Fifty years ago this month, Cambodia adopted a new constitution—one that enshrined the principles of communism into law. By Marxist decree, 1976 was to be “year zero” in which Cambodia’s history was to be forgotten. It was the culmination of a 9-month revolution, led by the guerilla group, the Khmer Rouge, which in turn was led by the bloodthirsty Pol Pot, a Marxist radical educated in Paris. The Khmer Rouge’s grip on power came as Cambodia suffered the after-effects of the Vietnam War and the U.S. bombing campaign. The vacuum left by the U.S. withdrawal and the deplorable postwar conditions made the situation ripe for this takeover, culminating in the rebels April 1975 capture of the capital city, Phnom Penh.
The Khmer Rouge promised a classless, agrarian society and sought to establish this utopia through a brutal campaign of torture, mass starvation, and forced labor. They emptied out the cities, demanding that men, women, and children flee, even the sick and the lame, into the countrysides. They slaughtered anyone considered elite, including teachers, scholars, historians, even those who wore glasses or expressed compassion for others.
Their radical version of Marxism taught that cities were corrupt, intellectuals were evil, religion was subversive, and that family loyalties must give way to loyalty to the ruling party, the Angkar. In true communist fashion, money, private property, and religion were abolished. There was no freedom of speech, freedom of worship, or freedom of assembly. Muslims, Buddhists, and Christians were put to death. The slaughter was systematic, where people were tortured into false confessions and sent to the rural communities where they were either forced into labor or executed. These places became known as “The Killing Fields.”
The worst concentration camp, Tuol Sleng, was a converted high-school, controlled by a special, lethal branch of the Khmer Rouge. Thousands of men, women, and children met their deaths there. One survivor, a doctor in Phnom Penh who was forced to the labor camps, said this: “In the eye of communism, a human being has no value until he served the political party … we don’t have the right to talk or even laugh.”
Before the Khmer Rouge was defeated by the invading Vietnamese in 1979, between 1.5 and 2 million people were killed, nearly 20% of the Cambodian population. In the late 1990s, a court of justice was organized and top leaders of the Khmer Rouge were convicted and imprisoned, but Pol Pot died in 1998 before going to trial.
A half century later, we rightly recoil at one of the worst genocides in the 20th century at a time when the term “genocide” is cheaply thrown around by activists. It’s a stark reminder of the logical end of the Marxist philosophy that promises utopia but only delivers suffering and death on a mass scale.
Today, too many, even in America, are indifferent to the idea of communism. A recent poll showed that 34% of Americans under 30 had a favorable view of the totalitarian ideology. And so many more are open to proposals that reflect communism’s softer cousin, socialism. The newly minted mayor of New York, for instance, has spoken fondly of the “warmth of collectivism.”
The only conclusion is that we’ve forgotten recent history. The 20th century reveals the mass brutality and suffering brought by Marxism, with at least 100 million dead and many more millions consigned to a miserable existence. Cambodia’s killing fields are just one snapshot of a brutal portfolio.
Click Here to Read More (Originally Published at World Magazine)
Daniel is the director of the Land Center for Cultural Engagement at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. He is the author of several books, including The Dignity Revolution, Agents of Grace, and his forthcoming book, In Defense of Christian Patriotism. Dan is a graduate of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He and his wife, Angela, have four children.
