The document provides a detailed overview of the brutal Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia from 1975-1979 led by Pol Pot. It describes how Pol Pot rose to power and sought to transform Cambodia into an agrarian utopian society, declaring "year zero" and purging the country of influences from the past. The Khmer Rouge forcibly evacuated cities, established labor camps, and systematically killed millions perceived as enemies of the state through starvation, overwork, and execution. While the exact death toll is uncertain, most estimates range from 1.5-2 million killed through genocide and its aftermath. The international community largely ignored or disregarded the atrocities as they occurred. Pol Pot and other Khmer Rouge leaders evaded prosecution and maintained

1. Lisa Spears
The Cold War
Prof. Arne Kislenko, Freie Universitat Berlin
15 August 2008
The Khmer Rouge Regime (1975-1979)
“My conscience is clear.” So states an old and frail Pol Pot, former leader of the Khmer Rouge and the
man responsible for the deaths of millions of people in the Cambodian genocide. In his last public
appearance, he claims that he made mistakes but could not be held accountable for them. A fairly
unrecognized and exceedingly enigmatic regime, the Khmer Rouge orchestrated one of the most brutal
genocides of the twentieth century, one which still directly affects Cambodia today.
Much of Pol Pot’s biography remains unfathomable. A radio announcement in Korea stated he was
born as Saloth Sar in May, 1925, while French colonial records state he was born in May, 1928. His
parents were both well-off and well-respected, with multiple connections to the royal palace. His
cousin, Meak, held the position entitled “lady in charge of the women,” and his brother, Loth Suong,
was a clerk in the palace. When he was twenty-one, he joined the Indochinese Communist Party, a
resistance movement against the French occupation of Vietnam. Shortly afterwards, Pol Pot studied
radio electricity in France and joined the French Communist Party. He became obsessed with Marxism,
neglected his studies, and lost his scholarship. Instead, he spent time writing and publishing ferocious
criticisms of the Cambodian monarchy, calling it “an unjust doctrine, a malodorous running sore that
just people must eliminate.” Returning to Cambodia to teach history and geography, he then became
an active member of Kampuchean People’s Revolutionary Party. He slowly climbed the ranks of this
Communist movement, and in 1963, he became the commander of the Worker’s Party of Kampuchea.
Pol Pot spent the next several years building a guerilla army.
In 1954, Cambodia achieved independence from France, and a royal monarchical government was
established. The leader of Cambodia, Prince Norodom Sihanouk, exiled Pol Pot into the jungle, as he
perceived him as a military threat. Over the next several years, Pol Pot’s rural army waged war against
Sihanouk’s government. In 1970, a U.S.-backed military coup ousted Sihanouk from power. Sihanouk
immediately launched a resistance movement against Lon Nol, the new Prime Minister, and Pol Pot
seized this opportunity to form a public alliance (but private resistance) with Sihanouk.
In the jungles of Cambodia in the 1960s, the Khmer Rouge began. Named by Sihanouk himself, it
literally means “Red Cambodians” in French. The Kampuchean army began a violent and aggressive
insurgency against the Cambodian government. Ieng Sary (born Kim Trang), who later became the
Deputy Prime Minister of the Khmer Rouge, and also taught history and geography before joining the
movement, went to Vietnam to seek military aid. North Vietnam and the Viet Kong aided the
communist attack against the government. In 1970, the United States invaded Cambodia in an effort to
expel the North Vietnamese and combat the Kampuchean insurgency. Throughout 1972 and 1973, the
U.S. launched an aerial campaign of B-52s which destroyed nearly all of the Eastern Zone of Cambodia,
resulting in a military and economic destabilization of the country, which in turn garnered growing
support among the public for Pol Pot. By 1975, the Cambodian government lost its military support
from the U.S. The Khmer Rouge seized this opportunity. On January 1, 1975, the Kampuchean Army

