277-459: Pol Pot (born Saloth Sâr ; 19 May 1925 – 15 April 1998) was a Cambodian communist revolutionary , politician and dictator who ruled Cambodia as Prime Minister of Democratic Kampuchea between 1976 and 1979. Ideologically a Maoist and a Khmer ethnonationalist , he was a leading member of Cambodia’s communist movement the Khmer Rouge , from 1963 to 1997. He served as General Secretary of
554-567: A ballet teacher. When Sâr was six years old, he and an older brother were sent to live with Meak in Phnom Penh ; informal adoptions by wealthier relatives were then common in Cambodia. In Phnom Penh, he spent 18 months as a novice monk in the city's Vat Botum Vaddei monastery, learning Buddhist teachings and to read and write the Khmer language . In summer 1935, Sâr went to live with his brother Suong and
831-529: A communist revolution would put the working class in power, and in turn establish common ownership of property, the primary element in the transformation of society towards a communist mode of production . Communism in its modern form grew out of the socialist movement in 18th-century France , in the aftermath of the French Revolution . Criticism of the idea of private property in the Age of Enlightenment of
1108-509: A de facto one-party state extinguished hopes that the Cambodian left could take power electorally. North Vietnam's government nevertheless urged the Khmer Party not to restart the armed struggle; the former was focused on undermining South Vietnam and had little desire to destabilize Sihanouk's regime given that it had—conveniently for them—remained internationally un-aligned rather than following
1385-626: A semi-colony to a leading world power, with greatly advanced literacy, women's rights, basic healthcare, primary education, and life expectancy. Its leading role in World War II saw the emergence of the industrialized Soviet Union as a superpower . Marxist–Leninist governments modeled on the Soviet Union took power with Soviet assistance in Bulgaria , Czechoslovakia , East Germany , Poland , Hungary, and Romania . A Marxist–Leninist government
1662-698: A July military parade Pol Pot announced the formal integration of all troops into a national Revolutionary Army, to be headed by Son Sen . Although a new Cambodian currency had been printed in China during the civil war, the Khmer Rouge decided not to introduce it. At the Central Committee Plenum held in Phnom Penh in September, they agreed that currency would lead to corruption and undermine their efforts to establish
1939-694: A Vietnamese-backed "liberation army" to fight against the Khmer Rouge government. Meanwhile, the Vietnamese Communist Party Politburo was meeting in Hanoi to discuss its strategy for Kampuchea. It concluded that the Khmer Rouge government was a proxy of China, which had been trying to fill the power vacuum following the withdrawal of the United States. As such, China was identified as Vietnam's main enemy, and its client government in Phnom Penh had to be removed by conventional military force, because
2216-584: A cell that met on the rue Lacepède; his cell comrades included Hou Yuon, Sien Ary, and Sok Knaol. He helped to duplicate the Cercle's newspaper, Reaksmei ("The Spark"), named after a former Russian paper . In October 1951, Yuon was elected head of the Khmer Student Association (AEK; l'Association des Etudiants Khmers ), establishing close links between the organisation and the leftist Union Nationale des Étudiants de France . The Cercle Marxiste manipulated
2493-462: A classless society based entirely on worker-peasants. The radical ideologies and goals of the Khmer Rouge were alien concepts to the masses. The socialist revolution held very little popular appeal, which led Pol Pot and his cadres to use ultra-nationalist sentiment, repressive and murderous rule, and propaganda aimed at demonising the Vietnamese to maintain control. A major point of departure between
2770-581: A coalition government with the CPP. Shortly afterward, the constitutional monarchy was restored and the Khmer Rouge was outlawed by the newly formed Cambodian government. Angkor , the seat of the Khmer Empire , was subjected to Vietnamese influence as early as the 13th century . Vietnamese influence spread gradually and indirectly, and it was not until the early 19th century that Vietnam exercised direct control. However, Vietnamese attempts to annex Cambodia began in
3047-554: A counterattack and removing Kampuchean forces from Phú Quốc and Thổ Chu, and then invading the Kampuchean island of Koh Poulo Wai . In June 1975, while on a visit to Hanoi , Pol Pot proposed that Vietnam and his country should sign a treaty of friendship and begin discussions on border disputes. However, those discussions never materialised, and the Kampucheans claimed that Vietnam turned down both offers. In August 1975, Vietnam returned
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#17328482637753324-414: A decade. Communism Communism (from Latin communis , 'common, universal') is a sociopolitical , philosophical , and economic ideology within the socialist movement , whose goal is the creation of a communist society , a socioeconomic order centered around common ownership of the means of production , distribution, and exchange that allocates products to everyone in
3601-555: A degree. Sâr arrived in Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City) on 13 January 1953, the same day on which Sihanouk disbanded the Democratic -controlled National Assembly , began ruling by decree , and imprisoned Democratic members of parliament without trial. Amid the broader First Indochina War in neighboring French Indochina , Cambodia was in a civil war, with civilian massacres and other atrocities carried out by all sides. Sâr spent several months at
3878-439: A departing US Navy ship just twelve days later. Within the city, Khmer Rouge militia under the control of different Zone commanders clashed with one another, partly as a result of turf wars and partly due to the difficulty of establishing who was a group member and who was not. The Khmer Rouge had long viewed Phnom Penh's population with mistrust, particularly as the city's numbers had been swelled by peasant refugees who had fled
4155-468: A distinct stage between capitalism and communism. This intermediate stage was a concept introduced by Vladimir Lenin as a means to defend the Bolshevik seizure of power against traditional Marxist criticism that Russia's productive forces were not sufficiently developed for socialist revolution . A distinction between communist and socialist as descriptors of political ideologies arose in 1918 after
4432-463: A form of state capitalism . Public memory of 20th-century Communist states has been described as a battleground between anti anti-communism and anti-communism . Many authors have written about mass killings under communist regimes and mortality rates , such as excess mortality in the Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin , which remain controversial, polarized, and debated topics in academia, historiography, and politics when discussing communism and
4709-520: A form of communism. In their words, the Hutterites "established in their communities a rigorous system of Ordnungen, which were codes of rules and regulations that governed all aspects of life and ensured a unified perspective. As an economic system, communism was attractive to many of the peasants who supported social revolution in sixteenth century central Europe." This link was highlighted in one of Karl Marx 's early writings; Marx stated that "[a]s Christ
4986-691: A four-man General Affair Committee leading the party. Its existence was to be kept secret from non-members. The Kampuchean Labour Party's conference, held clandestinely from September to October 1960 in Phnom Penh, saw Samouth become party secretary and Nuon Chea his deputy, while Sâr took the third senior position and Ieng Sary the fourth. Sihanouk spoke out against the Cambodian Khmer communists; he also warned of its totalitarian character and its suppression of personal liberty. In January 1962, Sihanouk's security services cracked down further on Cambodia's socialists, incarcerating Pracheachon's leaders and leaving
5263-535: A four-month journey along the Ho Chi Minh Trail to reach the Cambodian's new base at Loc Ninh . In October 1966, he and other Cambodian party leaders made several key decisions. They renamed their organisation the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK), a decision initially kept secret. Sihanouk began referring to its members as the " Khmer Rouge " ('Red Cambodians'), but they did not adopt this term themselves. It
5540-466: A full-scale invasion using 13 divisions, estimated at 150,000 soldiers well-supported by heavy artillery and air power. Initially, Kampuchea directly challenged Vietnam's military might through conventional fighting methods, but this tactic resulted in the loss of half of the KRA within two weeks. Heavy defeats on the battlefield prompted much of the Kampuchean leadership to evacuate towards the western region of
5817-616: A good teacher. He courted society belle Soeung Son Maly before entering a relationship with fellow communist revolutionary Khieu Ponnary , the sister of Sary's wife Thirith. They were married in a Buddhist ceremony on 14 July 1956. According to Philip Short, Sâr had chosen this date in order to coincide with the symbolic Bastille Day All correspondence between the Democratic Party and the Pracheachon went through him, as did most communication with underground elements. Sihanouk cracked down on
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#17328482637756094-500: A great deal of support, both domestically and internationally. In 1975, the troops defending Phnom Penh began discussing surrender, eventually doing so and allowing the Khmer Rouge to enter the city on 17 April. There, Khmer Rouge soldiers executed between 700 and 800 senior government, military, and police figures. Other senior figures escaped; Lon Nol fled into exile in the US. He left Saukham Khoy as acting president, although he too fled aboard
6371-455: A greater emphasis on certain aspects of classical Marxism while rejecting or modifying other aspects. Many schools of thought have sought to combine Marxian concepts and non-Marxian concepts, which has then led to contradictory conclusions. There is a movement toward the recognition that historical materialism and dialectical materialism remain the fundamental aspects of all Marxist schools of thought . Marxism–Leninism and its offshoots are
6648-488: A hierarchical basis, with active cells of members as the broad base. They were made up only of elite cadres approved by higher members of the party as being reliable and completely subject to party discipline . The Great Purge of 1936–1938 was Joseph Stalin 's attempt to destroy any possible opposition within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union . In the Moscow trials , many old Bolsheviks who had played prominent roles during
6925-482: A major turning point in the course of Soviet-Vietnamese and Sino-Vietnamese diplomatic relations, and ultimately the Vietnamese invasion of Kampuchea, a Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation was signed between Vietnam and the Soviet Union on 3 November 1978, which guaranteed the former of vital Soviet military aid in the scenario that China intervened in the conflict. Later, in November 1978, a command and control headquarters
7202-548: A massive expansion in size. Many of the new recruits for the Khmer Rouge were apolitical peasants who fought in support of the King, not for communism, of which they had little understanding. In April 1970, Sâr flew to Hanoi. He stressed to Lê Duẩn that while he wanted the Vietnamese to supply the Khmer Rouge with weapons, he did not want troops: the Cambodians needed to oust Lon Nol themselves. North Vietnamese armies, in collaboration with
7479-471: A matter of debate, but the distinction rests largely on the communists' adherence to the revolutionary socialism of Karl Marx." In the United States, communism is widely used as a pejorative term as part of a Red Scare , much like socialism , and mainly in reference to authoritarian socialism and Communist states . The emergence of the Soviet Union as the world's first nominally Communist state led to
7756-698: A month-long training course for CPK cadres in the Northern Zone headquarters. This was followed by the CPK's Third Congress, attended by around 60 delegates, where Pol Pot was confirmed as the Secretary of the Central Committee and Chairman of its Military Commission. In early 1972, Pol Pot embarked on his first tour of the Marxist-controlled areas across Cambodia. In these areas, called "liberated zones", corruption
8033-504: A more authoritarian vanguardist or communist party -driven approach through the development of a socialist state , followed by the withering away of the state . As one of the main ideologies on the political spectrum , communist parties and movements have been described as radical left or far-left. Variants of communism have been developed throughout history, including anarchist communism , Marxist schools of thought , and religious communism , among others. Communism encompasses
8310-618: A nationalist separatist Cambodian movement, the Khmer Serei (Free Khmers), in order to pursue independence. In accordance with the 1954 Geneva Accords negotiating the end of the French domination, newly created communist North Vietnam pulled all of its Viet Minh soldiers and cadres out of Cambodia. Since the KPRP was staffed primarily by ethnic Vietnamese or Cambodians under its tutelage, approximately 5,000 communist cadres went with them. The power vacuum
8587-618: A new conflict between Vietnam and Cambodia. Although the North Vietnamese and the Khmer Rouge had previously fought side by side, the leaders of the newly created Democratic Kampuchea continued to view Vietnam with great suspicion, because they believed the Vietnamese communists had never given up their dream of creating an Indochinese federation with Vietnam as the leader. For that reason, the Kampuchean government removed all North Vietnamese military forces from Kampuchean territory shortly after their capture of Phnom Penh on 17 April 1975. In
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8864-670: A new revolutionary culture must replace it starting from scratch. “Year Zero" was announced by the Khmer Rouge on April 17, 1975 , where everything before that date must be purged. The Khmer Rouge emptied the cities, frogmarched Cambodians to labor camps and relocated the urban population to collective farms , where mass executions, abuse, torture, malnutrition and disease were rampant. At the Killing Fields more than 1.3 million people were executed and buried in mass graves. Pursuing complete egalitarianism , money, religion, and private property were abolished and all citizens were forced to wear
9141-425: A particular type of communism. One of the first uses of the word in its modern sense is in a letter sent by Victor d'Hupay to Nicolas Restif de la Bretonne around 1785, in which d'Hupay describes himself as an auteur communiste ("communist author"). In 1793, Restif first used communisme to describe a social order based on egalitarianism and the common ownership of property. Restif would go on to use
9418-533: A political struggle. In January 1970 he flew to Beijing. There, his wife began showing early signs of the chronic paranoid schizophrenia she would later be diagnosed with. In March 1970, while Sâr was in Beijing, Cambodian parliamentarians led by Lon Nol deposed Sihanouk when he was out of the country. Sihanouk also flew to Beijing, where the Chinese and North Vietnamese Communist Parties urged him to form an alliance with
