Khmer Rouge insurgency

After the fall of Pol Pot's regime, Cambodia came under Vietnamese military occupation and a pro-Hanoi, pro-Soviet government, the People's Republic of Kampuchea, led by the Kampuchean United Front for National Salvation, a group of leftists Cambodians discontented with Khmer Rouge, was established. The conflict was fought during the 1980s between the People's Republic of Kampuchea against the Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea, a government in exile formed in 1981 and composed of three Cambodian political factions: the royalist FUNCINPEC party led by Prince Norodom Sihanouk, the Party of Democratic Kampuchea (often referred to as the Khmer Rouge) and the Khmer People's National Liberation Front (KPNLF). The Khmer Rouge representative at the UN, Thiounn Prasith, was Maintained.

Throughout the 1980s, the Khmer Rouge, supported by China, Thailand, the United States and the United Kingdom, continued to control large part of the country and attacked territory that was not under its control. This conflict led to economic sanctions on Cambodia by the United States and its allies, which made reconstruction practically impossible and left the country extremely poor.

Peace efforts intensified between 1989 and 1991, with two international conferences in Paris, and a UN peacekeeping mission helped maintain a ceasefire. The UN was given a mandate known as the United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia (APRONUC) to enforce a ceasefire and deal with the issue of refugees and disarmament.

As part of the peace effort, UN-sponsored elections were held in 1993 which helped restore some semblance of normality as well as the gradual decline of the Khmer Rouge. However, a low-intensity conflict continued between the Cambodian government army and Khmer Rouge guerrillas until 1998. Norodom Sihanouk was restored as the king of Cambodia, but the conflict situation would intensify by the 1997 coup. A coalition government, formed after national elections in 1998, brought political stability and renewed the surrender of the remaining Khmer Rouge forces that year.

The Conflict

After the end of the Khmer Rouge regime and the conflict with Vietnam, Cambodia's economic situation was disastrous, with the plundering of the country's resources by Vietnamese troops only making matters worse: during the first six months of 1979, approximately 80,000 people fled from Cambodia to reach Thailand. Refugees, many of whom die as a result of anti-personnel mines that are riddled in Cambodia, are returned to their country by Thai authorities to camps, especially in Preah Vihear province, where living conditions are more than precarious. The country's food situation worsens further: Vietnamese troops attacked during the rice harvest and food stocks were hit by the two belligerent camps. From August 1979 onwards, the exile of the Cambodians became a true cataclysm: more than a million people, driven by general hunger, spread to the Thai border. The Khmer Rouge also sent its worst-off troops to the refugee camps: humanitarian aid, which flowed to the camps through the Royal Thai Armed Forces, contributed to helping the Khmer Rouge troops get back on their feet. After the first wave of the Cambodian exodus, a population of one hundred thousand to three hundred thousand civilian refugees remain sheltered in camps on the Thai border, along a strip of around thirty kilometers: they constitute a human mass that can be used by the various resistance groups. anti-Vietnamese, which China supplies with small arms through Thailand. At the international level, the entry of Vietnamese troops into Cambodia is condemned by most countries. Under pressure, namely from China and the United States, who wish to prevent Vietnam from establishing itself as a dominant power in Southeast Asia and, by extension, harming the interests of the USSR in the region, the UN does not recognize the People's Republic of Kampuchea; following a vote in November 1979, the United Nations considers Democratic Kampuchea, whose representative continues to sit in the General Assembly, to be Cambodia's sole legitimate government.

Starting in 1983, Margaret Thatcher's government sent the SAS, the British special forces, to train the Khmer Rouge in landmine technologies. The United States and the United Kingdom also impose an embargo with serious consequences for the Cambodian economy.

The Thais, who now welcome all refugees, opened the Khao I Dang camp in Sa Kaeo province on November 19, 1979, about ten kilometers from Cambodia, where 150,000 people will soon arrive: Thailand apparently intended to recruit all Cambodian men of military age to form a force capable of repelling a possible Vietnamese attack. Around 250,000 other Cambodians prefer to stay in no man's land between the two countries and survive thanks to various trafficking.

Prince Norodom Sihanouk, placed under house arrest by the Khmer Rouge in 1976, was taken from his palace during the Vietnamese offensive to be evacuated by plane to China. In the summer, an armed group favorable to the former monarch, the Movement for the National Liberation of Kampuchea (MOULINAKA), was founded on the border with Thailand to fight against the Vietnamese occupier: former corvette captain Kong Siloah leads it to his death in August 1980. Different groups of the Khmer Serei, or "Free Khmers", which carried out guerrilla operations against the Khmer Rouge between 1975 and 1979, also organize themselves to fight the Vietnamese.

Son Sann, former prime minister of Sihanouk, brings together several Khmer Serei and soldiers who took refuge in the West to found the National Front for the Liberation of the Khmer People (KPNLF): in April 1979, it had around ten thousand refugees transported by the army Thai to the mountainous region of Sok Sann, opposite the province of Chanthaburi, which he declared a "liberated zone" and from where he launched appeals to his compatriots.

