Schanberg's Political Rants Are BS, Deliberately Omits Communism - The Killing Fields (1985) Discussion

[–] fedrulez 17 years ago

Incorrect, the most heavily bombed place was Cambodia.

"The data released by Clinton shows the total payload dropped during these years to be nearly five times greater than the generally accepted figure. To put the revised total of 2,756,941 tons into perspective, the Allies dropped just over 2 million tons of bombs during all of World War II, including the bombs that struck Hiroshima and Nagasaki: 15,000 and 20,000 tons, respectively. Cambodia may well be the most heavily bombed country in history."
Source: www.yale.edu/cgp/Walrus_CambodiaBombing_OCT06.pdf

THAT'S MORE THAN ALL THE BOMBS DROPPED IN WWII by the allies, IN A TINY SPOT. THAT INCLUDES the 2 NUCLEAR BOMBS. It's disgusting that you won't accept the United States' heinous war crime here. Malta was a footnote compared to this.

Bauer vs. Bourne, that is the question.

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[–] Jakealope 17 years ago

I'd like to verify that data. They said more bombs were dropped on Nam than in WW ll, but they were bombing Nam for over a decade. Besides, like most critics, you seem to think that was some sort of excuse slip for the Communists. The bloodthirsty Maoist Communist Khmer Rouge, headed by Pol Pot but never identified as such in the movie, were SOLELY responsible for the atrocities and the totatlitarian prison camp system they foisted on their own people. I might add that this methodical depravity sprang from the core of their ideology, not because some bombs upset Pol Pot's sleep. Besides, we were mainly bombing the North Vietnamese troops, who had been systematically violating Cambodian neutrality for over a decade. So shouldn't the North Vietnamese get some onus for originally bringing the war into Cambodia?
You seem to want to have your cake and eat it. The US was bad cause we fought the mass murdering Communist tyrants and we were bad because somehow the atrocities those same fascist committed were our fault.

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[–] fedrulez 17 years ago

Verify all you like. Consult the paper, it was released recently. The data was released from hte outgoing Clinton administration in order to help identify locations of UXB's. Here is the paper: http://www.yale.edu/cgp/Walrus_CambodiaBombing_OCT06.pdf. Remember the database has black periods, so the bombing was probably even higher. Another quote from theh paper

====
Previously, it was estimated that between 50,000 and 150,000 Cambodian civilians were killed by the bombing. Given the fivefold increase in tonnage revealed by the database, the number of casualties is surely higher.

The Cambodian bombing campaign had two unintended side effects that ultimately combined to produce the very domino effect that the Vietnam War was supposed to prevent. First, the bombing forced the Vietnamese Communists deeper and deeper into Cambodia, bringing them into greater contact with Khmer Rouge insurgents. Second, the bombs drove ordinary Cambodians into the arms of the Khmer Rouge, a group that seemed initially to have slim prospects of revolutionary success.
====

Again you act as if Cambodia's suffering begun in 1975. It didn't, it begun in 1965. I am not making excuses and again recent data disproves the notion that the bombing was to halt smuggling. The authors of the papers above also seem to think bomnbing a country to pieces might have had something to do with the Khmer's success. Unless multiple US administrations were literally morons, why didn't they realise the stated goal was being harmed by the bombing? A plausible explanation is that, perhaps, the outcome was indeed the goal of the bombing.

The problem is it sounds really really disgusting and morally despicable to ignore US war crimes like you do. Change some of the names/places, it'd be like something from the the Nazi archives. But sadly even papers like the NY Times indulges in such behaviour.

My personal opinion on the communists is their ideology caused Pol Pot's brutality, any time you believe in religion it causes suffering. Whether that's Muslim insurgents, patriotism, Marxism, or free market-ism. Any time you believe so much you don't look at the evidence it can cause immense suffering. The ideology of communism created that. But again, communism in Indochina was a technical term to US elites, it meant independent development, land reform, using a countries wealth for her own people.

Mr. Julian Craig, I would like to thank you for the information. I had not thought of it like that, indeed the data posted suggests 'only' 10% indiscriminate bombing where as bombing in WWII was literally concentrated on the population, especially our bombing which was far worse than the facist powers.

Bauer vs. Bourne, that is the question.

