The Rise of Pol Pot

The Khmer Rouge was originated in the 1960s during the period when the Cold War was at its peak, and the United States and the Soviet Union actually came very close to a direct arms conflict. Communism had gathered a lot of strength all around the world, particularly in China, where Mao Zedong had inspired a communist revolution in 1950. This greatly affected the politics of the nations of the region like Vietnam and North Korea, and certain elements also developed in Cambodia, a country controlled by the French colonists for a long time.

The basic foundation to such a force came into effect with the foundation of the communist political forces in the region, such as the Indochinese Communist Party, which was even before the World War II, and the formation of the Cambodian version of the party called the KPRP or the Khmer People’s Revolutionary Party, under the supervision of the Vietnamese, which played an important part in the struggle for independence against the French colonists.

It is hard to credit the origin of the Khmer Rouge to any one person, but if one face was to represent the foundation, the organization and the operations of the Khmer Rouge, it was Pol Pot. The Khmer Rouge was an armed movement which was largely formed in the dense jungles of Cambodia, where they could easily operate without any resistance. The movement was inspired primarily by Stalinist ideals and planned to turn Cambodia into an agrarian utopia.

The Khmer Rouge was originally influenced by the Paris Student Group in the 1950s, which featured names like Pol Pot and Ieng Sary. These educated men began to exert their influence among the Cambodian students in Paris, and later went on to influence the KPRP local communist movement in Cambodia when Pol Pot returned to the country in 1953.

The Khmer Rouge rose as a prominent force when Pol Pot came to control the KPRP in 1963, when he was asked to fill in the position of the party general secretary who had been murdered. The basis why the Khmer Rouge had gained a lot of following and support during its days of infancy was due to the fact that they advocated a system of radical communism to liberate the motherland from corruption and foreign influence. However, their rise to power was also helped later by the supporters of the exiled King Sihanouk.

The Khmer Rouge forces began its insurgency in full force in 1968. During the period Prime Minister Lon Nil and the National Assembly forced Nordom Sinahouk, the monarch of the time, to an exile in China after he was removed from the position of the head of state in 1970 in a coup, placing Lon Nil as the new head of state. The new regime became to be known as Khmer Republic. But the struggle of Khmer Rouge continued their insurgency against a new regime for the control of the country.

However, the exiled monarch allied with the Khmer Rouge and due to the support of the King, a great number of the rural population supported Khmer Rouge, as they thought doing so would help restore the King to the throne. Finally the short-lived Khmer Republic fell at the hands of Khmer Rouge in 1975, which was helped by the fact that the US Congress had suspended its aid to the pro-American Republic in 1973. The new regime was called Democratic Kampuchea and the exiled King Sihanouk was declared the Head of State, although a nominal and temporary one, and was replaced by Khieu Samphan in 1976. Pol Pot became the Party Leader, and later the Head of Government

in 1976.