Do you believe the 1970 expansion of the Vietnam War into Cambodia directly contributed to the Khmer Rouge's rise to power and, by relation, the atrocities that followed? And if so, what do you think are the greater implications this has on the concept of American Imperialism?
"I encouraged the Chinese to support Pol Pot. I encouraged the Thai to help the DK [Democratic Kampuchea]. The question was how to help the Cambodian people. Pol Pot was an abomination. We could not support him but China could." - Zbigniew Brzezinski
The reason for that was to break Soviet influence in SE Asia, that's all; nothing particularly 'imperialistic' about it, just Cold War geo-politics. The Soviets were the 'Imperialist' power, not the US.
Nobody was predicting the massacres that came later, and despite all the hysteria, US power is limited by local influences, not all-encompassing domination, regardless of what the loons out in the fever swamps fantasize about. It was a part of the Nixon-China detente policy, actually, Red China not being particularly happy with a Soviet puppet state on their southern border.
Like Kissinger said, most of the time choices are limited and many times all of them are bad, so you have to decide which is the least bad, or something to that effect.
I would like to see an original, primary source for that quote. The earliest I can find is from 1995, and Brzezinski denies making it. All the other references to it seem to be hearsay.
We were still in Viet Nam in 1972; we didn't pull out until 1975. !979 sounds like a better time frame than 1972.
There is no justification for supporting the Khmer Rouge. None. They were racist fanatics who were also Communists, and they killed Vietnamese, Chinese (the PRC was apathetic to the plight of its own people) and intellectuals (which apparently encompass anybody who wears glasses). About 2 million people died due to the genocide. The only reason we helped them is because the Soviets were on the other side.Is there an argument for the premise that war wouldn't have spread to Cambodia if the US wasn't involved? Given Soviet foreign policy , my guess is that it would have been far worse, especially if they had won Viet Nam.
madlib said:About 2 million people died due to the genocide.
I wasn't ranting about Communists. I actually sympathize with socialism. I don't have to be a McCarthyist to believe that the Khmer Rouge were sick bastards. If a capitalist regime did exactly the same thing, my response would be exactly the same (as I've showed in my criticism of Leopold II imperialism). In fact, the genocide was ignoring a basic tenet of communism: that everybody is equal. If Pol Pot was a laissez-faire dictator, and commit the genocide, I still would have thought that he deserves to be drawn and quartered.This number masks the countless innocents massacred in the indiscriminate bombing campaigns of Kampuchean cities. The reason your post is ridiculous is because, while it emphasizes the destructive actions of the Khmer Rouge, it completely ignores the complicity of western-backed forces in the massacres.
You say that the US "shouldn't" have supported the Khmer Rouge. What you don't understand is that they did precisely because the US government is equally as amoral and unconcerned with human rights abuses as the Khmer Rouge. Perhaps you should remember that next time before going on silly rants about "Communists".
madlib said:However, I do believe that it unfair to say that the U.S. is exactly the same as the Khmer Rouge. Our country is a constitutional republic; Democratic Kampuchea was in reality a totalitarian state.
Violence against civilians has been increasingly looked down upon and is now highly limited. I believe that the developed countries are getting better on this matter.All states in essence operate within the confines of the conditions in which they exist, and exploit their own situation to their advantage. The US state exists within the confines of conditions that make its existence - or appearance - as a democratic republic a necessity, in order to maintain its legitimacy. This has no bearing on the fundamental, concrete fact that when violence is beneficial to advance its own aspirations and defend its own interests, that it will do so provided that it feels it can get away with it. This is why the majority of the wanton slaughter of innocent civilians by the American state and its allies happens outside of American soil.
Violence against civilians has been increasingly looked down upon and is now highly limited.
Oberon said:The meme of 'the U.S. just likes to bomb innocent women and children for no reason is cuz it's just evil, and nobody else is' myth is still alive and well, I see.
See my sig.
Nobody said that. We are criticizing the U.S. for supporting what are essentially Red Nazis, and for killing civilians during the war. You're attitude seems to be that Americans are the good guys no matter what they actually do.Well, nobody wants to discuss the realities and history of Cambodian politics, then.
