Cambodia & History: Pol Pot, that smiling, polite monster and dunce

Pol Pot, born Saloth Sar on 19 May 1925 in the Cambodian province of Kompong Thom, remains one of the most infamous figures in history for his role as leader of the Khmer Rouge regime.

Pol Pot, that smiling, polite monster and dunce

His radical communist government, which ruled Cambodia from 1975 to 1979, was responsible for the Cambodian genocide that claimed the lives of nearly three million people, victims of forced labour, famine, disease, torture and executions.

Wealthy family

Pol Pot was born into a relatively wealthy farming family in Prek Sbauv, near Kampong Thom. His family was of mixed Chinese and Khmer descent, and his mother was respected for her piety.

After experiencing difficulties at school, Pol Pot studied carpentry before obtaining a scholarship to study radio electronics in Paris in 1949. In France, he became involved with the French Communist Party and the Cambodian revolutionary nationalists. On his return to Cambodia in 1953, Pol Pot found a nation on the verge of independence.

Political beginnings

He began working as a teacher while secretly engaging in underground communist activities aimed at opposing King Norodom Sihanouk.

Some historians claim that the young Pol Pot was fascinated by the French Revolution and the period known as the Terror. This would explain his commitment to radical methods.

In 1960, Pol Pot helped found the Cambodian Communist Party, later known as the Khmer Rouge, and adopted its revolutionary pseudonym. These early experiences laid the ideological and organisational foundations for his future leadership of the Khmer Rouge regime.

Coming to power

Pol Pot came to power after leading the Khmer Rouge forces that overthrew the regime of General Lon Nol in 1975. Thus, although Pol Pot was deeply involved in revolutionary warfare and guerrilla strategies, there is no evidence that he personally participated in any ground combat or even ever handled a weapon.

As prime minister from 1976 to 1979, he implemented radical social reforms aimed at creating an agrarian utopia, which devastated the population and infrastructure of Cambodia. He was ousted by Vietnamese forces in January 1979 and retreated for a time to Thailand to lead guerrilla resistance against the new government.

A contrasting personality

Accounts of Pol Pot's private behaviour suggest a stark contrast to the brutality of his regime. Interviews with those who interacted with him personally describe him as soft-spoken, polite and reserved. Despite being the instigator of one of the most devastating genocides in modern history, Pol Pot is said to have been calm and collected in private. This juxtaposition between his gentle personal demeanour and the atrocities committed under his leadership has been noted by both historians and survivors.

However, his ideological rigidity and unwavering commitment to radical communist principles were evident even in private discussions, reflecting his belief in the need for extreme measures to realise his vision of an agrarian utopia.

Pol Pot married twice. His second marriage was in 1986 to Mea Son, with whom he had a daughter named Sar Patchata. In fact, there is little information about Pol Pot's personal life apart from his marriages and children. He focused mainly on his political ambitions and the implementation of his extreme communist ideology.

In the mid-1990s, Pol Pot's influence weakened as the Khmer Rouge fractured under the effect of desertions and internal conflicts. In June 1997, he was ousted from the leadership and placed under house arrest. Found guilty of treason by his colleagues in July of the same year,

Pol Pot died on 15 April 1998, near Anlong Veng, at the age of 72. Officially attributed to heart failure, his death was surrounded by rumours of suicide or murder, but no autopsy was performed to confirm the cause.