Talk:History of Cambodia/Archive 1

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The numbers of folks killed during the Combodian genocide are well-known enough among scholars (this includes undergrad students) that citations aren't really all that necessary. Approximately 25% of both urban and rural Khmer died, about half of Chinese city-dwellers, all or nearly all Vietnemes city-dwellers, and about 40% of the Lao. These figures apply to "new" (that is, non-base) citizens. Among base citizens, 15% of rural Khmer, 36% of Chams, nearly 100% of Vietnemese, 40% of Thai, and 15% of the upland minorities (including the Khmer Loeu) died. These numbers are from Kiernen's chapter on Cambodia in Century of Genocide, p. 343. Similar numbers are presented in Kiernen's The Pol Pot Regime, Melson's Revolution and Genocide, and Powers' A Problem From Hell. While scholars do exist who wish to say that genocide (as defined by the 1948 UN convention) did not occur in Cambodia, the numbers and methods used by the KR seem to starkly deny their claim. Keep in mind that the destruction of a culture, forced relocation of children, etc all count as genocide. In total, approximately 1.7 million people died in the period 1975-79, about 21% of the population.

It seems clear that the brutal treatement of the Khmer citizens does not count for genocide (class is not even cited in the 1948 convention). Ethnic Vietnemese, Chinese, and Chams were certainly genocided, however; I don't know enough about the Thai to say one way or the other.

The regime basically did control every aspect of life. A basic work day was fieldwork from 4-10 am, an hour for lunch, then work until around 6 pm in the fields. There was a break for dinner, followed by more fieldwork or the tending of garden-plots. See Century of Genocide for more detail. What you're claiming as "outrageous" is, in actuality, pretty well known. Further, only Khmer was allowed to be spoken, religion was outlawed (Muslim Chams were forced to eat pork), etc.

"Older faiths such as Mahayana Buddhism and the Hindu cult of the god-king had been supplanted by Theravada Buddhism, and the Cambodians had become part of the same religious and cultural cosmos as the Thai. This similarity did not prevent intermittent warfare between the two kingdoms, however."

please check your fact. the last time i checked the history of the southeast asian region, the khmer empire established theravada buddhism well before the thai gain control on part of khmer empire. also, khmer culture predate that of thai and thai were from the southern china region. thai addopted and assimulated khmer culture and religion through conquests and capturing of khmer royal court. what is written here is the reverse and incorrect.

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I just finished breaking this article into series. The component articles need lots of wikifying. Help will be appreciated! --Jiang 03:40, 27 Oct 2003 (UTC)

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This article makes no reference to the NVA supplying of the Khmer Rouge with weapons and other supplies. Not much of what happens makes sense without it. Stargoat 23:28, 18 Mar 2004 (UTC)

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It should be noted that:

The U.S. bombing of Cambodia during the Vietnam War in an effort to eliminate NVA and VC targets was illegal. The article mentions in reference, that the U.S. bombed within 10-30 miles of the Vietnam border, but does not mention that this bombing was illigetimate for the following reasons:

1. Cambodia had not entered into the Vietnam War.

2. NVA occupation was involuntary; on the part of Cambodia.

While this does not change the elapse of events noted in the article, it has important historical value in the involvement of world powers in indo-china and United States Foreign Policy; in Cambodia.

Wardell-Burrus, Travers Travers2586 12:25, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

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Remnants of the old society

In "The new government sought to completely restructure Cambodian society. Remnants of the 100 year old French colonial society were abolished and religion, particularly Buddhism, was suppressed.", the "100 year old French colonial society" was removed. I think a real question, considering that Cambodia was French colony for 100 years prior to the CPK takeover, is whether the CPK was changing Cambodian society, or whether it was simply casting off most of the 100 years of French colonialism, and the colonialists attempt to take over Cambodian society. Cambodia has a long history, and the French foreign colonialists were only there for 100 years, and their influence was mostly limited to the cities, is getting rid of this foreign influence once control is taken from them and their puppets and trying to restore Cambodian society, autonomy and so forth from it's 100 year absence more of an attempt to fundamentally change Cambodian society, or more of an attempt to shake off 100 years of colonialism? Hanpuk 18:20, 6 May 2004 (UTC)

Cholas in Cambodia?