9695-525: A possible communist or socialist theorist, or as the first author to give communism a serious consideration. The 5th-century Mazdak movement in Persia (modern-day Iran) has been described as communistic for challenging the enormous privileges of the noble classes and the clergy , criticizing the institution of private property , and striving to create an egalitarian society. At one time or another, various small communist communities existed, generally under
9972-521: A post-capitalist society – positive humanism, socialism, Communism, realm of free individuality, free association of producers, etc. He used these terms completely interchangeably. The notion that 'socialism' and 'Communism' are distinct historical stages is alien to his work and only entered the lexicon of Marxism after his death." According to the Encyclopædia Britannica , "Exactly how communism differs from socialism has long been
10249-599: A prerequisite to socialism , were critical of the Bolsheviks from the beginning due to Russia being seen as too backward for a socialist revolution . Council communism and left communism , inspired by the German Revolution of 1918–1919 and the wide proletarian revolutionary wave, arose in response to developments in Russia and are critical of self-declared constitutionally socialist states . Some left-wing parties, such as
10526-575: A programme and statutes for a new party that would be allied with but not subordinate to the Vietnamese. They established party cells, emphasising the recruitment of small numbers of dedicated members, and organized political seminars in safe houses. At a 1959 conference, the movement's leadership established the Kampuchean Labour Party, based on the Marxist–Leninist model of democratic centralism . Sâr, Tou Samouth and Nuon Chea were part of
10803-568: A provincial tour in a bus to raise money for a trip to Angkor Wat . In 1947, he left the school. That year, he passed exams that admitted him into the Lycée Sisowath , meanwhile living with Suong and his new wife. In summer 1948, he sat the brevet entry examinations for the upper classes of the Lycée, but failed. Unlike several of his friends, he could not continue on at the school for a baccalauréat . Instead, he enrolled in 1948 to study carpentry at
11080-456: A quota of three tons of paddy, or unmilled rice, per hectare, an increase on what was previously the average yield. There he also announced that manufacturing should focus on the production of basic agricultural machinery and light industrial goods such as bicycles. From 1975 onward, all of those Cambodians who were living in rural co-operatives, meaning the vast majority of Cambodia's population, were reclassified as members of one of three groups:
11357-724: A rallying point for opposition and thus was better brought into the Khmer government itself; he also hoped to take advantage of Sihanouk's stature in the Non-Aligned Movement . Once home, Sihanouk settled into his palace and was well treated. Sihanouk was allowed to travel abroad, in October addressing the UN General Assembly to promote the new Cambodian government and in November embarking on an international tour. The Khmer Rouge's military forces remained divided into differing zones and at
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11634-458: A socialist principle of " to each according to his contribution ". Socialism has been described as a philosophy seeking distributive justice, and communism as a subset of socialism that prefers economic equality as its form of distributive justice. In 19th century Europe, the use of the terms communism and socialism eventually accorded with the cultural attitude of adherents and opponents towards religion . In European Christendom , communism
11911-465: A socialist society and launch a secret campaign to oppose Sihanouk's influence. In September 1974, a Central Committee meeting was held at Meakk in Prek Kok commune. There the Khmer Rouge agreed that it would expel the populations of Cambodia's cities to rural villages. They thought this was necessary to dismantle capitalism which they associated with the urban culture. By 1974, Lon Nol's government had lost
12188-578: A socialist society. Thus, there were no wages in Democratic Kampuchea. The population were expected to do whatever the Khmer Rouge commanded of them, without pay. If they refused, they faced punishment, sometimes execution. For this reason, Short characterised Pol Pot's Cambodia as a "slave state", with its people effectively forced into slavery by working without pay. At the September Plenum, Pol Pot announced that all farmers were expected to meet
12465-546: A socialist state that is in the process of constructing communism. Terms used by Communist states include national-democratic , people's democratic , socialist-oriented , and workers and peasants' states. According to Richard Pipes , the idea of a classless , egalitarian society first emerged in ancient Greece . Since the 20th century, ancient Rome has been examined in this context, as well as thinkers such as Aristotle , Cicero , Demosthenes , Plato , and Tacitus . Plato, in particular, has been considered as
12742-472: A text outlining a framework for carrying out a revolution in colonial and semi-colonial, semi-feudal societies . Alongside these texts, Sâr read the anarchist Peter Kropotkin 's book on the French Revolution , The Great Revolution . From Kropotkin he took the idea that an alliance between intellectuals and the peasantry was necessary for revolution; that a revolution had to be carried out without compromise to its conclusion to succeed; and that egalitarianism
13019-439: A variety of schools of thought, which broadly include Marxism , Leninism , and libertarian communism, as well as the political ideologies grouped around those. All of these different ideologies generally share the analysis that the current order of society stems from capitalism , its economic system , and mode of production , that in this system there are two major social classes, that the relationship between these two classes
13296-536: A villa in the south of the city for his own. To give his government a greater appearance of legitimacy, Pol Pot organised a parliamentary election, although there was only one candidate in every constituency except in Phnom Penh. The parliament then met for only three hours. Although Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge remained the de facto government, initially the formal government was the GRUNK coalition, although its nominal head, Penn Nouth , remained in Beijing. Throughout 1975,
13573-619: A visiting Vietnamese media delegation that there were "obstacles and difficulties" in the relationship between the two countries. Nonetheless, on 21 September 1976, the first air service connecting Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City with Phnom Penh was established. Then in December 1976, the Kampuchean Revolutionary Organisation sent greetings to the Vietnamese Communist Party during their Fourth Congress . Towards
13850-692: A work about More, whose ideas could be regarded as "the foregleam of Modern Socialism" according to Kautsky. During the October Revolution in Russia, Vladimir Lenin suggested that a monument be dedicated to More, alongside other important Western thinkers. In the 17th century, communist thought surfaced again in England, where a Puritan religious group known as the Diggers advocated the abolition of private ownership of land. In his 1895 Cromwell and Communism , Eduard Bernstein stated that several groups during
14127-466: Is a non- idealist attempt at the understanding of material history and society, whereby communism is the expression of a real movement, with parameters that are derived from actual life. According to Marxist theory, class conflict arises in capitalist societies due to contradictions between the material interests of the oppressed and exploited proletariat – a class of wage laborers employed to produce goods and services – and
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#173284826377514404-424: Is exploitative, and that this situation can only ultimately be resolved through a social revolution . The two classes are the proletariat , who make up the majority of the population within society and must sell their labor power to survive, and the bourgeoisie , a small minority that derives profit from employing the working class through private ownership of the means of production. According to this analysis,
14681-480: Is that of educating voters in what are deemed their true interests rather than in response to the expression of interest by voters themselves. When they have gained control of the state, Leninist communists' main task was preventing other political parties from deceiving the proletariat, such as by running their own independent candidates. This vanguardist approach comes from their commitments to democratic centralism in which communists can only be cadres, i.e. members of
14958-530: Is the intermediary unto whom man unburdens all his divinity, all his religious bonds, so the state is the mediator unto which he transfers all his Godlessness, all his human liberty." Thomas Müntzer led a large Anabaptist communist movement during the German Peasants' War , which Friedrich Engels analyzed in his 1850 work The Peasant War in Germany . The Marxist communist ethos that aims for unity reflects
15235-650: Is viewed overwhelmingly negatively as a mass murderer ; for significant numbers of Russians and Georgians, he is regarded as a great statesman and state-builder. After the Chinese Civil War , Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Party came to power in 1949 as the Nationalist government headed by the Kuomintang fled to the island of Taiwan. In 1950–1953, China engaged in a large-scale, undeclared war with
15512-596: The 1917 Russian Constituent Assembly election , socialist parties totaled well over 70% of the vote. The Bolsheviks were clear winners in the urban centres, and took around two-thirds of the votes of soldiers on the Western Front, obtaining 23.3% of the vote; the Socialist Revolutionaries finished first on the strength of support from the country's rural peasantry, who were for the most part single issue voters , that issue being land reform, obtaining 37.6%, while
15789-482: The 1936 Constitution of the Soviet Union . War communism was the first system adopted by the Bolsheviks during the Russian Civil War as a result of the many challenges. Despite communism in the name, it had nothing to do with communism, with strict discipline for workers, strike actions forbidden, obligatory labor duty, and military-style control, and has been described as simple authoritarian control by
16066-469: The 1946 general election . According to historian David Chandler, Sâr and Sary worked for the party during its successful election campaign; conversely, Short maintains that Sâr had no contact with the party. Sihanouk opposed the party's left-leaning reforms and in 1948 dissolved the National Assembly, instead ruling by decree . The Việt Minh attempted to establish a nascent communist movement, but it
16343-588: The British Army 's Special Air Service . Behind the scenes, Prime Minister Hun Sen of the PRK government approached factions of the Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea (CGDK) to begin peace talks. Under diplomatic and economic pressure from the international community, the Vietnamese government implemented a series of economic and foreign policy reforms, and withdrew from Kampuchea in September 1989. At
16620-517: The Cambodian People's Party (CPP), formerly the Kampuchean People's Revolutionary Party (KPRP), to win the general elections. However, the CPP leadership refused to accept defeat, and announced that the eastern provinces of Cambodia, where most of the CPP's votes were drawn from, would secede from Cambodia. To avoid such an outcome, Norodom Ranariddh , the leader of FUNCINPEC, agreed to form
16897-537: The Cham ethnic group before being rolled out across other communities. Pol Pot also dressed in this fashion. CPK members were expected to attend regular (sometimes daily) "lifestyle meetings" in which they engaged in criticism and self-criticism. These cultivated an atmosphere of perpetual vigilance and suspicion within the movement. Pol Pot and Nuon Chea led such sessions at their headquarters, although they were exempt from criticism themselves. By early 1972, relations between
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#173284826377517174-644: The Cheget , to Russian president Boris Yeltsin . That evening at 7:32, the Soviet flag was lowered from the Kremlin for the last time and replaced with the pre-revolutionary Russian flag . Previously, from August to December 1991, all the individual republics, including Russia itself, had seceded from the union. The week before the union's formal dissolution, eleven republics signed the Alma-Ata Protocol , formally establishing
17451-598: The Chinese Civil War and the French Communist Party was one of the country's largest, attracting the votes of around 25% of the French electorate. Sâr found many of Karl Marx 's denser texts difficult, later saying he "didn't really understand" them. But he became familiar with the writings of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin , including The History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviks) . Sâr also read Mao's work, especially On New Democracy ,
17728-723: The Christian universalist teaching that humankind is one and that there is only one god who does not discriminate among people. Communist thought has also been traced back to the works of the 16th-century English writer Thomas More . In his 1516 treatise titled Utopia , More portrayed a society based on common ownership of property, whose rulers administered it through the application of reason and virtue . Marxist communist theoretician Karl Kautsky , who popularized Marxist communism in Western Europe more than any other thinker apart from Engels, published Thomas More and His Utopia ,
18005-399: The Cold War had begun. Stalin himself believed that capitalism was a hollow shell and would crumble under increased non-military pressure exerted through proxies in countries like Italy. He greatly underestimated the economic strength of the West and instead of triumph saw the West build up alliances that were designed to permanently stop or contain Soviet expansion. In early 1950, Stalin gave
18282-480: The Commonwealth of Independent States , and declared that the Soviet Union had ceased to exist. As of 2023, states controlled by Communist parties under a single-party system include the People's Republic of China, the Republic of Cuba , the Democratic People's Republic of Korea , the Lao People's Democratic Republic , and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam . Communist parties, or their descendant parties, remain politically important in several other countries. With
18559-406: The Communist Party of Kampuchea from 1963 to 1981 and his rule converted Cambodia into a one-party communist state . He perpetrated the Cambodian genocide of which from 1975 to 1979 between 1.5 and 2 million people died , approximately a quarter of Cambodia's entire population. His iron rule ended when Vietnam invaded Cambodia in December 1978, occupying the whole country in two weeks, ending
18836-446: The English Civil War (especially the Diggers) espoused clear communistic, agrarianist ideals and that Oliver Cromwell 's attitude towards these groups was at best ambivalent and often hostile. Criticism of the idea of private property continued into the Age of Enlightenment of the 18th century through such thinkers as Gabriel Bonnot de Mably , Jean Meslier , Étienne-Gabriel Morelly , and Jean-Jacques Rousseau in France. During
