Sydney Schanberg: Cambodia Genocide

      Sydney Schnaberg, a New York Times journalist, is best known for his work in Cambodia for which he won the 1976 Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting.  Schanberg helped uncover the story of Cambodia where Pol Pot about two million of his own countrymen.  In 1980 he released a book about his experiences in Cambodia called, “The Life and Death of Dith Pran” a story about a dear friend he made while working in Cambodia and how he lived through the genocide.  Schanberg was able to help the world understand the genocide in Cambodia and worked with Dith Pran to teach the world about the atrocities that he experienced.  Through Sydney Schanberg’s journalistic skills he taught the world of the terrors of the killing fields.  

In South East Asia in 1953 Cambodia gained their independence after about a hundred years of being under French rule.  Less then ten years after getting their independence, Cambodia's population grew to about seven million and was ruled by the monarchy of Prince Sihanouk.  In 1970, Prince Sihanouk had been deposed by a military coup.  A new right winged government had taken over, led by Lieutenant – General Lon Nol; The Prince out of anger joined a communist guerilla organization called Khmer Rouge. In 1970, the Khmer Rouge guerilla movement began and was lead by Pol Pot.  Pol Pot was educated in France and was a fan of Maoist communism.  Soon after his joining, the Khmer Rouge attacked Lon Nol’s army, which started a civil war in Cambodia.

While Cambodia was having a war of its own, next door in the east, Vietnam was also fighting a war against communism.  Cambodia trying their best to stay out of the war became a neutral country towards North and South Vietnam.  By doing so Prince Sihanouk gave each side what they wanted.  The Vietnamese communist were allowed to use the ports in Cambodia to ship supplies.  The U.S. was allowed to bomb what supposedly were Viet Cong hideouts.   When Lon Nol came to power, the U.S. felt free to go into Cambodia to defeat the Viet Cong.  This then created disaster in Cambodia, constantly having B-52 bombers flying over their country in attempts to stop the war in Vietnam.   The American bombers killed up to 750,000 Cambodians. 

            By 1975 Pol Pot’s force had grown to over 700,000 men and they had defeated Lon Nol’s army.  The Khmer Rouge guerilla movement believed that all Cambodians must work in one huge federation of collective farms and that any western influence was bad.  Anyone that did not fit the regulations of Maoist communism was to be killed.  Upon their taker over the Khmer Rouge forced all occupants of towns and cities were forced to leave, anyone who was to ill or didn’t move fast or refused to go were killed.  Religion was banned and all Buddhist monks were killed.  In addition, anyone who was educated, such as a doctor, teacher, scientist, were killed as well as their extended family.  If anyone was caught with any western technology or product they were killed.  These policies resulted in the murder of millions of Cambodian citizens.  

            Those that survived the evacuation of cities were put to work in fields, with little to eat and impossibly long hours.  The Khmer Rouge discouraged their workers from creating relationships with the other workers and gave them uncomfortable quarters to sleep in.  Soon the workers started to fall ill and were killed on the spot.  Then the Khmer Rouge started to kill anyone one who wasn’t Cambodian or anyone who had a Chinese, Vietnamese, or Thai ancestor.  They soon began to question their own and started to interrogate their members, imprisoning them or killing them if they felt they were even slightly suspicious.   http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/cambodia/ (Pol Pot's Shadow, Frontline)

Dith Pran lived through the genocide and was forced to work for the Khmer Rouge.  In 1970 he became a journalist with a small British organization.  In 1972, he met New York Times writer Sydney Schanberg and they both eventually became co-workers and good friends.  Sydney Schanberg had started his journalism career with the New York Times in 1959, and spent most of the 1970s in South East Asia covering Cambodia. 

 

Photograph by Dith Pran

In April of 1975 when American personnel left Phnom Penh when Pol Pot assumed control of Cambodia.  Most Cambodians knowing that the Khmer Rouge would soon be taking over the city fled from the area.  Schanberg helped Pran to get his wife and kids onto a U.S. transport to escape the country.  Pran and Schanberg stayed in Phnom Penh to cover the story.  After the Khmer Rouge had taken Phnom Penh, Schnaberg and Pran didn’t expect the mass murder that was about to happen.  Soon after the takeover the Khmer Rouge started to plunder stores for goods and to kill people on the streets.  The Khmer Rouge had a saying 'To spare you is no profit, to destroy you is no loss.’  
  

The two friends tried to stay together as long as they could, reporting on what was happening in the city of Phnom Penh.  Schanberg and Pran and two other reporters were the only ones who stayed after the clearing of the city.  Schnaberg and Pran along with the other reporters went to a hospital to see how many were dead or injured.  Before reaching the hospital the group ran into Khmer Rouge soldiers.  Pran being the only Cambodian there was able to talk to the soldiers and convince them not to kill Sydney and the other reporters.  The soldiers agreed to not harm them but wanted them to leave the country.  Schanberg was forced out of the county, being taken to the border of Thailand, and then returned back to New York City to look for Pran’s wife and kids.  Pran was not able to go with Sydney to America and had to stay in Cambodia.

