TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/100989/10098900.011

Text File | 1992-09-23 | 10.0 KB | 194 lines

                `I╙                                                          WORLD, Page 38

SOUTHEAST ASIA

Will It Ever End?


As Vietnam's soldiers head home, three guerrilla armies,
including the Khmer Rouge, gird for war in Cambodia

By Jill Smolowe


    They have known almost nothing but war. For a generation
men have fought over the fabled ruins of Angkor Wat, the
colonial palaces of Phnom Penh, and the rich rice paddies along
the Mekong River, leaving more than a million Cambodians dead
and their land in ruins. But at long last the shell-shocked
country had something to cheer. Cambodians crowded the streets
last week to hail the withdrawal of the last of the 200,000
Vietnamese troops who had occupied their country for nearly
eleven years. Across the eastern border in Vietnam, there was
also celebration. Senior officials embraced the leaders of the
returning units, and parents rushed to greet their returning
sons.

    Cambodia and Vietnam are desperate for change. Yet there
was no real jubilation for two countries that have battled one
enemy or another, Cambodia for the past 20 years, Vietnam for
more than twice as long. In Cambodia three guerrilla armies, not
least the brutal Khmer Rouge, are spoiling to settle their
differences with the Hanoi-approved government of Hun Sen. The
departure of the Vietnamese promises only the renewal of civil
strife as these groups struggle for dominance.

    Even as the occupiers marched off, Cambodians attacked one
another along the western border shared with Thailand. At dawn
on Saturday, 5,000 fighters from the non-Communist resistance
group linked to former Prime Minister Son Sann launched an
offensive that thrust as deep as 30 miles into northwestern
Cambodia, claiming to capture several towns along Route 69 in
a test of strength against the army of Phnom Penh. As for
Vietnam's soldiers, they left behind more than 50,000 dead and
returned home to a nation demoralized by poverty, unemployment,
food shortages, corruption and continuing status as an
international pariah. Both countries confront internal
challenges that may make the past decade seem a time of relative
tranquillity.

    Of the two war-exhausted nations, Cambodia faces the more
dire future. A 19-nation conference convened in Paris to hammer
out a settlement between the Cambodian government and the
tripartite resistance collapsed in August over the fate of the
Khmer Rouge. Hun Sen refused to consider any power-sharing
arrangement with the guerrillas who had turned Cambodia into a
charnel house, and Prince Norodom Sihanouk, the country's former
ruler and the titular head of the resistance, refused to come
into a government without them. The combatants and their
assorted international sponsors had hoped to reach agreement
before the Vietnamese pullout. Now, with the occupiers gone and
no political settlement in sight, the country is girding for
further bloodshed. Most chilling is the possibility of the
return of the Khmer Rouge, a force of some 25,000 guerrillas who
now dismiss as "mistakes" the genocidal practices that provoked
the Vietnamese to chase them from power in 1979.

    As pessimism descends over a land haunted by shadows and
fears, rumors and bad dreams, there is no obvious leader to
guide Cambodia toward a more sane solution. The capricious
Sihanouk, who ruled in the 1950s and '60s, stands as a symbol
of better times. But his erratic behavior in recent months has
baffled Cambodians and international observers alike as he has
bounced between conciliation with Hun Sen and collaboration with
the Khmer Rouge. Son Sann maintains links with a second
guerrilla force whose disciplined units are outnumbered by
troops preoccupied with smuggling and black-market trading. And
the Khmer Rouge continue to inspire revulsion among a populace
that remains deeply scarred by Pol Pot's reign of terror between
1975 and 1979.

    In recent months Prime Minister Hun Sen has been winning
favorable reviews. Once regarded as a mere puppet of the
authorities in Hanoi, Hun Sen, 38, has emerged as a leader with
a mind of his own. Whether by conviction or out of cynical
self-interest, he has pursued reformist policies designed to
repair his country's shattered economy as well as to endear him
to skeptical citizens: the institution of land-tenure rights
for farmers, the beginnings of a free-market economy and
recognition of Buddhism as the state religion. While Hun Sen's
cloudy history as a former member of the Khmer Rouge and his
association with the Vietnamese continue to haunt him, he is
gaining stature as a nationalist. He is regarded by many
Cambodians as the only viable alternative to the Khmer Rouge.