19113-409: The Indochinese Communist Party (ICP), almost exclusively dominated by the Vietnamese, originally meant to fight French colonial rule in Indochina . In 1941, Nguyen Ai Quoc (commonly known by his alias Ho Chi Minh ) founded the Viet Nam Doc Lap Dong Minh Hoi, or the Viet Minh . When the Japanese were defeated at the end of World War II, he initiated the first Indochinese war of independence against
19390-533: The Khmer Rouge remained unwilling to negotiate seriously. Small-scale fighting continued between the two countries throughout 1978, as China tried to mediate peace talks between the two sides. However, the two governments could not reach a compromise. By the end of 1978, Vietnamese leaders decided to remove the Khmer Rouge-dominated government of Democratic Kampuchea, perceiving it as being pro-Chinese and hostile towards Vietnam . On 25 December 1978, 150,000 Vietnamese troops invaded Democratic Kampuchea and overran
19667-400: The Khmer Viet Minh organisation and its guerrilla war against King Norodom Sihanouk 's newly independent government. Following the Khmer Viet Minh's 1954 retreat into North Vietnam , Pol Pot returned to Phnom Penh , working as a teacher while remaining a central member of Cambodia's Marxist–Leninist movement. In 1959, he helped formalise the movement into the Kampuchean Labour Party, which
19944-512: The Russian Revolution or in Lenin's Soviet government afterwards, including Lev Kamenev , Grigory Zinoviev , Alexei Rykov , and Nikolai Bukharin , were accused, pleaded guilty of conspiracy against the Soviet Union, and were executed. The devastation of World War II resulted in a massive recovery program involving the rebuilding of industrial plants, housing, and transportation as well as
20221-596: The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party renamed itself as the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , which resulted in the adjective Communist being used to refer to socialists who supported the politics and theories of Bolshevism, Leninism , and later in the 1920s those of Marxism–Leninism . In spite of this common usage, Communist parties also continued to describe themselves as socialists dedicated to socialism. According to The Oxford Handbook of Karl Marx , "Marx used many terms to refer to
20498-688: The Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies in the October Revolution; after a few weeks of deliberation, the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries formed a coalition government with the Bolsheviks from November 1917 to July 1918, while the right-wing faction of the Socialist Revolutionary Party boycotted the soviets and denounced the October Revolution as an illegal coup . In
20775-577: The Second World War , Nazi Germany invaded France, and in 1941 the Japanese ousted the French from Cambodia, with Sihanouk proclaiming his country's independence. After the war ended, France reasserted its control over Cambodia in 1945, but allowed for the creation of a new constitution and the establishment of various political parties. The most successful of these was the Democratic Party , which won
21052-629: The Socialist Party of Great Britain , boasted of having called the Bolsheviks, and by extension those Communist states which either followed or were inspired by the Soviet Bolshevik model of development, establishing state capitalism in late 1917, as would be described during the 20th century by several academics, economists, and other scholars, or a command economy . Before the Soviet path of development became known as socialism , in reference to
21329-754: The Third Jakarta Informal Meeting in 1990, under the Australian-sponsored Cambodian Peace Plan , representatives of the CGDK and the PRK agreed to a power-sharing arrangement by forming a unity government known as the Supreme National Council (SNC). The SNC's role was to represent Cambodian sovereignty on the international stage, while the United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia (UNTAC)
21606-598: The United Nations Security Council , so Prince Sihanouk could present the deposed government's case. Despite strong objections from the Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia , the UN Security Council gave Sihanouk this chance. Although Sihanouk distanced himself from the human rights abuses of the Khmer Rouge, he accused Vietnam of using aggression to violate Kampuchea's sovereignty. As such, he demanded all UN countries suspend aid to Vietnam and not recognise
21883-517: The Viet Cong militia and North Vietnamese troops , Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge forces advanced and controlled all of Cambodia by 1975. Pol Pot transformed Cambodia into a one-party state that he called Democratic Kampuchea. Seeking to create an agrarian socialist society that he believed would evolve into a communist one . Year Zero was an idea put into practice by Pol Pot where he believed that all cultures and traditions must be completely destroyed and
22160-427: The bourgeoisie – the ruling class that owns the means of production and extracts its wealth through appropriation of the surplus product produced by the proletariat in the form of profit . This class struggle that is commonly expressed as the revolt of a society's productive forces against its relations of production , results in a period of short-term crises as the bourgeoisie struggle to manage
22437-400: The common ownership of the means of production, therefore abolishing the bourgeoisie, ultimately abolishing the proletariat itself and ushering the world into communism as a new mode of production . In between capitalism and communism, there is the dictatorship of the proletariat ; it is the defeat of the bourgeois state but not yet of the capitalist mode of production, and at the same time
22714-648: The dissolution of the Soviet Union and the Fall of Communism , there was a split between those hardline Communists, sometimes referred to in the media as neo-Stalinists , who remained committed to orthodox Marxism–Leninism , and those, such as The Left in Germany, who work within the liberal-democratic process for a democratic road to socialism; other ruling Communist parties became closer to democratic socialist and social-democratic parties. Outside Communist states, reformed Communist parties have led or been part of left-leaning government or regional coalitions, including in
22991-450: The dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, several previously Communist governments repudiated or abolished Communist rule altogether. Afterwards, only a small number of nominally Communist governments remained, such as China , Cuba , Laos , North Korea , and Vietnam . With the exception of North Korea, all of these states have started allowing more economic competition while maintaining one-party rule. The decline of communism in
23268-539: The materialist conception of history which holds that the key characteristic of economic systems through history has been the mode of production and that the change between modes of production has been triggered by class struggle. According to this analysis, the Industrial Revolution ushered the world into the new capitalist mode of production . Before capitalism, certain working classes had ownership of instruments used in production; however, because machinery
23545-445: The means of production , earning profit via the surplus value generated by the proletariat, who have no ownership of the means of production and therefore no option but to sell its labor to the bourgeoisie. According to the materialist conception of history, it is through the furtherance of its own material interests that the rising bourgeoisie within feudalism captured power and abolished, of all relations of private property, only
23822-401: The productive forces ) is the primary agent of change in the structure of society and of human social relations and that social systems and their relations (e.g. feudalism , capitalism , and so on) become contradictory and inefficient as the productive forces develop, which results in some form of social revolution arising in response to the mounting contradictions. This revolutionary change is
24099-435: The two-stage theory , communists made no major distinction between the socialist mode of production and communism; it is consistent with, and helped to inform, early concepts of socialism in which the law of value no longer directs economic activity. Monetary relations in the form of exchange-value , profit , interest , and wage labor would not operate and apply to Marxist socialism. While Joseph Stalin stated that
24376-590: The École française de radioélectricité to study radio electronics . He took a room in the Cité Universitaire 's Indochinese Pavilion, then lodgings on the rue Amyot, and eventually a bedsit on the corner of the rue de Commerce and the rue Letellier. Sâr earned good marks during his first year. He failed his first end-of-year exams but was allowed to retake them and narrowly passed, enabling him to continue his studies. Sâr spent three years in Paris. In summer 1950, he
24653-452: The "peaceful transition" to socialism espoused by Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev , accusing him of being a revisionist . In contrast to Khrushchev's interpretation of Marxism–Leninism, Sâr and his comrades sought to develop their own, explicitly Cambodian variant of the ideology. Their interpretation moved away from the orthodox Marxist focus on the urban proletariat as the forces of a revolution to build socialism, giving that role instead to
24930-511: The "people's war" concept in favour of a conventional military campaign. Not to be outdone by the Vietnamese military build-up, the Government of Democratic Kampuchea was busy strengthening its armed forces with Chinese support. In previous years, China had only provided the KRA with a limited quantities of arms and ammunition, but as relations with Vietnam worsened in 1978, Beijing established additional supply routes through Kampuchea and increased
25207-513: The 17th century when Vietnamese forces of the Nguyen domain in Cochinchina helped Cambodian dissidents topple its only Muslim king, Ramathipadi I . From then on, Nguyen lords and their successors, Nguyen emperors frequently intervened in Cambodia. In 1813, Nak Ong Chan gained the Cambodian throne with the help of Vietnam, and under his rule Cambodia became a protectorate . Following his death in 1834,
25484-575: The 18th century through such thinkers as Gabriel Bonnot de Mably , Jean Meslier , Étienne-Gabriel Morelly , Henri de Saint-Simon and Jean-Jacques Rousseau in France. During the upheaval of the French Revolution , communism emerged as a political doctrine under the auspices of François-Noël Babeuf , Nicolas Restif de la Bretonne , and Sylvain Maréchal , all of whom can be considered the progenitors of modern communism, according to James H. Billington . In
25761-414: The 20th century, several ostensibly Communist governments espousing Marxism–Leninism and its variants came into power, first in the Soviet Union with the Russian Revolution of 1917, and then in portions of Eastern Europe, Asia, and a few other regions after World War II . As one of the many types of socialism , communism became the dominant political tendency, along with social democracy , within
26038-601: The 20th century. In Western Europe, communist parties were part of several post-war governments, and even when the Cold War forced many of those countries to remove them from government, such as in Italy, they remained part of the liberal-democratic process. There were also many developments in libertarian Marxism, especially during the 1960s with the New Left . By the 1960s and 1970s, many Western communist parties had criticized many of
26315-576: The AEK and its successor organisations for the next 19 years. Several months after the Cercle Marxiste's formation, Sâr and Sary joined the French Communist Party (PCF). Sâr attended party meetings, including those of its Cambodian group, and read its magazine, Les Cahiers Internationaux . To many young people in France and Cambodia, communism seemed to be the future; the Chinese Communist Party won
26592-459: The Bay Damran army post south of Battambang . Further attacks targeted police and soldiers and seized weaponry. The government responded with scorched-earth policies, aerially bombarding areas where rebels were active. The army's brutality aided the insurgents' cause; as the uprising spread, over 100,000 villagers joined them. In the summer, Sâr relocated his base 48 kilometres (30 mi) north to
26869-671: The Bolsheviks to maintain power and control in the Soviet regions, rather than any coherent political ideology . The Soviet Union was established in 1922. Before the broad ban in 1921, there were several factions in the Communist party, more prominently among them the Left Opposition , the Right Opposition , and the Workers' Opposition , which debated on the path of development to follow. The Left and Workers' oppositions were more critical of
27146-406: The Communist Party's control over Cambodia was kept secret. At a special National Congress meeting from 25 to 27 April, the Khmer Rouge agreed to make Sihanouk the nominal head of state , a status he retained throughout 1975. Sihanouk had been dividing his time between Beijing and Pyongyang but in September was allowed to return to Cambodia. Pol Pot was aware that if left abroad, Sihanouk could become
27423-422: The Communist ideal. Mao charged that Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev was the leader of a "revisionist clique" which had turned against Marxism and Leninism and was now setting the stage for the restoration of capitalism. The two nations were at sword's point by 1960. Both began forging alliances with communist supporters around the globe, thereby splitting the worldwide movement into two hostile camps. Rejecting
27700-717: The Constituent Assembly in January 1918. The Draft Decree on the Dissolution of the Constituent Assembly was issued by the Central Executive Committee of the Soviet Union , a committee dominated by Lenin, who had previously supported a multi-party system of free elections. After the Bolshevik defeat, Lenin started referring to the assembly as a "deceptive form of bourgeois-democratic parliamentarianism." Some argued this
27977-596: The Democratic Party to win. Sihanouk feared a Democratic Party government and in March 1955 abdicated the throne in favor of his father, Norodom Suramarit . This allowed him to legally establish a political party, the Sangkum Reastr Niyum , with which to contest the election. The September election witnessed widespread voter intimidation and electoral fraud, resulting in Sangkum winning all 91 seats. Sihanouk's establishment of
28254-636: The Eastern Military Zone of those he perceived to have been contaminated by the Vietnamese, Pol Pot ordered military units from the Southwest Zone to move into eastern Kampuchea and eliminate the "hidden traitors". Unable to withstand an attack from the Kampuchea Government, So Phim committed suicide while his deputy Heng Samrin defected to Vietnam. On 12 April 1978, the Kampuchean government declared they and Vietnam could negotiate again if
28531-706: The Ecole Technique in Russey Keo , in Phnom Penh's northern suburbs. This drop from an academic education to a vocational one likely came as a shock. His fellow students were generally of a lower class than those at the Lycée Sisowath, though they were not peasants. At the Ecole Technique, he met Ieng Sary , who became a close friend and later a member of his government. In summer 1949, Sâr passed his brevet and secured one of five scholarships allowing him to travel to France to study at one of its engineering schools. During
