[lbo-talk] Pol Pot: Not Such A Bad Guy

Carl G. Estabrook galliher at illinois.edu
Tue Oct 16 14:33:04 PDT 2012


Because Shamir is despised, we can put aside the attempt to understand what happened in Cambodia?

(A subject about which Western press and scholarship have hardly distinguished themselves.)

'At the moment [Feb. 2012] , we are failing to commemorate the 50th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy's decision to launch the most destructive and murderous act of aggression of the post-World War II period: the invasion of South Vietnam, later all of Indochina, leaving millions dead and four countries devastated, with casualties still mounting from the long-term effects of drenching South Vietnam with some of the most lethal carcinogens known, undertaken to destroy ground cover and food crops.

'The prime target was South Vietnam. The aggression later spread to the North, then to the remote peasant society of northern Laos, and finally to rural Cambodia, *which was bombed at the stunning level of all allied air operations in the Pacific region during World War II, including the two atom bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki*. In this, Henry Kissinger's orders were being carried out -- "anything that flies on anything that moves" -- a call for genocide that is rare in the historical record. Little of this is remembered. Most was scarcely known beyond narrow circles of activists.' [Chomsky]

" If the Cambodians are pressed to name their great destroyer (and they are not keen about burrowing back into the past), it is Professor Henry Kissinger they name, not Comrade Pol Pot."

On Oct 16, 2012, at 2:56 PM, Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:


>
> On Oct 16, 2012, at 3:44 PM, "Carl G. Estabrook" <galliher at illinois.edu> wrote:
>
>> Lost your faith again?
>
> No, but reading that at the end of a long apologia for Pol Pot degrades the socialist dream totally.
>
> Doug
> ___________________________________
> http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk



More information about the lbo-talk mailing list