Thanks the professor for Cambodian history review but the professor's
preference of using the Khmer Rouge terms like "Khmer bodies but
Vietnamese heads" is puzzling and smacks his proclaim of his dislike of
khmer partisan demonizing each others. The question is does he believe
what the Khmer Rouge said about their opponents were true?
the statement like this "Now, Cambodians inside the country affirm that
one cannot distinguish who is Khmer and who is Vietnamese anymore:
Khmers speak Vietnamese and do business in Vietnamese language; and
Vietnamese speak Khmer and have Khmer names."
cannot be taken seriously. The prof should go to cambodia before he
wrote nonesense like this. This is again, is like the Khmer Rouge
ideology which always suspicious of fellow Cambodians as traitors or
foreigners.
On 2/24/2010 7:38 AM, [email protected] wrote:
Cambodians oppressed, distracted, divided
<http://feedproxy.google.com/%7Er/blogspot/bmaW/%7E3/umhayMicER0/cambodians-oppressed-distracted-divided.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email>
Posted: 23 Feb 2010 04:24 PM PST
<http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_76xUgRgjZYM/StTUV4nOBsI/AAAAAAAAM0Q/lPf3hEEk7hQ/s200/Gaffar+Peang-Meth+A.+02.jpg>February
24, 2010
By A. Gaffar Peang-Meth
PACIFIC DAILY NEWS (Guam)
Cambodians' public discussions of Cambodia's past, present and future
churn through cyberspace. A discussion that targets domestic political
developments, particularly the perennial tensions between those who
advocate civil rights and freedoms and those who support stability and
economic development, foments passionate debate.
When the debate turns to Cambodia's external problems with her
neighbors to the east and west -- Vietnam and Thailand, both viewed
historically as "swallowers of Khmer land" -- the conversation has
fallen to the depths of racial slurs and intensified hatred.
Premier Hun Sen's supporters and critics are deaf to each other's
arguments. Persuasion and compromise are foreign concepts. Those who
comment do so anonymously to more easily demonize the opposition.
Hun Sen has successfully used governmental administrative machinery to
keep Cambodians intimidated and ignorant of their civil rights and the
principles of good governance. He dangled showy projects and physical
improvements to infrastructure, while many scavenge the city's dumps
and live on rodent meat.
Of late, Sen has succeeded, with Cambodians' complicity, to divert
attention from his peoples' domestic plight to focus on the Thais,
whose leader Sen has cursed publicly almost every day. His call to
protect Cambodia's Preah Vihear Temple from the Thais brings many
Cambodians to his side, though they are mute over Vietnamese
expansionism from the east.
There is endless and mindless debate over the use of the term "Yuon,"
because some non-Khmers say it's "racial pejorative." Yet, the
authoritative Buddhist Institute's "Dictionnaire Cambodgien," 5th
edition, 1967, defines "Yuon" as "Vietnamese," pure and simple. Sen's
supporters love the debate: it divides and distracts critics.
I have written on the history of Vietnam's southward movement since
the Vietnamese ended their thousand-year bondage to China in 939. They
physically moved away from Chinese threat while seizing and absorbing
territories before them. Johns Hopkins retired professor Naranhkiri
Tith's Web site deals at length with the fundamentals of Vietnam's
"Nam Tien" (southward movement) and his proposed roadmap to save
Cambodia from it.
Vietnam's more recent attempts to integrate Cambodia into a Greater
Vietnam may be read in the Vietnam Workers' Party's (Lao Dong)
political report to its second congress in February 1951: "We must
strive to help our Cambodian and Laotian brothers ... and arrive at
setting up a Vietnam-Cambodian-Laotian Front" against the French.
In March 1951, the "Joint National United Front for Indochina" was
formed. In November, the Lao Dong created the "Dang Nhan Dan Cach Mang
Cao Mien" (Revolutionary Cambodian People's Party) -- with name and
statute drafted in the Vietnamese language.
Brian Crozier, a former Reuters correspondent, quoted a captured
November 1951 Viet Minh document: "The Vietnamese Party reserves the
right to supervise the activities of its brother parties in Cambodian
and Laos." Crozier also quoted a Viet Minh radio broadcast of April
1953: "The Lao Dong Party and the people of Vietnam have the mission
to make revolution in Cambodia and Laos. We, the Viet Minh elements,
have been sent to serve this revolution and to build the union of
Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos."
Viet Minh administrations with their own armed forces and system of
tax collection were established in Cambodia and Laos.
But more than one reader has told me, "That was then, and this is now."
Now, Cambodians inside the country affirm that one cannot distinguish
who is Khmer and who is Vietnamese anymore: Khmers speak Vietnamese
and do business in Vietnamese language; and Vietnamese speak Khmer and
have Khmer names.
When the July 1954 Geneva Accords ordered Viet Minh forces to leave
Cambodia, they took with them between 4,500 (a conservative figure)
and 8,000 (reportedly claimed by Vo Nguyen Giap in 1971) Cambodians,
mostly young children, who were raised, cultured and given political
and military training. These Cambodians -- with "Khmer bodies but
Vietnamese heads" -- returned to Cambodia after 1970 to fight Lon Nol,
and to unsuccessfully wrest control of the Communist Party of
Kampuchea from Pol Pot.
Some were arrested, others purged. In May 1977, Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge
units entered Vietnam's border towns between Ha Tien and Chau Doc, and
by November they operated as deep as four miles inside Vietnam and
inflicted casualties.
In response, the Vietnamese built up units in Tay Ninh and by December
operated as deep as 10 to 15 miles inside Cambodia.
After Christmas 1977, eight Vietnamese military divisions, supported
by artillery, tanks and planes, invaded Cambodia, cut off the Parrot's
Beak area and advanced as far as Neak Loeung, 40 miles from Phnom
Penh. Out of fuel, they pulled back.
On Nov. 3, 1978, Hanoi signed a 25-year peace and cooperation treaty
with Moscow. A month later, on Dec. 3, Hanoi Radio announced the birth
of the "Kampuchean National United Front of National Salvation," led
by a 14-member Central Committee under Heng Samrin, a former commander
of the Khmer Rouge's 4th Division. Hun Sen was a former chief of staff
and regimental deputy commander in Sector 21.
On Christmas Eve 1978, 100,000 Vietnamese troops led 18,000 KNUFNS
soldiers across the border into Cambodia. They captured Phnom Penh on
Jan. 7, 1979.
On Feb. 18, 1979, Heng Samrin and Pham Van Dong signed a 25-year
treaty of peace, friendship and cooperation, a treaty that effectively
integrated Cambodia into a Greater Vietnam. I will discuss the treaty
in my next column.
A. Gaffar Peang-Meth, Ph.D., is retired from the University of Guam,
where he taught political science for 13 years. Write him at
[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>.
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