28808-516: The Fourierists in France were considered respectable socialists, while working-class movements that "proclaimed the necessity of total social change" denoted themselves communists . This latter branch of socialism produced the communist work of Étienne Cabet in France and Wilhelm Weitling in Germany. While liberal democrats looked to the Revolutions of 1848 as a democratic revolution , which in
29085-797: The French Army in large numbers and the French government relented, rather than risk a costly, protracted war to retain control. In November, Sihanouk declared Cambodia's independence. The civil conflict then intensified, with France backing Sihanouk's war against the rebels. Following the Geneva Conference held to end the First Indochina War, Sihanouk secured an agreement from the North Vietnamese that they would withdraw Khmer Việt Minh forces from Cambodian territory. The last Khmer Việt Minh units left Cambodia for North Vietnam in October 1954. Sâr
29362-508: The French. During this time, Vietnamese forces made extensive use of Cambodian territory to transport weapons, supplies, and troops. This relationship lasted throughout the Vietnam War , when Vietnamese communists used Cambodia as a transport route and staging area for attacks on South Vietnam. In 1951, Vietnam guided the establishment of a separate Cambodian communist party, the Kampuchean People's Revolutionary Party (KPRP), which allied with
29639-530: The Great Leap was a very expensive disaster." Put in charge of rescuing the economy, Deng adopted pragmatic policies that the idealistic Mao disliked. For a while, Mao was in the shadows but returned to center stage and purged Deng and his allies in the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976). The Cultural Revolution was an upheaval that targeted intellectuals and party leaders from 1966 through 1976. Mao's goal
29916-580: The KRA advanced about 10 km (6.2 mi) into Tay Ninh Province , where they killed more than 1,000 Vietnamese civilians in Tân Biên district . Angered by the scale of Kampuchean assaults, the PAVN assembled eight divisions, estimated at 60,000 soldiers, to launch a retaliatory strike against Kampuchea. On 16 December 1977, the PAVN divisions, with support from elements of the Vietnam People's Air Force , crossed
30193-524: The KRA along the border regions to overthrow the Khmer Rouge government. Against the backdrop of military clashes, between 9 January and 20 February 1978, Vietnamese Deputy Foreign Minister Phan Hien made several trips to Beijing to hold discussions with representatives of the Kampuchean government, which ultimately proved to be fruitless. On 18 January 1978, China attempted to mediate between Kampuchea and Vietnam when Vice Premier Deng Yingchao (widow of Zhou Enlai ) travelled to Phnom Penh, where her effort
30470-601: The Kampong Thom monastery. Despite his family's relatively prosperous origins, in an interview with Yugoslav television in 1977, Pol Pot claimed that he was born into a "poor, peasant family". At the time, Cambodia was a monarchy but the French colonial regime held effective political control of the country. Sâr's family had connections to the Cambodian royalty: his cousin Meak was a consort of King Sisowath Monivong and later worked as
30747-544: The Kampuchean Revolutionary Army in just two weeks, thereby ending Pol Pot 's government, which had been responsible for the deaths of almost a quarter of all Cambodians between 1975 and December 1978 during the Cambodian genocide . Vietnamese military intervention, and the occupying forces' subsequent facilitation of international food aid to mitigate the massive famine, ended the genocide. On 8 January 1979
31024-422: The Kampucheans. Again, the Vietnamese pushed the KRA forces back into the provincial cities of Suong and Prey Veng and then pulled out. However, as they had done before, the KRA moved its artillery back towards the border and continued shelling Vietnamese villages as though nothing had happened. During the second half of 1978, Vietnamese leaders devoted much of their energy towards the military campaign against
31301-428: The Kampucheans. In a private meeting with the Soviet ambassador to Vietnam on 16 November 1976, Lê Duẩn dismissed both Ieng Sary and Pol Pot as "bad people" for their pro-Chinese policies. Le Duan then asserted that Nuon Chea, who had ascended to the position of Premier of Democratic Kampuchea as Pol Pot's replacement, was a person of pro-Vietnamese orientation, so Vietnam could exercise its influence through him. However,
31578-436: The Khmer Rouge and its Vietnamese Marxist allies were becoming strained and some violent clashes had broken out. That year, the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong main-force divisions began pulling out of Cambodia primarily for the offensive against Saigon. As it became more dominant, the CPK imposed increasing numbers of controls over Vietnamese troops active in Cambodia. In 1972, Pol Pot suggested that Sihanouk leave Beijing and tour
31855-620: The Khmer Rouge and the North Vietnamese remained strained. After the latter temporarily reduced the flow of arms to the Khmer Rouge, in July 1973 the CPK Central Committee agreed that the North Vietnamese should be considered "a friend with a conflict". Pol Pot ordered the internment of many of the Khmer Rouge who had spent time in North Vietnam and were considered too sympathetic to them. Most of these people were later executed. In summer 1973,
32132-460: The Khmer Rouge at Khao Larn camp in Trat Province . Meanwhile, in Phnom Penh, the new Kampuchean government tried to rebuild the country's economic and social life, which was largely destroyed by decades of political upheavals and constant warfare. However, efforts to rebuild the country were severely hampered by the lack of educated and qualified personnel, as most educated people had either fled
32409-626: The Khmer Rouge during their fight against the Lon Nol government, in the hope that the Kampuchean communists would adopt a pro-Vietnamese line upon their victory in the same way as the Pathet Lao had done. However, their hopes were dashed as early as 1973, because People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) formations operating in Khmer Rouge-occupied territories were occasionally subjected to armed attacks by their allies. The Vietnamese position inside Kampuchea
32686-581: The Khmer Rouge faction and the Vietnam-aligned Communist Party of Kampuchea , which has favored more classical Marxism–Leninist ideology, was the Khmer Rouge's embrace of a nationalistic form of Maoism , one of the few major communist parties to do so in the wake of the Sino-Soviet split . This served as the basis for the Khmer Rouge's agrarian policies. Even before the Vietnam War ended,
32963-536: The Khmer Rouge government, by seeking political support from the Soviet Union. In a briefing with Vietnamese Foreign Ministry officials on 25 July 1978, the Soviet chargé d'affaires in Hanoi was told that the Kampuchean Government had deployed 14 of its 17 regular army divisions and 16 local regiments along the border with Vietnam. Then, in early September 1978, Lê Duẩn informed the Soviet ambassador that Vietnam aimed to "solve fully this question of Kampuchea by
33240-402: The Khmer Rouge government. Finally, China's PLA stationed a few hundred thousand soldiers on its own border with Vietnam (which would eventually be deployed in the brief Sino-Vietnamese War ), as well as nearly two million soldiers in its border with the Soviet Union. On 21 December 1978, Kampuchea's new-found strength was tested when a Vietnamese offensive, consisting of two divisions, crossed
33517-498: The Khmer Rouge government. Furthermore, instead of sending congratulatory messages as they had done in the previous years, the Vietnamese media changed their tone and began referring to the Kampuchean Government as the "Pol Pot-Ieng Sary clique" as the Kampuchean military continued their campaign in Vietnam. By the end of June, the Vietnamese military assembled a multi-division task force to launch another limited-objective campaign against
33794-419: The Khmer Rouge greater control over the food supply, ensuring that farmers did not provision government forces. Many villagers resented the collectivisation and slaughtered their livestock to prevent it from becoming collective property. Over the following six months, about 60,000 Cambodians fled from areas under Khmer Rouge control. The Khmer Rouge introduced conscription to bolster its forces. Relations between
34071-579: The Khmer Rouge launched its first major assault on Phnom Penh, but was forced back amid heavy losses. Later that year, it began bombarding the city with artillery. In the autumn, Pol Pot traveled to a base at Chrok Sdêch on the eastern foothills of the Cardamom Mountains . By winter, he was back at the Chinit Riber base where he conferred with Sary and Chea. He concluded that the Khmer Rouge should start talking openly about its commitment to making Cambodia
34348-495: The Khmer Rouge to overthrow Lon Nol's right-wing government. Sihanouk agreed. On Zhou Enlai 's advice, Sâr also agreed, although his dominant role in the CPK was concealed from Sihanouk. Sihanouk then formed his own government-in-exile in Beijing and launched the National United Front of Kampuchea to rally Lon Nol's opponents. Sihanouk's support for the Khmer Rouge helped greatly in recruitment, with Khmer Rouge undergoing
34625-442: The Khmer Rouge's advance and were considered to be traitors. Shortly after taking the city, the Khmer Rouge announced that its inhabitants had to evacuate to escape a forthcoming US bombing raid; the group falsely claimed that the population would be allowed to return after three days. This evacuation entailed moving over 2.5 million people out of the city with very little preparation; between 15,000 and 20,000 of these were removed from
34902-597: The Laos-Kampuchea border. On 13 December 1978, the Chinese Government warned Vietnam that its patience was limited, and that Vietnam would be punished if it behaved in an "unbridled fashion". The final piece of the Vietnamese strategy emerged when Vietnam announced the formation of the Kampuchean United Front for National Salvation (KUFNS) in the "liberation zones" of Kampuchea. Hanoi claimed that KUFNS
35179-581: The October Revolution which involved the assault on Petrograd occurred largely without any human casualties . By November 1917, the Russian Provisional Government had been widely discredited by its failure to withdraw from World War I, implement land reform, or convene the Russian Constituent Assembly to draft a constitution, leaving the soviets in de facto control of the country. The Bolsheviks moved to hand power to
35456-710: The People's Representatives and Premier of Kampuchea, respectively. Furthermore, the Vietnamese even denounced the alleged "U.S. bombing" of Siem Reap in February 1976, thereby reinforcing the Kampucheans' fictitious claims over the incident. In response, in June 1976, the Kampuchean leadership sent a message to the Provisional Revolutionary Government of the Republic of South Vietnam , which had governed South Vietnam since
35733-643: The Russian Federation has some supporters, but is reformist rather than revolutionary, aiming to lessen the inequalities of Russia's market economy. Chinese economic reforms were started in 1978 under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping , and since then China has managed to bring down the poverty rate from 53% in the Mao era to just 8% in 2001. After losing Soviet subsidies and support, Vietnam and Cuba have attracted more foreign investment to their countries, with their economies becoming more market-oriented. North Korea,
36010-443: The Sangkum government, called new elections, and produced a list of 34 left-leaning Cambodians, demanding that they meet him to establish a new administration. Sâr was on the list, perhaps because of his role as a teacher, but refused to meet with Sihanouk. He and Ieng Sary left Phnom Penh for a Viet Cong encampment near Thboung Khmum in the jungle along Cambodia's border with South Vietnam. According to Chandler, "from this point on he
36287-466: The South Vietnamese side of the border. The Viet Cong allowed his actions to be officially separate from its own, but still wielded significant control over his camp. At a plenum of the party's Central Committee, it was agreed that they should re-emphasize their independence from Vietnamese control and endorse armed struggle against Sihanouk. The Central Committee met again in January 1965 to denounce
36564-415: The South Vietnamese supported a failed coup against Sihanouk, relations between the countries deteriorated and the United States initiated an economic blockade of Cambodia in 1956. After Sihanouk's father died in 1960, Sihanouk introduced a constitutional amendment allowing himself to become head of state for life. In February 1962, anti-government student protests turned into riots, at which Sihanouk dismissed
36841-435: The South-Western and Eastern Zones. You have a lot of experience. It's better than ours. We don't have the right to criticise you ... Basically you are right. Have you made mistakes or not? I don't know. Certainly you have. So rectify yourselves; do rectification ! ... The road is tortuous. — Mao's advice to Pol Pot, 1975 In May, Pol Pot adopted the Silver Pagoda as his main residence. He then relocated to
37118-431: The Soviet Union . The declaration acknowledged the independence of the former Soviet republics and created the Commonwealth of Independent States , although five of the signatories ratified it much later or did not do it at all. On the previous day, Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev (the eighth and final leader of the Soviet Union ) resigned, declared his office extinct, and handed over its powers, including control of
37395-423: The Soviet government of Nikita Khrushchev , who enacted a period of de-Stalinization and re-approached diplomatic relations with Yugoslavia in 1976. The Communist Party of China, led by Mao Zedong, established the People's Republic of China , which would follow its own ideological path of development following the Sino-Soviet split . Communism was seen as a rival of and a threat to Western capitalism for most of
37672-456: The Soviet model of rapid urbanization, Mao Zedong and his top aide Deng Xiaoping launched the Great Leap Forward in 1957–1961 with the goal of industrializing China overnight, using the peasant villages as the base rather than large cities. Private ownership of land ended and the peasants worked in large collective farms that were now ordered to start up heavy industry operations, such as steel mills. Plants were built in remote locations, due to
37949-450: The Soviets, built the hydrogen bomb , and strengthened the NATO alliance that covered Western Europe . According to Gorlizki and Khlevniuk, Stalin's consistent and overriding goal after 1945 was to consolidate the nation's superpower status and in the face of his growing physical decrepitude, to maintain his own hold on total power. Stalin created a leadership system that reflected historic czarist styles of paternalism and repression yet
38226-433: The Thai and South Vietnamese governments in allying with the anti-communist United States . Sâr rented a house in the Boeng Keng Kang area of Phnom Penh. Although not qualified to teach at a state school, he gained employment teaching history, geography, French literature, and morals at a private school, the Chamraon Vichea ("Progressive Knowledge"); his pupils, who included the later novelist Soth Polin , described him as
