Tuesday, January 11, 2011
Ralph Shaw
Daily Times (Pakistan)
The major reason behind the American inspired coup and subsequent invasion of Cambodia was Vietnamisation — the idea that the US could buy its way out of the Vietnam quagmire, ‘honourably’, by increased military assistance and economic aid to the South Vietnamese government of Nguyen Thieu
The American-instigated coup that ousted Prince Sihanouk on March 18, 1970 is aptly described as the “beginning of the end of Cambodia” by Seymour Hersh in his book The Price of Power. The coup really was the start of a minor apocalypse for the country. Sihanouk had kept his country neutral in the raging conflict in neighbouring Vietnam by performing a balancing act between the communist and right wing forces. The anti-communist faction that deposed Sihanouk strengthened ties with the US and formally allowed South Vietnamese to conduct cross-border raids against communist sanctuaries in Cambodia, which were under secret US bombardment since March 1969, with the result that the communists moved further inland towards the Capital Phnom Penh.
Claiming that the Cambodian capital was in danger President Nixon launched an invasion of Cambodia on April 30 1970 in support of Lon Nol’s anti-communist government in Phnom Penh. The US foray into Cambodia ended two months later, without achieving anything, with 344 American, 818 South Vietnamese and untold communist combat deaths. The bitter civil war in Cambodia continued unabated and the social order collapsed. In 1975, the same year that Saigon fell, Lon Nol was overthrown by the communists. The reign of genocide that followed killed hundreds of thousands of Cambodians. The total number of civilian deaths in a population of 8 million at the time, including those from starvation and disease, is estimated to be around 1.7 million.
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