What Was Pol Pot Smoking? - A History of Cambodia in Less Than a 1000 Words

Angkor Wat - photo by JoAnn Sturman

by Scott Sturman

Even third world countries have had their time in the sun, and Cambodia is no exception.  A half of a millennium of ascendency is longer than most, but the inevitable decline is predictable:  poor leadership, corruption, loss of national vision, and squandering of wealth and resources.  With the view of someone who has spent only five days in country, this overview may seem presumptuous.  However, if Hollywood stars can testify before Congress on matters of foreign policy and national security, these simple observations may not be that far off target.  

The list of the Seven Wonders of the World has expanded to accommodate the sensibilities of an increasingly number of sensitive national egos.  These compilations are a subjective exercise which shouldn’t make any difference to anyone, but making or not making the list is worth millions of tourist dollars.  In a controversial move, the New7Wonders of the World omitted the Pyramid at Giza, but after considerable protest, this original Wonder of the Ancient World was given an honorary spot.  Even if the “experts” now concede there are Eight Wonders, a visitor to Cambodia’s Angkor Wat will scratch one’s head and wonder why there aren’t nine.

Ta Prohm - photo by JoAnn Sturman

For about five hundred years from 800-1300 AD the Khmers, now known as Cambodians, expanded to become the dominant power of Southeast Asia.  The empire encompassed much of what is now Cambodia, Thailand, Laos, Burma, Malaysia, and Vietnam.  The most spectacular monuments to this past glory can be found near Siem Reap, Cambodia.  Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom are the most famous, but only two of the magnificent sites covering the region.   For an agrarian culture to build these marvelously ornate structures over several centuries in the jungles of Southeast Asia requires a significant amount of capital and labor.  A major source of this immense wealth was rice and fish, and without the unique geography of the area, it would not have been possible.

The secret is the tropical climate, the extraordinary flatness of the land, the Mekong River, and the Tonle Sap.  Siem Reap is located near the Sap River which connects Southeast Asia’s largest lake, the Tonle Sap, with the Mekong River at Phnom Penh.  In this distance of 139 miles the river drops only twenty feet from 59 to 39 feet above sea level.  It takes the Mekong another 127 miles to reach the sea.  At the onset of the monsoon each June, the swollen Mekong’s riverbed is insufficient to empty the effluence into the South China Sea.  The force of the nutrient rich water causes the Sap River to reverse direction and flow uphill to engorge the Tonle Sap.  The lake teems with fish, and its area expands six fold, only to recede in November when the monsoon abates.  The sediment filled, exposed lake bed allows for nearly perfect rice growing conditions. 

Ta Prohm - photo by JoAnn Sturman

Saloth Sar, AKA Pol Pot and son of a moderately prosperous Cambodian farmer, was sent to Paris in 1949, where he studied for four years.  A poor student, he became involved with the Communist movement and fell under the spell of Marxists who asserted the world’s problems were due to the urban class exploiting their rural brothers.  The remedy called for evacuation of all cities in order for everyone to work the land. This bizarre notion coupled with a fascination of Cambodia’s past grandeur made a profound impression on Saloth Sar .  He returned to Cambodia to eventually become leader of the Khmer Rouge.  In 1975 the Communist Party gained control of the country, and as its head, Sar took charge under the name Pol Pot, “Brother Number One.”

Pol Pot possessed a megalomaniac’s vision of Cambodia– a way for this sleepy, xenophobic country of farmers to regain preeminence in Southeast Asia.  At its zenith the Khmer Empire fueled its expansion with rice production.  In Pol Pot’s mind the generation of wealth and power based on crop production was undermined by urbanites and intellectuals, who exploited farmers and villagers.  Within a few days after  assuming control of the country, Pol Pot ordered all cities evacuated.  Men, women, children, babies, and the elderly, were compelled to live in the countryside, where they grew rice.  Any resistance was punished by a perverse form of execution, where the accused dug a pit and then was obliged kneel at its side.  Using a blunt instrument, an executioner stuck the condemned in the back of the head with such force that the victim fell into the grave.  In the view of the Khmer Rouge non conformists were not worth the price of a bullet.  Intellectuals and non Khmers were slaughtered even if compliant with the regime; ethnicity and sophistication were ample reasons for extermination.

Angkor Wat - photo by JoAnn Sturman

The Killing Fields cost 2 million of Cambodia’s 8 million people but did not deter Pol Pot from attempting to teach the Vietnamese a lesson through a number of bumbling military attacks.  Like a gnat which could no longer be tolerated, the Vietnamese Army defeated the Cambodians in a matter of days, forcing Pol Pot to flee to the mountains.  In an ironic twist the United States and Great Britain responded to the ouster of one of the 20th century’s most heinous psychopaths by supporting him financially and providing military advisors.  So deep was the distrust of the Vietnamese, that we and our most steadfast ally elected to succor a monster who slaughtered 25% of his countrymen.

Cambodia, one of the poorest countries in Asia, is ostensibly a multiparty democracy under a constitutional democracy.  It suffers from nepotism, graft, corruption, poor education, and wealth maldistribution.   Despite cronyism and repression, economic progress is being made.  If these same people, whose ancestors built Angkor Wat, could be relieved of inept leaders and left to their own resources, they could do a lot more than grow rice.   

        Pol Pot's Handiwork