Cambodia: AMERICANS + COMMUNISTS = YUON WARMONGERS [FR]

THE FACT that the mode of Lon Nol depended on the Americans for the equipment of his army and political support made the play of the Communists. A many not-Communists, in particular in the cities, judged on the other hand that the origin of the conflict was the invasion country by the North-Vietnamese. Thousands of young men voluntarily engaged in the forces of Lon Nol, naively hoping to release their country in the space of a few weeks. Hundreds of them were killed or wounded. Lon Nol's Republic Regime has tried to bring out all Vietcong who had been hiding everywhere in Cambodian jungles for a right time patiently to have appeared on the international stage by disguising themselves among the ignorant Khmer Rouge soldiers, to terribly misled the people in the outside world that the war in Cambodia was only civil war fighting between red Khmer and White/Green Khmer, but in fact all Vietcong who are the murderous warmongers....As William Shawcross clearly tells us Khmer victims:- The new, US-backed government stirs anti-Vietnamese sentiment and initiates ineffectual military operations against the Viet Cong troops. Simultaneously, the Lon Nol government cancels an agreement allowing North Vietnam to use the port at Sihanoukville.

In summer of 1972 an anti-Vietnamese demonstration organized by the Khmer Rouge in Kompong Cham. Villagers marched around, brandishing machetes and shouting, "We do not fear to die from bombs dropped from airlanes," and "We all agree to die together in order to get the VC/NVA out of Cambodia."

Americans might have thought that helping Cambodia preventing from being wiped out on the World Map, and could hinder Vietnamization. But it was different result; it only brought Cambodia down to its knees with a real destruction that South Vietnamese troops who had "Good Blessing" from their American masters as William Shawcross writes to tell us Khmer victims:- There were no attempt was being made tor restrain the South Vietnamese from crashing across the border when they wished. Simultaneously, the North Vietnamese moved westward into with the apparent intention of securing their lines of communication. Lon Nol told an Asian diplomat, who told the U.S. Embassy, that he greatly regretted that the United States had not consulted Cambodia first. He wished that the Americans had blocked the Communists' westward escape route before attacking, instead of spreading them across Cambodia. The Cambodian leader told Haig that there was no way his small force could stop them. His country was in danger. Only the American army could help. To prevent loss of major objectives to NVA/VC...It is considered that the prevention of total take-over of Cambodia by the NVA/VC is a prime objective and that RVNAF ground forces and United States air interdiction should be used to achieve this objective.

At the same time Cambodia was open house for the South Vietnamese Air Force. They and the army were free, for the first time in decades, to give expression to their historical contempt for the Khmers. They behaved as if they were conquering a hostile nation, rather than helping a new ally; every Cambodian was a VC and target. Perhaps the most chilling evidence of the pleasure that the pilots took in it all was contained in a cable sent by Abrams to the Pentagon. He reported that until now it had been virtually impossible to induce the South Vietnamese to fly on Sundays. Now they were paying bribes of 1, 000 piastres each to be allowed to go out seven days a week-over Cambodia.

It was the same with the South Vietnamese ground troops. ARVN soldiers returned home with looted Hondas, bicycles and radios, and their commanders did not deter them. Throughout the later part of the summer, the 495th ARVN battalion rampaged through the villages around the town of Takeo. According to a CIA report from Phnom Penh, the ARVN commander, captain Le Van Vien, frequently called air strikes "to drive the people from the villages; he and his men would seize the villagers' animals and force them to buy them back. Rives reported to Washington that ARVN troops frequently ambushed and killed Cambodian officers; the governor of Svay Rieng made constant complains about the way in which the South Vietnamese stole cars, sandwiched them into military convoys and barrelled through border posts firing at the Cambodian sentries. Rives informed his superiors that even Lon Nol was "was getting increasingly fed up" and was considering how he might get rid of his "ally." But he could not. Thieu began to demand that the Cambodians pay for ARVN's presence.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Cambodia
• Kampuchea
• Yuon
• Nixon
• Kissinger

[mlovmo]

Too bad for Cambodia. This is simply the fate of poor countries who need a helping hand, sometimes. FANK General Sutsakhan complained that the Republic of Korea got bailed out of its problems in 1950 by the UN, but the Khmer Republic was left to wither and die in 1975. He's got a point, but it's more complicated than that, of course. Substantive UN intervention means, of course, USA intervention. And that wasn't going to happen in 1975.

[jiraffeee]

Its a tarnashans shame y´neu,amreekas gon find owt orl abawt justice!  wen theyz a beaten!

[mytran80]

darn its in french ,great vid though