38503-419: The Ukrainian Socialist Bloc finished a distant third at 12.7%, and the Mensheviks obtained a disappointing fourth place at 3.0%. Most of the Socialist Revolutionary Party's seats went to the right-wing faction. Citing outdated voter-rolls, which did not acknowledge the party split, and the assembly's conflicts with the Congress of Soviets, the Bolshevik–Left Socialist-Revolutionaries government moved to dissolve
38780-518: The United States, South Korea, and United Nations forces in the Korean War . While the war ended in a military stalemate, it gave Mao the opportunity to identify and purge elements in China that seemed supportive of capitalism. At first, there was close cooperation with Stalin, who sent in technical experts to aid the industrialization process along the line of the Soviet model of the 1930s. After Stalin's death in 1953, relations with Moscow soured – Mao thought Stalin's successors had betrayed
39057-430: The Viet Cong, nevertheless invaded Cambodia to attack Lon Nol's forces; in turn, South Vietnam and the United States sent troops to the country to bolster his government. This pulled Cambodia into the Second Indochina War already raging across Vietnam. The U.S. dropped three times as many bombs on Cambodia during the conflict as they had on Japan during World War II. Although targeting Viet Cong and Khmer Rouge encampments,
39334-430: The Vietnamese adaptation of the Maoist " people's war " doctrine had not been a success against the Khmer Rouge's security apparatus. To reflect the attitude of the country's leaders, Vietnam's state-controlled media stepped up its propaganda war against the Khmer Rouge, with the official Nhân Dân newspaper regularly calling for international intervention to save the Kampuchean people from domestic terror initiated by
39611-409: The Vietnamese communists left in their wake in Cambodia was soon filled by the return of a young group of Cambodian communist revolutionaries, many of whom received their education in France. In 1960, the KPRP changed its name to the Kampuchean Communist Party (KCP), and the name was later adopted by the majority coalition that formed around Saloth Sar ( Pol Pot ), Ieng Sary , and Khieu Samphan as
39888-431: The Vietnamese communists were planning to form an Indochinese federation, which would be dominated by Vietnam. They were also harboring irredentist sentiments about the Mekong Delta region . In order to pre-empt any attempt by the Vietnamese to dominate them, the Khmer Rouge leadership began, as the Lon Nol government capitulated in 1975, to purge Vietnamese-trained personnel within their own ranks. Then, in May 1975,
40165-460: The Vietnamese empire under Minh Mang , who held strong Confucian beliefs, annexed and colonised Cambodia. Cambodia was governed under a Vietnamese administration in Phnom Penh and termed a Vietnamese province . The Vietnamese emperor attempted to erase Khmer culture , which had derived the basis of Cambodian society, dress, and religion from India rather than China. The trend of Vietnamese dominance continued during French colonisation, under which
40442-425: The Vietnamese gave up their expansionist ambitions and recognised Kampuchea's sovereignty. However, there was also a pre-condition requiring Vietnam to meet several obligations through a seven-month trial ceasefire. The Vietnamese government immediately rejected the demand. In response, two KRA divisions penetrated up to 2 km (1.2 mi) into Vietnamese territory and massacred over 3,000 Vietnamese civilians in
40719-405: The Vietnamese invasion, was forced to take refuge in Thailand . The Thai government under Kriangsak Chamanan accommodated the Khmer Rouge refugees, in exchange for a promise by Deng Xiaoping to end material support to Thailand's insurgent communists . Despite the overwhelming economic challenges brought by the Khmer Rouge and the accompanying refugees, the Thai Government sheltered and protected
40996-534: The Vietnamese retaliation, the Kampuchean Government remained defiant. On 31 December 1977, Khieu Sampham declared that the Kampuchean Government would "temporarily" sever diplomatic relations with Vietnam until the Vietnamese military withdrew from the "sacred territory of Democratic Kampuchea". On 6 January 1978, PAVN divisions were only 38 km (24 mi) from Phnom Penh, but the Vietnamese Government decided to withdraw its forces from Kampuchea because they had failed to achieve Vietnam's political objective. During
41273-499: The Việt Minh and thus the international movement made it the best group for the Cercle Marxiste to support. The Cercle members in Paris took his recommendation. In August 1953, Sâr and Rath Samoeun travelled to Krabao, the headquarters of the Việt Minh Eastern Zone. Over the following nine months, around 12 other Cercle members joined them there. They found that the Khmer Việt Minh was run and numerically dominated by Vietnamese guerrillas, with Khmer recruits largely given menial tasks; Sâr
41550-479: The abolition of capitalism. For Leninist communism, such goals, including short-term proletarian interests to improve their political and material conditions, can only be achieved through vanguardism , an elitist form of socialism from above that relies on theoretical analysis to identify proletarian interests rather than consulting the proletarians themselves, as is advocated by libertarian communists. When they engage in elections, Leninist communists' main task
41827-447: The actions of communist states, distanced from them, and developed a democratic road to socialism , which became known as Eurocommunism . This development was criticized by more orthodox supporters of the Soviet Union as amounting to social democracy . Since 1957, communists have been frequently voted into power in the Indian state of Kerala . In 1959, Cuban communist revolutionaries overthrew Cuba's previous government under
42104-399: The age of 18. He continued to visit Meak at the king's palace, and it was there that he had some of his earliest sexual experiences with some of the king's concubines. While Sâr was at the school, King Monivong died. In 1941, the French authorities appointed Norodom Sihanouk as his replacement. A new junior middle school, the Collége Pream Sihanouk, was established in Kampong Cham, and Sâr
42381-566: The annexationist, Vietnamese aggressor enemy has given all of us greater confidence in the forces of our people and nation, in our Kampuchean Communist Party and our Kampuchean Revolutionary Army, and in our Party's line of people's war". The Kampuchean leadership claimed that one Kampuchean soldier was equal to 30 Vietnamese soldiers, so if Kampuchea could raise two million soldiers from a population of eight million, it could wipe out Vietnam's population of 50 million and still have six million people left. In reality, Kampuchean leaders simply ignored
42658-411: The areas of Cambodia under CPK control. When Sihanouk did so, he met with senior CPK figures, including Pol Pot, although the latter's identity was concealed from the king. In May 1973, Pol Pot ordered the collectivisation of villages in territory that the Khmer Rouge controlled. This move was both ideological, in that it built a socialist society void of private property, and tactical, in that it allowed
42935-462: The army and Mao's wife Jiang Qing . China's youth responded to Mao's appeal by forming Red Guard groups around the country. The movement spread into the military, urban workers, and the Communist party leadership itself. It resulted in widespread factional struggles in all walks of life. In the top leadership, it led to a mass purge of senior officials who were accused of taking a " capitalist road ", most notably Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping . During
43212-442: The beginning of 1979". While Vietnam was laying the political foundation for the military campaign against Kampuchea, Soviet ships were reported to be unloading military hardware and ammunition in Cam Ranh Bay . In October 1978, Vietnamese radio broadcast what it claimed were accounts of uprisings against the Khmer Rouge government, urging members of the KRA either to overthrow the "Pol Pot-Ieng Sary clique" or defect to Vietnam. In
43489-400: The bombing primarily affected civilians. This helped fuel recruitment to the Khmer Rouge, which had an estimated 12,000 regular soldiers at the end of 1970 and four times that number by 1972. In June 1970, Sâr left Vietnam and reached his K-5 base. In July he headed south; it was at this point that he began referring to himself as "Pol", a name he later lengthened to "Pol Pot". By September, he
43766-401: The border along several axes with the objective of forcing the Kampuchean Government to negotiate. On the battlefield, the KRA quickly lost ground to the Vietnamese. By the end of December 1977, Vietnam had won a clear military victory over Kampuchea, as Vietnamese formations marched through Svay Rieng Province and only stopped short of entering the provincial capital. Despite the ferocity of
44043-483: The border and moved towards the town of Kratie , while other support divisions were deployed along local routes to cut off the logistical tail of Kampuchean units. Despite enjoying generous support from China, the KRA could not withstand the Vietnamese offensive and suffered heavy casualties. On 23 December 1978, 10 out of 19 divisions of Khmer Rouge's military divisions opened fire along the shared Southwestern borderline with Vietnam. On 25 December 1978, Vietnam launched
44320-483: The border with Vietnam with the goal of invading the Vietnamese provinces of Đồng Tháp, An Giang and Kiên Giang. On 25 December 1978, Vietnam launched a full-scale invasion of Kampuchea, occupying the country in two weeks and removing the government of the Communist Party of Kampuchea from power. In doing so, Vietnam put an ultimate stop to the Cambodian genocide , which had most likely killed between 1.2 million and 2.8 million people — or between 13 and 30 percent of
44597-425: The city's hospitals and forced to march. Checkpoints were erected along the roads out of the city where Khmer Rouge cadres searched marchers and removed many of their belongings. The march took place in the hottest month of the year and an estimated 20,000 people died along the route. For the Khmer Rouge, emptying Phnom Penh was considered as demolishing not just capitalism in Cambodia, but also Sihanouk's power base and
44874-404: The city's tallest structure, the 1960s-built Bank Buildings, which became known as "K1". Several other senior government figures—Nuon Chea, Sary, and Vorn Vet—also lived there. Pol Pot's wife, whose schizophrenia had worsened, was sent to live in a house in Boeung Keng Kâng . Later in 1975, Pol Pot also took Ponnary's old family home in the rue Docteur Hahn as a residence, and subsequently also took
45151-407: The communist Viet Cong . Following the 1970 coup, thousands of Vietnamese were massacred by forces of Lon Nol. Many of the dead were dumped in the Mekong River . 310,000 ethnic Vietnamese fled Cambodia as a result. The Khmer Rouge would later murder the remaining Vietnamese in the country during their rule. The Khmer Rouge government adopted the mysterious term Angkar , or 'the organisation', and
45428-446: The communist parties of Kampuchea and Laos with Vietnamese-trained cadres. For that reason, when the first group of North Vietnamese-trained Khmer Rouge personnel returned to the country, they were immediately purged from the KCP. During the months following the defeat of the Lon Nol government, Pol Pot continued to purge the KCP and the Government of Democratic Kampuchea of those who he believed to be Soviet and Vietnamese agents. Then, in
45705-411: The community"; this semantic constitution has led to numerous usages of the word in its evolution. Prior to becoming associated with its more modern conception of an economic and political organization, it was initially used to designate various social situations. After 1848, communism came to be primarily associated with Marxism , most specifically embodied in The Communist Manifesto , which proposed
45982-418: The condition of the population in their own country and Vietnam; the Vietnamese, though poor, were in good physical condition, while Kampuchea's population was physically and mentally exhausted from years of hard labour, starvation and disease. In addition to the disparity in population, there was also a great disparity between the fighting capabilities of the armed forces of the two countries. In 1977, Vietnam
46259-470: The context of the triumphalism that prevailed among the Khmer Rouge leadership—they claimed they had single-handedly defeated the "American imperialists"—Democratic Kampuchea began preparing for war against Vietnam. As the KRA made preparations for its war against Vietnam, state-controlled media in Vietnam sent congratulatory messages to the Government of the Democratic Kampuchea on the second anniversary of its establishment, on 17 April 1977. On 30 April 1977,
46536-406: The country or had been murdered by the Khmer Rouge government during the previous four years. By the end of the year, the new government's attempts at nation-building were further challenged by several anti-Vietnamese resistance groups operating in the western regions of the country. Shortly after the capture of Phnom Penh, representatives of Democratic Kampuchea called for an emergency meeting of
46813-457: The country were with Ieng Sary, who had joined him there, Thiounn Mumm and Keng Vannsak . He was a member of Vannsak's discussion circle, whose ideologically diverse membership discussed ways to achieve Cambodian independence. In Paris, Ieng Sary and two others established the Cercle Marxiste ("Marxist Circle"), an organisation arranged in a clandestine cell system . The cells met to read Marxist texts and hold self-criticism sessions. Sâr joined
47090-457: The country. On 7 January 1979, the PAVN entered Phnom Penh along with members of the KUFNS. On the following day, a pro-Vietnamese Kampuchean state, known as the People's Republic of Kampuchea (PRK), was established, with Heng Samrin as the Chief of State and Pen Sovan as General Secretary of the newly refounded Kampuchean People's Revolutionary Party . The Khmer Rouge leadership, with much of its political and military structures shattered by
47367-429: The country’s population. On 7 January 1979, the Vietnamese captured Phnom Penh , which forced Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge to retreat back into the jungle near the border with Thailand . During the Vietnam War , Vietnamese and Cambodian communists had formed an alliance to fight U.S.-backed governments in their respective countries. Despite their cooperation with the Vietnamese, the Khmer Rouge leadership feared that
47644-501: The demobilization and migration of millions of soldiers and civilians. In the midst of this turmoil during the winter of 1946–1947, the Soviet Union experienced the worst natural famine in the 20th century. There was no serious opposition to Stalin as the secret police continued to send possible suspects to the gulag . Relations with the United States and Britain went from friendly to hostile, as they denounced Stalin's political controls over eastern Europe and his Berlin Blockade . By 1947,
47921-408: The dictator Fulgencio Batista . The leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro , ruled Cuba from 1959 until 2008. With the fall of the Warsaw Pact after the Revolutions of 1989 , which led to the fall of most of the former Eastern Bloc , the Soviet Union was dissolved on 26 December 1991. It was a result of the declaration number 142-Н of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of
