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HOLOCAUST
(Continued from page 7)
ao example, and her child was
crying beside her."
Starvatlon and Slavery
In the labor camps each fami ly had
to build its own hut without materi–
als or tools. Thereafter everyone was
forced to work from six in the morn–
ing to five at night- and sometimes
until
11
if there was a full moon–
seven days a week. Except for the
midday break, Khmer Rouge
guards allowed neither rest nor con–
versation.
Murder of a Gentle Land
relates
this nightmarish incident about
what life is like in these camps:
"About mid-June, while working in
the field , Ngy stepped on a sharp
piece of bamboo which penetrated
almost aU the way through his foot.
His whole leg swelled , he developed
a high fever and pains shot up to his
waist.... That night ... [Com–
munist] village committee members
took turns berating him: 'You must
learn to live with pain. You must
not be soft. You must not be lazy,
trying to get out of work.' There
followed a litany: Ngy was free.
Ngy was equal. Ngy was happy."
There are no holidays from the
relentless work. There are no days
off. A meal is a cup of rice gruel.
The only relief from the grinding
regimen is political meetings held
every two weeks. The meetings are
held in the communal dining halls
and are led by Khmer Rouge ad–
ministrators. The theme is always
tbe same: Work, work, work harder.
Lite in the Slave State
For those Cambodians who have
survived the forced labor, the star–
vation diet , the forced marches, the
executions, life remains a night–
marish , egalitarian hell. In the
words of one writer who is apolo–
getic for the Khmer Rouge, "Com–
plete equal ity prevails: Every
member of the cooperative receives
one black lineo suit of clothes from
the state every year. ... the . .. note–
worthy characteristic of this society
is the principie of egalitarianism,
40
really 'collective socialism'....
There is highly centralized state
control which obligates the state to
distribute everything from rice to
the annual suit of clothes for each
citizen" ("Kampuchea , Three Years
Old,"
Seven Days
magazine, May
19,
1978).
Even in Communist China, the
communes pay each person accord–
ing to his work. In Cambodia all
positive incentives have been elimi–
nated. There is only the ever–
present threat that if one falls be–
hind in his work he will be scolded
and la ter shot.
In the labor camps it is against
the rules to engage in any kind of
philosophical or política! conversa–
tion.
lt
is against the rules to read
books, or sing traditional folk songs,
In their zeal to
build a utopía no matter
what the human
suffering, the Communists
have demonstrated
the crying need for
God's government to
bring a real utopía.
or even to dance. And anyone who
breaks the rules in the labor camps
is subject to immediate execution–
usually being clubbed to death with
a pick handle.
The Khmer Rouge has deliber–
ately separated families, sending
children away to work in other
provinces. There is no recreation, no
gaiety or amusement, no leisure
time. There are no books. When the
Khmer Rouge took over, they ran–
sacked libraries, offices, and ar–
chives in order to find any written
material to destroy. Hundreds of
thousands of books have been
burned. The book burnings have
been part of a deliberate campaign
on the part of the Khmer Rouge to
root out every last vestige of the past
in Cambodian culture.
There is no prívate property.
Everything belongs to "the people,"
who are, of course; "represented" by
the Khmer Rouge. The only per–
sonal possessions a pers on is
allowed are his one suit of clothes
and a sleeping mat.
Tyrants and Sadists
Who are the sadists who, as Ieaders
of the Khmer Rouge, have com–
mitted these ghastly crimes? Ac–
cording to John Barron, they are a
remarkably homogeneous lot. He
told an interviewer for
Human
Events
magazine: "They all carne
from middle-class families , all were
educated in the 1950s in France:
they all became ardent Communists
ata time when the French Commu–
nist party was very much under the
Stalinist wing ofthe Soviet party....
They were all, or most of them, wed–
ded to theory. They were all , with one
exception , very puritanical. ... Al! of
them had spent mostoftheir adult life
outside ofCambodia, or in the jungles
detached from the mainstream of
their country's Ji fe. None ofthem has
ever worked with his or her hands , yet
they extol physical labor above all
else" (' 'Cambodia: The Face ofEviL"
Human Events,
May 21 , 1977).
One refugee suggested that the
leaders of the Khmer Rouge think
of themselves as the supreme Com–
munists, who Jook down on other
Communists who haven't had the
"vision" or "courage" to do what
they have done. Clearly they are
men obsessed with utopian visions.
T hey believe that every individual
in Cambodia should be happy to
spend his life toiling in the fields
to serve the will of the Khmer
Rouge.
Their beEefs, in the words of one
intelligence report , are "a grotesque
caricature of Marxism mixed with
radical French leftist intellectualism
and stirred up in the crucible of the
jungle."
The Deafenlng Sllence
Before the fall of Cambodia , a num–
ber of prominent Western politi–
cians and commentators urged that
America drop all aid to the anti–
Communist government then in
power. Senator George McGovern
The
PLAIN TRUTH
September
1978