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The cambodian genocide academic essay
The causes of the cambodian genocide essay
The cambodian genocide academic essay
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According to Genocide Watch, between 1.7 and 2.2 million people died in the Cambodian Genocide.(Genocide) Which was approximately twenty-five percent of the population in a short three year period stated World Without Genocide.(Walker) This horrible tragedy was caused by Pol Pot and the Kmer Rouge in most of Cambodia, in the 1970’s, because of religion and order. In Cambodia this devastation made everyone a peasant.
First, who was Pol Pot and the Kmer Rouge? Pol Pot was born in Kompong Thom Province and his real name is Saloth Sar. Next, he started taking place in Communist activities in 1953.(Thi) Later, Pol Pot took over the reorganization of the Cambodian Communist Party in 1960. (Thi) The Kmer Rouge was the name of his main guerilla forces. Later on, in 1975 under the leadership of Pol Pot, The Kmer rouge took over the Cambodian government. Also, The Kmer Rouge Guerilla force was founded in 1960 by Pol Pot.(Walker) The Kmer Rouge’s aim was to make their country like the Maoist China in which everyone was a peasant and had to work on rural sites.(Walker)
Next, why did they start devastating this small nation? It all started when the Kmer Rouge decided to make Cambodia like unto a Maoist China. They made everyone become peasants and anyone who could possibly be opposed to the system was exterminated. This included educated people, professionals, monks, religious enthusiasts, people who practice religion, and many from other countries or that have roots in other countries.(Walker) The Religions that were taken away were most commonly but not limited to Buddhist, Muslim, and Christians. The ethnicities that were devastated were Chinese, Vietnamese, Thai, and Cambodians with any of those heritages. Sadly, the main problems...
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...undreds of those were slaughtered. The murders and treachery performed by the Kmer Rouge were caused because of religion and ethnicity.
In conclusion, Over two million people died in the Cambodian Genocide. It is one of the greatest tragedies of the twentieth century. People were killed for their religion and ethnicity. Many thousands were killed because of their jobs and their families were also killed because they were related to someone with an educated job. Also, thousands were killed on farms and labor camps at the killing fields and pits. Plus, it all happened because of Pol Pot and the Kmer Rouge trying to make Cambodia like the Maoist China. Pol Pot and the Kmer Rouge would kill anyone for any reason. Finally, The Cambodian genocide was one of the greatest tragedies of all time and we should all stay aware of prejudice to avoid yet another genocide.
Evil doesn’t even begin to cover it. The mass murder of millions of people. The complete obliteration of an entire society. Each and every genocide has the same core principles, but a distinct face. A dictator takes over a weak country with promises of returning it to its former glory, once he has everyone’s support, he implements extremely discriminatory laws and finds reasons to kill anyone who dares oppose him. The Holocaust and the Cambodian genocides are remarkably similar, and yet strikingly different. The Holocaust was an attempt to wipe out all Jews and other minorities such as gypsies and handicapped people. The Cambodian genocide, led by Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge, was in some ways a mirror image of the Holocaust, but it happened forty-two years later. On the other hand, there are many more that one distinction that sets Cambodia apart from all other genocides.
This was an example of genocide that we can learn from and know what genocide is so we can stop genocide from occurring in the future because we are the next generation of the world..
"Cambodian Genocide." World without Genocide. William Mitchell College of Law, 2012. Web. 13 Apr. 2014. .
To start off with, what is genocide? Genocide is the killing of a massive number of people of in a group. Genocide has not only been practices in the present day, but it has been practiced for m...
Throughout the conflict, rebel militias would burn down villages leaving few, if any, civilians alive. The government military, while more benevolent, was not often in a position to oppose the rebels’ atrocities.
... to eliminate any Western influences in order to create a utopian society, killed off million of influential scholars, philosophers and any educated people in the country. These Cambodians believed that this would benefit the rest of the country and would create a utopian for the future generations of Cambodians. Even though this was morally and ethically wrong to them it was right. So who is to say who was right or wrong if it is based off their beliefs?
The Communist Party of Kampuchea, also known as the Khmer Rouge, took control of Cambodia on April 17, 1975, which lasted until January 1979. For their three-year, eight-month, and twenty-one day rule of Cambodia, the Khmer Rouge committed some of the most heinous crimes in current history. The main leader who orchestrated these crimes was a man named Pol Pot. In 1962, Pol Pot had become the coordinator of the Cambodian Communist Party. The Prince of Cambodia, Norodom Sihanouk, did not approve of the Party and forced Pol Pot to flee to exile in the jungle. There, Pol formed a fortified resistance movement, which became known as the Khmer Rouge, and pursued a guerrilla war against Sihanouk’s government. As Pol Pot began to accumulate power, he ruthlessly imposed an extremist system to restructure Cambodia. Populations of Cambodia's inner-city districts were vacated from their homes and forced to walk into rural areas to work. All intellectuals and educated people were eradicated and together with all un-communist aspects of traditional Cambodian society. The remaining citizens were made to work as laborers in various concentration camps made up of collective farms. On these farms, people would harvest the crops to feed their camps. For every man, woman, and child it was mandatory to labor in the fields for twelve to fifteen hours each day. An estimated two million people, or twenty-one percent of Cambodia's population, lost their lives and many of these victims were brutally executed. Countless more of them died of malnourishment, fatigue, and disease. Ethnic groups such as the Vietnamese, Chinese, and Cham Muslims were attacked, along with twenty other smaller groups. Fifty percent of the estimated 425,000 Chinese living in Cambod...
