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Cambodia: Irresistible Force vs. Immovable Object
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10569 |
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CURRENT ISSUES
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2 / 1986 |
1,667 Words |
| Author
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Douglas Pike
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The year 1985 began inauspiciously for the Cambodians in early January when full-scale warfare suddenly erupted with one of the most vicious military assaults by Hanoi during its six year effort to subdue Cambodia. Vietnamese troops, planes, and tanks struck at guerrilla bases and refuge enclaves along the entire Cambodian-Thai border.
So determined was the on-slaught that some observers in Bangkok were led to the initial assessment that 1985 would go down in the history books as the year Vietnam achieved final victory over Cambodia.
But the guerrillas managed to hold. The attack expended itself, the rain came, and Cambodia settled in for another year of Vietnamese military occupation and resistance against it.
After the initial bad start for the anti-Vietnamese forces, the remainder of 1985 was marked by steady improvement. By the end of the year the Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea (CGDK) was sending guerrillas into virtually every province of the country and was effective enough in the capital region of Phnom Penh to force imposition of a dawn to dusk curfew.
The year was marked by extensive but largely fruitless efforts to end the war and secure the withdrawal of Vietnamese troops. Most of these were generated by the CGDK itself or by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (AEAN), led by Indonesia.
Sihanouk 'Retirement'
In the CGDK camp, intramural friction and general distrust continued among the key leaders: President Norodom Sihanouk, Prime Minster Son Sann, and Vice-President Khieu Samphan. A fourth figure, the notorious Pol Pot, in mid-August "retired" as the military commander of Democratic Kampuchea (DK) forces, the full meaning of which is still not clear. Sihanouk and Son Sann spent much of the year traveling the world in search of material and psychic support, with some success. In an effort to demonstrate solidarity, chiefly to the pressuring Chinese, a single CGDK military command was formed in midyear.
In the opposing Phnom Penh camp, the government of the People's Republic of Kampuchea (PRK), led by Heng Samrin, struggled to make itself viable and to build a native armed force that would take over from the occupying Vietnamese and permit their withdrawal. Perhaps more significantly the Phnom Penh and Hanoi governments moved steadily closer to what might be called institutional integration (what critics call federation) with the development of joint mechanisms for handling foreign policy economic planning, and military offensives. Vietnamese "settlers" continued to arrive in Cambodia in numbers.
Foreign reporters visiting Phnom Penh found the place in somewhat better physical condition than in the early 1980s. Consumer goods are now more plentiful and there is a thriving black market (the dollar exchange rate is eight times the legal rate).
Food is more abundant but still in short supply, exactly how much no one is certain. The Cambodian population is estimated at about seven million which means it requires about 1.2 million tons of rice/grain annually to stay slightly above the subsistence
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