The meme of 'the U.S. just likes to bomb innocent women and children for no reason is cuz it's just evil, and nobody else is' myth is still alive and well, I see.
Nobody seems to mind that the Cambodian government allowed North Vietnamese troops to operate from there with impunity, provided them cover within civilian populations and even cut a deal with Red China to allow unrestricted supply lines through Cambodia in violation of it's own proclamations of 'Neutrality' doesn't matter, and doesn't count as an expansion of the war for some reason, and of course discussing the alternatives is pointless cuz the US is just evil and likes to kill lots of people, while the Maoists and Soviets don't, and nobody would have died at all if weren't for the U.S.
Okay ... whatever ...
Oh, I'm sorry we want to change our methods when bad things happen to normal people. I completely deserved the personal attack.I'm not interested in fever swamp crap. Play grabass with MadLib. I come to this forum to discuss history stuff. I go upstairs for the sniveling and whining stuff. See my sig.
Well, nobody wants to discuss the realities and history of Cambodian politics, then.
The meme of 'the U.S. just likes to bomb innocent women and children for no reason is cuz it's just evil, and nobody else is' myth is still alive and well, I see.
Nobody seems to mind that the Cambodian government allowed North Vietnamese troops to operate from there with impunity, provided them cover within civilian populations and even cut a deal with Red China to allow unrestricted supply lines through Cambodia in violation of it's own proclamations of 'Neutrality' doesn't matter, and doesn't count as an expansion of the war for some reason, and of course discussing the alternatives is pointless cuz the US is just evil and likes to kill lots of people, while the Maoists and Soviets don't, and nobody would have died at all if weren't for the U.S.
Okay ... whatever ...
There are lessons to be learned from Vietnam. The entire postwar American policy for Indochina was a series compounding mistakes as increasingly stupid measures were used to try and "fix" the situation created by incompetence. Cambodia was simply the last in a very long line of moronic choices that lead to complete disaster. Escalation Vietnam made domino theory a self fulfilling prophecy as the war created instability which predictably spread to neighboring countries. The response to that situation was to bomb the crap out of said countries, destabilizing them even further. Then after failing in Vietnam, we end up supporting pol pot simply because he was anti-Vietnam. The whole scenario was a bunch of stupid emotional reactions rather than anything approaching sensible policy choices. There is no ****ing logical thought process in which you end up supporting probably the worst communist mass murder of all time in a war fought to "prevent the spread of communism".
There is no ****ing logical thought process in which you end up supporting probably the worst communist mass murder of all time in a war fought to "prevent the spread of communism".
Oberon said:Our Indochina policy was an outgrowth of Roosevelt's postwar plans made during WW II to dismantle the remnants of European colonialism and modernize Asia into independent states. Khrushchev and Mao had other, imperialist plans of their own for SE Asia.
That doesn't matter. We are no better than the Soviets or the Maoists (who, by the way, also supported Pol Pot to escape Soviet influence) if we support Red Fascists like Pol Pot.I missed this earlier.
Do you think U.S. policy makers deliberately supported Pol Pot because they knew he was going to kill a couple million people?
I disagree that U.S. policy was a 'series of mistakes'; we actually achieved the main strategic goal, which was preventing the Soviets from establishing a major warm water naval base astride key trading routes, where they would have eventually strangled the rest of East Asia.
Our Indochina policy was an outgrowth of Roosevelt's postwar plans made during WW II to dismantle the remnants of European colonialism and modernize Asia into independent states. Khrushchev and Mao had other, imperialist plans of their own for SE Asia.
]The first 'serious mistake' for the U.S. was John Kennedy's assassination of Diem, which pretty much made an escalation automatic.
If you're interested, we can walk through it all. I'll also throw in that the war also is the war that bankrupted the Soviet Union, despite Reagan falsely taking credit for that, an added benefit. Another, unintended benefit, was the U.S. presence also defused a budding war between the Soviets and Chinese as well, which could have easily kicked off a third 'world war', a nuclear one. More on that also, later.
Do you think U.S. policy makers deliberately supported Pol Pot because they knew he was going to kill a couple million people?
Utter garbage. The very first step post WW2 was to give our support to the French re-colonizing Indochina.
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