Pran was forced to work in awful conditions in the fields.  He was only feed about a spoonful of rice a day.  While Pran was still in Cambodia, which had then changed to Kampuchea, Sydney Schanberg was in New York City writing about his work in Cambodia.  In 1976, because of his efforts to bring awareness to the genocide in Cambodia, Sydney won the Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting.  Schanberg never stopped looking for Pran during his time in New York. 

In 1978, the Vietnamese invaded Cambodia and overthrew the Khmer Rouge.  They set up a socialist government mostly made up of Khmer Rouge renegades in order to revive the country.  This was a very difficult task because Pol Pot had decided to kill everyone who was educated and had ruined the economy.  During this time while the Vietnam was taking over the government, Pran had made the decision to escape from Cambodia and leave to the border of Thailand.  Once he reached the border he was able to enter a refugee camp and asked on of the U.S. officials to contact Sydney.  Schanberg was able to reach Pran in the next week and helped him become a U.S. citizen and to find his wife and kids. 

Finally in 1989 the last troops of the Vietnam had left due to international pressure.  The U.S. used economic sanctions to force the Vietnams backer, the Soviet Union, out.  This allowed Cambodia to regain its name and establish self-rule. 

Sydney Schanberg and Dith Pran played a major role in telling this story to the world.  Many people ignored the genocide and acted as though it was not happening.  With the help of these two great reporters, we were all able to learn of what truly happened in Cambodia.

The Last Word: The New York Times

http://video.nytimes.com/video/2008/03/19/obituaries/1194817114251/last-word-dith-pran.html?scp=8&sq=cambodian%20genocide&st=cse
          This video is of Dith Pran and Sydney Schanberg telling the story of their experience in Cambodia.  Pran discussed what it was like to be a laborer in the work camps that Khmer Rouge made.  I had a hard time comprehending the awful things this man has been through, and watching him talk about it seemed almost unbelievable.  At one point, Pran talked about how he had written a book call “Children of Cambodia’s Killing Fields”, and how the children were forced by the Khmer Rouge to become soldiers, spies, and executioners.  What happened to these children is almost more horrible than what happens to their victims.  Soldiers twisted young minds to do the unthinkable, the most horrible things in the world.  To also hear, firsthand, what Pran’s experiences were with the Khmer Rouge was very interesting and upsetting.  His stories of what they did to him, how he had to hide his education because they would kill him for it, well, it’s hard to get your mind wrapped around.  I would have liked to hear more about how he survived the Khmer Rouge and less about the movie, “The Killing Fields”.  Even though it was interesting to see some of the scenes that he lived through portrayed, I didn’t really believe it was necessary because what they did show was never something that was too significant.  Overall, I found the video to be very informative and interesting, and to hear this horrific story from both Schanberg and Pran was unimaginable.  

Cambodia by Sydney Schanberg: An Excerpt from the book, Crimes of War

http://www.crimesofwar.org/thebook/cambodia.html

         This article, written by Sydney Schanberg, explains how the genocide in Cambodia began and why.  I found his writing very compelling, I was immediately captivated in his story.  I only wish that he wrote more about his experiences in Cambodia, rather than the origins of the war.  I would find it fascinating to hear what he saw and felt when he was in the city of Phnom Penh; I wanted to hear what it was like to be in the middle of all this chaos.  What he did describe of his experiences in Cambodia were disturbing. For example, when he wrote about the two troops from Lon Nol’s army and how they burned two Viet Cong and  left them hanging in the city.  That image was powerful and horrifying.  I tried to imagine such atrocities happening right in front of my eyes.  Maybe that's why he didn’t want to elaborate more on what he saw there.  Something that I found very interesting and that I didn’t know before reading this article was about the “new people”.  The “new people” were the men and women the Khmer Rouge believed to be anti-communist or have western influence.  The Khmer Rouge would label them with a neckerchief, and the “new people” would eventually be executed.  Schanberg drew the reference to the Nazis labeling the Jews with the Star of David and how similar these two acts were.  As Schanberg said in the beginning of his article, “It is to Asia what the Holocaust was to Europe.”

Interview with Sydney Schanberg

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/asia/june97/cambodia_6-18.html

           This is an interview with Sydney Schanberg and Nate Thayer, both journalists who worked heavily in Cambodia.  I thought this interview was particularly interesting because of what Schanberg said about capturing Pol Pot and relating to how it would be similar if Hitler had been caught.  This startled me because I wasn't as well aware of the situation in Cambodia, whereas I know a lot about the Holocaust.  Most people know everything about the Holocaust and very few know about Pol Pot.  It made me realize that if we choose to ignore something, then it becomes less important in history.  What happened in Cambodia should be important in history.  Two million people died. 

            Another fascinating fact has to do with Pol Pot’s education.  Pol Pot was educated in France and he learned Maoist communism.  The interesting thing I found out here, he wasn’t a very bright student and never got his PhD.  This fascinated me because the Khmer Rouge's big idea was to kill the educated, the good students, the ones that he couldn't be. I wasn’t sure why he hated the intellectuals, but now it seems to make a bit more sense.  I liked to hear more about Pol Pot.  It seems obvious that if he had made his plan at any other time, people would have recognized he was mad, but because the Vietnam war was spilling into Cambodia and there was so much chaos going on they didn't.