Talk:Khmer Rouge rule of Cambodia

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Pro-Beijing[edit]

"...pro-Beijing regime..."

I've removed this, as it's not relevant and there exists evidence of only very limited cooperation between the two nations, given that Chinese-Cambodians, along with all other minorities in the country, were persecuted to the brink of extermination.

External Links[edit]

I added a link to an article analyzing DK from a communist (Maoist) perspective. It's an interesting read IMO. - anthropophag

The link doesn't work - much to my annoyance. I wanted to read it. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 165.155.110.74 (talk) 19:55, August 21, 2007 (UTC)

Title of article[edit]

Should title be renamed? I realise it is what the country was called under the Khmer Rouge, but with historic hindsight it makes one brain explode! Does anyone object to Pol Pot's Democratic Kampuchea?

Further work to be done breaking up article. - redcountess 00:36, Feb 27, 2004 (UTC)

I don't see how "Pol Pot's Democratic Kampuchea" is going to make it anything different. Adding Pol Pot is just making the title unnecessarily long and redundant. --Jiang 00:39, 27 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Not knowing much about the History of Cambodia, I saw that heading and thought it meant there was a time when a country called Kampuchea was democratic, as well as a time when it was under the rule of Pol Pot. The longer title would make it clear that it's talking about Pol Pot's regime and that its name was "Democratic Kampuchea". Better ideas? - David Gerard 00:57, Feb 27, 2004 (UTC)

What matters is accuracy and concision. Since it was called "Democratic Kampuchea", there is nothing misleading about it in the way we have represented it. If it is misleading, people reading the article will find soon enough. The content matters more.

One can argue the the Democratic People's Republic of Korea is not democratic either, or that the People's Republic of China is not for the people. --Jiang 01:04, 27 Feb 2004 (UTC)

True. I hope the new intro paragraph gets the point across suitably. - David Gerard 01:27, Feb 27, 2004 (UTC)
The official name was Democratic Kampuchea. If it were to be changed to "Pol Pot's Democratic Kampuchea", that would be ridiculous. It would imply that Pol Pot was single handedly in control of everything in Cambodia at that time. And if the name was changed, someone would have the bright idea of changing "North Korea" to "Kim Jeong-Il's North Korea". Before you know it there would be calls for "George Bush's United States of America" or "Colonel Khadaffi's Libya". How about "Ariel Sharon's Israel"? This is, to be frank, one of the most absurd ideas I've seen suggested in a long time. --Ce garcon 08:34, 20 Sep 2004 (UTC)
though i agree that it should not be changed i'd just point out that the problem the user had was that the term "Democratic" in Democratic Kampuchea could be somewhat misleading as it was a one-party psychotic-Maoist state. that is not a problem with the other country's you mentioned 64.7.89.54 30 June 2005 08:33 (UTC)

Well, some people would argue that the case of North Korea or even Lybia (until recently) is not that different. I think it is better to leave the name the way it is; otherwise lots of names will have to be changed, sometimes for other reasons. After all, "United States of America" does not include all of "America"! Tsschmidt 13:58, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think it should be renamed because people know it better as the Cambodian Genocide. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.168.28.59 (talk) 16:21, 28 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Protection[edit]

I protected the last stable version of the page. We're seeing edit wars without a two-way attempt to discuss content changes in the talk pages on this and two other Cambodia-related articles (Cambodia and History of Cambodia. 172 06:56, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Very Verirly,

You will not get away with arbitrarily reverting the work of anyone else but me. After all, when I'm not a party in a dispute, **I** can intervene as an admin to stop the edit war. And I am not a participant in the Cambodia-related edit wars (my edits to the Cambodia-related pages have solely entailed adding past protection notices).