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[–] Jakealope 17 years ago

Thank you for you insights. I never realized that the bpombing campiagn was so severe and over such a long time. But please speare me the obligatory rant:
"My personal opinion on the communists is their ideology caused Pol Pot's brutality, any time you believe in religion it causes suffering. Whether that's Muslim insurgents, patriotism, Marxism, or free market-ism. "

Communism is not a religion. Communism is atheistic and "scientific". Communism managed to cause the worst cases of mass murder, oppression, famine and totalitarian control in man's history in less than one hundred years. People who refuse to recognize that and accept that being anti-communism meant you were on the side of freedom were handmaids to tyrants. Yes, a huge amount of intellectuals and artists were openly leftist, especially during the depression, but that didn't make it good. Comparing Marxism to patriotims or free markets is absurd. They are not ideologies and political movements. Even Islamic fundamentalism, cntemptible as it is, pales before communism. As far as your thesis that we bombed Cambodia so it would become Communist, I reject that too. If we had stood beside South Vietnam and prevented her from falling to the Communist, Cambodia would have never fallen. What about Prince Sihanouk, who let himself become a Maoist pawn? Once the Norht took over, Cambodia was doomed. Or fault was trying but in the end pulling out nad letting the whole mess collapse.

The US should have been more above board. We should have declared war officially and not bombed Cambodia in secret. Trouble is that the left was openly rooting for the Communist and did their best to vilify the US and South Vietnam. Like after the Tet Offensive, every leftists was screaming about our defeat when it was the NVA who was defeated AND who committed mass murders every chance they got. But since they killed counterrevolutionaries and middle class people, their deaths were good, not bad. All the horrors of communism have been well documented, so there is no excuse to ignore them or downplay them since they happened whereever Communism was applied.

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[–] fedrulez 17 years ago

"They are not ideologies and political movements"

I think you're entirely wrong in your statement that the freemarket isn't a political movement or an ideology. Infact it is perhaps one of the most successful political movements in history. Currently with World Bank, IMF and WTO free marketism is propaganised and forced on nations that do not want it. It is forced on them despite all the evidence showing the conventional doctrines have no basis in reality. If you are interested in investigating this further you should read Bad Samaritans, by Ha Joon-Chang a Cambridge economist who runs through the record.

I should have prefaced my statement that communism was a religion with my argument, because it requires one. Religion is blind belief in something or someone despite lack of evidence or even contrary evidence. Marxism certainly is like a religion in that sense, it is blind belief in the forces of materialism will result, eventually but ever surely, the utopic communist society. Free marketism is even more religious because it is akin to deductive theology. You start with a set of ridiculous axioms (free movement of the factors of production, for example) you build up a mathematical argument and voilla a conclusion. You then impose the factors that lead to the conclusion in your abstract model on a society and ruin people's lives causing slow growth or even negative growth and higher income inequality. All successful economies in history have developed because they have not followed free market ideas. Yet despite the evidence there is a 'neo-liberal' consensus in developmental economics, even though it goes against ALL the evidence.

"The US should have been more above board. We should have declared war officially and not bombed Cambodia in secret"

As you read the above quotes I cited may I remind you that the death toll with the old figures was perhaps 150,000. So multiply that by five to get a round about figure as to the real death toll. What right does the US have to inflict this damage on a country? Considering the bombing did make an unpopular Khmer Rogue party more popular, with the benefit of hindsight, it is insane to propose bombing today. Absolutely insane and cruel.

"Like after the Tet Offensive, every leftists was screaming about our defeat when it was the NVA who was defeated AND who committed mass murders every chance they got"

What is a leftist to you? Is it someone that advocates not starting illegal wars? Or following the US Constitution in that Congress has to be consulted before a war is started? Seems quite conservative to me to follow the law.

Also it was the business elites that started to turn against the war in 1968, important sectors of population were voicing concern at the cost of the war. Note, the cost to the United States NOT to the Vietnamese. Furthermore the whole concept of 'defeat' and 'victory' in Vietnam is absurd. What would have been victory? Completely destroying Vietnam with nuclear weapons? How else could the US have 'won' that war? They were propping up an unpopular regime that had a record of atrocious crimes. The CIA's own reports stated that the revolutionary nationalist forces had the support of over half the population. The US was in there to impose its own client regime.

Also may I remind you that it was the invasion by Vietnam of Cambodia in 1979 that put an end to the Khmer Rogue. Perhaps the only case of humanitarian intervention in history.

Bauer vs. Bourne, that is the question.

