While estimates are unclear as to the number of Cambodian deaths that resulted from these bombings, they range between 50, and , Map 3: Mass burial sites from Khmer Rouge period, Unsurprisingly, the bombing fostered anger and fear among the Cambodian people, driving some from the countryside to seek shelter in the capital city of Phnom Penh.
But there was another significant factor in nudging more Cambodian peasants towards the Khmer Rouge: after Sihanouk was overthrown in , he joined the Khmer Rouge from exile in China and, through a radio broadcast, called on his fellow Cambodians to join him. Of course, not all people freely chose to join the Khmer Rouge. When the Khmer Rouge took control of an area, they would simply draft those old enough to fight or serve the movement in other ways.
To resist would mean death. By , the Khmer Rouge had gained control of most of the countryside and started requiring villagers to live in co-operatives and engage in large-scale agricultural projects. As the majority of the countryside came under Khmer Rouge rule, the situation in the capital city of Phnom Penh became increasingly dire.
The Lon Nol government could no longer hold its ground against the Khmer Rouge, especially after the U. The last helicopter carrying the remaining U. Initially, some in Phnom Penh expressed relief that the war had come to an end. But any sense of relief they felt quickly vanished.
The rationale they gave was that now that they had taken over the capital, the Americans would most certainly bomb the city. The residents were given no time to pack and were ordered at gunpoint to leave. There were no exceptions. Patients were dragged from their hospital beds and women were forced to give birth along the road.
The young, the old, the frail, and the sick all had to keep moving or risk being shot. Under the scorching hot April sun in Cambodia, many who were frail died along the road, their bodies left to swell in the heat. Figure 2: Khmer Rouge soldiers march into Phnom Penh, Both city residents and those in the countryside were assigned to work in agrarian labour camps to grow rice and build dams and dikes, or work on other agricultural projects.
In addition to eliminating personal property, the Khmer Rouge were also determined to root out ideas that were considered counter to their revolution. This included religion, education, and knowledge. They closed schools, destroyed libraries and temples, and banished religion. But even that was not enough; in their desire to purify the nation from all dissent and corrupting elements, they also annihilated anyone deemed a threat. For example, when Khmer Rouge soldiers seized Phnom Penh, they quickly executed government and military leaders.
They also targeted the wealthy, the educated, and the religious for eradication. The urbanites who managed to survive this initial round of executions quickly learned to conceal their education and to avoid displaying manners that might be associated with the higher classes. The set of beliefs that shaped life under Democratic Kampuchea, which was the formal name given to Cambodia by the Khmer Rouge, drew from Marxist-Leninist and Maoist thought and integrated communist ideology with pre-existing Cambodian religious and cultural ideas.
During what became known as the Cambodian Genocide , an estimated 1. The Vietnamese Army invaded Cambodia in and removed Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge from power, after a series of violent battles on the border between the two countries.
Pol Pot had sought to extend his influence into the newly unified Vietnam, but his forces were quickly rebuffed. After the invasion, Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge fighters quickly retreated to remote areas of the country. However, they remained active as an insurgency, albeit with declining influence. Vietnam retained control in the country, with a military presence, for much of the s, over the objections of the United States.
Over the decades since the fall of the Khmer Rouge, Cambodia has gradually reestablished ties with the world community, although the country still faces problems, including widespread poverty and illiteracy.
Prince Norodom returned to govern Cambodia in , although he now rules under a constitutional monarchy. Pol Pot himself lived in the rural northeast of the country until , when he was tried by the Khmer Rouge for his crimes against the state. The trial was seen as being mostly for show, however, and the former dictator died while under house arrest in jungle home. The stories of the suffering of the Cambodian people at the hands of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge have garnered worldwide attention in the years since their rise and fall, including through a fictional account of the atrocities in the movie The Killing Fields.
BBC News. The Cambodian Genocide. United to End Genocide. Cambodian Genocide. The Khmer Rouge also began to implement their radical Maoist and Marxist-Leninist transformation program at this time. They wanted to transform Cambodia into a rural, classless society in which there were no rich people, no poor people, and no exploitation.
To accomplish this, they abolished money, free markets, normal schooling, private property, foreign clothing styles, religious practices, and traditional Khmer culture. Public schools, pagodas, mosques, churches, universities, shops and government buildings were shut or turned into prisons, stables, reeducation camps and granaries.
There was no public or private transportation, no private property, and no non-revolutionary entertainment. Leisure activities were severely restricted. People throughout the country, including the leaders of the CPK, had to wear black costumes, which were their traditional revolutionary clothes.
During this time, everyone was deprived of their basic rights. People were not allowed to go outside their cooperative. The regime would not allow anyone to gather and hold discussions. If three people gathered and talked, they could be accused of being enemies and arrested or executed.
Family relationships were also heavily criticized. People were forbidden to show even the slightest affection, humor or pity.
The UN helped establish a tribunal to try surviving Khmer Rouge leaders, beginning work in Only three Khmer Rouge leaders have ever been sentenced.
Kaing Guek Eav - known as Duch - was jailed for life in for running the notorious Tuol Sleng prison. In November , the tribunal also found them guilty of genocide over the attempted extermination of the Cham and Vietnamese minorities.
It remains the first and only genocide conviction against the Khmer Rouge. Cambodian Genocide Program. Human Rights Watch. Image source, Getty Images. Pol Pot projected an image to the world of Cambodians thriving under his radical leadership. Communist philosophy.
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