If you refuse to discuss your differences with Hanpuk directly, as opposed to griping about superficial behavioral red herrings on other users' pages, **I** will protect the page. BTW, I will not be acting in a capacity in which I can be accused of protecting "the wrong version" I will protect the most recent version of the page once the three revert rule has been violated, irrespective of whose version is protected. I'll will post this notice: This page is protected from editing until disputes have been resolved on the discussion page. 172 08:20, 5 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]

You're clearly not neutral in any conflict involving me. Hanpuk has simply reverted back to his version which had already been rejected by several users for reasons explained at considerable length by countless people. -- VV 08:25, 5 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
Really? The page histories say otherwise with respect to the Cambodia-related articles. Ironically, **Hanpuk** would be able to make the argument that I am biased against him in any conflict involving him. In the past Cambodia-related edit wars, I was usually (if not always—if my memory's correct) protecting the most recent stable versions, which tended to be the versions posted before Hanpuk had edited the pages, and thus the versions that you had been restoring over and over again. Lately, I haven't been seeing other admins bothering to go to such lengths to avoid charges of protecting "the wrong version." So, this time I'll protect the page on the version not posted by the first person who has broken the three revert rule. This is an objective formula for determining whose version gets protected, so I fail to see how I could possibly be charged with failing to act impartially. 172 08:38, 5 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
Because you have a well-known vendetta against me. There are 200 other admins who could get involved if that were needed, but you seem determined to do so yourself. -- VV 08:42, 5 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
And because of my vendetta against you, I was protecting pages on your preferred versions. That's not going to make sense to anyone else but you. 172 08:48, 5 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]

Page[edit]

There are many things to discuss about this page. Here are some of them

- Khmer Rouge was a slur used to describe the CPK. They called themselves the CPK and I use this term, not the slur their enemy used against them. The term 'Khmer Rouge' was coined by Norodom Sihinouk, who would go on to be the reluctant champion of Democratic Kampuchea and the post-Maoist gang that steered it. It was not a negative propoganda created by it's enemies, by which I assume you mean the 'West'or everyone eles for that matter. Well maybe not China.87.252.40.45 (talk) 11:08, 26 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

- there is lots of lack of NPOV in this article like "People began to realize that, in the eyes of the victors, the war was not over; it was just beginning, and the people were the new enemy." Or "Having lost parents, siblings, and friends in the war and lacking the Buddhist values of their elders, the Khmer Rouge youth also lacked the inhibitions that would have dampened their zeal for revolutionary terror."

- entries I have made have been deleted. That people were starving to death prior to the CPK takeover, that the US was bombing the countryside and the like are removed. A book by Michael Vickery is an OK reference to link to, but my link to Noam Chomsky's research into Cambodia coverage is removed. Much of what I say is removed.

- Some things I think should be discussed like "There were no exceptions to the evacuation." What is the source for this? Due to US bombing, peasants had fled to major cities and were starving before the CPK took over (as were city residents, who relied on farmers for food). And of course, humanitarian aid disappeared as soon as the CPK took over, requiring them to come to an immediate solution, the only thing preventing an evacuation beforehand was foreign aid, as soon as that disappeared, the actions of the West were the catalyst for the evacuation. Anyhow, there is this idea everyone was evacuated from all of the cities and they were abandoned henceforth. There are sources that say this is not so. 

      Fox & Ung (The Murderous Revolution 1985, p.11), as well as Short (Pol Pot: The History of a Nightmare 2004, p273), say that the Khmer Rouge soldiers were ordered to evacuate Phnom Penh and every provincial city and town without exception, and that these orders were carried out to the letter - including the 15-20 thousand people from Phnom Penh's hosptitals. Other sources suggest that up to 50,000 people were living in the abandoned Phnom Penh during the period 1975-79, but these were mainly the Khmer Rouge themselves. The claim that a food shortage in the capital was imminent as a result of the US bombing was actually made by Pol Pot himself. Short (p287) states, quoting the Central Committee's own documents, that the evacuation had been planned in October 1974 to destablise Sihanouk's support base, get the urban population to take part in agricultural production, and eliminate capitalism with one stroke. Moreover, the CPK refused foreign aid as a matter of face as it would weaken the Kampuchean position.