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[–] Jakealope 17 years ago

Free marketism is a made up word to describe capitalism, which, by the way, created the technology we are using as well as permitted us to converse about politcal matters with it. As far as illegal wars, what about the North Vietnamese's illegal seizure of the South or use of Cambodia? Communism is one of the most evil, debilitating freedom hating systems yet and the one hundred million plus dead it harvested stand silent testimony to that fact.
If you can't acknowledge the murdered and oppressed by both the North Vietnamese and the Khmer Rouge, then you have forfeited any claim to berate us for fighting those monsters.
What if we pressed the North after Tet and actually defeated them and ended the war in favor of us and defeated the commnunist monsters? Then there would have been a free South, no boat people and no Khmer Rouge atrocities. So by snatching defeat out of the jaws of victory after Tet, egged on by your ilk, helped prolong the war and insured Communist victory and bloodbaths.

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[–] fedrulez 17 years ago

You are incorrect sir. The Freemarket did not create the technology we are using to converse. That was created by the state, via public funding then given to 'free' enterprise for private profit. The theoretical basis of the computer was established by a group of mathematicians and logicians attempting to prove or disprove the thesis that all axioms in mathematics can be proved (Godel and especially Turing). Its theoretical basis for software development was provided by Von Neumann. All with public funding at public universities or military R&D. After the theoretical basis had been established the practical technology we are using now to converse - the Internet - was created by particle physicists wanting an easier way to share data from various particle accelerators in the world. It's places like Stanford, MIT, and Cal-tech that created the Internet, not private enterprise. Private enterprise cannot supply such cutting edge technology because such R&D needs to be insulated from market competition.

'You' were not fighting monsters in Vietnam, cf the Pentagon papers. There was very little discourse about fighting evil monsters. Rather, the large concern was the threat of a good example or development outside US control. The planners were terrified that if Indochina fell, Japan would turn red and align her economy to the red block and the whole pacific war in WWII would be have been a waste. As the CIA's own internal reports from the time state, the nationalist movement had the support of well over 50% of the population.

You can't fight monsters by saturation bombing or propping up unpopular regimes. May I also remind you again that the Khmer Roughe's brutal reign ended when the monsters in Vietnam invaded in 1979.

Bauer vs. Bourne, that is the question.

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[–] Jakealope 17 years ago

The original technology was first developed by some government r & d. But the refinement of that technology, including the mass production, low prices, high power and ease of use, as well as HTML, JavaScript, PHP, Java, etc that made the Internet what we know today was mainly private enterprise. After all, what DARPA developed versus what we have today is like a ox cart versus a modern automobile.

Can you tell me that China, Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia going Communist was a good thing for the people there and that no one here should have feared that, after what happened in Eastern Europe and Korea less than a decade earlier? My relatives came from Russia and Eastern Europe and not one of them had one kind word for Communism. One of them was a chief engineer of a steel mill there and had to be a simple mechanic here and he regreted nothing.

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[–] fedrulez 17 years ago

Re: computers

'Some' government R&D? Your history is quite false. Computers were *entirely* developed by social funding in universities and government labs. I ran through some of the history in my post above, you can google/wiki more. It's a basic principle of real world free marketism - socialise risk, privatise profit. The aspects you mention are very true: private enterprise created mass production and low prices. But that came at the end of a long developmental cycle, the chief technology was funded and created by governments and couldn't have possibly taken place in the free market. What markets are great at is taking basic R&D created by social capital and streamlining it. A very useful process.

The internet we know today is this private enterprise, but they took the technology as a gift from the public. Even the elements you mention: high level programming languages in general were not created by free markets. Bell Labs created one of the first languages - C. Bell Labs wouldn't have possibly won 6 Nobel prizes in science doing outstanding research without its monopoly power, an abomination in free market theory. AT&T, the parent company used its monopoly profits obtained by unfair market behaviour and channelled them into basic R&D. Just like governments do with tax money.

Re: communism

You write as if communism is a monolithic conspiracy that the good guys, the US, were fighting exactly fitting into the Cold War myth that is prevalent in US circles. What did 'going communist' mean? Obviously going communist for Cambodia was, I personally think, the most disgusting things in human history outside the holocaust. But again, why did the Khmer Rouge become popular? From having very little support to mass support? The bombing in Cambodia was only about stopping the KR for a tiny period, in the paper I cited earlier: “The last phase of the bombing, from February to August 1973, was designed to stop the Khmer Rouge’s advance on the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh”
Vietnam didn't even have the facade of stopping a blood bath. If you read the Pentagon Papers the planners constantly speak of the "free world" and that communism must be stopped. The reasons they give as to why it needs to be stopped is a rational version of the domino theory - if Vietnam is lost then IC will fall, Japan will integrate its economy into the red block and the whole pacific war in WWII would have been a waste of time. Basically very bad for US capital so it must be stopped.

