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Since the 1960s, the Kingdom of Cambodia has been in crisis.
The country’s pseudo-democratic system has been no match for its authoritarian government,
and the population is one of the poorest in the region.
Recent decades have seen war, genocide, and invasion, and some historians blame none other
than the United States for the country’s many tragedies.
So, why does Cambodia hate the US?
Well, Cambodia’s long-term struggle largely stems from their involvement, or really, lack
of involvement during the Cold War.
While communists backed by the Soviet Union and anti-communists backed by the US fought
for control in Vietnam, Cambodia declared itself neutral.
But its government allowed Vietnamese communists to use the border region as a supply route
and safe zone, which proved to be a huge mistake.
Why?
Well, at the time, the Vietnam War was incredibly unpopular in the United States, and was viewed
as an ideological war, not one that would benefit Americans.
By the time Richard Nixon took office in 1969, the US was already in the process of withdrawing
troops from the conflict and had scaled back bombing in the region.
But Nixon and his National Security Advisor, Henry Kissinger, were committed to prolonging
the war in the hopes of defeating the communists.
They sought to find another way to keep fighting without a heavy presence in Vietnam, and without
making it seem as though they were ramping up military operations.
Their solution was to effectively hijack the United States military, and secretly, and
illegally bomb Vietnamese forces hiding in Cambodia, a country with which the US was
not at war.
Operation Menu, the first of two major bombing campaigns, was even kept secret from Congress.
According to an expose by New York Times writer Seymour Hersh, in order to accomplish this,
Kissinger and high ranking military members created fake flight plans for bombers in Vietnam,
and destroyed all evidence of their actual bombing targets in Cambodia.
They even allegedly used a specially designated furnace to destroy records, according to testimony
from the head of American military operations in Vietnam.
From 1969 to 1973, the US dropped half a million tons of bombs on Cambodia, killing more than
100,000 civilians.
Overall, the US dropped 6 millions tons of bombs on Southeast Asia, which decimated the
region, and forged extreme resentment against anti-communist forces.
Many historians believe this resentment created a power vacuum for a disruptive and deadly
regime to seize power in Cambodia.
The Khmer Rouge was just that, a militant regime violently seeking power.
They emerged from the very same North Vietnamese communist forces the US had been trying to
disrupt.
Just two years after the end of the secretive bombing raids, the Khmer Rouge began a Cambodian
genocide.
From 1975 to 1979, they killed between 1.5 and 3 million civilians, or about 25% of the
population.
The US’s illegal bombing campaign never quite saw the same level of coverage as the
concurrent Watergate scandal that took down Richard Nixon.
Ironically, before the bombing was revealed, Kissinger even received a Nobel Peace Prize
for bringing peace to Vietnam.
He actually attempted to return the Prize two years later when communist forces ultimately
took over Vietnam.
Today, opinion on Kissinger is split between seeing him as a war criminal, versus a powerful
foreign policy leader.
Although relations have somewhat normalized since the 1970s, the deadly history between
the US and Cambodia has left a dark stain on America’s reputation and the Cambodian
population.
While there is plenty of debate as to the influence and extent of the US’s illegal
actions, their lasting scars of war remain.
Another country where the United States covertly attempted to eliminate communism was Venezuela,
and today, Venezuela is devolving into a dictatorship.
Check out this video to learn about what exactly is going on in the South American country.
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