Son Sann made contact with Norodom Sihanouk in January 1979 so that he could take over leadership of his troops, but the prince refused on several occasions. In early 1981, Sihanouk created with the support of ASEAN countries his own organization intended to lead anti-Vietnamese resistance, the National United Front for an Independent, Neutral, Peaceful and Cooperative Cambodia (FUNCINPEC). In turn, he committed to founding his own army and, for this purpose, organized in March 1981 the grouping of his followers, transporting MOULINAKA troops to Khmer territory, on the Thai border near the province of Surin: the Former troops of Kong Siloah joined the prince's ten thousand supporters, with whom they founded the National Sihanoukist Army (in French: Armée nationale sihanoukiste, ANS), which constitutes the armed wing of FUNCINPEC.

In turn, the Khmer Rouge, during the summer of 1979, took advantage of the monsoon that hampered the movement of Vietnamese troops to reorganize themselves in order to launch offensives, renaming their armed forces with the name of the National Army of Democratic Kampuchea (in French: Armée nationale du Kampuchéa démocratique). In July, Pol Pot installs his new headquarters, Bureau 131, under the flank of Mount Thom. The Khmer Rouge benefits from the assistance of Thai special forces, who ensure the training and recruitment of the various Khmer armed forces they count as allies in the event of a Vietnamese invasion. In 1979, Khieu Samphân assumed the leadership of a new body that took the place of the government in exile, the Front of the Grand National Democratic Patriotic Union of Kampuchea (in French: Front de la grande union nationale démocratique patriotique du Kampuchéa, FGUNDPK), while Pol Pot was content with the more discreet role of commander of the armed forces and did not make any public appearances after 1980.

Three Cambodian resistance movements against the Vietnamese invasion coexisted from 1981: the Khmer Rouge and its National Army of Democratic Kampuchea, led by Pol Pot and numbering 20 to 30,000 men; Son Sann's KPNLF (10,000 men) the Sihanoukist Nationalist Army (6,000 men). Each of the three movements extends its power over some Cambodian refugee camps. The Khmer Rouge, supported by China, which supplies them with weapons, and Thailand, which distributes them, controls the largest number of civilians; anti-communist FNLPK guerrillas control fewer refugees but, because of their collusion with the United States, receive substantial aid; The Sihanoukist guerrillas have no supply problems, but their poor performance in the field prevents them from extending their authority to a significant number of civilians. At first, Sihanoukist forces were practically non-existent: Prince Norodom Ranariddh, one of Sihanouk's sons, installed in Bangkok as his father's special representative, was appointed commander-in-chief of the ANS, without any military qualifications. Ranariddh depends on the Khmer Rouge to whom he provides funds and in return guarantees the formation of the ANS. It is only gradually that the Sihanoukist National Army, like the FNLPK, distinguishes itself by true feats of arms.

The Vietnamese occupation troops, in turn, numbered around 200,000 troops in 1981; the Vietnamese were also responsible for training the army of the People's Republic of Kampuchea, the People's Revolutionary Armed Forces of Kampuchea, which initially numbered around 30,000 men. The United States, in turn, gives the People's Republic of China carte blanche on the Cambodian problem and continues to recognize Democratic Kampuchea as the government of Cambodia, to mark its opposition to the USSR-supported Vietnamese occupation. With the United Kingdom, and through Thailand, the United States government supports the Khmer Rouge as well as other guerrilla movements against the Vietnamese. Under American leadership, the World Food Program provides approximately US$12 million in food to the Khmer Rouge through the Thai army. The British SAS trains Khmer Rouge troops. The USSR, in turn, appears to be quite overwhelmed by the situation in Cambodia: by supporting Vietnam so that the Red Army can have access to the ports on the Vietnamese coast, the Soviet government is not very active in the scenario of Cambodian events, since their attention is monopolized at the same time by the Euromissile crisis and the War in Afghanistan.

The revelation by the Vietnamese of the atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge seriously damaged the latter's international credibility: to make them more presentable in the eyes of the international community, China urges them to ally themselves again with Norodom Sihanouk, a more acceptable personality in the eyes of the West . On the other hand, China and the United States only agree to subsidize the Sihanoukist resistance if the prince forms an anti-Vietnamese coalition with the Khmer Rouge, which can provide him with troops. Sihanouk initially refuses any idea of a new coalition with Pol Pot's men, as several of his children and grandchildren disappeared between 1975 and 1979; Thus, in 1981, noticing that the Khmer Rouge were resisting Vietnamese offensives to dislodge them from their strongholds, they agreed to ally again so as not to disappear from the political game and have a chance to return to power. On 4 September 1981, Sihanouk, Khieu Samphân and Son Sann published a joint statement announcing the formation of a coalition government to liberate Cambodia from "Vietnamese aggressors". Under the encouragement of China, which threatens to stop delivering weapons, Western countries and ASEAN, the three factions formed on June 21, 1982 in Kuala Lumpur the Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea (GCKD) chaired by Sihanouk and recognized by the UN . Son Sann is the Prime Minister and Khieu Samphân is the Deputy Prime Minister responsible for foreign affairs. This government of Democratic Kampuchea continues to be recognized by the international community (with the exception of the communist Eastern Bloc and COMECON countries) and maintains ambassadors to the UN and France. The GCKD serves, in practice, as a political front to hide the international aid given to the Khmer Rouge, which remains the most powerful military partner of the anti-Vietnamese coalition.