Even outside of this the stated purpose of intervention in Vietnam was to support a 'free' South Vietnamese. Yet in 1961 Kennedy authorised the bombing of South Vietnamese villages including chemical warfare to starve villagers into halting support for the indigenous resistance and drove people into concentration camps ('strategic hamlets'). The bombing in the south was 3-4 times that of the North. Infact it was talked about as a 'military laboratory' by the Kennedy administration, as recently declassified internal USAF histories show: (http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB248/index.htm) How is this helping free Vietnam and fighting communism?

Furthermore the thesis that the US supported a free South Vietnam is totally false. It is amazing that history books still perpetuate the lie today. According to the Geneva Accords elections were meant to take place in July 1956. The US, alone as ever, refused to sign the accords. Diem therefore didn't hold elections. Eisenhower was worried that 80% of the population would have voted for the communists. So in this case, communism might have been the will of the people not imposed on them by brutes. Isn't that called democracy? It’s a common theme in western foreign policy, we love elections and markets when our guys (candidates/corporations) win, but do everything in our power to oppose them when our guys lose.

I don't know enough about Korea and Russia to go into their histories. But obviously Stalinist Russia was a blood bath but I don't think saturation bombing of Russia would have helped one bit.

On a personal note, I also used to believe the Cold War mythology that the US was fighting an evil and fanatical enemy. That she never intervened in self interest and no empire and efforts in Vietnam were begun with “blundering efforts to do good” but went sour over time to quote Anthony Lewis. At school I recall writing a paper that the US should have never lost the war, that the bombing should have been increased in the North and Rolling Thunder should have been used as a military objective, not a diplomatic one to bomb the North back to the bargaining table. That the press should have been censored to stop the anti-war opposition at home. But then, rather than relying on the pronouncements of leaders I read the documentary record and a different picture emerged untainted by historical debate.

Bauer vs. Bourne, that is the question.

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[–] MrPie7 17 years ago

"Also may I remind you that it was the invasion by Vietnam of Cambodia in 1979 that put an end to the Khmer Rogue. Perhaps the only case of humanitarian intervention in history." And just what do you call the US attempt to help the Somalies? Genocide? What about the multi-national intervention in Kosovo? Or the efforts of Sweden, Italy, and Ireland to stop the bloodshed in The Congo? Or the hundreds of interventions done by the American Red Cross?

There was bad blood between the Vietnamese & Khmer Rouge for YEARS. But of course they invaded Cambodia for "humanitarian" reasons. Give my regards to Santa Clause and the Easter Bunny!

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[–] fedrulez 17 years ago

The American Red Cross isn't a state. It doesn't engage in military interventions, as far as I am aware. I would be intersted in seeing any references to the Red Cross's military agression though.

Kosovo? Is this a serious statement? Are you aware of the rich documentary record on our intervention in 1999? Even Parliamentary reports by my government have shown that genocide was a non-issue. NATO hegemony was the prime issue. Infact, the bombing CAUSED the pogrom of violence against the Kosovars. Other interpretations by main stream press and historians like Nial Fergussion reverse the chronology. This is the absoulte prime example of media propaganda, historical amensia and mass brain washing.

The report is available here: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm199900/cmselect/cmfaff/28/2802.htm

Noam Chomsky puts it best,

"There were two incidents cited in retrospect as having justified the self-adulation. One of them was the bombing of Serbia in 1999. We now know a tremendous amount about it. There are two major collections of State Department documents to justify the bombing. The British Parliament carried out a lengthy parliamentary inquiry into those events. The OSCE produced extensive detailed accounts almost daily up to the bombings. The KVM monitors were producing reports. They all say the same thing - almost uniform: it was an unpleasant place. There were about 2,000 people killed the year before the bombing. The British Government, which was the most hawkish element, draws an utterly astonishing conclusion. I didn’t believe it when I first read it but now it’s backed up by the parliamentary inquiry. Their judgement was that the majority of killings up to January 1999 (and from the OSCE records we know that nothing substantial changed afterwards) was by the KLA guerrillas who were coming from across the border to try to elicit a harsh Serbian response, they were supported by the CIA in early 1999, which could be used to provide justification for bombing. And so it continued until March 1999, at which point Blair and Clinton decided to bomb, with the anticipation, as we now know, that it would lead to significant atrocities, as indeed it did. As soon as the bombing began, the anticipated reaction began, the ethnic cleansings, atrocities, and so on. There were diplomatic options on the table, we know that. That’s the jewel in the crowd. How it’s dealt with in the intellectual scholarship is to reverse the chronology and to suppress the documentation. Take a look, go through it, it’s a quite interesting incident of intellectual history."