2. began an assault on the capitol, Phnom Penh, and by February, the city was completely surrounded. On
April 17, Pol Pot’s troops entered the city and overthrew the government, establishing the Democratic
Kampuchean People’s Republic in its place. The initial public reaction was one of joy and relief; many
people saw this as the end of war and oppression. However, this was short-lived.
Pol Pot had previously visited Communist China, witnessing Mao Zedong’s “Great Leap Forward.” Pol
Pot considered Mao to be a mentor of sorts, a man he greatly admired and wished to emulate. The
Great Leap Forward involved the “cleansing” of class enemies and the evacuation of cities, in an attempt
to purge all class differences from the masses. Pol Pot intended to carry out his own “Great Leap” in
Cambodia. He envisioned a classless, agrarian, utopian society.
Pol Pot had 1975 declared “year zero,” as the mark of a new era. “Year Zero” was an attempt to
distance his new regime not only from Cambodia’s history, but from the entire world. He claimed that
the new Kampuchea would be “purified,” ousting any Western influence, Capitalism, religion, city life, or
foreign influences. He began by banning all foreign languages, shutting down all forms of news and
media, confiscating means of travel, and banning all forms of outside communication, such as
telephones, radios, and mail. All religious and educational institutions were shut down, and all
businesses were closed. Private property and currency were abolished. Parental authority was
eliminated, and children were placed in communes. Many were forced into collective marital
ceremonies involving hundreds of people.
Any individual with potentially middle or upper class standing, with respect to wealth, occupation,
lineage, or education, was immediately exterminated. “Purges” were conducted on a regular basis, and
many people attempted to hide their former occupation in order to avoid execution. Lawyers, police,
teachers, doctors, religious leaders, and government officials, as well as their relatives, were
exterminated. Entire families were killed, including children and babies. Anyone suspected of disloyalty
to Pol Pot was executed as well. Eventually, even high-ranking officials of the Khmer Rouge were killed
due to accusations of disloyalty.
All major cities and urban areas were evacuated, and those who were not immediately killed were
moved into forced labor camps or prisons. 2.5 million people were forced out of Phnom Penh at
gunpoint, and those who refused or were unable to comply (such as those in hospitals) were killed.
Many people, such as the elderly or ill, died along the way. These previously urban people, many of
whom had no experience in hard labor, were forced to work on farms, cultivating rice and fruit. Some
locations fed their workers a lunch of rice porridge or boiled bananas each day, while others had a diet
of one tin of rice every two days. These “killing fields” would produce crops which the workers were not
allowed to eat, and as a result, many people died of starvation or disease. At the end of each day, trucks
would pick up the cultivation. The working conditions consisted of an eighteen-hour day (from sunrise
to midnight), with Khmer Rouge soldiers supervising. Many of these soldiers were only teenagers, and
were eager to kill anyone for the slightest infringement. Every tenth day, workers were allowed to rest,
and during the Khmer New Year, workers were given three days off.
Suspected enemies of the state were sent to prisons. A former high school, Tuol Sleng, was converted
into “Security Office 21,” or S-21. Records from Tuol Sleng indicate that at least 16,000 people were
tortured and killed. Henry Locard, who has studied Cambodia’s prisons extensively, estimates around
150 such prisons, in which 500,000 people were tortured and executed altogether. People who were
deemed enemies of the state were sent to such prisons, and were photographed and forced to strip to

3. their underwear upon arrival. A former guard describes how he had difficulty controlling his teenage,
hormonal urges at the time, and how there were few female guards. Many female prisoners, therefore,
were subject to sexual violence and humiliation. Prisoners were shackled to the floor and forced to
sleep without any bedding. At S-21, the bottom floor was for single prisoners, and the top floor was for
communal cells. In each cell, the prison rules were posted:
You must answer accordingly to my questions. Do not turn them away.
Do not try to hide the facts by making pretexts of this and that. You are strictly prohibited to contest me.
Do not be a fool for you are a chap who dares to thwart the revolution.
You must immediately answer my questions without wasting time to reflect.
Do not tell me either about your immoralities or the revolution.
While getting lashes or electrification you must not cry at all.
Do nothing. Sit still and wait for my orders. If there is no order, keep quiet. When I ask you to do something, you
must do it right away without protesting.
Do not make pretexts about Kampuchea Krom in order to hide your jaw of traitor.
If you do not follow all of the above rules, you shall get many lashes of electric wire.
If you disobey any point of my regulations, you shall get either ten lashes or five shocks of electric discharge.
The slightest action required permission. If prisoners did not ask permission before changing positions
while sleeping or relieving themselves, they faced a severe beating. Bathing consisted of spraying a
communal cell with a hose sporadically. Prisoners were regularly tortured to evoke a confession, such
as water-boarding, being strapped to iron beds, being hung upside down, and being tormented with
knives. At night, prisoners were led out to the rice fields, where they were shot or bludgeoned to death
(to conserve bullets). Only six people survived the prison.
The overseer of S-21 was Kang Khek Ieu, better known as Duch. Ta Mok, or “Brother Number Two,”
ordered the elimination of the entire intellectual class, but never actually supervised these executions.
In an interview with Valerio Pellizzari, Duch insists that he what did was necessary and that he had no
choice.
“I and everyone else who worked in that place knew that anyone who entered had to be psychologically
demolished, eliminated by steady work, given no way out. No answer could avoid death… If I had tried to flee,
they were holding my family hostage, and my family would have suffered the same fate as the other prisoners in
Tuol Sleng. If I had fled or rebelled it would not have helped anyone.”
This sentiment is echoed in scores of former members of the Khmer Rouge, who describe a sense of
powerlessness over their actions.
In December, 1978, Vietnam launched an attack on Cambodia in an effort to end border clashes since
1977. On January 7, 1979, Vietnam overthrew Phnom Penh and Pol Pot’s regime was defeated.
Vietnam established a government, using Khmer Rouge defectors as officials. This resulted in several
years of a Vietnamese occupation of Cambodia, and the Sino-Vietnamese War. Pol Pot was evacuated
and taken to Thailand by helicopter, while other Khmer Rouge officials fled by train. Over the next