48198-401: The disputed Wai Island , Pol Pot, Nuon Chea, and Ieng Sary travelled secretly to Hanoi in May, where they proposed a Friendship Treaty between the two countries. In the short term, this successfully eased tensions. After Hanoi, Pol Pot proceeded to Beijing, again in secret. There he met with Mao and then Deng. Although communication with Mao was hindered by the reliance on translators, Mao warned
48475-427: The disputed areas, and create a demilitarised zone between the opposing forces. Both sides ignored each other's proposals, and the KRA continued sending soldiers across the border to attack Vietnamese towns and villages. In September 1977, KRA artillery struck several Vietnamese villages along the border, and six villages in Đồng Tháp Province were overrun by Kampuchean infantry. Shortly afterwards, six divisions of
48752-606: The end of 1972, all families living in the Marxist-controlled areas possessed an equal amount of land. The poorest strata of Cambodian society benefited from these reforms. From 1972, the Khmer Rouge began trying to refashion all of Cambodia in the image of the poor peasantry, whose rural, isolated, and self-sufficient lives were regarded as worthy of emulation. As of May 1972, the group began ordering all of those living under its control to dress like poor peasants, with black clothes, red-and-white krama scarves, and sandals made from car tyres. These restrictions were initially imposed on
49029-411: The end of 1976, while Vietnam and Kampuchea publicly appeared to be improving their relationships, the private suspicions of both countries' leadership grew. From the Vietnamese perspective, they were the patrons of genuine Marxist–Leninist revolutions in Southeast Asia, so it was vital for them to exercise control over the Kampucheans and the Laotians. Indeed, that was the reason North Vietnam supported
49306-404: The events which developed over the next few months would prove Lê Duẩn had been mistaken in his assessment of Nuon Chea. Meanwhile, in Phnom Penh, the Kampuchean leadership had developed a fear and hatred of the Vietnamese leadership as a result of Vietnam's historical dominance over their country. From the Kampuchean perspective, the Vietnamese strategy to dominate Indochina involved infiltrating
49583-525: The fall of Saigon, congratulating them on the seventh anniversary of their establishment. In July 1976, following the establishment of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam as a reunified country, Phnom Penh Radio broadcast a commentary which proclaimed the "militant solidarity and friendship between peoples of Democratic Kampuchea and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam grow constantly greener and sturdier". However, during that same month, Pol Pot publicly hinted at tensions between Vietnam and Kampuchea when he told
49860-452: The feudal privilege, thereby taking the feudal ruling class out of existence. This was another key element behind the consolidation of capitalism as the new mode of production, the final expression of class and property relations that has led to a massive expansion of production. It is only in capitalism that private property in itself can be abolished. Similarly, the proletariat would capture political power, abolish bourgeois property through
50137-480: The first major clash between the two former allies, the Kampuchean Revolutionary Army (KRA) invaded the Vietnamese island of Phú Quốc on 1 May 1975 (barely 24 hours after Saigon fell), claiming it was historically part of Kampuchea's territory . Nine days later, on 10 May 1975, the KRA continued its incursion by capturing the Thổ Chu Islands , where it executed 500 Vietnamese civilians. The Vietnamese military immediately responded to Kampuchean actions by launching
50414-477: The former Eastern Bloc. In Nepal, Communists ( CPN UML and Nepal Communist Party ) were part of the 1st Nepalese Constituent Assembly , which abolished the monarchy in 2008 and turned the country into a federal liberal-democratic republic, and have democratically shared power with other communists, Marxist–Leninists, and Maoists ( CPN Maoist ), social democrats ( Nepali Congress ), and others as part of their People's Multiparty Democracy . The Communist Party of
50691-419: The former Finance Ministry building. The party leadership soon held a meeting at the Silver Pagoda , where they agreed that raising agricultural production should be their government's top priority. Pol Pot declared that "agriculture is key both to nation-building and to national defence"; he believed that unless Cambodia could develop swiftly then it would be vulnerable to Vietnamese domination, as it had been in
50968-405: The former southern region of Cambodia (the Saigon region, the Mekong Delta and Tây Ninh ) was integrated into the French colony Cochinchina . The Khmer Rouge later justified their incursions into Vietnam as an attempt to regain the territories which Cambodia had lost during the previous centuries. The communist movement in Cambodia and Vietnam began before World War II with the founding of
51245-448: The full-rights members, the candidates, and the depositees. The full-rights members, most of whom were poor or lower-middle peasants, were entitled to full rations, and able to hold political posts in the co-operatives and join both the army and the Communist Party. Candidates could still hold low-level administrative positions. The application of this tripartite system was uneven and it was introduced to different areas at different times. On
51522-442: The genocide, toppling the Khmer Rouge and establishing a new Cambodian government . Born to a prosperous farmer in Prek Sbauv , French Cambodia , Pol Pot was educated at some of Cambodia's most elite schools. Arriving in Paris in October 1949 on an academic scholarship, he later joined the French Communist Party in 1951 while studying at École française de radioélectricité . Returning to Cambodia in 1953, he involved himself in
51799-415: The go-ahead for North Korea 's invasion of South Korea , expecting a short war. He was stunned when the Americans entered and defeated the North Koreans, putting them almost on the Soviet border. Stalin supported China 's entry into the Korean War , which drove the Americans back to the prewar boundaries, but which escalated tensions. The United States decided to mobilize its economy for a long contest with
52076-433: The ground, the basic societal division remained between the "base" people and the "new" people. It was never Pol Pot and the party's intention to exterminate all "new" people although the latter were usually treated harshly and this led some commentators to believe extermination was the government's desire. Pol Pot instead wanted to double or triple the country's population, hoping it could reach between 15 and 20 million within
52353-420: The headquarters of Prince Norodom Chantaraingsey —the leader of one faction—in Trapeng Kroloeung , before moving to Phnom Penh, where he met with fellow Cercle member Ping Say to discuss the situation. Sâr regarded the Khmer Việt Minh , a mixed Vietnamese and Cambodian guerrilla subgroup of the North Vietnam-based Việt Minh, as the most promising resistance group. He believed the Khmer Việt Minh's relationship to
52630-417: The height of global communism's impact, Pol Pot proved to be divisive to the international communist movement. Many claimed that he deviated from orthodox Marxism–Leninism, but China and the US supported his government as a bulwark against Soviet influence in Southeast Asia . He was widely denounced internationally for his role in the Cambodian genocide and he was also regarded as a totalitarian dictator who
52907-452: The historic circumstances in which it finds itself", and stated that Russia might be able to skip the stage of bourgeois rule through the Obshchina . The moderate Mensheviks (minority) opposed Lenin's Bolsheviks (majority) plan for socialist revolution before the capitalist mode of production was more fully developed. The Bolsheviks' successful rise to power was based upon the slogans such as "Peace, Bread, and Land", which tapped into
53184-418: The idea to group together different countries, such as Afghanistan and Hungary , has no adequate explanation. While the term Communist state is used by Western historians, political scientists, and news media to refer to countries ruled by Communist parties, these socialist states themselves did not describe themselves as communist or claim to have achieved communism; they referred to themselves as being
53461-422: The identities of its leaders remained confidential until 1977. The official head of state was Khieu Samphan, but the two men in control of the party were Pol Pot and Ieng Sary. The ultimate objective of the Khmer Rouge was to erase the structure of the Cambodian state, which they viewed as feudal , capitalist, and serving the agendas of both the landholding elite and imperialists. In its place, they hoped to create
53738-429: The inspiration of religious text . In the medieval Christian Church , some monastic communities and religious orders shared their land and their other property. Sects deemed heretical such as the Waldensians preached an early form of Christian communism . As summarized by historians Janzen Rod and Max Stanton, the Hutterites believed in strict adherence to biblical principles, church discipline, and practised
54015-442: The intensifying alienation of labor experienced by the proletariat, albeit with varying degrees of class consciousness . In periods of deep crisis, the resistance of the oppressed can culminate in a proletarian revolution which, if victorious, leads to the establishment of the socialist mode of production based on social ownership of the means of production, " To each according to his contribution ", and production for use . As
54292-442: The international socialist movement by the early 1920s. During most of the 20th century, around one-third of the world's population lived under Communist governments. These governments were characterized by one-party rule by a communist party, the rejection of private property and capitalism, state control of economic activity and mass media , restrictions on freedom of religion , and suppression of opposition and dissent. With
54569-414: The island of Koh Poulo Wai to Kampuchea and formally recognised Kampuchean sovereignty over the island. Following those incidents, both countries attempted to improve their diplomatic relations with a series of congratulatory messages and exchange visits. On 17 April 1976, Vietnamese leaders sent a message to congratulate Khieu Samphan, Nuon Chea and Pol Pot on their "elections" as president, President of
54846-402: The journey, he contracted malaria and required a respite in a Viet Cong medical base near Mount Ngork. By December, plans for armed conflict were complete, with the war to begin in the North-West Zone and then spread to other regions. As communication across Cambodia was slow, each Zone would have to operate independently much of the time. In January 1968, the war was launched with an attack on
55123-561: The lack of technical experts, managers, transportation, or needed facilities. Industrialization failed, and the main result was a sharp unexpected decline in agricultural output, which led to mass famine and millions of deaths. The years of the Great Leap Forward in fact saw economic regression, with 1958 through 1961 being the only years between 1953 and 1983 in which China's economy saw negative growth. Political economist Dwight Perkins argues: "Enormous amounts of investment produced only modest increases in production or none at all. ... In short,
55400-660: The last Communist country that still practices Soviet-style Communism, is both repressive and isolationist. Communist political thought and theory are diverse but share several core elements. The dominant forms of communism are based on Marxism or Leninism but non-Marxist versions of communism also exist, such as anarcho-communism and Christian communism , which remain partly influenced by Marxist theories, such as libertarian Marxism and humanist Marxism in particular. Common elements include being theoretical rather than ideological, identifying political parties not by ideology but by class and economic interest, and identifying with
55677-422: The late 20th century has been attributed to the inherent inefficiencies of communist economies and the general trend of communist governments towards authoritarianism and bureaucracy . While the emergence of the Soviet Union as the world's first nominally Communist state led to communism's widespread association with the Soviet economic model , several scholars posit that in practice the model functioned as
55954-438: The latter's wife and child. That year, he began an education at a Roman Catholic primary school, the École Miche, with Meak paying the tuition fees. Most of his classmates were the children of French bureaucrats and Catholic Vietnamese . He became literate in French and familiar with Christianity . Sâr was not academically gifted and was held back two years, receiving his Certificat d'Etudes Primaires Complémentaires in 1943 at
56231-430: The law of value would still apply to socialism and that the Soviet Union was socialist under this new definition, which was followed by other Communist leaders, many other communists maintain the original definition and state that Communist states never established socialism in this sense. Lenin described his policies as state capitalism but saw them as necessary for the development of socialism, which left-wing critics say
56508-504: The legacy of Communist states. Communism derives from the French word communisme , a combination of the Latin -rooted word communis (which literally means common ) and the suffix isme ( an act, practice, or process of doing something ) . Semantically, communis can be translated to "of or for the community", while isme is a suffix that indicates the abstraction into a state, condition, action, or doctrine . Communism may be interpreted as "the state of being of or for
56785-446: The long run ensured liberty, equality, and fraternity , Marxists denounced 1848 as a betrayal of working-class ideals by a bourgeoisie indifferent to the legitimate demands of the proletariat . By 1888, Marxists employed the term socialism in place of communism , which had come to be considered an old-fashioned synonym for the former. It was not until 1917, with the October Revolution , that socialism came to be used to refer to
57062-433: The massive public desire for an end to Russian involvement in World War I , the peasants' demand for land reform , and popular support for the soviets . 50,000 workers had passed a resolution in favour of Bolshevik demand for transfer of power to the soviets Lenin's government also instituted a number of progressive measures such as universal education , healthcare and equal rights for women . The initial stage of
57339-408: The misery of the proletariat – a new class of urban factory workers who labored under often-hazardous conditions. Foremost among these critics were Marx and his associate Engels. In 1848, Marx and Engels offered a new definition of communism and popularized the term in their famous pamphlet The Communist Manifesto . In 1917, the October Revolution in Russia set the conditions for
57616-476: The more mountainous Naga's Tail, to avoid encroaching government troops. At this base, called K-5, he increased his dominance over the party and had his own separate encampment, staff, and guards. No outsider was allowed to meet him without an escort. He took over from Sary as the Secretary of the North East Zone. In November 1969, Sâr trekked to Hanoi to persuade the North Vietnamese government to provide direct military assistance. They refused, urging him to revert to