I find the architecture of temples in Cambodia to be similar to the Chola architecture. Also, I've read that Cholas ruled parts of Cambodia. Recently, I heard that Thevaram, a Tamil language hymn was recited on the occasion of the coronation of the new king there. Is that true? If so, can some one make a mention of the Cholas in the article? -- Sundar 10:37, Nov 24, 2004 (UTC)

You're probaly thinking about the Sri Vijayans. The Khmer people were never ruled by the Cholas, the greatest extant reached the north of the malay peninsula. Its probaly simmiliar because the Khmers blended Indian and native indo-chinese culture together. CanCanDuo 02:20, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Deja vu

i was reading this article and it struck me how familiar the passages were.. Then i looked back at Diane Law's book 'the worlds most evil dictators' ISBN - 9 781405 488266 and was surprised to see the two match word for word. What dores this mean for the article? rewrite? alwrite? (cough). Billcarr178 23:03, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

CIA involvement in Sihanouk case

I have a problem with following statement

  The United States saw Prince Sihanouk as a North Vietnamese sympathizer and
  a thorn on the United States, and using the CIA, it began plans to get rid of
  Sihanouk.[2]

The problem is that reference [2] does not support fully above statement. Is there any evidence that CIA planned to get rid of Sihanouk? I've tried to find something on the net but failed due to time constraints :] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.203.37.168 (talk) 23:41, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Chinese policy allowed; US and UK policy deleted

Please adjust your attitude, TheTimesAreAChanging. Firstly you use the word "garbage" in in an edit summary; you accuse me of using a "fabricated" quote (an accusation supplied with no evidence whatsoever, and despite my having supplied multiple RS for it including a Yale professor); you inaccurately state the nature of the libel case against Pilger (none of the material I added had anything to do with the libel case); I eliminated all reliance on Pilger (though there was absolutely no need to have done); and having met all complaints, you simply proceed to hack out 2k of material.

Would you care to explain your, what from my position, are completed unjustified deletions? What you need to explain is why you have absolutely no problem whatsoever with having "China 'armed and trained' the Khmer Rouge during the civil war and continued to aid them years afterward" in the article, but any mention of Western support and policy is immediately and aggressively deleted. Note that is too late to go back now and deleted the Chinese material and claim "even-handedness", since you have already demonstrated that you have no problem with it being there (I already drew your attention to it in one of my edit summaries, and it is still there).

I expect decent answers to all these questions, as these ought to have been straightforward additions, particularly in light of your demonstrated contentedness with regard to the mention of Chinese policy. I have no POV, but yours is to eliminate all mention of Western support. It is disgraceful. ColaXtra (talk) 17:22, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

But, the alleged Western support is still mentioned.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 17:32, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

The part about Chinese support was left because it was actually during the Civil War whereas allegeed western support occured post 1979 so should be mentioned there not under the civil war section. Stumink (talk) 21:10, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

• The imbalance is more profound than that. ColaXtra would have you believe that this article has extensive commentary about Chinese support for the KR, and that there is no mention of any Western involvement. In reality, the article currently devotes several paragraphs to the US role in the Cambodian civil war (with entire blockquotes denouncing the US), along with one sentence describing the Chinese role in the Cambodian civil war. Post-1978 Chinese support for the Khmer Rouge is never mentioned except in the paragraph devoted to the alleged Western support. ColaXtra has conflated all of these issues, and employed the very strawmen tactics he accuses me of.
• In addition, ColaXtra has asked me why I think the "quote" from Brzezinski is inaccurate. My answer is that it's unlikely Brzezinski would go out of his way to incriminate himself by making wild claims to journalists, only to repeatedly deny those same claims; if it were actually true, Brzezinski would have been prosecuted like Oliver North. However, I have not removed the "quote".
• ColaXtra later proposed an even worse revision in which the alleged post-1978 Western support was inserted in the middle of the genocide. The text went directly from "The UK government trained the Khmer Rouge and later recommended that the Khmer Rouge should be involved in Cambodia's post-genocide governance" to "Thousands starved or died of disease during the evacuation and its aftermath". My statement that this was a "ludicrous" place for the material apparently offended him.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 21:46, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

Well, quite a pickle. This has taken up far more of my time than it has been worth.

So where do we start? With this reasonable suggestion: "western support occured post 1979 so..." That's fine with me. Indeed, I did move it as you requested to the next section; if it's been moved back subsequently, not guilty.

Now to TTAAC. Remember: the original carping was "fabricated quote; libel; POV".

The "fabricated" quote has now been downgraded to "I don't think he would have said that"/"inaccurate". And total silence on the libel, so I'll take that as a tacit admission you were either lying or didn't have a clue what you were whimpering about. POV? I think I dealt with the absurdity of that claim above. The only "POV" that could possibly be claimed is that I believe it outrageous for any country to have supported the Khmer Rouge, whether that's China, the US, or the pUKe. Long and short, I sought balance where he sought censorship.

So what's the next cry about? OK, so now the justification has switched: what I wanted to add was "extensive commentary". Well, even if that were in the original yelping you gave for your deletion, which it was not, "extensive" commentary can be cured with a bit of pruning—so why did you pull it up by the roots? How—what was it, three lines of text for the UK–US mentioned combined?—can constitute "extensive" commentary is not clear to me. Even allowing for differing interpretations of the word extensive, we still have the switching and the by-the-roots.