- As I said, there is a lack of sourcing for some of the more outrageous claims. "There were no exceptions to the evacuation." is unsourced, unqualified, and in my opinion wrong. This can not be given as a fact it has to be qualified - "Some say there were no exceptions to the evacuation". After qualifying it, then give a source where this comes from. Other sources say there were exceptions, so that is put it as well. The more outrageous the claim, the more it needs to be sourced. "Even Phnom Penh's hospitals were emptied of their patients." It's probably more like one witness claimed he saw a hospital in Phnom Penh discharging patients. Was it more than one hospital? Were they very sick or just slightly sick? Is the witness, probably an anti-CPK witness in an anti-CPK run Thai camp selected by an anti-CPK bureaucrat for an anti-CPK journalist, reliable?

Some of these issues, like how many who were executed while the CPK were in power, spread across many pages dealing with Cambodia. David Gerard wants this discussion to be on 5 or more different pages apparently, to waste people's time and have the same arguments over and over 5 times. I think it would make more sense to discuss how many people died in one place instead of having the same argument 5 different times. Whatever. Hanpuk 16:13, 6 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]

"Khmer Rouge" is the common name in English, like it or not. The source for these articles is the Library of Congress Country Studies; the present text is substantially theirs. - David Gerard 16:27, May 6, 2004 (UTC)
Well, there are a host of points of contention regarding this article. If you feel particularly strong about that one, we can leave it to the last to discuss. In other words, I will leave it as Khmer Rouge on this page while a consensus comes about regarding everything else. Then we can discuss what to call them. Hanpuk 16:44, 6 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
The term "Khmer Rouge" is equivalent to the term "Red Chinese". It's obviously not NPOV to use it, all the same, it is most widely recognised by far. I suggest informing readers at the top of the article that CPK refers to the Red Khmer and then referring to the party by name thereafter. --Ce garcon 08:41, 20 Sep 2004 (UTC)
While this is true the term "Khmer Rouge" is the commonly used name in the west. If we are not going to call then the Khmer Rouge then I demand that the Viet Cong are refered to by their true (as opposed to common) name- the National Liberation Front in all articles, as Viet Cong, much like Khmer Rouge, was a simplistic and insulting phrase applied to said groups by their enemies.

Names in Unicode characters[edit]

It's a good thing having the local characters, but I can't read them! (Mozilla Firefox on Windows and on FreeBSD with quite a lot of fonts added.) What font or character set would they need? - David Gerard 11:08, May 10, 2004 (UTC)

I also can't read these with IE 7.0. This bothers me on a lot of pages.Eebster the Great (talk) 03:13, 3 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In pages with Indic and Ge'ez script, there is a small template with link to structions for settings and font download to read their fonts. Perhaps a similar one should be created for pages with Khmer unicode text. --Soman (talk) 05:37, 3 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Needs mention of Thai and US support for Khmer Rouge against Vietnamese government[edit]

Some mention has to be made in this article of Thai and US support to the Khmer Rouge against the Vietnamese established government. Not only does it make a gaping hole in the history of Democratic Kampuchea, but could also be considered not NPOV. Mention also needs to be made of the fact that DK kept the seat at the UN even after they had been driven from power to the safety of Thailand (the only government in exile to be so honoured) --Ce garcon 07:37, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC)

The U.S. never supported the Khmer Rouge. They did, however, support an insurgent coalition of the Khmer People's National Liberation Front (KPNLF,) a pro-democracy group, ANS, a pro-Sihanouk group, and the Khmer Rouge, no doubt hoping the KPNLF would emerge dominant. The refusal to recognize the PRK was (obviously) just a protest against the Vietnamese, not surprising considering the U.S.'s previous involvement in the region. J. Parker Stone 30 June 2005 08:35 (UTC)
J. Parker Stone, I think you shouldn't say something like "no doubt hoping the KPNLF would emerge dominant", that's just your personal opinion, how do you know that for sure anyway?? The fact is:

- Pol Pot has never been brought to justice.

- Without U.S. help, the Khmer Rouge wouldn't be able to continue its terrorist activities more than 10 years later.