Note: I am not saying that Vietnam invaded Cambodia for purely humanitarian interventions, but it is one of the very few I can think of where immense human suffering was ended due to intervention. The other instance you mention I do not have enough knowledge about to mention. Of hand, I can say India's invavsion of East Pakistan too.

Bauer vs. Bourne, that is the question.

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[–] MrPie7 17 years ago

I didn't say the Red Cross was a state but the US government usually supports what it does. Also you said "intervention" not invasion. If Kosovo was purely a NATO exercise why did the US get involved so late? Noam Chomsky: now THERE's an unbiased opinion.

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[–] Stirling00 12 years ago

Stopped reading after the (apparently earnest and quite irony free) Chomsky reference.

If the OP is over 22- SHAME on him!!!

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[–] 12 years ago

[deleted]

[–] julescraig9 17 years ago

Dear Sir / Madam "Fedrulez"

RE: Bombing of Cambodia ( and WW2 " comparisons" therein)

In the six months ending August 1973, 32000 sorties ( including 8000 by B - 52's) we're flown by the United States Air Force over Cambodia. During this period 245000 tons of bombs we're dropped on that nation.

This deluge totaled 50% more than all the "conventional" ( ie. non nuclear) bombs that the US rained apon Japan during the entirety of the second world war.

However, most of this tonnage, was aimed at geurillas hiding amidst heavy jungle in thinly populated or entirely unhibited area's.

As a result, the bombing did not inflict the kind of destruction and untold suffering caused by raids over the urban ,heavy population centres targeted during WW2.

Nor did it cause the geurillas to surrender.

Best regards

Julian Craig

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[–] MrPie7 17 years ago

On another thread I explained to this person that 500,000 people cannot be in killed in a place where 500,000 people do not exist. I cited Russell Ross' book "Cambodia: A Country Study" which states the the population density in north east Cambodia (which is where the Trail was, and the bombing took place) was zero to 5 persons per sq. kilometer. His idea that 5 xs the bombs = 5 xs the casualties is insane. If you put a pipe bomb in a car and it kills all 5 people in the car, putting 5 bombs in the car will not kill 25 people.(in the car) It's amazing how some grown people have never learned to understand simple math.

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[–] Frankc_ca 17 years ago

I think this person lives in a fantasy world where the free market has no evidence to support it, where the US is to blame for Khmer Rouge atrocities, and private development and refinement of a technology that existed in a primitive form used by universities, the military, and even corporations is minor and somehow underhanded.

It might not be in your interest to argue with him, if only for your own sanity.

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[–] MrPie7 17 years ago

I guess you're right. But hey, I DID get him to back off the "purely humanitarian invasion" lunacy, by those noted good Samaritans, the Vietnamese...

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[–] Mars_atax 16 years ago

In all fairness, although it is true that the Khmer Rouge atrocities were the direct result of their communist ideology, we can still give credit to the communist Vietnamese for driving the K.R. from power. Similarly, we should celebrate the Soviet contribution to the victory over Nazi Germany, even though Stalin was a rival with Hitler for the title of most brutal dictator of all time.

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[–] MrPie7 16 years ago

Re: Schanberg's Political Rants Are BS, Deliberately Omits Communism
by - Mars_atax on Thu Dec 4 2008 12:49:33
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
" we can still give credit to the communist Vietnamese for driving the K.R. from power."

