him well in the dyspeptic bars where he does much of his reporting, but one that belies his blue- blood lineage (his father was an ambassador to Singapore) and his own intellectual bent as a rapacious reader who recently did a turn as a think-tank scholar with Johns Hopkins University.

The waitress greets Thayer in a motherly way and asks if he wants his eggs poached, an item not on the menu. He says yes, asks her the news and looks around at the orderly calmness that pervades this community. "Having lived so long in the absence of rules," he says, "I've come to appreciate a properly organized society."

Thayer began his career as a flouter of rules, a hard-drinking 28- year-old with a taste for conflict and serious weapons. As a Bangkok- based freelance reporter, he quickly gained a reputation for going where others couldn't--or wouldn't--go. He learned the local dialects, lived and walked in the jungle with the bad guys and endured the sundry malignancies of modern Indochina: multiple bouts of cerebral malaria, kidnappings, a land mine explosion that shattered his leg and ruined his hearing. But the stories kept coming. In 1992, along the old Ho Chi Minh trail, Thayer discovered a forgotten band of mountain rebels who had to be convinced the Vietnam War was over and their American sponsors long gone. He has exposed heroin kingpins, corrupt politicians and murderous generals. "I want to go to my grave making people with guns, power and money nervous," he says with a frank grin. "I love it."

But more than any other, Thayer has been in pursuit of one villain for the whole of his career: Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge dictator who oversaw the greatest mass murder since Hitler. To work his way into Khmer Rouge territory, Thayer allowed himself to be captured numerous times, each occasion making friendly with another local Communist field commander. He tramped, on one trip, through more than 400 miles of jungle with Khmer Rouge units. He shared their mess and was treated in their field hospital after the truck he was riding in tripped a land mine and he woke up with his head in the engine compartment and a companion's severed leg across his chest. Finally, in 1998, Thayer's single-minded pursuit led him to what many consider the scoop of the decade, the first on-the-record interview with Pol Pot since he was driven from Phnom Penh in 1979. When they met in a sweltering jungle hut, the man responsible for killing an estimated 2 million people fixed his gaze on Thayer and said slowly, "I've known your name for a long, long time."

Five months later, Pol Pot--old and broken--was dead.

Somehow, it's even more jarring to hear Thayer's matter-of-fact telling of his extraordinary history as he moves through his now decidely ordinary life in Dorchester County. After breakfast, he rumbles down brick-paved High Street, past the boat basin crowded with both yachts and work boats. The big, shady Victorian sea captains' houses along here are slowly being bought and restored. It's an antique waterside neighborhood that seems like it could be, maybe, on the verge of better times.

"I think it's going to take off," Thayer says, pulling up to a large, well-groomed red house with a noble front porch. It's Cambridge House, a bed-and-breakfast that Thayer wants to visit. He entertains a steady stream of globe-trotting reporters, photographers and diplomats at his new place, and he considers it a host's duty to be able to recommend local inns and restaurants. Inside, innkeeper Stuart Schefers cautiously shares Thayer's optimism about the county.

"Slowly it's coming back," says Schefers. In addition to Cambridge House--already popular with bicyclists, birders and hunters-- Schefers is a partner in the Chesapeake Grill, one of a number of ambitious new restaurants in the area. "It's been neglected, but it is one of the few areas around the bay that hasn't been ruined by overdevelopment."

Driving the growing feeling that Dorchester may finally cash in on the tourism that has plumped up St. Michaels Island just across the Choptank River is a Hyatt resort being built hard on the edge of town. The $150 million, 450-acre development is slated to open in Christmas 2001, instantly becoming the biggest employer in the county. After decades of placidly watching tourist dollars zoom through town at 60 mph on their way to Ocean City, Dorchester may be in for a boom of its own.

A few minutes later, Thayer is driving down the wattle of shoreline below Cambridge, an intricate terrain laced with the many creeks and marshes that feed the Chesapeake. There are few buildings, just some modest homes, a sun-baked one-room schoolhouse where young Harriet Tubman once learned her letters and, tucked in a shoreside forest, an ancient Anglican church and cemetery. The corn fields are in stubble now; the sorghum is up and the waterfowl are on the wing. It's duck-hunting country and through the autumn, Thayer--who has heard some gunfire in his time--listens to the reports echoing across this wet, flat land.

"It's so dominated by water," he says, gazing at the low white crab boats working up the creek. Thayer is a slow, deliberate talker, and he drives the same way. Old farmers in tractor caps pass him in pickups even shabbier than his. "It's steeped in classic rural traditions, agriculture, fishing. That's what drives life here."

That will remain, Thayer believes, even if more people discover what he has, in part, because the vast 25,000-acre Blackwater refuge keeps adding more land. But there's also a doggedness to the local culture that will survive the lure of quick-buck development. (And already, more Volvos lugging bikes and kayaks are to be seen on the local roads, pulling into B&Bs and restaurants that cater to city visitors who come for the Eastern Shore the way it used to be.)

"You find that they are determined to maintain a farmer's way of life, even though they could make a killing by selling out to developers," says the war correspondent. As he rolls by, window open, a blazing white egret lifts out of the reeds with heavy, angelic flaps. "They know better than I do what a good place this is."

ESCAPES KEYS

Getting There: Dorchester County (war-free since 1865) is on the Eastern Shore, about 90 miles from Washington. From the Beltway, take Route 50 east all the way to Cambridge. James Michener set part of "Chesapeake" here, and it's the birthplace of Harriet Tubman (Home Towne Tours offers tours of Tubman sites, 410-228-0401).

Lodging: Cambridge House (112 High St., 410-221-7700, www.cambridgehousebandb.com) is a stout, begabled old captain's mansion at the town waterfront. Rooms are $120, with a five-course dinner available with weekend packages ($329). Twenty-eight miles south of Cambridge, Wingate Manor (2335 Wingate-Bishop's Head Rd., 888-397-8717, $80 to $120) is a comfortable, roomy old pile hard on the Honga River. Bikes available gratis, boats for rent.

Eating: Rolston's Chesapeake Grill (321 High St.) makes it no longer necessary to cross the Choptank for upscale steak and seafood (entrees start at $20, with a less expensive bar and bistro up front). Hysers (824 Locust St.), an honest lunch counter, mixes a serious ice cream soda.

Antiquing: Dorchester remains bargain country, with almost a dozen antiques shops around Cambridge proper, the largest being the Packing House Antique Mall (411 Dorchester Ave., 410-221-8544).

Info: Dorchester County Tourism, 800-522-8687, www.tourdorchester.org.