In 1970, the Khmer Rouge soldiers began an insurgency against the government. They were helped by the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong troops, and used this combined power to gain control over more than two-thirds of the country in a short time. The popularity of the Khmer Rouge is witnessed by the dramatic rise in strength from 3,000 in the year 1970 to 30,000 in 1973. With this, most of the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong troops had withdrawn.

Finally, led by Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge overthrew the Cambodian government in 1975, after which the “Democratic Kampuchea” was established. Literally overnight, the new governance took cruel and drastic measures. Entire cities were evacuated. Property was abolished. Factories were closed. Schools were shut down. Money did not hold any value. Hundreds of thousands of taxi drivers, cooks, factory workers, clerks and everyone else became farmers suddenly. They even assassinated skilled workers and intellectuals, and many others died due to starvation. Records show that at least 2 million people died. Cambodia was reduced to nothing but a nation of slaves.

By the year 1979, tensions with Vietnam increased and Vietnamese troops invaded, helping the rival Communists factions in deposing the new Khmer Rouge government. But the Khmer Rouge continued to have a huge army of 30,000 near the Thai border and was also recognized by the United Nations as the official Cambodian government.

In 1982, this government entered into a coalition with former premier Norodom Sihanouk and Son Sann, who was a non-Communist leader. Leadership also changed hands from Pol Pot to Khieu Samphan, although it was widely believed that the real leader was still Pol Pot. In 1991, all the Cambodian factions signed a treaty asking for UN-supervised elections and in 1992; the UN assumed the administrative functions of the government. It was at this time that the Khmer Rouge disconnected itself from the peace process and started fighting. It also rejected the results of the UN-run elections that saw the beginning of a coalition government in Cambodia.

As is wont to happen, in 1997, due to factional fighting within themselves, Pol Pot was oustered and imprisoned by the Khmer Rouge and he died in 1998. That was the end of the Khmer Rouge, as most of the members were either captured, had surrendered or defected by 1999.

Not many scholars believed the reports of mass killings in Cambodia before 1979; however, when the Khmer Rouge was overtaken by the Vietnamese, the extent of the disaster was clear to all.

The Khmer Rouge even till this day evokes a sense of shock from Cambodians as well as the whole world, not just due to the death toll, which does not reflect the brutalities and tortures they carried out during their regime. The severity of their rule was such that there probably was no other revolution which changed the lives of an entire population.

Khmer Rouge overworked and starved the Cambodian people to death.  While at the same time chose certain groups to be executed because the government was fearful of their intelligence, groups such as teachers, merchants, and any type of intellectual, including people who simply wore glasses.  The Khmer Rouge was most threatened of the people learning, for they did not want the people to be able to outsmart them, so in addition to killing anyone with intelligence, they burned books, closed schools and hospitals, prohibited religions, eradicated all types of currency, and allowed no type of collaboration of the people without the Khmer Rouge and kept them all in labor farms, allowing them no privacy either.

The population continued to die, not including executions.  Many people on the labor farms died from exhaustion or starvation.  The Khmer Rouge was forcing them to work twelve consecutive hours, without sleep, food, or water.  Due to the closing of hospitals, there were not proper facilities for the sick or dying.  Khmer Rouge refused to use western medicine, so people were forced to use traditional peasant medicine.  This may have been their belief, or it may have been another way to keep out the western culture.  They allowed no influence of other cultures, and they even lied to the people and blamed many of the inconveniences on America, saying that America was going to bomb them.

Khmer Rouge knew what they were doing was wrong, and they were very threatened by, not only intellectuals, but leaders of the former government, foreign governments, and any person who had leadership skills or experience.  They executed anyone who was tied to the former government or foreign governments.  They also executed people of other ethnics, minorities, and people who had been Christians before their rule.  In addition, KCP leaders were executed in an effort to stop people from attempting to kill Pol Pot.

Khmer Rouge was forced out of Cambodia by the Vietnamese in 1979.  While Vietnam and Cambodia normally got along, Pol Pot decided to attack Vietnam in December of 1978 in fear of Vietnam attacking them first.  Pol Pot’s fears were correct because the Vietnamese were getting very impatient with the number of fleeing Cambodians coming into their country.  At the beginning of January Vietnam responded with a counter attack and captured  Phnom Penh.  This eventually led to the Khmer Rouge’s withdrawal from Cambodia in 1979.

Khmer Rouge traveled west and still attempted to take over various areas.  In 1981 Khmer Rouge took on nationalism instead of communism and emphasized their practices on anti-Vietnamese.  Analysis argue that this did not mean that they changed their tactics.  In 1999 Khmer Rouge members were almost all captured or surrendered, and now the group no longer exists.  As of now the trials are still taking place against Khmer Rouge leaders for genocide and crimes against humanity.