This victory was made possible because the idiots running the KR extended their lethal purges to the troops defending the border with Vietnam! Not only reducing their numbers, but shattering the morale of the remaining force. As far as the Soviets go, I will ACKNOWLEDGE their contribution, but never "celebrate it. After the war, many of those responsible for Soviet success were thrown into the Gulag, especially those who had been captured by the Germans. Let me relate just TWO of the hundred horror stories I am aware of re; this. One Russian non-com, decorated veteran of numerous battles was knocked unconcious by artillary fire. When he awoke he was a prisoner. He later escaped and fought again for the motherland. He was rewarded by being worked to his demise in the Gulag. In another case, in Dec. 1941,as Axis forces came within sight of Moscow, an office worker in the Kremlin rallied his fellow office rats to scrounge weapons and head toward the front to fight. In inspiring his fellows, he made the statement "They've all run (meaning the high Communist Party functionaries) but we're still here! Let's save Moscow from the Fascists!" This statement, critical of his superiors earned HIM years in the Gulag. THOSE WHO RAN made sure his remark was denounced as "counter-revolutionary propaganda"!

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[–] 16 years ago

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[–] nickm2 16 years ago

MrPie:

Let's not forget the NVA also nurtured, sheltered, armed & encouraged the KR while they (the NVA) were in control of those border sanctuaries in Cambodia...in fact they even took the time to maul the Cambodian Army to buy the KR a bit more time to 'develop';
LASTLY they didn't give a frakk about the KR from 1975-1978 until like YOU said, the KR began to 'nibble' at the Cambodia/Vietnam border regions...

nm

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[–] MrPie7 16 years ago

I am so sick of these "blame America first" idiots... I think if we were invaded by "Baby-eating Mole men from the planet Sphyncter" they would complain that "American jingoism" had caused it.

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[–] nickm2 16 years ago

MrPie:

Well if you are sick of such stuff & rairin' for a fight you should also drop in on the 'Searchers' board...you'll find some fine live wires there!

nm

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[–] Jakealope 16 years ago

I mentioned that in irony. The Khmer were so bad, even the old style Communists were humane in comparison. Over 4 million Russian pows were murdered or died of neglect in the Nazis' hands yet the Soviets tormented the survivors afterwards. It was Stalin acting on his guilt for letting the country and army down via his and the Party's monumental incompetence and bestiality, which was only exceeded by the Nazis but not much.

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[–] MrPie7 16 years ago

Yeah, with the Nazis, at least we had the satisfaction of Hitler seeing all his dreams of glory shattered and him being reduced to taking his own life in order to prevent the Soviets from taking him captive and displaying him in a cage. With Stalin, there was no justice. He died peacefully in his sleep. The way almost all of us want to pass!

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[–] Jakealope 16 years ago

I take all those conspiracy stories with a grain of salt, but some say he was poisoned or assassinated but made to appear he died naturally.

But your over all point is good: the Communist regimes and apparatchiks mostly faded away and only a few, like Ceascescu or Honecker ever faced any justice for their crimes against humanity. Even in WWll, the Soviets persecuted their own POWs, ruthlessly exiled whole nationalities and subjected their own people to tyrannical controls that were little better than anything Hitler did. What Mao and Pol Pot did was just as horrible and we still have the scum in North Korea showing us how not to live.

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[–] Jakealope 16 years ago

Pol Pot was a Communist, and was supported by other Communists, mainly Mao at the end. Communism, as in Marxism, is supposedly based on iron laws of Science that predicts all history based on dialectic materialism: which says that all history and man's whole existence is based on ecomomic and material conditions. That is how a true Marxist would describe themselves.
This gets like the Islamophiles defending Islam by saying the Ayatollah or Bin Laden or the Taliban aren't true Muslims. Of course, no one can be 100% COMMUNIST, but they used Marxism and previous examples and methods as their model. In Pol's case, it was the agrarian model of Mao's. If he wasn't Communist, then how would you describe him?
Please leave out the "enlightened" aspects of Marx, Implicit in Marxism is totalitarianism, which means that niceties like justice, tolerance, mercy, human rights, etc are jettisoned as bourgeoisie. All that matters is wiping out the enemies of the people, and then the golden age of the people will arrive.

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[–] Aticusfinch 15 years ago

I can´t but agree with the OP. For reasons unknown, this movie tries in a certain way to establish a link between the Khmer Rouge genocide and the Nixon administration. However morally questionable the bombings on Cambodia may have been, it´s absurd to try to explain the genocide as a consequence of the bombings; fact is the killings were perfectly coherent with Pol-Pot´s ideological views and in general with communist ideology. Mass murders have been always the rule whenever a Communist Regime takes power - USSR, China, Ethiopia, Cambodia, Vietnam --.

It´s also quite striking that popular memory links usually Vietnam with Nixon. Fact is: it was the Democrats with Kennedy who started american implication in Indochina and it was Nixon who stopped it.

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