57893-417: The most advanced capitalist development; however, the Russian Empire was one of the poorest countries in Europe with an enormous, largely illiterate peasantry, and a minority of industrial workers. Marx warned against attempts "to transform my historical sketch of the genesis of capitalism in Western Europe into a historico-philosophy theory of the arche générale imposed by fate upon every people, whatever
58170-427: The most well-known of these and have been a driving force in international relations during most of the 20th century. Classical Marxism is the economic, philosophical, and sociological theories expounded by Marx and Engels as contrasted with later developments in Marxism, especially Leninism and Marxism–Leninism. Orthodox Marxism is the body of Marxist thought that emerged after the death of Marx and which became
58447-408: The movement, whose membership had halved since the end of the civil war. Links with the North Vietnamese communists declined, something Sâr later portrayed as a good thing as "it gave us the chance to be independent and develop ourselves". He and other members increasingly regarded Cambodians as too deferential to their Vietnamese counterparts; to deal with this, Sâr, Tou Samouth, and Nuon Chea drafted
58724-498: The name Saloth Phem, was a prosperous farmer who owned nine hectares of rice land and several draft cattle. Loth's house was one of the largest in the village and at transplanting and harvest time he hired poorer neighbors to carry out much of the agricultural labour. Sâr's mother, Sok Nem, was locally respected as a pious Buddhist. Sâr was the eighth of nine children (two girls and seven boys), three of whom died young. They were raised as Theravada Buddhists , and on festivals travelled to
59001-403: The newly formed Democratic Kampuchea began attacking Vietnam, beginning with an attack on the island of Phú Quốc or Koh Trol as referred to by both Vietnam and Cambodia at that time. In spite of the fighting, the leaders of reunified Vietnam and Kampuchea made several public diplomatic exchanges throughout 1976 to highlight the supposedly strong relations between them. However, behind
59278-402: The official philosophy of the socialist movement as represented in the Second International until World War I in 1914. Orthodox Marxism aims to simplify, codify, and systematize Marxist method and theory by clarifying the perceived ambiguities and contradictions of classical Marxism. The philosophy of orthodox Marxism includes the understanding that material development (advances in technology in
59555-491: The ongoing Vietnam War and thus did not want Sâr's forces to destabilize Sihanouk's government; the latter's anti-American stance rendered him a de facto ally. In Hanoi, Sâr read through the archives of the Workers' Party of Vietnam , concluding that the Vietnamese Communists were committed to pursuing an Indochinese Federation and that their interests were therefore incompatible with Cambodia's. In November 1965, Saloth Sâr flew from Hanoi to Beijing , where his official host
59832-526: The only element which places into the realm of possibility moving on from this mode of production. This dictatorship , based on the Paris Commune 's model, is to be the most democratic state where the whole of the public authority is elected and recallable under the basis of universal suffrage . Cambodian%E2%80%93Vietnamese War Vietnamese victory Post-invasion: [REDACTED] Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea (1982–1990) Second Third The Cambodian–Vietnamese War
60109-413: The party as being reliable and completely subject to party discipline . Trotskyism overtook the left communists as the main dissident communist current, while more libertarian communisms , dating back to the libertarian Marxist current of council communism, remained important dissident communisms outside the Soviet Union. Following Lenin's democratic centralism , the Leninist parties were organized on
60386-428: The party largely moribund. In July, Samouth was arrested, tortured and killed. Nuon Chea had also stepped back from his political activities, leaving open Sâr's path to become party leader. As well as facing leftist opposition, Sihanouk's government faced hostility from right-wing opposition centred on Sihanouk's former Minister of State, Sam Sary , who was backed by the United States, Thailand and South Vietnam. After
60663-401: The party who are full-time professional revolutionaries, as was conceived by Vladimir Lenin . Marxism is a method of socioeconomic analysis that uses a materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism , to understand social class relations and social conflict and a dialectical perspective to view social transformation . It originates from
60940-511: The past. Their goal was to reach 70 to 80% farm mechanisation in five to ten years, and a modern industrial base in fifteen to twenty years. As part of this project, Pol Pot saw it as imperative that they develop means of ensuring that the farming population worked harder than before. The Khmer Rouge wanted to establish Cambodia as a self-sufficient state. They did not reject foreign assistance altogether, although they regarded it as pernicious. While China supplied them with substantial food aid, this
61217-460: The pro-Vietnamese People's Republic of Kampuchea (PRK) was established in Phnom Penh , marking the beginning of a ten-year Vietnamese occupation. During that period, the Khmer Rouge's Democratic Kampuchea continued to be recognised by the United Nations as the legitimate government of Kampuchea, as several armed resistance groups were formed to fight the Vietnamese occupation. Throughout the conflict, these groups received training in Thailand from
61494-468: The productive forces continued to advance, the communist society , i.e. a classless, stateless, humane society based on common ownership , follows the maxim " From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs ." While it originates from the works of Marx and Engels, Marxism has developed into many different branches and schools of thought, with the result that there is now no single definitive Marxist theory. Different Marxian schools place
61771-440: The proletariat. According to communists, the proletariat can avoid mass unemployment only if capitalism is overthrown; in the short run, state-oriented communists favor state ownership of the commanding heights of the economy as a means to defend the proletariat from capitalist pressure. Some communists are distinguished by other Marxists in seeing peasants and smallholders of property as possible allies in their goal of shortening
62048-443: The relationship between the Khmer Rouge —which was in the process of seizing power from a US-backed government headed by Lon Nol—and North Vietnam was strained. Clashes between Vietnamese communists and Khmer Rouge forces began as early as 1974, and the following year Pol Pot signed a treaty codifying the "friendship" between the Khmer Rouge and China. The Fall of Phnom Penh and the Fall of Saigon in April 1975 immediately brought
62325-440: The religious emphasis with a rational and philanthropic basis. Notable among them were Robert Owen , who founded New Harmony, Indiana , in 1825, and Charles Fourier , whose followers organized other settlements in the United States, such as Brook Farm in 1841. In its modern form, communism grew out of the socialist movement in 19th-century Europe. As the Industrial Revolution advanced, socialist critics blamed capitalism for
62602-435: The rise to state power of Vladimir Lenin 's Bolsheviks , which was the first time any avowedly communist party reached that position. The revolution transferred power to the All-Russian Congress of Soviets in which the Bolsheviks had a majority. The event generated a great deal of practical and theoretical debate within the Marxist movement, as Marx stated that socialism and communism would be built upon foundations laid by
62879-489: The rural peasantry, a far larger class in Cambodian society. By 1965, the party regarded Cambodia's small proletariat as full of "enemy agents" and systematically refused them membership. The party's main area of growth was in the rural provinces and by 1965 membership was at 2000. In April 1965, Sâr travelled by foot along the Ho Chi Minh Trail to Hanoi to meet North Vietnamese government figures, among them Ho Chi Minh and Lê Duẩn . The North Vietnamese were preoccupied with
63156-415: The same black clothing. Repeated purges of the CPK generated growing discontent; by 1978 Cambodian soldiers were mounting a rebellion in the east. After several years of violent incursions by the Khmer Rouge on Vietnamese territory resulting in massacres, Vietnam invaded Cambodia in December 1978. By January 1979, Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge had been toppled, the surviving Khmer Rouge members retreated to
63433-404: The same period, Mao's personality cult grew to immense proportions. After Mao's death in 1976, the survivors were rehabilitated and many returned to power. Mao's government was responsible for vast numbers of deaths with estimates ranging from 40 to 80 million victims through starvation, persecution, prison labour , and mass executions. Mao has also been praised for transforming China from
63710-406: The scattered jungles near the Thai border, from where they continued to fight and raid, but were severely weakened and were hunted down by Vietnamese soldiers until their withdrawal in 1989. In declining health, Pol Pot stepped back from many of his roles in the movement. In 1998, the Khmer Rouge commander Ta Mok placed Pol Pot under house arrest and shortly afterward, Pol Pot died. Taking power at
63987-446: The scenes, Kampuchean leaders continued to fear what they perceived as Vietnamese expansionism. Therefore, on 30 April 1977, they launched another major military attack on Vietnam. Shocked by the Kampuchean assault, Vietnam launched a retaliatory strike at the end of 1977 in an attempt to force the Kampuchean government to negotiate. The Vietnamese military withdrew in January 1978, even though its political objectives had not been achieved;
64264-482: The second anniversary of the fall of Saigon, the Kampuchean reply came in the form of a military attack against the Vietnamese provinces of An Giang and Châu Đốc , killing hundreds of Vietnamese civilians. The PAVN responded by moving its troops to areas attacked by Kampuchea and, on 7 June 1977, Vietnam proposed high-level talks to discuss outstanding issues. On 18 June 1977, the Kampuchean Government replied by demanding that Vietnam remove all of its military units from
64541-402: The side of the peasantry. At a meeting, the Cercle decided to send someone to Cambodia to assess the situation and determine which rebel group they should support; Sâr volunteered for the role. His decision to leave may also have been because he had failed his second-year exams two years in a row and thus lost his scholarship. In December, he boarded the SS Jamaïque , returning to Cambodia without
64818-445: The society based on need. A communist society would entail the absence of private property and social classes , and ultimately money and the state (or nation state ). Communists often seek a voluntary state of self-governance but disagree on the means to this end. This reflects a distinction between a more libertarian socialist approach of communization , revolutionary spontaneity , and workers' self-management , and
65095-459: The spy network of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). This dismantling facilitated Khmer Rouge dominance over the country and enabled driving the urban population toward agricultural production. On 20 April 1975, three days after Phnom Penh fell, Pol Pot secretly arrived in the abandoned city. Along with other Khmer Rouge leaders, he based himself in the railway station, which was easy to defend. In early May, they moved their headquarters to
65372-471: The state-capitalist development and the Workers' in particular was critical of bureaucratization and development from above, while the Right Opposition was more supporting of state-capitalist development and advocated the New Economic Policy . Following Lenin's democratic centralism , the Leninist parties were organized on a hierarchical basis, with active cells of members as the broad base. They were made up only of elite cadres approved by higher members of
65649-403: The successor to the KCP. This clique became the genesis of the Khmer Rouge, and its doctrine was heavily influenced by Maoist ideology. After the removal of Sihanouk from power in March 1970, the leader of the new Khmer Republic , Lon Nol , despite being anti-communist and ostensibly in the "pro-American" camp, backed the FULRO against all Vietnamese, both anti-communist South Vietnam and
65926-465: The term communism fell out of use during this period. An early distinction between communism and socialism was that the latter aimed to only socialize production , whereas the former aimed to socialize both production and consumption (in the form of common access to final goods ). This distinction can be observed in Marx's communism, where the distribution of products is based on the principle of " to each according to his needs ", in contrast to
66203-545: The term frequently in his writing and was the first to describe communism as a form of government . John Goodwyn Barmby is credited with the first use of communism in English, around 1840. Since the 1840s, the term communism has usually been distinguished from socialism . The modern definition and usage of the term socialism was settled by the 1860s, becoming predominant over alternative terms such as associationism ( Fourierism ), mutualism , or co-operative , which had previously been used as synonyms. Meanwhile,
66480-453: The term's widespread association with Marxism–Leninism and the Soviet-type economic planning model. In his essay "Judging Nazism and Communism", Martin Malia defines a "generic Communism" category as any Communist political party movement led by intellectuals ; this umbrella term allows grouping together such different regimes as radical Soviet industrialism and the Khmer Rouge 's anti-urbanism. According to Alexander Dallin ,
66757-448: The upheaval of the French Revolution , communism emerged as a political doctrine under the auspices of François-Noël Babeuf , Nicolas Restif de la Bretonne , and Sylvain Maréchal , all of whom can be considered the progenitors of modern communism, according to James H. Billington . In the early 19th century, various social reformers founded communities based on common ownership. Unlike many previous communist communities, they replaced
67034-416: The vehicle for fundamental society-wide changes and ultimately leads to the emergence of new economic systems . As a term, orthodox Marxism represents the methods of historical materialism and of dialectical materialism, and not the normative aspects inherent to classical Marxism, without implying dogmatic adherence to the results of Marx's investigations. At the root of Marxism is historical materialism,
67311-402: The village of Ba Chúc in An Giang Province. In June 1978, the VPAF started bombing KRA positions along the border regions, flying about 30 bombing sorties per day and inflicting heavy casualties on the Kampucheans. By that stage in the conflict, most surviving leaders of the Eastern Military Zone had escaped into Vietnam, where they assembled at various secret camps with the purpose of forming