Khmerguy owns a website about Khmer music at KhmerPortal.com.

When Khmer Rouge ruled Cambodia in 1975, they executed and killed millions of people.  The numbers are not known, but close to two million graves were found from this time period, while it is widely known not everyone had a grave.  Experts say it could be anywhere from two million to four million.  While the numbers are not known, what happened is known.

When Khmer Rouge ruled they were a communist party, and they were threatened by many people within the society.  Any one the proposed a threat, including people affiliated with the former government or foreign governments, teachers, intellectuals, people with intellectual stereotypes (glasses), merchants, Catholics and Christians, and minorities, were executed in mass numbers.  It is estimated that half of the Cambodians who died in this time frame died from execution.

Other than execution, people were dying from overworking, starvation, lack of rest or sleep, illnesses, and other various types of death.  The citizens who were not executed were kept on labor farms so they could be controlled and monitored.  These people were forced to work twelve hours straight with no food or water.  Khmer Rouge did not provide them with necessities, and they closed the hospitals, so there was no facility for the sick or dying.  In addition, Khmer Rouge banned western medicine, so only traditional medicine was allowed to be used.

The people that could successfully fled to Vietnam, which is a country bordering Cambodia.  As the number increased, Vietnam was becoming restless with the Khmer Rouge ruling.  When Khmer Rouge attacked Vietnam in December of 1978, Vietnam had its last straw.  Vietnam attacked and drove away Khmer Rouge in early January of 1979.  Cambodia was finally free from Khmer Rouge’s rule.

The Cambodians did not feel free.  They were still fearful the Khmer Rouge would return, and their way of life changed completely.  Each Cambodian lived in fear, and the fear was passed generation to generation.  In 2005, three quarters of the population alive during the genocide was no longer living, but the story is still very well known.  Due to the severity and emotions about the genocide, the government does not require schools to teach about the Khmer Rouge.  The story is strictly living on the word of mouth between generations.

Starting in 2009, schools will begin teaching about the tragedy that Khmer Rouge brought upon Cambodia.  This is ten years after Khmer Rouge no longer existed, and it is eighteen years after Khmer Rouge no longer practiced communism.  This goes to show the pain and suffering the Cambodia’s endured during the four short years Khmer Rouge ruled their country.  The genocide of Cambodia is said to be one of the worst of its kind.

Khmerguy owns a website about Khmer music at KhmerPortal.com.

While Khmer Rouge ruled Cambodia they executed over a million political leaders, teachers, merchants, intellectuals, and minorities.  In addition, over a million people died of lack of necessities because they were forced to work twelve consecutive hours without rest, food, or water.  Then when they were not working they were not provided with the proper necessities still, with little food, no hospitals, and no medication.

Khmer Rouge was charged of “crimes against humanity, genocide, grave breaches of the Geneva Convention, homicide, torture and religious persecution,” by Cambodian and international prosecutors in 2007.   Pol Pot, the leader of Khmer Rouge, combined “extremist ideology with ethnic animosity and a diabolical disregard for human life to produce repression, misery, and murder on a massive scale.”  But what made them do these horrible things?  What could they have possibly believed in or wanted to possess them to do such things?

The basis of Khmer Rouge was communism, it was much worse than communism, but that was the biggest principle in their beliefs.  Communism comes from the word commune.  Commune means for people to share earnings and property and have no individual rights.  So in communism, all people are treated equally and have no rights to property or money, and the government has all ownership and the people are equal, in theory.  As you can now see, communism itself is not the enemy, it is the government in which communism is over.  Communism never works out properly because in most cases the government turns tyrannical.

Khmer Rouge was more than a tyrannical communist government though.  Pot Pol used fear to force the people to do what he wanted them to do, similar to what Hitler did in Germany.  To sustain fear in the people and to secure his place in power, Pot Pol had to do away with intellectual people that could educate the society and then possibly lead an overturn of the government, which would mean the death of his rule.  In order to get rid of all people with intelligence, Pot Pol used execution, which also helped maintain fear in the population.  With fear maintained, Pot Pol had nothing to worry about because no one would take a chance to speak out or rebel against him, in fear of their own lives.

It is unclear why Pot Pol could not supply the working people will adequate food, water and shelter.  Majority conclude he did not have the resources himself or he simply wanted to keep them weak and useless.  It is known he forced to make them work twelve hours a day so they would not have the energy or time to relax and think.  If they would have had time to think, then they may have been able to find a way to overthrow the government.

Khmerguy owns a website about Khmer music at KhmerPortal.com.