"ColaXtra would have you believe..." No, I really don't think so. I imply the completely opposite, that Chinese support is merely "mentioned", right after where I explicitly quote the lone sentence that constitutes that mention. Besides, trying to lie about the article on its talk page is unquestionably just about the most stupid thing imaginable. Has anyone ever tried it? And I repeat: this question of balance/"Boo-hoo, it's too extensive" is completely new whining, just freshly squeezed out here now like a stinking turd. He's just moving the goal posts, which is pretty tedious. I do wish he'd make his mind up.

Anyway, like I said, this has wasted enough of my time. Let's delete my additions, save for the UK one, if it's all the same with you?

Surely we can all now agree that there's consensus? Yep, and we're done. ColaXtra (talk) 02:34, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

So basically, you're just trolling?TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 03:46, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

So, what concretely was wrong with this version? You labeled it "poorly sourced undue weight material against consensus" in your edit summary. What makes it poorly sourced? And what consensus did you just refer to, because I see none here? Zloyvolsheb (talk) 11:26, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

It's hard to know where to begin.

• Let's start with the first source. An article by John Pilger, a fringe journalist who had to pay libel damages for his inaccurate claims about this very topic. Still, perhaps the journal is reputable? Nah! "Covert Action Quarterly" is a worthless source that deserves no attention, especially in an article covering centuries of history. And the link is just a copyright violation on the self-published website of Stalinist propagandist Grover Furr, who is also a Cambodian genocide denier! "But what was concretely wrong with it," you ask? Why, nothing, my friend; nothing at all! Sources surely don't come more reliable than that!
• Source two fails verification, but could--it would at first seem--be used to support a different claim. Given the extraordinary nature of that claim, I thought it would be wise to check the source on Google books, only to realize that ColaXtra (a banned sockpuppet) had deliberately changed the quote from "the British department of defense admitted that Britain had helped train Khmer Rouge allies" fighting the Vietnamese occupation to "the British department of defence admitted that Britain had helped train the Khmer Rouge". Perhaps the British would be unlikely to admit to such a conspiracy even if it were true, but then banned users shouldn't invent sensationalistic "confessions" of guilt by wholly altering the meaning of text.
• Source three is a primary source government document that transcribes private conversations from several years before the supposed events discussed in sources one and two. It was added based on the original research of the banned editor as a form of synthesis. The relevance of this conversation in an article about centuries of history is unclear and highly dubious. The "counter-weight" quote is not even in the source.
• Source four may be technically reliable, although not eminently so, but it doesn't stand on its own when you gut the rest of the material.
• Source five is another primary source employed as original research without consideration for due weight and that doesn't wholly support the text in question. Two editors agreed with me at RSN that it cannot be used for factual claims. The discussion continued on this talk page, with User:NebY also endorsing my position (and you know where User:Stumink stands). There were separate discussions at DRN and ANI, sufficient to state that removal was the consensus. You'd have to be crazy to defend such blatant POV-pushing, bad sourcing, and undue weight, particularly in an article about centuries of history. Cheers,TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 12:33, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

Okay, thanks for your explanation. I partly agree with you and partly disagree, but it's good that you are willing to discuss it.

• You say that John Pilger is a "fringe journalist." Actually, Pilger is very well-known for his investigative journalism, having twice won the British Journalist of the Year award and numerous other accolades, including the 1990 Richard Dimbleby Award for factual reporting from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts.
• You say that source two (historian Daniele Ganser) fails verification, but I can see the text on GoogleBooks in footnote 28 on p. 266. That footnote reads:

  28. SAS officer to distinguished investigative journalist John Pilger. British daily The Guardian, October 16, 1990. The Reagan Administration was furious when in 1986 the correspondence of congressional lawyer Jonathan Winer exposed that the US had been funding Pol Pot with 85 million dollars between 1980 and 1986 according the logic [sic] 'the enemy of my enemy is my partner' (John Pilger in the British daily The Guardian, October 6, 1990). The British side was not less embarrassed. In 1990 British Prime Minister Thatcher according to plausible denial logics denied the testimonies of SAS officers. Finally in a libel case in 1991 involving John Pilger the British department of defence admitted that Britain had helped train Khmer Rouge allies (The British daily The Guardian, April 20, 1993).

  You are absolutely correct that ColaXtra manipulated that claim. The Khmer Rouge was waging a guerrilla war alongside its monarchist allies, and the British government trained those forces. However, the text also says that Pol Pot had been a recipient of 85 million dollars in US funding. That should be rewritten to correctly reflect the text in the source.
• You say that source three is "a primary source government document that transcribes private conversations from several years before the supposed events discussed in sources one and two." However, source three was not a primary document, but a summary of that document by the National Security Archive at George Washington University. You are correct that the conversation referred to by the source took place before the events described in the first two sources, as Kissinger, the secretary of state for the Nixon Administration was discussing the Khmer Rouge in relation to North Vietnam, obviously before Vietnamese reunification in 1975. Specifically, the source gives the following summary of Kissinger's conversation:

  * Discussing Cambodia with Thailand's Foreign Minister, Kissinger acknowledged that the Khmer Rouge were "murderous thugs" but he wanted the Thais to tell the Cambodians "that we will be friends with them": Cambodia aligned with China could be a "counterweight" to the real adversary, North Vietnam.