67588-583: The volume of military hardware which travelled down each route. On the eve of the Vietnamese invasion, Kampuchea had an estimated 73,000 soldiers in the Eastern Military Zone bordering Vietnam. At that time, all branches of the Kampuchean armed forces were significantly strengthened by large quantities of Chinese-made military equipment, which included fighter aircraft, patrol boats, heavy artillery, anti-aircraft guns, trucks and tanks. Additionally, there were between 10,000 and 20,000 Chinese advisers in both military and civilian capacities, providing their support to
67865-436: The withdrawal, the PAVN also evacuated thousands of prisoners and civilian refugees, including future leader Hun Sen . Instead of being sobered by the Vietnamese show of force, the Kampuchean government boasted that the Vietnamese withdrawal was a major victory for Democratic Kampuchea, comparing it to the "defeat of U.S. imperialism" on 17 April 1975. The Kampucheans went on further to proclaim that "our 6 January victory over
68142-472: The works of 19th-century German philosophers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels . As Marxism has developed over time into various branches and schools of thought , no single, definitive Marxist theory exists. Marxism considers itself to be the embodiment of scientific socialism but does not model an ideal society based on the design of intellectuals , whereby communism is seen as a state of affairs to be established based on any intelligent design; rather, it
68419-429: The younger Cambodian against uncritically imitating the path to socialism pursued by China or any other country, and advised him to avoid repeating the drastic measures that the Khmer Rouge had imposed before. In China, Pol Pot also received medical treatment for his malaria and gastric ailments. Pol Pot then travelled to North Korea, meeting with Kim Il Sung . In mid-July he returned to Cambodia, and spent August touring
68696-581: Was Deng Xiaoping , although most of his meetings were with Peng Zhen . Sâr gained a sympathetic hearing from many in the governing Chinese Communist Party (CCP)—especially Chen Boda , Zhang Chunqiao and Kang Sheng —who shared his negative view of Khrushchev amid the Sino-Soviet split . CCP officials also trained him on topics like dictatorship of the proletariat , class struggles and political purge . In Beijing, Sâr witnessed China's ongoing Cultural Revolution , influencing his later policies. Sâr left Beijing in February 1966, and flew back to Hanoi before
68973-498: Was a full-time revolutionary". Conditions at the Viet Cong camp were basic and food scarce. As Sihanouk's government cracked down on the movement in Phnom Penh, growing numbers of its members fled to join Sâr at his jungle base. In February 1963, at the party's second conference, held in a central Phnom Penh apartment, Sâr was elected party secretary, but soon fled into the jungle to avoid repression by Sihanouk's government. In early 1964, Sâr established his own encampment, Office 100, on
69250-424: Was agreed that they would move their headquarters in Ratanakiri Province , away from the Viet Cong, and that—despite the views of the North Vietnamese—they would command each of the party's zone committees to prepare for the relaunch of armed struggle. North Vietnam refused to assist in this, rejecting their requests for weaponry. In November 1967, Sâr travelled from Tay Ninh to base Office 102 near Kang Lêng. During
69527-405: Was also created under Josip Broz Tito in Yugoslavia ; Tito's independent policies led to the Tito–Stalin split and expulsion of Yugoslavia from the Cominform in 1948, and Titoism was branded deviationist . Albania also became an independent Marxist–Leninist state following the Albanian–Soviet split in 1960, resulting from an ideological fallout between Enver Hoxha , a Stalinist, and
69804-427: Was also quite modern. At the top, personal loyalty to Stalin counted for everything. Stalin also created powerful committees, elevated younger specialists, and began major institutional innovations. In the teeth of persecution, Stalin's deputies cultivated informal norms and mutual understandings which provided the foundations for collective rule after his death. For most Westerners and anti-communist Russians, Stalin
70081-442: Was an armed conflict between Democratic Kampuchea , controlled by Pol Pot 's Khmer Rouge , and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam . The war began with repeated attacks by the Kampuchea Revolutionary Army on the southwestern border of Vietnam, particularly the Ba Chúc massacre which resulted in the deaths of over 3,000 Vietnamese civilians. On 23 December 1978, 10 out of 19 of the Khmer Rouge's military divisions opened fire along
70358-496: Was an independent Kampuchean communist movement, with members drawn from all walks of life. Heng Samrin, formerly a member of the Khmer Rouge and commander of the KRA 4th Division, was the chairman of the KUFNS Central Committee. Previously, the KUFNS was known as the Provisional Revolutionary Government of Kampuchea (PRGK), which consisted of 300 former Khmer Rouge cadres who defected to Vietnam. The PRGK regularly sent representatives abroad in search of support, before Vietnam abandoned
70635-431: Was based at a camp on the border of Kratie and Kompong Thom , where he convened a meeting of the CPK Standing Committee. Although few senior members could attend, it issued a resolution setting out the principle of "independence-mastery", the idea that Cambodia must be self-reliant and fully independent of other countries. In November, Pol Pot, Ponnary, and their entourage relocated to the K-1 base at Dângkda. His residence
70912-416: Was believed to be the atheist way of life. In Protestant England , communism was too phonetically similar to the Roman Catholic communion rite , hence English atheists denoted themselves socialists. Friedrich Engels stated that in 1848, at the time when The Communist Manifesto was first published, socialism was respectable on the continent, while communism was not; the Owenites in England and
71189-463: Was beset by ethnic tensions between the Khmer and Vietnamese. News of the group was censored from the press, and it is unlikely Sâr was aware of it. Access to further education abroad made Sâr part of a tiny elite in Cambodia. He and the 21 other selected students sailed from Saigon aboard the SS Jamaïque , stopping at Singapore , Colombo , and Djibouti en route to Marseille . Sâr arrived in Paris on 1 October 1949. In January 1950, Sâr enrolled at
71466-490: Was established for the planned invasion of Kampuchea, with Senior General Lê Đức Anh taking full control of PAVN units along the border areas. The Vietnamese government drafted 350,000 men into the military to replace earlier losses and augment its units along the border. While the new recruits were completing training, ten divisions were deployed to the border regions of Long An , Đồng Tháp and Tây Ninh Provinces. Vietnam also shifted three divisions based in Laos south towards
71743-602: Was estimated to have 615,000 soldiers and 900 tanks, supported by a 12,000-member air force with 300 combat aircraft, including one squadron of light bombers. In comparison, Kampuchea had an army of 70,000, only a few heavy tanks, 200 armoured vehicles and limited air capability. Despite facing such heavy odds, Kampuchea showed no signs of hesitation as its military continued to assault Vietnam's border regions. In January 1978, KRA forces still held portions of Vietnamese territory and began overrunning Vietnamese outposts in Hà Tiên Province. On 27 January 1978, Vietnam started calling on
72020-450: Was further weakened after the end of the war, as there were no pro-Vietnamese elements left within the Kampuchean Communist Party. When the pro-Chinese Pol Pot and his brother-in-law Ieng Sary resigned from their respective positions as premier and foreign minister in September 1976, Vietnamese Prime Minister Phạm Văn Đồng and General Secretary of the Communist Party Lê Duẩn were optimistic that Vietnam could exercise greater influence on
72297-530: Was guilty of crimes against humanity . Pol Pot was born in the village of Prek Sbauv , outside the city of Kampong Thom . He was named Saloth Sâr, the word sâr ("white, pale") referencing his comparatively light skin complexion. French colonial records placed his birth date on 25 May 1928, but biographer Philip Short argues he was born in March 1925. His family was of mixed Chinese and ethnic Khmer heritage, but did not speak Chinese and lived as though they were fully Khmer. His father Loth, who later took
72574-452: Was held at this base, bringing together 27 delegates to discuss the war. During 1971, Pol Pot and the other senior party members focused on the construction of a regular Khmer Rouge army and administration that could take a central role when the Vietnamese withdrew. Membership of the party was made more selective, permitting only those regarded as "poor peasants", not those seen as "middle peasants" or students. In July and August, Pol Pot oversaw
72851-416: Was later renamed the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK). To avoid state repression, in 1962 he relocated to a jungle encampment and in 1963 became the CPK's leader. In 1968, he relaunched the war against Sihanouk's government. After Lon Nol ousted Sihanouk in a 1970 coup , Pol Pot's forces sided with the deposed leader against the new government , which was bolstered by the United States military. Aided by
73128-432: Was met with strong resistance by Kampuchean leaders. Meanwhile, Vietnamese government officials began conducting secret meetings with So Phim , the Khmer Rouge leader in Kampuchea's Eastern Military Zone, to plan a military uprising backed by Vietnam. During that same period, military setbacks experienced by the KRA in the Eastern Military Zone prompted Pol Pot to label the region as a "nest of traitors". In order to purge
73405-415: Was much more efficient, this property became worthless and the mass majority of workers could only survive by selling their labor to make use of someone else's machinery, and making someone else profit. Accordingly, capitalism divided the world between two major classes, namely that of the proletariat and the bourgeoisie . These classes are directly antagonistic as the latter possesses private ownership of
73682-420: Was never established, while some Marxist–Leninists state that it was established only during the Stalin era and Mao era , and then became capitalist states ruled by revisionists ; others state that Maoist China was always state capitalist, and uphold People's Socialist Republic of Albania as the only socialist state after the Soviet Union under Stalin, who first stated to have achieved socialism with
73959-493: Was not among them, deciding to remain in Cambodia; he trekked, via South Vietnam , to Prey Veng to reach Phnom Penh. He and other Cambodian revolutionaries decided to pursue their aims through electoral means. Cambodia's communists wanted to operate clandestinely but also established a socialist party, Pracheachon , to serve as a front organization through which they could compete in the 1955 election. Although Pracheachon had strong support in some areas, most observers expected
74236-467: Was not publicly acknowledged. Shortly after the taking of Phnom Penh, Ieng Sary travelled to Beijing, negotiating the provision of 13,300 tons of Chinese weaponry to Cambodia. At the National Congress meeting in April, the Khmer Rouge declared that it would not permit any foreign military bases on Cambodian soil, a threat to Vietnam, which still had 20,000 troops in Cambodia. To quell tensions arising from recent territorial clashes with Vietnamese soldiers over
74513-508: Was one of 18 Cambodian students who joined French counterparts in traveling to the FPR Yugoslavia to volunteer in a labour battalion building a motorway in Zagreb . He returned to Yugoslavia the following year for a camping holiday. Sâr made little or no attempt to assimilate into French culture and was never completely at ease in the French language. He nevertheless became familiar with French literature; one of his favorite authors being Jean-Jacques Rousseau . His most significant friendships in
74790-476: Was selected as a boarder at the institution in 1942. This level of education afforded him a privileged position in Cambodian society. He learned to play the violin and took part in school plays. Much of his spare time was spent playing football (soccer) and basketball . Several fellow pupils, among them Hu Nim and Khieu Samphan , later served in his government. During the new year vacation in 1945, Sâr and several friends from his college theatre troupe went on
75067-404: Was set up on the northern side of the Chinit river; entry was strictly controlled. By the end of the year, Marxist forces had a presence in over half of Cambodia; the Khmer Rouge played a restricted role in this, for throughout 1971 and 1972, the majority of fighting against Lon Nol was carried out by Vietnamese or by Cambodians under Vietnamese control. In January 1971, a Central Committee meeting
75344-434: Was stamped out, gambling was banned, and alcohol and extramarital affairs were discouraged. From 1970 to 1971, the Khmer Rouge had generally sought to cultivate good relations with the inhabitants, organising local elections and assemblies. Some people regarded as hostile to the movement were executed, although this was uncommon. Private motor transport was requisitioned. Wealthier peasants had their land redistributed so that by
75621-406: Was tasked with growing cassava and working in the canteen. At Krabao, he gained a rudimentary grasp of Vietnamese , and rose to become secretary and aide to Tou Samouth , the Secretary of the Khmer Việt Minh's Eastern Zone. Sihanouk desired independence from French rule, but after France refused his requests he called for public resistance to its administration in June 1953. Khmer troops deserted
75898-437: Was tasked with supervising the country's domestic policies until a Cambodian government was elected by the people. Cambodia's pathway to peace proved to be difficult, as Khmer Rouge leaders decided not to participate in the general elections, but instead chose to disrupt the electoral process by launching military attacks on UN peacekeepers and killing ethnic Vietnamese migrants. In May 1993, Sihanouk's FUNCINPEC movement defeated
76175-434: Was the basis of a communist society . In Cambodia, growing internal strife resulted in King Sihanouk dismissing the government and declaring himself prime minister. In response, Sâr wrote an article, "Monarchy or Democracy?", published in the student magazine Khmer Nisut under the pseudonym "Khmer daom" ("Original Khmer"). In it, he referred positively to Buddhism , portraying Buddhist monks as an anti-monarchist force on
76452-407: Was the beginning of the development of vanguardism as an hierarchical party–elite that controls society, which resulted in a split between anarchism and Marxism , and Leninist communism assuming the dominant position for most of the 20th century, excluding rival socialist currents. Other communists and Marxists, especially social democrats who favored the development of liberal democracy as
76729-560: Was to purify communism by removing pro-capitalists and traditionalists by imposing Maoist orthodoxy within the Chinese Communist Party . The movement paralyzed China politically and weakened the country economically, culturally, and intellectually for years. Millions of people were accused, humiliated, stripped of power, and either imprisoned, killed, or most often, sent to work as farm laborers. Mao insisted that those he labelled revisionists be removed through violent class struggle . The two most prominent militants were Marshall Lin Biao of
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