I have some serious questions about this place

This is where our community discusses almost anything! While we're mainly a Cambodia expat discussion forum and talk about expat life here, we debate about almost everything. Even if you're a tourist passing through Southeast Asia and want to connect with expatriates living and working in Cambodia, this is the first section of our site that you should check out. Our members start their own discussions or post links to other blogs and/or news articles they find interesting and want to chat about. So join in the fun and start new topics, or feel free to comment on anything our community members have already started! We also have some Khmer members here as well, but English is the main language used on CEO. You're welcome to have a look around, and if you decide you want to participate, you can become a part our international expat community by signing up for a free account.
gavinbrisbane
Expatriate
Posts: 256
Joined: Sat Feb 13, 2016 8:09 pm
Reputation: 0

Re: I have some serious questions about this place

Post by gavinbrisbane »

Thanks for the recommendation on some literature PR - that will keep me busy for a while!

:idea:
willyhilly
Expatriate
Posts: 1758
Joined: Sun Jan 17, 2016 7:11 am
Reputation: 357
Location: Australia
Albania

Re: I have some serious questions about this place

Post by willyhilly »

Crossing Three Rivers is the best book by a Khmer. An educated man who survived with his wife, the KR midwives killed their twins at birth. He became a politician but was eventually forced to leave in the nineties by HS. Although he had done a degree in the US as a young man he was very spiritual and believed in ghosts who he often saw.
His story would make a far better movie than the one Jolie is filming, his book is unique. Richards recomendations I agree with as well, I always liked When the War was Over by Elizabeth Becker and Jon Swains book about the Mekong. And the movie Une nuit apres la guerre by that Khmer guy whose name I cant remember.
Very few Khmers will talk about the past, either because of the pain or because they were complicit. The only ones that wern't complicit seem to be those in front of the Tribunal.
User avatar
John Bingham
Expatriate
Posts: 13674
Joined: Sun Dec 07, 2014 11:26 pm
Reputation: 8892
Cambodia

Re: I have some serious questions about this place

Post by John Bingham »

willyhilly wrote:Crossing Three Rivers is the best book by a Khmer.
Who wrote it? Was it Nhek Bun Chhay?
Very few Khmers will talk about the past, either because of the pain or because they were complicit.
Not my experience at all, the topic has often come up and other times I overhear people discussing the Pol Pot regime.
The only ones that wern't complicit seem to be those in front of the Tribunal.
So you don't believe Nuon Chea or Khieu Samphan were complicit?
Silence, exile, and cunning.
User avatar
phuketrichard
Expatriate
Posts: 16790
Joined: Wed May 14, 2014 5:17 pm
Reputation: 5733
Location: Atlantis
Aruba

Re: I have some serious questions about this place

Post by phuketrichard »

Best book on the " Mekong" is by Milton Osborne
updated in 2006

Cant find any reference on duck duck go to the book "Crossing Three Rivers"

NO ONE over 50 is Innocent
In a nation run by swine, all pigs are upward-mobile and the rest of us are fucked until we can put our acts together: not necessarily to win, but mainly to keep from losing completely. HST
bkktrapper
Expatriate
Posts: 528
Joined: Fri Oct 23, 2015 3:03 pm
Reputation: 0
Location: the ceiling

Re: I have some serious questions about this place

Post by bkktrapper »

phuketrichard wrote:Best book on the " Mekong" is by Milton Osborne
updated in 2006

Cant find any reference on duck duck go to the book "Crossing Three Rivers"

NO ONE over 50 is Innocent
On the road to Phnom Tamoa zoo you will find alot of old khmer women begging.

They look near 80-90 years old.


Majority of khmer rouge footsoldiers were in there teens.
ceiling cat is watching you masterbate
User avatar
John Bingham
Expatriate
Posts: 13674
Joined: Sun Dec 07, 2014 11:26 pm
Reputation: 8892
Cambodia

Re: I have some serious questions about this place

Post by John Bingham »

phuketrichard wrote:
NO ONE over 50 is Innocent
So anybody who was above the age of 14 in 1979 has blood on their hands? Is that supposed to be a joke or something?
Silence, exile, and cunning.
User avatar
juansweetpotato
Expatriate
Posts: 2637
Joined: Sun Jul 27, 2014 8:45 pm
Reputation: 75

Re: I have some serious questions about this place

Post by juansweetpotato »

John Bingham wrote:
phuketrichard wrote:
NO ONE over 50 is Innocent
So anybody who was above the age of 14 in 1979 has blood on their hands? Is that supposed to be a joke or something?

