Conspiracies on Vietnam

One of the students in my group came home the other week and told us that she got into an interesting conversation with lawyers at her work in which they proceeded to tell her all their own theories on those responsible for the Khmer Rouge, not Pol Pot or the Cambodians on trial, but the country of Vietnam. I couldn't believe her story. These were lawyers, highly educated men in Cambodia, working at the largest legal aid organization in the Country, who truly truly believed what they were saying. I totally dismissed her story as a couple crazy guys she works with but the next day at my job when we were out to lunch, I couldn't help but take the opportunity to ask a man in my office how he felt about Vietnam, and I got the exact same story....

He went on and on about how tricky and crafty the Vietnamese are. He said that Pol Pot loved the country and was trying to do what was best for Cambodia but Vietnamese spies infiltrated the Khmer Rouge and started killing people. I couldn't believe his theories and the conviction he felt for them. I tried to ask him questions to point out how ridiculous he sounded, like "what about the fact that Vietnam was the one that liberated Cambodia from the Khmer Rouge, why would they do that if they were running it?" He said that is the oldest trick in the book. It's like starting a fire and then calling to report the fire, no one will suspect you because you were the one that tried to fix the problem, but really it was you all along.

He just kept saying, if you think about it, none of what happened makes any sense at all. Cambodians are mostly Buddhist, they don't believe in killing anything, it's just not in their nature. Plus, why would Cambodians kill other Cambodians? It just doesn't make sense.

The amazing thing was that I had heard this story all before, not through another student in my group but during our first week in the country. We went to an art gallery that was run by Germans and they had a private movie showing for us. They presented us this Vietnamese propaganda movie that was shown around the time of the Khmer Rouge. This art gallery used to show the movie all the time but the Cambodian government got involved and told them they had to stop showing it. Our dean knew the owner of the gallery and was able to get him to make an exception and play the film for us.

In the movie, you see Ing Thirith, the wife of one of the leaders of the Khmer Rouge and one of those who was supposed to be on trial in the ECCC. She is sitting there talking to the camera about the horrible things that Vietnam is doing to Cambodia and how they are trying to help. She says that they are farming more than ever and they are curing the problem with starvation in the country. She is then combating all of the "rumors" about the Khmer Rouge. She says why would we kill the educated people, then I would have to kill myself and my family we were educated outside of Cambodia. She says why would we kill people with glasses, I wear glasses, then I would have to kill myself.

Everything she is talking about is exactly what I keep going over in my head the more and more I learn. Basically that it just doesn't make sense. Why would they systematically target people who were exactly like them? And then I think about the Nazis. How Hitler wanted his Aryan society but he had dark hair. How his parents were Jewish. And I wonder, are all of these things just cases of people who's own self hatred got so out of control that they started killing everyone like them? Can one's own self-loathing really drive them to such extremes? And I try to make sense of it all, to understand, to rationalize. And then I feel crazy because the second you can rationalize genocide and mass killings, there is something seriously wrong with your feelings toward humanity. And I think back to the image of Ing Thirith in her interviews. She is so adamant about this conspiracy and doing nothing wrong and Cambodia being fine. She is chubby. In a country where people are dying left and right of starvation. Where there were bodies everywhere because those who were still alive didn't have enough strength to bury the dead because they were also so close to death, she is plump. And you ask yourself, how can a leader, who loves their people so much and is doing "what's best for them”, eat to the point of excess in an environment where everyone is starving. And you realize that she is not so innocent after all.

Maybe it's easier for Cambodians to believe that their own people didn't do this to them. Maybe that's just how they are able to deal with what happened.

Maybe Vietnam really is responsible.

I think one of the hardest things about all of this is that no one is ever going to really know the extent of what happened in Cambodia and who is responsible. The world feels like we need to know, I think that's what the ECCC is all about, finding out the truth and who is responsible. But even the court isn't getting at the truth and frustration of a lack of truth is driving people to lose hope in ever knowing.

At the end of the movie there was a question and answer session. There was a younger Khmer journalist there who immediately starting ripping into the group of Americans that was there to watch the film. He asked why America didn't take any responsibility, why don't Americans know what happened, why aren't we more educated on Cambodia? For a group of students who was there to learn more, he struck a nerve with all of us and there was bad blood for a while. Part of me felt ashamed, like why did it take me coming to Cambodia to learn all of this? Why wasn't I taught about it in school? But then frustration came back because how is the outside world supposed to know about everything that happened and who was responsible and what was done when Cambodia isn't even in agreement over it all? When you have smart, well-educated Cambodians, saying that Pol Pot wasn't responsible.

I asked the man at my work what he thought of the ECCC. He said it was a big waste of money. Nothing was going to change. Those responsible weren't really on trial and those that were on trial would never actually have anything happen to them. He said why not just give the money to Cambodia.

It’s hard to understand that mentality, of not caring what happens to those responsible. Maybe not so much not caring, but accepting that nothing will happen. It's not that he doesn't care or wasn't affected. Everyone in Cambodia was affected. Everyone lost family members, friends, parts of themselves. Everyone was affected. But still people here move on. They don't like to talk about what happened. Many will never visit S21 or the killing fields. Maybe because it's too hard for them, or maybe because they feel like they can't change the past. I can't decide if I feel bad for this mentality or if I admire it. I respect the resilience and the strength to move forward, but I worry it's because there is a complete lack of faith in their ability to ever receive justice.