  I agree that this summary of Kissinger's remarks is undue by itself, but the same thing was laid out by Secretary of State Brzezinski during the Carter Administration. As Peter Maguire, citing two other works, writes in footnote 1 on p. 209 of his book Facing Death in Cambodia,

  1. In the spring of 1979, Brzezinski stated 'I encouraged the Thais to help the [Khmer Rouge]. The question was how to help the Cambodian people. Pol Pot was an abomination. We could never support him. But China could' (Kenton Clymer, 'Jimmy Carter, Human Rights, and Cambodia,' Diplomatic History [April 2003]: 273). Nayan Chanda, Brother Enemy (New York: Harcourt Brace, Jovanovich, 1986), 256.
  
  – Peter Maguire (2005). Facing Death in Cambodia. Columbia University Press. p. 209.

• I agree that source five is a primary source. The RSN commentators said that it should not be used to assert facts in Wikipedia's voice, but it can be used for direct quotations per WP:PRIMARY. Still, it is undue.

In summary, I agree with you on a lot of your concrete points of objection to what ColaXtra originally put in the text. However, there still needs to be an acknowledgment of Western support for the Khmer Rouge against Vietnam and the government of Democratic Kampuchea, which is described by historians like Daniele Ganser and others. For instance, China and the Western Bloc left Cambodia's United Nations to Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge after the retaliatory Vietnamese invasion overthrew Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge regime in 1979, arguing that the Khmer Rouge remained the country's official government under the letter of the international law, as historian Ben Kiernan explains in his 2008 book The Pol Pot Regime: Race, Power, and Genocide in Cambodia Under the Khmer Rouge, 1975-79:

The Pol Pot regime fell on 7 January 1979, to a retaliatory Vietnamese invasion. The CPK leaders and DK military remnants fled west and regrouped on the Thai border. Their anti-Vietnamese cause had already attracted U.S. support for the Khmer Rouge, but Pol Pot's genocidal record quickly became an embarrassment to both. In exile in 1985, Pol Pot finally told the truth about his age to justify a new lie - that he had just retired from politics - hoping it would win the Khmer Rouge further support. Pol Pot now claimed to have reached DK's official 'retirement age' of sixty. Few believed that the Khmer Rouge had ever adopted a mandatory retirement age. Anyway, Pol Pot's marriage certificate had sugested he was now only fifty-seven. Yet that document was just another lie.

The deceptions persisted. Pol Pot did not step down but continued to run the Khmer Rouge from the shadows. In a secret speech in Thailand in 1988, he blamed most of his former regime's killings on "Vietnamese agents." As for DK's massacres of defeated pro-U.S. leaders and troops, he insisted: "This strata of the imperialists had to be totally destroyed." Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge army continued to wage war from the Thai border until defections and mutinies broke it up in 1996-98. He apparently died in his sleep in the jungle on 15 April 1998. He never faced trial for his crimes. Indeed, from 1979 to 1992 the United Nations, at the insistence of the United States, had legitimized Pol Pot's anti-Vietnamese cause and supported his exiled Khmer Rouge as Cambodia's representatives.

– Ben Kiernan (2008). The Pol Pot Regime: Race, Power, and Genocide in Cambodia Under the Khmer Rouge, 1975-79. Yale University Press, Preface to the Third Edition, pp. xi - xii.

Furthermore, political scientist Michael Haas explicitly writes this:

MYTH #2: THE US GOVERNMENT OPPOSED THE KHMER ROUGE

Athough Americans heard verbal condemnations of the Pol-Potists from Washington, the Khmer Rouge remained in the UN. Each year resolutions backing the Khmer Rouge position on Cambodia received US support. In 1979 US food aid literally kept the Khmer Rouge army alive.

Meanwhile, several US allies gave military aid to Pol Pot, directly or indirectly, without any protest from Washington. China gave direct aid and admitted it, providing larger sums of money to the resistance than all other sources combine. Britain, France, Singapore, Thailand, and the United States claimed that they only aided the non-Communist resistance, but NCR aid was significantly below the level of Chinese aid to the Khmer Rouge. Failing to lavish aid on NCR soldiers, ANS and KPNLA salaries failed to attract troops away from the undisciplined army of the Khmer Rouge. Anglo-American funds were used to train NCR soldiers at the jungle warfare school in Pulada, Malaysia. In Vietnam the US army learned that many soldiers eager to be trained for the army of South Vietnam completed their schooling satisfactorily, then faded into the countryside with US weapons as the latest recruits for the Vietcong. Anglo-American training of Khmer Rouge soldiers was doubtless taking place in the 1980s on the same basis. Photographs of Khmer Rouge munitions in warehouses on US-leased land in Thailand perhaps best complete the picture (Stein 1991).