    But China and most of the nations of Southeast Asia
consider Hun Sen a usurper. The Prime Minister is a reminder of
Vietnam's expansionist impulse, which has earned Hanoi distrust
and fear throughout the region for centuries. China, which
continues to arm the Khmer Rouge, is not alone in refusing to
allow Vietnam to win through political means what it failed to
achieve militarily. Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore
says that Hun Sen must legitimize his rule in a free election.
"Any other way of leaving Hun Sen in charge," says Lee, "would
mean that aggression does pay."

    The U.S., which has long provided aid to the non-Communist
forces of Sihanouk and Son Sann and has not ruled out military
assistance in the future, similarly argues that Hun Sen heads
an illegitimate administration imposed by a foreign power. In
its anti-Vietnamese zeal, Washington overlooked Sihanouk's
alliance with the Khmer Rouge, which did most of the fighting
during eleven years of guerrilla opposition. The Bush
Administration is left in the uncomfortable position of backing
a mercurial prince who remains aligned with men bent on
restoring an odious regime. But the Administration maintains,
with good reason, that any settlement that ignores the Khmer
Rouge is a formula for civil war.

    Last week the U.S. attempted to lay blame for the policy
impasse on Hanoi's doorstep. Said State Department spokesman
Richard Boucher: "We believe that Vietnam cannot evade its
responsibility to help achieve a comprehensive political
solution in Cambodia." Until now, the U.S. led Hanoi to believe
that the withdrawal of its troops from Cambodia would be enough
to rescue Vietnam from its international isolation. But with
that formulation, Washington destroyed Hanoi's hopes for prompt
normalization of relations with the outside world and an end to
the trade embargo that has wrecked Vietnam's economy. The
crippling boycott has deprived Hanoi of all Western aid, credit,
technology and trade, turning the country of 65 million people
into a basket case.

    Hanoi will have to try to revive its bankrupt economy with
little help from the outside world. The Vietnamese dream is for
another Asian miracle, patterned on what its newly
industrialized neighbors have achieved. Reformers have laid
ambitious plans for restructuring the economy on free-market
principles. "We think of ourselves as South Korea 25 years ago,"
says Nguyen Xuan Oanh, a senior adviser to the Vietnamese
government. "The only stumbling block is how soon will the U.S.
give us the green light."

    Even with American cooperation, that vision could prove
elusive. The aging revolutionaries who dominate Vietnam's
13-member Politburo are largely uneducated and rigidly
dogmatic. They resist the creative solutions of younger
technocrats and refuse to countenance the kind of political
renovation that might stanch the flow of tens of thousands of
refugees each year. Like the Chinese, they continue to believe
that economic miracles are possible without political reform.
"The Old Guard was good for war," says a Foreign Ministry
official, "but not for peacetime Viet Nam."

    As for Cambodia, the current political stalemate is certain
to prove costly for the country's weary civilians. Deserters
from Hun Sen's army tell stories suggesting that some of the
40,000 regulars lack both the esprit and basic fighting skills
required to hold back the resistance forces. The army's recent
practice of shanghaiing young conscripts off the streets is not
likely to generate goodwill -- or good soldiers. The national
battalions are supplemented by local and provincial militias,
perhaps 150,000 in all, which Hun Sen hopes will do better at
defending their homes. As yet, both the army and the rural
militias are largely untested. But last week the regulars were
still resisting a Khmer Rouge offensive on Pailin, a ruby-rich
district near the Thai border that is critical to the rebels'
infiltration route.

    Hun Sen's forces should be able to hold off the poorly
disciplined forces of Sihanouk and Son Sann, perhaps 20,000 in
all. The declared aim of their offensive was to test the
strength of the government and force resumption of political
talks. The Khmer Rouge are a different matter. Inside Cambodia
the common wisdom is that Khmer Rouge strength and ability are
overrated. But the view from the border, where most of the
troops are based, is far less sanguine. "The Khmer Rouge are in
this fight to the end," says a guerrilla-warfare expert in
Thailand. Observes an international relief worker: "They are
known as a clean and disciplined movement, not corrupt like the
others."

    There is a widespread assumption that the Khmer Rouge are
gearing for a major offensive. Many analysts believe that the
rebels will move fast to demonstrate the military weakness of
the Hun Sen government. Only by inflicting a significant
military defeat within the next couple of months can they
forestall a growing willingness to recognize his rule. Equally
important, a major Khmer Rouge victory would destroy any
lingering thoughts Sihanouk might entertain about cutting a deal
with Hun Sen. Sadly, it seems more bloodletting will be needed
to convince the various factions that political compromise is
the only answer. Until then, Cambodia's long nightmare will go
on.


-- Ross H. Munro/Aranyaprathet and William Stewart/Phnom Penh