-----Original Message----- From: Vanna Lanh <[email protected]> To: Vanna Lanh <[email protected]> Sent: Mon, May 14, 2012 10:58 am Subject: Achilles' Heel Ashort dissertation on "Building a Liberation Army" It saddened me that many of our Khmer citizens includingmembers of the old FARK/FANK elite seem to be clueless of how and why Cambodiahas become what it is. My own explanation is based on Khmer history as far back asKing Ang Chan I, who returned from Thailand with his contingent of Khmer troopsfrom the north side of the present border (Thai Issan), to reclaim and tried torestore the Angkorian civilization, unfortunately without success. Since then, Khmer has never had an "Army", it had bands ofwarrior loyal to whomever fed them. The last active band of fighters was withKing Ang Duong, and a few more bands in the delta south, Kampuchea Krom,fighting the Youn. Not something you can call a Khmer Nation Armed Force. The modern day post colonial French Khmer Armed Force wasbuilt on the skeleton of the defeated colonial French Army. All the Khmer officersand cadres of this newly formed army were hastily trained by the French to takeover the defense of Cambodia, thus it has been inherently inadequate - look atthe new Iraqi and Afgan Armies who struggle to make somebody else' ideas work.To expect these formerly French-trained officers and cadres to think out of thebox and use their own authentic Khmer wisdom is something out of a fairy tale. I am not very harshon my seniors, but I can proudly claim that my experience serving two armies ofsharply contrasting mindset and power help me look at this issue from acompletely different perspective. I believe an army must be built from scratch muchlike a machine, and the task of tweaking, refining, and testing shall beforever on-going, much like a Samurai ritual/routine in sharpening his sword,and practicing different moves when not busy fighting. The extreme case of building an army is the old GreekCity-State of Sparta. The state would check out its army recruits from birth;take the child to boot camp at seven; the boys then live and train with hiscohort until the age of 20; still live there to train the younger ones, and beavailable for war mobilization until he is 60 years old. The entire Spartansociety was totally behind it. Spartan mothers were quoted to tell their sons "ComeHome with Your Shield, or On It", and a young Spartan when told about thePersian Archers who would simultaneously unleash their hundreds of thousands ofarrows that they can block the sunlight over the battlefield, and the young manwould say ".Then we shall fight in the SHADE". It goes to show that this warmachine was undoubtedly superbly built. The subtle dimension of warfare missing from our former Khmermilitary mindset is their ignorance of how the internal systems of a warmachine suppose to work. Since the war machine is built or constructed by human(not magically right there when you come out of a military school), it surelyhas flaws; it is just that some armies has more flaws than the others, but sureenough no one war machine is free of flaw and perfect in every aspect. This isfamously known per Greek Mythological tale as the ACHILLES' HEEL. To illustrate this concept -- a Commander must focus on hisenemy Achilles' Heel when he plans for an offense. He should pay attention tothe enemy's strength only when he has to put up a defense. In most cases whenyou feel that it is not profitable to face off your opponent, you just turntail and batten down the hatch, and wait - the strategy employed successfullyby the VC, IRA, Taliban..etc. My final analysis is that we may never achieve the level of cultureof readiness and self-defense posture as the Spartans once were, but we mustnot give up the thought and the dream, and actively trying, or we simply loseALL before we even thinking of climbing out of this situation. Presently our enemiesare gleefully celebrating the state of our mindset, betting that we will nevercome out of our paralysis condition to reclaim what is ours. I did not mean to be this long, but it is a good mental exerciseas we go around and persuade our brethren to look for realistic ways and meansto liberate the mother land, versus the elusive multiple-ring circus played bythe pacifist crowd we're seeing. It is still possible to BUILD a liberation forceas long as we feel the fire in our gut. I am so worry that the longer ourhesitance and fear of the status quo persist, it will eventually become aself-fulfilling prophesy that will certainly place the Khmer on the list ofextinct civilization such as our cousins the Mons of Thailand and Burma, andthe Cham of Highland Vietnam. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Cambodia Discussion (CAMDISC) - www.cambodia.org" group. This is an unmoderated forum. Please refrain from using foul language. Thank you for your understanding. Peace among us and in Cambodia. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/camdisc Learn more - http://www.cambodia.org