Since supplies could reach the NCR only through Thai territory, Thai military personnel handled distribution. To profit from the transaction, Thai officers supplied aid to the highest bidder, which of course was the Khmer Rouge. The myth of Washington's opposition to the Khmer Rouge was thus contradicted by the fact that NCR aid was a cover for Western countries to play the 'Khmer Rouge card' against Vietnam. Most countries in the UN, fearing a cutoff of US economic aid, supported the Sino-American-Thai policy that legitimized the Khmer Rouge, thereby encouraging Pol Pot to believe that he would return to power in due course.

– Michael Haas (1991). Cambodia, Pol Pot, and the United States: The Faustian Pact. Greenwood Publishing. pp. 28-29.

So, we should say that Secretaries of State Kissinger and Brzezinski both encouraged the Thai government to support Pol Pot as part of the American geopolitical strategy against Vietnam, that China and the United States both recognized Pol Pot as the legitimate ruler, vetoing the admission of Democratic Kampuchea into the United Nations, and that China and the West supported the insurgency against Vietnam-aligned Democratic Kampuchea - an insurgency that was waged by a political coalition that included the Khmer Rouge. Zloyvolsheb (talk) 08:29, 12 November 2012 (UTC)

No, that's just a conspiracy theory invented by academics who feel guilty over their past support for the Khmer Rouge. Yawn. Pilger is a fringe source, his claims did not hold up in court, and he is not a historian of Cambodia. That he writes for "Covert Action Quarterly" tells you everything you need to know. Gasner is just citing Pilger, who is supposedly citing a primary source. Gasner is not a historian of Cambodia, but if you can find a single history of Cambodia that makes the claim, it might merit inclusion. Surely, one would exist, if it were true. Brzezinski and Kissinger are deliberately misquoted all the time by propagandists because they are European-Americans with sinister-sounding last names and political connections, and these "quotes" are repeated in an echo chamber (Brzezinski is also, allegedly, rabidly "anti-Soviet" by virtue of his Polish roots, while Kissinger is a dreaded Jew). If you think this fabricated Brzezinski quote merits coverage, we should at least include his denial. But it's really undue. (And I always wonder why he would make such "confessions" to journalists--which are conveniently never recorded--only to publicly deny his former words! If these assertions were actually true, Brzezinski would have been prosecuted like Oliver North.) Because some nominally reliable sources indulge in these fantasies, they might deserve a sentence or two in this article about centuries of history, and that's exactly how much space they are presently allotted:

• "Ben Kiernan claimed that the US offered support to the Khmer Rouge after the Vietnamese invasion.[40] Other sources have disputed these claims,[41][42][43][44] and described "extensive fighting" between the US-backed forces of the Khmer People's National Liberation Front and the Khmer Rouge.[45]"

The sources that disagree, like Nate Thayer and Stephen J. Morris, are actual experts on Cambodia and Indochina. Kiernan is also an expert, which makes him a more legitimate source than Pilger. Perhaps you could add another source to go alongside Kiernan in the sentence. And FYI, Democratic Kampuchea was the state that existed from 1975 to 1979, not the Vietnamese puppet. Get your facts straight.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 11:14, 12 November 2012 (UTC)

That's interesting. All these different academic sources say that the US backed Pol Pot, but you think that all that is a "conspiracy theory invented by academics who feel guilty over their past support for the Khmer Rouge," especially regarding things said about European-Americans like Kissinger and Brzezinski. Sure, this writer or that might have gotten something down inaccurately - maybe there is a reason to suppose that there is a misquote of Brzezinski - but I'm not sure that all of these authors make everything up completely – the summary of Kissinger's conversation, the UN seat, the humanitarian aid, and so on. I'm curious if you deny that China, the United States, and others in the anti-Soviet camp insisted that the Khmer Rouge retain its seat at the UN? Yes, the name in the 1980s was, of course, was People's Republic of Kampuchea, my mistake.