- Without the Khmer Rouge, a coalition of KPNLF & ANS is still more than able to continue the fight with U.S. help.--lt2hieu2004 05:59, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

i hear you saying "the fact is" but making unattributed claims/claims that don't say anything. 134.69.166.209 00:52, 29 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I said it is fact because it is truly fact. Can you deny that Pol Pot has never been brought to justice? Can you deny that the U.S did indeed help the Khmer Rouge by providing them with financial aid & military training and voted to keep their seat in the UN? There were times when the Vietnamese army invaded some of the western provinces of Thailand to wipe out the Khmer Rouge which retreated there everytime the situation turned against them, but couldn't hold on for long fearing restarting the war with U.S & China. Moreover, right after the PAVN took over Phnom Penh and Pol Pot fled on 7-1-1979, U.S has been supporting the Khmer Rouge, denouncing the Vietnamese, 2 months later, China (a U.S ally at that time) invaded VN in support of the Khmer Rouge. The CGDK was only formed 3 years later - in 1982.--81.100.174.75 14:57, 23 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]


Just a thought - Carter did condem the Veitnamese invasion of Cambodia, like most states of the world at the time. Does opposing Country A invading Country B, even if country B has a reprehensible despot ruling it mean that you, in a way, are supporting that despot? To say that Carter supported Pol Pot because of this would be like saying Ted Kennedy supported Saddam because he was against invading Iraq--Dudeman5685 03:37, 24 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]


Can anybody actually cite a credible source that the US supported the KR while it was in power? Like a declassified document or something? If not, don't mention it. Then there was the insurgent period during the 1980s - as I have said the Vietnamese occupation was very unpopular with the international community - the UN condemned it, etc - so, again, you have the Saddam paradox I mentioned above. The question comes up - did the US support the KR directly during this period. As far as I know, it did not. It supported an umbrella opposition group which counted the KR as one of its members. If any one can cite a govt document or statement by an official that either Carter or Reagan supported the KR, then put it on the article. If not, drop it. (PS it seems out of charechtar for Human Rights guru Carter or Anti-Communist Reagan to support the KR, directly at least) --Dudeman5685 23:50, 27 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

plagiarization[edit]

This article is plagiarized from another source[http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/khtoc.html. Furthermore is just one long anti-Khmer Rouge rant - one of the first sentences is "The troops who entered the capital on April 17 were mostly grim-faced youths clad in black with the checkered scarves that had become the uniform of the movement." - beyond trying to evoke POV by saying all the soldiers were grimacing all day as they came in it isn't even correct, the youths who entered the city on April 17th were students who were not in the Khmer Rouge. So it is POV writing around a factual error, plagiarized and put here without permission. Ruy Lopez 02:48, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)

The above text was posted by Ruy Lopez. --Ce garcon 12:40, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I agree. Not discounting the horrors of Democratic Kampuchea, at the same time, there is no need to resort to such obvious POV to use such POV phrases as "grim-faced". At the same time: "Information contained in the Country Studies On-Line is not copyrighted and thus is available for free and unrestricted use by researchers. As a courtesy, however, appropriate credit should be given to the series." according to the LOC. Therefore there is no need for the passage to be removed... although it does need to be edited to comply with Wikipedia`s NPOV policy. --Ce garcon 12:36, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Added NPOV tag. --Ce garcon 12:38, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

New sections on CGDK[edit]

any reorganizing, new sources, or comments on whether this should be moved to its own page would be greatly appreciated. J. Parker Stone 30 June 2005 10:22 (UTC)

Reverting to previous version[edit]

Who keeps messing this up bad? The Frederick 11:10, 21 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

New link[edit]

I think there should be a link to Cambodian coup of 1970 somewhere. Anyone agree? Cigale 06:53, 30 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

In other ways[edit]

"People who were discovered praying or expressing religious sentiments in other ways were often killed". This affermation don't have sense! Who is the significance of "other ways"? Vess

Infoboxes[edit]

Should we not have one for pre-1970 Cambodia, one for the Khmer Republic, one for Democratic Kampuchea etc., so that people can see the difference in flags etc. etc. Cripipper 11:16, 5 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Doesn't cite sources[edit]

Seems like the article only really cites one source.

Renaming the article[edit]

I moved the article to Communist Cambodia for two reasons:

  1. Very few Westerners are aware that Kampuchea refers to Cambodia.
  2. Not too many people realize that there is a long-running dispute between communists and anti-communists over the meaning of the word "democratic".