The American and British governments at the time certainly do. I don't think we will ever hear them apologize for it though.
"Can you spare some cutter for an old man?"
User avatar
John Bingham
Expatriate
Posts: 13674
Joined: Sun Dec 07, 2014 11:26 pm
Reputation: 8892
Cambodia

Re: I have some serious questions about this place

Post by John Bingham »

That's all very well but it's totally off topic.
Silence, exile, and cunning.
User avatar
Jamie_Lambo
The Cool Boxing Guy
Posts: 15039
Joined: Mon Apr 20, 2015 10:34 am
Reputation: 3132
Location: ลพบุรี
Great Britain

Re: I have some serious questions about this place

Post by Jamie_Lambo »

juansweetpotato wrote:
John Bingham wrote:
phuketrichard wrote:
NO ONE over 50 is Innocent
So anybody who was above the age of 14 in 1979 has blood on their hands? Is that supposed to be a joke or something?

The American and British governments at the time certainly do. I don't think we will ever hear them apologize for it though.
how much involvement did the british military actually have during the end of the vietnam war/KR era?
genuine question as i thought it was mainly the US/CIA, i might have to do some more googling
:tophat: Mean Dtuk Mean Trei, Mean Loy Mean Srey
Punchy McShortstacks School of Hard Knocks :x
User avatar
Kuroneko
Expatriate
Posts: 3809
Joined: Thu May 15, 2014 11:18 am
Reputation: 879

Re: I have some serious questions about this place

Post by Kuroneko »

Jamie_Lambo wrote:
juansweetpotato wrote:
John Bingham wrote:
phuketrichard wrote:
NO ONE over 50 is Innocent
So anybody who was above the age of 14 in 1979 has blood on their hands? Is that supposed to be a joke or something?

The American and British governments at the time certainly do. I don't think we will ever hear them apologize for it though.
how much involvement did the british military actually have during the end of the vietnam war/KR era?
genuine question as i thought it was mainly the US/CIA, i might have to do some more googling
Here's a start: How Thatcher gave Pol Pot a hand

Until 1989, the British role in Cambodia remained secret. The first reports appeared in the Sunday Telegraph, written by Simon O'Dwyer-Russell, a diplomatic and defence correspondent with close professional and family contacts with the SAS. He revealed that the SAS was training the Pol Pot-led force. Soon afterwards, Jane's Defence Weekly reported that the British training for the "non-communist" members of the "coalition" had been going on "at secret bases in Thailand for more than four years". The instructors were from the SAS, "all serving military personnel, all veterans of the Falklands conflict, led by a captain".

The Cambodian training became an exclusively British operation after the "Irangate" arms-for-hostages scandal broke in Washington in 1986. "If Congress had found out that Americans were mixed up in clandestine training in Indo-China, let alone with Pol Pot," a Ministry of Defence source told O'Dwyer-Russell, "the balloon would have gone right up. It was one of those classic Thatcher-Reagan arrangements." Moreover, Margaret Thatcher had let slip, to the consternation of the Foreign Office, that "the more reasonable ones in the Khmer Rouge will have to play some part in a future government". In 1991, I interviewed a member of "R" (reserve) Squadron of the SAS, who had served on the border. "We trained the KR in a lot of technical stuff - a lot about mines," he said. "We used mines that came originally from Royal Ordnance in Britain, which we got by way of Egypt with marking changed . . . We even gave them psychological training. At first, they wanted to go into the villages and just chop people up. We told them how to go easy . . ." http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/po ... l-pot-hand
Post Reply Previous topicNext topic
  • Similar Topics
    Replies
    Views
    Last post

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: Amazon [Bot], Bobby66, Khmu Nation, Moe and 1237 guests