Guerrilla movements carry out their actions along the border with Thailand. Khmer Rouge troops continue to invest in remote and mountainous areas and install anti-personnel mines, which cause many casualties among civilian populations. Son Sann and Sihanouk's goal is to exist militarily and then weigh in on any future negotiations. The ongoing conflict unfolds at a seasonal pace: each year, during the dry season, which runs from November to April, the Vietnamese People's Army attacks guerrilla camps, sometimes penetrating far into Thai territory. During the rainy season, from May to October, the absence of paved roads immobilizes Vietnamese mechanized units: this will allow guerrilla movements to launch incursions into Cambodian territory. Starting in 1984, the Vietnamese mobilized the Cambodian population in a vast enterprise of passive defense: for three to six months a year, civilians were forced to build roads to the west of the country, fortify villages, cut down forests and dig protective dikes. , along the Thai border and in a part of the border with Laos.

One-fifteenth of the requested civilians die during the task, victims of malnutrition, overwork or malaria. From 1985 onwards, the military mobilization of Cambodians, within the People's Revolutionary Armed Forces of Kampuchea, became more rigid: the length of service increased from two to five years. The army of the People's Republic of Kampuchea, poorly motivated and forced to operate under the leadership of the Vietnamese army, suffered many desertions. If the Cambodian population had initially thanked the Vietnamese for freeing them from the Khmer Rouge, military operations soon made the occupiers unpopular, the entry into Cambodia of almost 500,000 Vietnamese immigrants ending up depleting their credit. However, the Cambodian population continues to fear the return of the Khmer Rouge more than anything. Furthermore, the defensive measures of the Vietnamese army are effective: the Khmer Rouge, the KPNLF and the ANS are unable to regain their position within the country, where the installation of many Vietnamese, in the cities and in some camps, further complicates their task. But the Vietnamese were also unable to put an end to the activities of the rebel movements, especially because China provoked, to put pressure on Vietnam, several border incidents – around 3,750 between 1979 and 1982 – in the Tonkin region.

Vietnam is therefore forced to further strengthen its military personnel, which accentuates its dependence on Soviet supplies. Military spending represents 20% of Vietnam's GDP, the latter absorbing 17.5% of military aid and 20% of economic aid provided by the USSR to the Third World. The United States, in turn, finances Son Sann's KPNLF to promote Vietnam's stagnation in Cambodia and the Vietnamese threat argument also allows them to strengthen military cooperation with ASEAN countries. By the meads-1980s, the Cambodian conflict reached a military stalemate and increasingly weighed on Vietnamese and Soviet finances.

In April 1983, the Vietnamese People's Armed Forces launched an offensive on the Cambodian-Thai border, which provoked a response from the Thais who shelled Vietnamese positions. In late 1984, the Vietnamese army attacked resistance bases with heavy weapons that it had not used for five years. In January 1985, the Vietnamese captured the Ampil base held by the FLNKP and the Phnom Malai base held by the Khmer Rouge, on the border with Thailand. Thai villages receive howitzers. The Thai army retaliates and sees one of its helicopters shot down by the Vietnamese. These fighting provoke an additional exodus of refugees into camps in Thailand (200,000 in 1985). These military losses weaken the political weight of the resistance; the defeat was a painful setback for Son Sann's troops, while the Sihanoukist National Army gained a good reputation in battles where it was defeated only because of the desertion of the Thai army, which allowed the Vietnamese to catch his troops from the rear

Deprived of their main bases, the forces of the Khmer Rouge-KPNLF-ANS coalition took refuge in the jungle and continued carrying out guerrilla actions. If the Cambodian resistance was not in a position to militarily endanger the Vietnamese army, continued fighting impedes the country's normalization and exerts political pressure on Vietnam. The Vietnamese are interested in a negotiated exit from this endless and costly conflict, but they demand the exclusion of the Khmer Rouge beforehand. The Cambodian resistance coalition demands the same, in turn, from Vietnamese troops.

On September 2, 1985, Pol Pot, having reached the age of sixty, announced his retirement and left command of the Armed Forces to Son Sen, however assigning himself the presidency of a "Higher Institute of National Defense", a position with vague responsibilities but which seem to indicate that the former general secretary of the Communist Party of Kampuchea maintains leadership of the Khmer Rouge troops, who are trying to regain control of western Cambodia. Around 10,000 men remain in practice under the command of Pol Pot, who operates from a camp located in Thailand. Ta Mok also leads 10,000 men in the O Trao region. Khieu Samphân and Ieng Sary, in turn, command troops in the Battambang region, also in Thai territory. China, willing to put the USSR in difficulties in the region, continues to fuel the Khmer Rouge rebellion without openly approving Pol Pot's "excesses" as it once did.