We should, of course, represent this dispute fairly, not taking sides or making judgments. So I leave open the question of whether the communism of Cambodia was "really democratic". This controversy needs to be fleshed out more, say in an article on Democratic republics or Peoples democracy. I wonder how our Definitions of democracy article is coming along. --Uncle Ed 18:36, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Ed, "Democratic Kampuchea" is the normal English language term for the Pol Pot regime. It is used even by people who strongly disagree with the Pol Pot regime and consider it evil, such as me. Furthermore, using "Communist Cambodia" for the Pol Pot regime is ambigous: the People's Republic of Kampuchea was also Communist, but was not the Pol Pot regime. Do you have evidence of an actual neutrality dispute here or just a conjectural one? Morwen - Talk 09:59, 5 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I never said there was a Wikipedia:Neutrality dispute here. I was just trying to improve the naming scheme.

I've renamed the article (and one other) and incorporated both name changes in the Template:History of Cambodia infobox. My idea is to give each of these spin-off (or summary style) articles consistent names. The periods are named as follows:

  1. Colonial Cambodia (1887-1953) - as is
  2. Cambodia under Sihanouk (1954-1970) - as is
  3. Cambodian Civil War (1967-1975) - as is
  4. Cambodia under Pol Pot (1975-1979) - renamed from Democratic Kampuchea
  5. Cambodia Under Vietnamese Occupation (1979-1989) - renamed from People's Republic of Kampuchea
  6. Modern Cambodia (1989-present) - as is

Do we need another article concentrating on Politics and government of Cambodia? I think the series (spin-off's or 'summary articles') is fine the way it is. I just thought these titles were clearer and easier for the reader to follow. --Uncle Ed 14:11, 5 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Certainly Cambodia under Pol Pot (1975-1979) is better than Communist Cambodia for this article. Morwen - Talk 14:23, 5 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I must share the credit with you, because until reading your comment I had not paid attention to the template. (Another example of collaboration amongst courteous colleagues).
I went ahead and fixed a bunch of redirects, too. --Uncle Ed 14:32, 5 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I would suggest more changes to make all of the articles consistent:
  • "Colonial Cambodia" should change to "Cambodia under the French".
  • Cambodian Civil War should be split into "Cambodia under Lon Nol (1970-1975)" and probably a seperate article on the cambodian civil war as a "war"
There also may be some value in creating new articles for Democratic Kampuchea, People's Republic of Kampuchea and the Khmer Republic describing the governments/states that went by those names. 168.127.0.51 15:31, 5 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, both ideas are excellent suggestions. I'm not sure I have the expertise to separate the "government from the country" as you suggest; can you do this yourself, while we all watch and applaud? :-) --Uncle Ed 16:07, 5 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Sure. I'll put creating the new pages for the governments on my todo list. The articles would be mostly new content so it would not get in the way of anything done for the history articles - 168.127.0.51

"Cambodia under Pol Pot" is not a good title for this article. It should be moved to "Democratic Kampuchea" since this is the official name for the state. I've heard people say that this is inappropriate due to the horrible things Pol Pot did, blah, blah... using the official name doesn't mean endorsing its' activities. Using IDF doesn't mean you think the Israeli military is defensive, using PRC doesn't mean you think the Chinese Communists operate a "people's state", and referring to the Final Solution to the Jewish Problem doesn't mean that you think Jews are a "problem". Let's go with the official and most widely used form.--Ce garcon 21:18, 22 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

That name is for a period of history, not for a regime. Three weeks ago, anon 168 suggested writing about the regime (aka government). I haven't followed up yet, to see if he did the suggested work.
Most readers are interested in the history of Cambodia: what happened and when. If you know anything about a government of Cambodia which was in power during any of these periods, please write about it!
I don't know the history very well, so I couldn't even say whether the period 1975-1979 coincides exactly with the period during which Democratic Kampuchea was the name of Cambodia. All I know for sure is that the typical American I talk to knows roughly where "Cambodia" is but has a hard time placing "Kampuchea". I'd love to see a template listing the various names the country has had. --Uncle Ed 17:55, 23 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
moreover it's a terrible name because it's referencing something that doesn't really exist, "cambodia" is not some concrete thing, cambodia was never "under pol pot", this was a different country. and since when did american ignorance have a damn thing to do with the name of an article? that's a slippery slope if there ever was such a thing. does this mean that every other government someone doesn't agree with will now be renamed? perhaps the gdr will become "north easterly germany under stalinism (1949-1990)" ?? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 151.201.9.209 (talk • contribs) 11:58, 3 December 2006 (UTC).[reply]
I've written a stub at Democratic Kampuchea. --Kaasje 02:01, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Do something with Section 1![edit]