4. several years, Pol Pot continued to command the Khmer Rouge army, and fought guerrilla warfare
against the Vietnamese occupation. After a series of power struggles, however, he lost control of the
Khmer Rouge, and was arrested.
The aftermath of the Khmer Rouge continued long after its defeat. As a result of the killing fields, there
was little food for the remaining people, and cultivating what food was left was quite difficult. Many
people continued to die of starvation and disease. It was not until many years later that Cambodia
received international relief.
The exact death toll of the Khmer Rouge regime is difficult to determine. The number of people
systematically killed in labor camps or prisons is only moderately difficult to calculate; however, the
number of people who died as a result of disease and famine, especially those who died in the
aftermath, is far more unfathomable. The most common estimate is 1.5 million to 1.7 million
altogether; however, repetition does not make this statistic reliable. As Bruce Sharp explains in an
article which seeks to determine the true death toll, “Estimates often gain superficial credibility through
repetition…Dubious statistics about Cambodia abound, often surfacing in books and articles that are
otherwise very carefully researched.” He illustrates how various articles cite other articles to the point
where exact origin of the statistic is unknown. Michael Vickery estimates at less than one million,
whereas Ben Kiernan, in The Pol Pot Regime, estimated 1.5 million based on his own surveys of
Cambodian survivors.
In a household survey done by the Kampuchean government in the 1980s, in which they aimed to
interview the head of every household and determined what exactly happened in their family during the
Pol Pot regime, the numbers yielded over 3 million people. However, analysts later agreed that this
number was most likely too high, as the survey did not account for extended family members being
counted twice. Additionally, a study in which mass graves were actually exhumed and bodies counted
also yielded 3.3 million. The Documentation Center of Cambodia continues to seek out this number, and
currently estimates it at around two million. However, this process is long and any statistic is hardly
reliable.
The international recognition of this genocide is still fairly non-existent. When the statistic of 3 million
deaths was initially released, the West generally disregarded it as Vietnamese propaganda. The West
generally viewed Vietnam as the perpetrator, and believed the Khmer Rouge to be Cambodia’s
legitimate government. The Soviet Union and its allies attempted to relieve some of Cambodia’s famine,
but these efforts were scattered and fell apart during the collapse of Communism in the Soviet Union.
The Paris Peace Agreements in 1991 finally initiated some international relief effort and business
investment, and 1993, hundreds of thousands of refugees in Thailand were repatriated into Cambodia.
Pol Pot maintained his innocence until the end of his life. In an interview, he states, “Look at me now.
Do I seem like a violent person to you?” He explains how he never wanted to kill anyone, and how there
were many people who joined his movement but were not true Kampucheans. He and Ta Mok, Brother
Number One and Brother Number Two, both escaped legal and judicial justice by dying while under
house arrest before the trial could begin. In fact, Pol Pot was never tried for crimes against humanity,
but rather for killing his family.
While the numbers are uncertain, it is an irrefutable fact that the Khmer Rouge conducted large-scale
genocide against both its own people and foreigners. It attempted to erase all individuality, to win over

5. the hearts and minds of the people, and it systematically killed anyone who did not comply. Whether by
starvation, disease, famine, or a bullet in the head, all those who died in this genocide were victims of
the regime. While this should have had a greater impact on international relations, the West chose to
mildly acknowledge it and promptly ignore it, while the East made unenthusiastic relief efforts. Those
most responsible for the atrocities evaded prosecution, and five currently await tribunals. This is rarely
discussed in popular culture or in educational institutions. However, to continue to ignore it is an
affront not only to the victims, but to humanity in general.

6. Bibliography
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Etcheson, Craig. “The Number: Quantifying Crimes Against Humanity in Cambodia.”
"http://www.mekong.net/cambodia/toll.htm" http://www.mekong.net/cambodia/toll.htm.
Etcheson, Craig. The Rise and Demise of Democratic Kampuchea. Boulder: Westview Press, 1984.
Jackson, Karl D. Cambodia 1975-1978: Rendezvous with Death. New Jersey: Princeton University Press,
1989.
Kiernan, Ben. The Pol Pot Regime. New York: Yale University, 1996.
Kiernan, Ben. How Pol Pot Came to Power: A History of Communism in Kampuchea, 1930-1975.
London: Thetford Press, 1985.
Mak, Kanika. “Genocide and Irredentism under Democratic Kampuchea.” Yale Center for International
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Panh, Rithy. S-21: The Khmer Rouge Killing Machine. Cambodia Information Center, 2006.
Pellizzari, Valerio. “Kang Khek Ieu: ‘They all had to be eliminated.’” 2008.
Cambodian Documentation Center.
Ponchaud, Francois. Cambodia: Year Zero. Originally by Editions Rene Julliard; English translation by
Holt, Rinehart and Winston of Canada, 1977.
Sharp, Bruce. “Counting Hell.” http://www.mekong.net/cambodia/deaths.htm
Thayer, Nate. “The Pol Pot Interview.” Far Eastern Economic Review, 1997.
Vickery, Michael. Cambodia 1975-1982. Boston: South End Press, 1984.
Dith, Pran. Children of Cambodia’s Killing Fields. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1997.