> >From: Rick Rozoff <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >[STOPNATO] How U.S. & Britain Gave Pol Pot A Hand - John Pilger > >STOP NATO: NO PASARAN! - HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.HOME-PAGE.ORG > > > >New Statesman (UK) > >How Thatcher gave Pol Pot a hand > > >John Pilger Monday 17th April 2000 > > > > >Almost two million Cambodians died as a result of Year >Zero. John Pilger argues that, without the complicity >of the US and Britain, it may never have happened > >On 17 April, it is 25 years since Pol Pot's Khmer >Rouge entered Phnom Penh. In the calendar of >fanaticism, this was Year Zero; as many as two million >people, a fifth of Cambodia's population, were to die >as a consequence. To mark the anniversary, the evil of >Pol Pot will be recalled, almost as a ritual act for >voyeurs of the politically dark and inexplicable. For >the managers of western power, no true lessons will be >drawn, because no connections will be made to them and >to their predecessors, who were Pol Pot's Faustian >partners. Yet, without the complicity of the west, >Year Zero might never have happened, nor the threat of >its return maintained for so long. > >Declassified United States government documents leave >little doubt that the secret and illegal bombing of >then neutral Cambodia by President Richard Nixon and >Henry Kissinger between 1969 and 1973 caused such >widespread death and devastation that it was critical >in Pol Pot's drive for power. "They are using damage >caused by B52 strikes as the main theme of their >propaganda," the CIA director of operations reported >on 2 May 1973. "This approach has resulted in the >successful recruitment of young men. Residents say the >propaganda campaign has been effective with refugees >in areas that have been subject to B52 strikes." In >dropping the equivalent of five Hiroshimas on a >peasant society, Nixon and Kissinger killed an >estimated half a million people. Year Zero began, in >effect, with them; the bombing was a catalyst for the >rise of a small sectarian group, the Khmer Rouge, >whose combination of Maoism and medievalism had no >popular base. > >After two and a half years in power, the Khmer Rouge >was overthrown by the Vietnamese on Christmas Day, >1978. In the months and years that followed, the US >and China and their allies, notably the Thatcher >government, backed Pol Pot in exile in Thailand. He >was the enemy of their enemy: Vietnam, whose >liberation of Cambodia could never be recognised >because it had come from the wrong side of the cold >war. For the Americans, now backing Beijing against >Moscow, there was also a score to be settled for their >humiliation on the rooftops of Saigon. > >To this end, the United Nations was abused by the >powerful. Although the Khmer Rouge government >("Democratic Kampuchea") had ceased to exist in >January 1979, its representatives were allowed to >continue occupying Cambodia's seat at the UN; indeed, >the US, China and Britain insisted on it. Meanwhile, a >Security Council embargo on Cambodia compounded the >suffering of a traumatised nation, while the Khmer >Rouge in exile got almost everything it wanted. In >1981, President Jimmy Carter's national security >adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski, said: "I encouraged the >Chinese to support Pol Pot." The US, he added, "winked >publicly" as China sent arms to the Khmer Rouge. > >In fact, the US had been secretly funding Pol Pot in >exile since January 1980. The extent of this support - >$85m from 1980 to 1986 - was revealed in >correspondence to a member of the Senate Foreign >Relations Committee. On the Thai border with Cambodia, >the CIA and other intelligence agencies set up the >Kampuchea Emergency Group, which ensured that >humanitarian aid went to Khmer Rouge enclaves in the >refugee camps and across the border. Two American aid >workers, Linda Mason and Roger Brown, later wrote: >"The US government insisted that the Khmer Rouge be >fed . . . the US preferred that the Khmer Rouge >operation benefit from the credibility of an >internationally known relief operation." Under >American pressure, the World Food Programme handed >over $12m in food to the Thai army to pass on to the >Khmer Rouge; "20,000 to 40,000 Pol Pot guerillas >benefited," wrote Richard Holbrooke, the then US >assistant secretary of state. > >I witnessed this. Travelling with a UN convoy of 40 >trucks, I drove to a Khmer Rouge operations base at >Phnom Chat. The base commander was the infamous Nam >Phann, known to relief workers as "The Butcher" and >Pol Pot's Himmler. After the supplies had been >unloaded, literally at his feet, he said: "Thank you >very much, and we wish for more." > >In November of that year, 1980, direct contact was >made between the White House and the Khmer Rouge when >Dr Ray Cline, a former deputy director of the CIA, >made a secret visit to a Khmer Rouge operational >headquarters. Cline was then a foreign policy adviser >on President-elect Reagan's transitional team. By >1981, a number of governments had become decidedly >uneasy about the charade of the UN's continuing >recognition of the defunct Pol Pot regime. Something >had to be done. The following year, the US and China >invented the Coalition of the Democratic Government of >Kampuchea, which was neither a coalition nor >democratic, nor a government, nor in Kampuchea >(Cambodia). It was what the CIA calls "a master >illusion". Prince Norodom Sihanouk was appointed its >head; otherwise little changed. The two >"non-communist" members, the Sihanoukists, led by the >Prince's son, Norodom Ranariddh, and the Khmer >People's National Liberation Front, were dominated, >diplomatically and militarily, by the Khmer Rouge. One >of Pol Pot's closet cronies, Thaoun Prasith, ran the >office at the UN in New York. > >In Bangkok, the Americans provided the "coalition" >with battle plans, uniforms, money and satellite >intelligence; arms came direct