During the First Indochina War, when Vietnam and Cambodia allied against the
French, Vietnamese forces had made great use of Cambodian territory in
transporting weapons, supplies, and troops. This relationship lasted through
the Vietnam War, and even after the war, people from both countries commonly
crossed the border unhindered.
Even before the Vietnam War had ended, the relationship between the Khmer Rouge
and Vietnam was strained. Clashes between Vietnamese and Khmer Rouge forces
began as early as 1974. The Khmer Rouge demanded that the Mekong Delta area be
returned to Cambodia, and that all Vietnamese leave the area. The Vietnamese
refused these demands since the Mekong Delta had been Vietnamese territory for
nearly three centuries. In retaliation, thousands of Vietnamese were either
executed or forced out of Cambodia, and villages along the border were
attacked. This led to further escalation of the conflict and ultimately to the
Vietnamese invasion and occupation of Cambodia.
The war between Vietnam and the Khmer Rouge's Democratic Kampuchea began
shortly after the fall of Saigon. On May 1, 1975, a team of Khmer Rouge
soldiers raided PhúQuốc Island against little or no Vietnamese resistance, and
then executed more than five hundred Vietnamese civilians on ThổChu Island.
Angered by the Khmer Rouge's aggression, Hanoi launched a counter-attack that
resulted in the liberation of those islands by Vietnamese forces. The battle
over PhúQuốc was a cause of concern for the newly-established Socialist
Republic of Vietnam as the country was challenged by a new enemy at a time when
relations with the People's Republic of China began to deteriorate due to
Vietnam's ideological alignment with the Soviet Union. That concern was further
strengthened by the presence of Chinese advisors to Pol Pot's regime and
increasing shipments of military hardware to Kampuchea's armed forces.
Following the raids on PhúQuốc and Thổ Chu Islands the Khmer Rouge conducted
two major incursions into Vietnam. The first attack occurred in April 1977,
when regular units of the Khmer Rouge army advanced 10 Km into Vietnam,
occupying some parts of An Giang Province where it massacred a large number of
Vietnamese civilians. The second attack was in September of the same year. This
time they were able to advance 150 Km into Vietnam. In retaliation, six
divisions of the Vietnam People's Army invaded Cambodia on December 31, 1977.
The Vietnamese army advanced as far as Neak Luong and later withdrew, taking
with them some key Khmer Rouge figures, including future Prime Minister Hun
Sen. The invasion was intended only as a "warning" to the Khmer Rouge. The
Vietnamese offered a diplomatic solution to the border conflict that would
require the establishment of a demilitarized zone along the border, but the
offer was rejected by Pol Pot and fighting
resumed.
Meanwhile, as the fighting continued to rage in the border areas between
Vietnam and Kampuchea, the Khmer Rouge leadership began to purge members of its
own party, as well as military commanders who escaped from Vietnamese forces
after the short offensive in September 1977. Undeterred by earlier defeats the
Khmer Rouge launched another major offensive into Vietnam using two regular
divisions. Once again the Khmer Rouge was able to occupy some townships in
Vietnam, conducting clearing operations that included the massacre of
civilians. In one notable event the town of Ba Chúc, Tri Tôn, An Giang
provincewas raided by the Khmer Rouge forces; by the time it was over most of
Ba Chúc's inhabitants were brutally slaughtered leaving only two survivors.
Hanoiwas now resolved to remove the threat of the Khmer Rouge permanently. The
Vietnamese assembled a force of 10 divisions along the border with Kampuchea,
with strong armour and air support they advanced into Khmer Rouge-held
territory on December 25, 1978. The Kampuchean National United Front for
National Salvation (KNUFNS), created with assistance from Hanoi, also went
along with the military operation.
The Pol Pot regime of Democratic Kampuchea was largely supported with the
Peoples Republic of China, with both regimes based on closely associated Maoist
ideologies. The Vietnamese attack on Cambodia on December 25, 1978 was followed
by massive amounts of troop deployments along the vast China-Vietnamese border.
On the dawn of February 17, 1979, the People's Liberation Army moved into
Vietnamese territory, at which point the Cambodian capital already had been
captured by the Vietnamese and the Pol Pot regime toppled (see below),
reportedly accusing the Vietnamese government of "revisionist" ideologies and
the mistreatment of ethnic Chinese living in Vietnam. The Chinese kept moving
into the north of Vietnam, reportedly advancing towards Hanoi at a high speed
though not on good terms with their supply lines. The Chinese army captured Cao
Bang on March 2 and Lang Son on March 4. The following day, however, the
Beijing regime announced that it would not
participate in further action moving more deeply into Vietnam, apparently
after meeting fierce and unexpected harsh resistance by the well trained and
experienced Vietnamese forces, supplied with American technology left behind
earlier. With the Chinese support lost after Vietnamese recapitulation,
Cambodia was left to the mercy of its destiny.
The Khmer Rouge had prepared a force of 70,000 to resist the invasion, but was
not able to prevent the Vietnamese from advancing to Phnom Penh, which was
captured on January 7, 1979. The Khmer Rouge switched to a guerrilla campaign
and began to attack the long and exposed line of communication of the
Vietnamese forces. The Vietnamese used the pretext that none of their own
troops were actually fighting but only supporting the KNUFNS in their struggle
against the brutal Khmer Rouge. This was not the case: Vietnam had over 150,000
troops in Cambodia, while the KNUFNS force numbered only 20,000. For the
remainder of the occupation, the Vietnamese and Khmer Rouge were locked in a
bloody guerrilla war. Vietnamese forces held the cities while the Khmer Rouge
controlled the rural areas, especially along the Thai border. The struggle did
not end until Vietnam withdrew its troops in the late 1980s. The number of
casualties is uncertain but is estimated at 40,000
on Pol Pot and 10,000 on Vietnam!
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