Anyway, I just found an academic source somewhat summarizing the academic discussion on US support, which says there was definitely some American support for the Khmer Rouge during its fight in the Thai borderlands, but states that there is insufficient support for many of the specific allegations made elsewhere. I think the most appropriate thing now is to create the article on the controversy itself and link to it where the information becomes relevant. Zloyvolsheb (talk) 12:02, 12 November 2012 (UTC)

The US apparently voted for the Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea to hold a UN seat, despite the fact that it included the Khmer Rouge.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 12:25, 12 November 2012 (UTC)

That's first-rate, what's the source? I'm looking for different sources from whatever angle to appropriately describe the controversy. The discussion of the specific claims I've just mentioned here is briefly discussed in Kenton Clymer (2004) The United States and Cambodia, 1969-2000: A Troubled Relationship, Routledge, on pages 141-142. Right now I'm thinking of the appropriate title and scope for an article to fairly reflect the controversy, which should include the official U.S. statements and the perspectives of authors in the foreign policy and Cambodia history areas. Please let me know if you know of any other secondary sources I might find useful, as that could be helpful in preventing some disagreement later on. Zloyvolsheb (talk) 13:08, 12 November 2012 (UTC)

Not sure what you mean. The CGDK held the UN seat. I was conceding the point.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 23:31, 13 November 2012 (UTC)

I am asking you for a source because the CGDK was only formed in 1982.[1] Vietnam invaded in December 1978 and overthrew the Khmer Rouge in January 1979. Whom, then, did the United States support as Cambodia's representatives at the United Nations until the formation of the CDGK in 1982, during the 1979-1982 period? The Khmer Rouge.

According to Peter Ronayne, who discusses the history of the Pol Pot at the UN debate in his book Never Again?: The United States and the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide Since the Holocaust, the United States and a number of its allies voted for the Khmer Rouge represent Cambodia at the UN, arguing that its vote was based on technical grounds:

In the fall of 1979, the Carter administration faced a symbolic but critical ethical leadership moment concerning the Khmer Rouge. As the thirty-fourth session of the UN General Assembly convened, the organization had to deal with the question of which group would represent Cambodia at the United Nations: the ousted Khmer Rouge regime of Democratic Kampuchea or the Vietnamese-imposed government of the People's Republic of Kampuchea. A third option also existed labeling the seat "vacant" until Cambodia resolved its political status.

The ASEAN nations launched the debate when they requested that the Pol Pot/Democratic Kampuchea regime be seated. Vietnam strongly protested this action, defending the legitimacy of the government of the People's Republic of Kampuchea. In response, the General Assembly turned the issue over to a special credentials committee. On September 19, 1979, that committee voted 7-3 to recommend that the General Assembly seat Pol Pot's representative. The United States, China, Belgium, Ecuador, Pakistan, and Senegal voted for Pol Pot. The Soviet Union, the Congo, and Panama voted against the Khmer Rouge.

– Peter Ronayne (2001). Never Again?: The United States and the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide Since the Holocaust. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 82.

According to political scientist Lilian A. Barria's entry on Cambodia in the 2009 Encyclopedia of Human Rights, an Oxford University Press work edited by David Forsythe, who holds the title of Charles J. Mach Distinguished Professor of political science at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and is known for his work on human rights and international studies,

The United States also supported the Khmer Rouge after 1979, leading Western nations to recognize Khieu Samphan as the legitimate representative of the Cambodian people at the UN. The United States pressured UN humanitarian organizations to provide assistance to the Khmer Rouge in the camps in Thailand. The World Food Program delivered aid that was destined to the Khmer Rouge in the camps in Thailand. The World Food Program delivered aid that was destined to the Khmer Rouge through Thai military facilities. Moreover, the United States providd funds to the Khmer Rouge to finance their weapons purchases, although the U.S. government denied this. During the 1980s the Khmer Rouge controlled large parts of western and northwestern Cambodia, using bases on the Thai side of the border to continue to fight the People's Republic of Kampuchea.

– Lilian A. Barria (2009) "Cambodia". In David Forsythe (ed.), Encyclopedia of Human Rights, Volume 1. Oxford University Press. p. 236.

According to foreign relations historian Kenton Clymer, who holds the post of Distinguished Research Professor at Northern Illinois University and whose book I earlier referred to,

Within the administration Sam Brown, a Carter appointee who directed ACTION (the domestic peace corps), sent in last-minute appeals to the President and Secretary Muskie imploring them to reconsider the decision to support the Khmer Rouge at the U.N. "It is wrong substantively and can only further alienate many people who are already concerned about the consistency in U.S. policy," he wrote. "This decision is the most fundamental test of our commitment to human rights. In a broad sense, it is a test of the morality and integrity of all our actions abroad." The NSC did not forward Brown's letter to the President, nor did Brzezinski sign a proposed reply to Brown that had been prepared for him. A few days later the United States joined ASEAN and China in voting again to seat the Khmer Rouge at the United Nations.

– Kenton Clymer (2004) The United States and Cambodia, 1969-2000: A Troubled Relationship, Routledge, p. 135.