The Cambodian Genocide took place from 1975 to 1979 in the Southeastern Asian country of Cambodia. The genocide was a brutal massacre that killed 1.4 to 2.2 million people, about 21% of Cambodia’s population. This essay, will discuss the history of the Cambodian genocide, specifically, what happened, the victims and the perpetrators and the world’s response to the genocide.
The Chinese have repeatedly tortured, imprisoned, and murdered Tibetans all for what they claim is national unity. While the oppression of the Tibetan people began in the 1950’s with the invasion of China, it continues just as strongly today. From religious oppression and unfair trials to the torture of nuns and monks, the Chinese abuse even the most reverent aspects of Tibetan culture. Political prisoners, whether they are monks, nuns or lay people, are tortured with utter disregard for human rights. Chinese laws have also been established to eradicate the Tibetan people entirely. Women often must endure forced abortions and sterilization due to Chinese birth policies. Through all of these crimes against humanity, China repeatedly commits acts of genocide as established by the United Nations.
History aims to examine the actions and legacy of mankind. The past is filled with the achievements that humans have reached, however, history also shows us the evil that man is capable of. No atrocity against mankind is more heinous than the act of genocide. Genocide is the aim to destroy all (or part of) of a racial, religious, ethnic, or national group of people. This paper will examine two famous cases of genocide in history: The holocaust of Jews and other groups in Nazi Germany, and the destruction of the Congolese people under Belgian colonialism. The Holocaust remains as one of the main legacies of Hitler and the Nazi party, who claimed an estimated 11 million victims, 6 million of which were Jews. Comparatively, the Congolese Genocide
The Guatemalan Genocide was part of the thirty-six year long Guatemalan civil war, which lasted from 1960 to 1996. Throughout those thirty-six years of civil unrest, the genocide was committed from 1981-1983. A genocide is defined as “the deliberate killing of people who belong to a particular racial, political, or cultural group” by the Merriam Webster Dictionary. The Mayan Indians were the targeted group in the Guatemalan Genocide. It is estimated by the Peace Pledge Union that about, “200,000 people were killed or “disappeared”” in the Guatemalan Genocide, which was about 3% of Guatemala’s population at the time. The United States was also involved in the genocide because it helped the Guatemalan government to find and kill their targets, the Mayan Indians. The reason for sympathizing with the Guatemalan government was that the United States was keen on protecting an American company’s investment in Guatemala. The Guatemalan Genocide is a relatively recent event, and the trial to convict the perpetrators of genocide is still in progress. (Thesis)
Similar actions were taken by the FLN in their campaign of violence against the population. Due to the FLN's nationalist approach they began a campaign of us verses them in regards to the French with no concept of neutrality on the matter and any Muslim who collaborated with the French would be murdered to bring allegiance and obedience aimed at cleansing and purifying the city of Algiers.1 The strategy was to remove all social and political parasites that made up any competing forces in light of La Pegre, a similar organization who worked under the French secret police as informants, so in order to covert more members and remove the threat they waged a war of intimidation.2 The FLN began its violence against the French settlers in Algeria
In the 1970’s, the Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot, started to grow significantly because of the war in Vietnam. Bombs aimed at Vietnamese soldiers kept entering Cambodia and the Cambodian leader at the time, Norodom Sihanouk, was doing nothing to help. Citizens found refuge in Pol Pot because he had motivation, intelligence, and charisma; three important characteristics of a leader. Pot was constructing an organized group, setting goals, and adapting to his situation, which defines Pot as a leader. Since Pot’s followers and army were growing so much, he felt he could take over Cambodia and become the sole leader. Once in power, Pol Pot planned to completely end Cambodia’s modern way of life and recreate an agricultural communist country. Pot lead his military to victory during the Cambodian civil war in 1975 and soon after became dictator. Pot’s journey to leadership was difficult, but eventually he persuaded enough people to follow him and successfully take over Cambodia.
There were also dictators in both genocides who wanted an ethnically pure nation and used propaganda to succeed in their goals. Pol Pot and Hitler prosecuted any person that was religious or had anything to do with religion. Cambodia and Germany both had many death camps during their genocides. Also destroyed property that was linked to religion. The living conditions during the genocides were crowded, cramped, and terrible. There were many mass executions and mass graves. people were tortured in horrifying ways in Cambodia and Germany. Most people died from either overwork, shootings, malnutrition, starvation, injury, and disease ("Compare and
What is one genocide that you have heard of the doesn’t include the Holocaust? One genocide that was just as bloody and gruesome as the Holocaust is the Guatemalan Civil War. The war had started in 1960. It had lasted 36 years. It finally had been ended by peace accords in 1996 (PBS). This war left many parts of the country in pieces (Pedrera). The civil war caused many deaths and a lot of destruction in the involved countries.