Section 1 of the Cambodia under Pol Pot page is really ugly the way it is now. Protection or not, it needs to be cleaned up -- it looks amateurish right now. Misterdoe 16:56, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Resolve this and Move Forward[edit]

Wikipedia still needs an article on the DK regime - simply because it is a phrase in use that people need to look up in an encyclopedia. The series on cambodia during different periods is excellent and valuable too. Paxse 15:39, 19 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Article Assessment[edit]

This article is really very close to B class, a lot of good information. All it needs is for the facts to be referenced and a few more images put in. There are plenty of images available in various sub articles on the KR. Cheers, Paxse 05:24, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Lack of consistency[edit]

There are three different titles of this regime in three places, one being "Cambodia under Pol Pot (1975-1979)", the title of the page, another being Democratic Kampuchea, located in the infobox, and Communist Cambodia, which are the first words and bolded. Is there any way that this can be made more consistent? --67.149.66.30 00:51, 23 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

cut and paste job from US military?[edit]

I know next to nothing on this subject so can't judge if the information is good or not. What I can tell is that whole chunks of it are simple cut and pastes from the 'Cambodia Country Study' linked to at the bottom. Which it turns out is a report produced by the US Army department. Again, I know very little, but given the US army is hardly an uninvolved bystander my inclination would be not to give this source 100% trust. Maybe someone who knows this subject should take a closer look.Candelabra 16:01, 19 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Merger proposal[edit]

Please see Talk:Khmer Rouge. --Soman 12:48, 21 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Another merge proposal[edit]

Democratic Kampuchea (see talk) is a stub that doesn't say anything that isn't already here. It has already been tagged for merge three times before, with Paxse (talk · contribs) consistently removing the tag; however, Paxse seems to be alone in objecting to the merge. If no one else objects, I'm going to redirect it here. - ∅ (∅), 16:21, 21 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Democratic Kampuchea continued to exist after 1979, and remained the recognized cambodian government for many western states. Thus it should not be merged with the history chapter of 1975-1979. --Soman 15:13, 22 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Taking my name in vain I see. Actually user Paxse was almost 'alone' in using the DK article page at all. The interesting thing about the triumphirate of drive-by merge taggers mentioned above is that not one of them managed to place merge tags correctly or explain their rationale for a merger on the talk page. When asked to provide a reason only one of the three even bothered to reply. Anyway, merging DK...

  1. The date when the term Democratic Kampuchea was first used internally to describe the area controlled by the Cambodian communist movement is still unclear
  2. The date that DK was officially announced was 5/1/76
  3. In 1990, the DK flag still flew outside the United Nations building and was recognized as the legitimate government of Cambodia.