Regarding the CGDK, Elizabeth Becker writes:

The new coalition was as much a conceit as the earlier Khmer Rouge front groups. The three resistance organizations [of the anti-Vietnamese Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea] remained entirely separate. Even though Sihanouk was the president and Son Sann the prime minister, the military muscle remained the Khmer Rouge. And they won the right to keep Khmer Rouge diplomats in all the foreign posts for this new entity, from Permanent Representative of Cambodia at the United Nations to Cambodian ambassador at UNESCO in Paris. The loudest protests came from Son Sann, who had built his career on independence. But he, too, succumbed under pressure from his sponsors: the governments of the United States and the Southeast Asian nations, in particular, Singapore. . . .

– Elizabeth Becker (1998). When the War Was Over: Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge Revolution. PublicAffairs, p. 457.

Ben Kiernan, the Yale University scholar you've acknowledged as "an expert" in your comment above, writes:

When Vietnam ousted the Khmer Rouge in January 1979, most of the world lined up in confrontational Cold War positions. Hanoi's intervention was seen as having created 'the Cambodian problem' rather than or despite having stopped a genocide. China, the United States, and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean), all supported Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge in various ways and opposed attempts to bring them to justice. Protracted legal inquiries found no state in the world willing to file a case against DK in the International Court of Justice. With US support, the Khmer Rouge held on to Cambodia's seat in the United Nations, representing their victims for another fourteen years. France was the only major Western country that even abstained on the seating issue, though Paris did not cast a vote against the DK. While the latter remained a UN member state, the Khmer Rouge were openly accountable for their crimes, but instead international aid poured into their coffers, abbetting their way to retake power while an international embargo targeted their PRK opponents in Phnom Penh. This enforced isolation of Cambdia, and the human rights abuses of the wartime one-party PRK regime, constrained and marred its acknowledged achievements in restoring normality and reconstructing the country's economy, administration, cultural life, and educaiton system.

From 1979 to 1982, the Khmer Rouge continued to hold Cambodia's UN seat alone, still using the name Democratic Kampuchea. Then Sihanouk and a onetime Prime Minister, Son Sann, led two smaller non-communist parties into a Khmer Rouge-dominated 'Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea' (CGDK)-in reality neither a coalition, nor a government, nor democratic, nor in Cambodia. With Sihanouk now the nominal CGDK leader, the Khmer Rouge flag flew over New York untol 1992. . . .

– Ben Kiernan (2004). How Pol Pot Came to Power: Colonialism, Nationalism, and Communism in Cambodia, 1930-1975. Yale University Press. Preface to the Second Edition, pp. xxvii-xxviii.

As you can see, there is no shortage of sources. I would like to ask two specific questions. Firstly, do you concede that the United States supported the Khmer Rouge as Cambodia's United Nations representative in 1979-1982? Secondly, do you concede that the formation of the CGDK in 1982 left the Khmer Rouge representing Cambodia at the UN, as described above?

Of course, we have Brzezinski's statement. But do you have any secondary sources which dispute the material I have presented above? Zloyvolsheb (talk) 08:00, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Certainly not. What way the US voted is no secret! And perhaps it's easy to see how it could lead to more elaborate claims of Western support, but I don't think that the UN policy was impossible to justify on geopolitical gounds. After all, the Vietnamese puppet regime killed tens if not hundreds of thousands of people and was composed almost entirely of Khmer Rouge defectors. In fact, ex-Khmer Rouge are still present in the Cambodian government today. Neither the PRK, nor the CGDK, had clean hands.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 08:12, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

OK, I'm glad that we have managed to clarify at least that point. Zloyvolsheb (talk) 08:27, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Deletion of Hansard and other sources

TheTimesAreAChanging has deleted sourced material from Hansard which he has not even read and is now edit waring over this statement that he has not read. He claims that it does not say that the British government trained Khmer terrorist. Here is what the piece actually says which he would know if he just read it first.

Mr. Mullin :Following the unwelcome public interest that was aroused by Mr. Karniol's report--a similar report appeared in The Sunday Telegraph, which is not a Labour newspaper, and there were several excellent television programmes-- Mr. Dennis Gallwey, the MI6 officer responsible for the military training programme for Cambodians, was hastily withdrawn from his post at the British embassy at Bangkok. I gather that he has since retired. British advisers are, however, still to be found training Khmer Rouge terrorists in Thailand.

and Mrs. Clwyd : I shall add to what my hon. Friend is saying by quoting from a letter written by Susan Eliot, who has worked for many years with Cambodian refugees. She has evidence that in Malaysia, British advisers have helped to train Khmer Rouge guerrillas. She states :

"The training was conducted by Malaysian army officers, through the medium of English language, with British and American trainers acting as advisers. Not only were the troops trained together but they travelled to and from Bangkok."