from China and from the >west, via Singapore. The non-communist fig leaf >allowed Congress - spurred on by a cold-war zealot >Stephen Solarz, a powerful committee chairman - to >approve $24m in aid to the "resistance". > >Until 1989, the British role in Cambodia remained >secret. The first reports appeared in the Sunday >Telegraph, written by Simon O'Dwyer-Russell, a >diplomatic and defence correspondent with close >professional and family contacts with the SAS. He >revealed that the SAS was training the Pol Pot-led >force. Soon afterwards, Jane's Defence Weekly reported >that the British training for the "non-communist" >members of the "coalition" had been going on "at >secret bases in Thailand for more than four years". >The instructors were from the SAS, "all serving >military personnel, all veterans of the Falklands >conflict, led by a captain". > >The Cambodian training became an exclusively British >operation after the "Irangate" arms-for-hostages >scandal broke in Washington in 1986. "If Congress had >found out that Americans were mixed up in clandestine >training in Indo-China, let alone with Pol Pot," a >Ministry of Defence source told O'Dwyer-Russell, "the >balloon would have gone right up. It was one of those >classic Thatcher-Reagan arrangements." Moreover, >Margaret Thatcher had let slip, to the consternation >of the Foreign Office, that "the more reasonable ones >in the Khmer Rouge will have to play some part in a >future government". In 1991, I interviewed a member of >"R" (reserve) Squadron of the SAS, who had served on >the border. "We trained the KR in a lot of technical >stuff - a lot about mines," he said. "We used mines >that came originally from Royal Ordnance in Britain, >which we got by way of Egypt with marking changed . . >. We even gave them psychological training. At first, >they wanted to go into the villages and just chop >people up. We told them how to go easy . . ." > >The Foreign Office response was to lie. "Britain does >not give military aid in any form to the Cambodian >factions," stated a parliamentary reply. The then >prime minister, Thatcher, wrote to Neil Kinnock: "I >confirm that there is no British government >involvement of any kind in training, equipping or >co-operating with Khmer Rouge forces or those allied >to them." On 25 June 1991, after two years of denials, >the government finally admitted that the SAS had been >secretly training the "resistance" since 1983. A >report by Asia Watch filled in the detail: the SAS had >taught "the use of improvised explosive devices, booby >traps and the manufacture and use of time-delay >devices". The author of the report, Rae McGrath (who >shared a joint Nobel Peace Prize for the international >campaign on landmines), wrote in the Guardian that >"the SAS training was a criminally irresponsible and >cynical policy". > >When a UN "peacekeeping force" finally arrived in >Cambodia in 1992, the Faustian pact was never clearer. >Declared merely a "warring faction", the Khmer Rouge >was welcomed back to Phnom Penh by UN officials, if >not the people. The western politician who claimed >credit for the "peace process", Gareth Evans (then >Australia's foreign minister), set the tone by calling >for an "even-handed" approach to the Khmer Rouge and >questioning whether calling it genocidal was "a >specific stumbling block". > >Khieu Samphan, Pol Pot's prime minister during the >years of genocide, took the salute of UN troops with >their commander, the Australian general John >Sanderson, at his side. Eric Falt, the UN spokesman in >Cambodia, told me: "The peace process was aimed at >allowing [the Khmer Rouge] to gain respectability." > >The consequence of the UN's involvement was the >unofficial ceding of at least a quarter of Cambodia to >the Khmer Rouge (according to UN military maps), the >continuation of a low-level civil war and the election >of a government impossibly divided between "two prime >ministers": Hun Sen and Norodom Ranariddh. > >The Hun Sen government has since won a second election >outright. Authoritarian and at times brutal, yet by >Cambodian standards extraordinarily stable, the >government led by a former Khmer Rouge dissident, Hun >Sen, who fled to Vietnam in the 1970s, has since done >deals with leading figures of the Pol Pot era, notably >the breakaway faction of Ieng Sary, while denying >others immunity from prosecution. > >Once the Phnom Penh government and the UN can agree on >its form, an international war crimes tribunal seems >likely to go ahead. The Americans want the Cambodians >to play virtually no part; their understandable >concern is that not only the Khmer Rouge will be >indicted. > >The Cambodian lawyer defending Ta Mok, the Khmer Rouge >military leader captured last year, has said: "All the >foreigners involved have to be called to court, and >there will be no exceptions . . . Madeleine Albright, >Margaret Thatcher, Henry Kissinger, Jimmy Carter, >Ronald Reagan and George Bush . . . we are going to >invite them to tell the world why they supported the >Khmer Rouge." > >It is an important principle, of which those in >Washington and Whitehall currently sustaining >bloodstained tyrannies elsewhere might take note. > > >__________________________________________________ >Do You Yahoo!? >Send online invitations with Yahoo! Invites. >http://invites.yahoo.com > > >______________________________________________________________________ >To unsubscribe, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED] >Start Your Own FREE Email List at http://www.listbot.com/links/joinlb > __________________________________ KOMINFORM P.O. Box 66 00841 Helsinki - Finland +358-40-7177941, fax +358-9-7591081 e-mail [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.kominf.pp.fi ___________________________________ [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe/unsubscribe messages mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] ___________________________________