Over the years, DK has been a sovereign state, a non-sovereign entity, a political party (the PDK) and finally an outlawed group. The 'lifetime' of this entity (call it what you will) was at least from 1976 to 1996. So how the hell can we squeeze this bizarre entity into any single Cambodian history article - particularly the one dealing with the 3 years 9 months and 30 days when Pol Pot's guys and gals were in charge of the entire country?
For future reference here's a link to a public domain primer on DK (a source for article expansion?)[1], the DK constitution with the date the country was officially announced [2] and an interesting UNEP document from 1980 showing the Soviet Union delegate complaining about the DK delegate being present at the 9th Governing Council session [3] (China told them to mind their own business). Finally, in 1994 the Cambodian Government passed a law outlawing the "DK group" - partly because of their attacks on UNTAC personnel who were supervising preparations for the 1993 general elections.[4] So, seriously how can we merge this concept with Cambodia 75-79 and claim to be building an accurate encyclopedia? Let's all work on expanding it into an accurate article that covers the topic instead, yeh? Cheers, Paxse 18:37, 23 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You've convinced me. :-) - ∅ (∅), 22:57, 24 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Aawwwww man, you took all my fun away. And I was looking forward to an argument too! :) Paxse 14:57, 26 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ben Kiernan mentions that 'Democratic Kampuchea' was established in some areas in 1973, but his wording doesn't make it clear whether he refers to a de facto embroytic DK or whether DK was a term actually used at the time. --Soman 08:23, 25 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Great research Soman, which Keirnan book was it? (I know, I know, I still owe you those banner translations). Paxse 14:57, 26 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
'How Pol Pot Came to Power'. I'll try to look for the page number for proper reference. --Soman 18:15, 26 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This and Democratic Kampuchea should be merged, but Khmer Rouge should have it's own article. --PDTantisocial (talk) 21:16, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Finally, after waiting almost a full year for mergists and non-mergists to make any further points - I'm gunna kill the ugly merge tag. I'll be quite disappointed if someone doesn't put it back next week :) Paxse (talk) 15:11, 29 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Fair use rationale for Image:Khmer Rouge6.jpg[edit]

Image:Khmer Rouge6.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to ensure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

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BetacommandBot (talk) 23:11, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

US role[edit]

Could the US role and involvement, with the Khmer Rouge, be mentioned adequately? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.95.9.231 (talk) 23:12, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Cambodian Genocide[edit]

Needs it's own article. --84.234.60.154 (talk) 19:06, 4 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. Maybe this article should just be renamed, and recentered on the events of the Cambodian Genocide? The other concern that this entry is tagged with, about a merging of this with Khmer Rouge, could be addressed by sending some text from here over there, and focusing this on the genocide. DBaba (talk) 21:11, 4 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It may need it's own article - though whether it was genocide or not is hotly disputed (perhaps autocide?) and very POV in any case. However, we can create another article without having that ugly tag at the top of this article for another six months. It's gone. Paxse (talk) 13:06, 22 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Suggest[edit]

May I suggest move this page back to Cambodia under Pol Pot, because the name Khmer Rouge period (1975–1979) is confuse with the article Khmer Rouge. 69.234.183.155 (talk) 04:02, 31 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Image copyright problem with Image:Son Sen.jpg[edit]

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Not enough about the actual genocide[edit]

I feel that this article makes very little reference to and does little to explain the actual genocide and torture that occurred in enormous waves throughout the country, at places like Tuol Sleng and the Killing Fields. This is extremely disconcerting and needs to be fixed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.3.21.45 (talk) 08:53, 17 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Dubious[edit]

"They killed almost everyone with an education, or even people wearing glasses" -- Exceptional claim without a source. If there are multiple, reliable, verifiable sources available that indicate that someone has made this claim, then we can say, "So-n-so said that they killed almost...". Otherwise that statement needs to go. Sparkie82 (t•c) 21:42, 11 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Public domain text[edit]

Much of this article is taken word-for-word from the public domain Cambodia country study of the U.S. Library of Congress. Attribution is still required per WP:PD. The edit that introduced it into the article 11 years ago acknowledges the source, but attribution on the talk page is better. Attribution in the article would be even better. Lagrange613 02:01, 4 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

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External links modified[edit]

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Death toll[edit]

I modified the Death toll section and removed a significant number of inaccurate, outdated or redundant data. I added more precise figures from Kiernan, who is a leading expert in this genocide. He is from Yale, so there is no need in a separate reference to the Yale genocide center. A mention of the wide range of estimates is redundant and misleading in a situation when much more precise data are available. Rummel is also not needed, because he just summarizes what all sources say (he does not do his own research).

I regrouped the text to make it logically correct: killing fields and mass graved go first, demographic estimate of the KR period go after that (which include direct killing and other causes), and the death that happened after 1979 go after that.

Please, keep in mind that KR genocide is a rare case when large estimates were coming from communist propaganda: since KR were Vietnam's enemies, the Vientamese (and Soviets) tried to exaggerate the scale of this genocide.--Paul Siebert (talk) 19:47, 26 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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