Both are British MP's debating in parliament at the time.I suggest that you revert your mistake.Kabulbuddha (talk) 05:12, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

So now the Malaysians trained the KR? That's a totally different allegation! These highly speculative allegations from primary source politicians are not statements of fact. Lots of the quotes said the opposite, or made far weaker claims. Taking a few select quotes out of context from primary sources doesn't cut it.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 05:24, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

This is sourced from the UK parliament minutes,these are British MP's discussing the British government training Khmer Rouge terrorists in a debate in the Houses of Parliament.It sates clearly that British advisors are training Khmer terrorists in Thailand and Malaysia You have provided no good excuse to excluded this reliably sourced information from the article at all.Your claim of what the source said was wrong because you never even read it and your excuse for deleting it was that the source was not verified which is rubbish.I have also reported you for edit waring at the discussion about you on the Admin noticeboard.Kabulbuddha (talk) 05:34, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

You must be another Zrdragon sock?TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 05:38, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

ColaXtra cited NATO's Secret Army: Operation Gladio and Terrorism in Western Europe for the following claim: "The UK government trained the Khmer Rouge and later recommended that the Khmer Rouge should be involved in Cambodia's post-genocide governance". When you check the source on Google books, you realize it actually says: "Britain had helped train Khmer Rouge allies". Removed.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 06:12, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

This discussion is about you deleting sourced material that I posted not about ColaXtra.What is zdragon?Kabulbuddha (talk) 06:24, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

Your source is invalid. We use scholarly sources for these historical articles. Those are the rules.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 06:27, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

I am sorry but you do not get to decide which sources are acceptable here, sources should be reputable and Hansard is certainly that,there is no rule to use scholarly sources for historical articles, you made that up.I will take it further up the chain of editors than you as this is going now where.Kabulbuddha (talk) 06:32, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

Hansard is a fairly reliable source for what has been said in Parliament. However not everyone elected to Parliament is a reliable source and it is not unusual for MPs to make statements which are contentious or cannot be verified or which are later shown to be false; the latter are sometimes withdrawn but this is rare. So Hansard can be used in Wikipedia to show that allegations have been made but not to show that those allegations are reliably sourced statements. NebY (talk) 16:00, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

Yes thanks. I have used a quote from an MP and linked to Hansard and I have also backed that up with two former members of the SAS stating that the SAS were training the Khmer Rouge,one of the former members claims to have actually been there doing the training and the other states in his book that they did. I have added that the British government has denied ever training the Khmer rouge but admitted to training other members allied to the Khmer Rouge.Kabulbuddha (talk) 16:31, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

Consensus at RSN is that "Hasnard should only be used to express the exact wording of comments that are mentioned in reliable secondary sources, i.e., rarely."TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 16:50, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

That is not the consensus,that is the opinion of one editor another editor states that it can be used.I have taken it to the dispute page as we are not getting anywhere here.Kabulbuddha (talk) 17:05, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

In case I am the "other editor" to whom you refer, I should add that I agree that we must seek reliable secondary sources. Use of Hansard without secondary sources normally constitutes original research (see WP:OR). My comment above was intended to address the suggestions that Hansard's report that an MP had said that A was a fact was a reliable source for A being a fact. NebY (talk) 17:50, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

Thanks but no you were not the other editor,we were discussing the discussion going on on another page.Kabulbuddha (talk) 17:52, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

I have found a few others sources stating that the British trained the Khmer Rouge.The first is by Nic Dunlop who claims in his book that he has talked to a Khmer Rouge fighter who was trained by British officers in Thailand. It is in his book Lost Executioner.In another book called NATO's Secret Army: Operation Gladio and Terrorism in Western Europe By Daniele Ganser,states that SAS officers said "We trained the Khmer Rouge in a lot of technical stuff".Kabulbuddha (talk) 18:12, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

The last time Nato's Secret Army was cited, it was misquoted. Give us page numbers and book titles, then we can discuss how much weight these claims deserve. Speculation aside, the preponderance of evidence does not suggest any deliberate policy of aid to the Khmer Rouge, although it is possible that British support for rebels got into the wrong hands or that all of the rebels are being lumped together. The Vietnamese tried to starve the country to kill off the Khmer Rouge, so it is no surprise that former Pol Pot admirers who defected to Hanoi, like Kiernan, accused even the World Food Program of helping the Khmer Rouge. But there's no evidence that the WFP intentionally singled out Khmer Rouge guerillas for assistance, even though some of them may have been fed. Lengthy speculation, debate, and contradictory details about this footnote in Cambodian history is really out of place here. We have no coverage of human rights under the Samrin regime!TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 18:30, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

I have already posted the book titles,it is in my post above yours.What I stated is also not misquoted as I am reading it from the actual books.It is page 210 in the Nic Dunlop book and page 44 in the Daniele Ganser book. Both are available on google books.Kabulbuddha (talk) 18:37, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

I think we should have a short description of US and UK policy on the post-1979 regime(s), written up from Kiernan. That the West opposed Vietnam at that time is pretty clear. Itsmejudith (talk) 11:19, 12 November 2012 (UTC)

We already do.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 11:41, 12 November 2012 (UTC)