CAMBODIA IS AN easy place to romanticise. From the vine-draped temples of the ancient Angkorian empire, remnants of Cambodia’s glorious past, to the forested Cardamom mountains and the Great Lake, it conforms to the clichéd postcard image of an eastern Garden of Eden. Its towns and cities, mapped out by the French, are spacious tree-lined boulevards with large villas of fading yellow stucco. Roughly the size of England and Wales, it is centred around the Tonle Sap or Great Lake, a vast expanse of water that stretches over a thousand square miles. The lake is surrounded by a green patchwork quilt of paddy fields fenced in by sugar palms. The land seems so apparently abundant in food that the Chinese even coined a saying, ‘as rich as Cambodia’. From the lake’s southern shores, the plain gradually sweeps up to the Cardamoms, disappearing into the leaden monsoon clouds. To the north, the Dangrek range forms a natural frontier with Thailand. Cutting the country in half is the mighty Mekong River.
Angkor was the capital of one of south-east Asia’s greatest empires, which once stretched from south Vietnam to Burma, and covered much of the Malay Peninsula. Tourists in Cambodia today are taken first to Angkor, then to Tuol Sleng, two strange apparent opposites as a basic itinerary for a holiday-maker. The lost kingdom of Angkor represented the peak of Khmer civilisation, while the brutality of Tuol Sleng represented the extreme perversity of power. In fact, the two places have more in common than one might think. Both were created at the cost of thousands of lives by regimes of institutionalised brutality. But the parallels don’t end there.
Angkor’s greatness depended on rice production, grown for centuries in the rich alluvial soil surrounding the Great Lake. The temple complex itself included large reservoirs, or baray, whose true purpose is still disputed. Many believe they were used for irrigation, even though there are no irrigation canals leading to the surrounding fields. It was with this mistaken belief that the Khmer Rouge ordered the construction of large dams and irrigation canals, projects on which hundreds of thousands of people died. Angkor was an inspiration and a symbol of the nation’s potential. As Pol Pot had said in 1976, ‘If our people can build Angkor, then they can do anything.’
Despite their attempts to rewrite history, the Khmer Rouge made constant references to Angkor: in speeches and broadcasts, even in their national anthem. King Jayavarman VII was the only Angkorian king the Khmer Rouge ever praised. Jayavarman–jaya means victorious, varman means protector–greatly expanded the empire, building more temples and edifices than any of his predecessors. He has often been referred to by historians as a megalomaniac. Like Pol Pot he mobilised the entire population and employed slave labour for the realisation of his vision.
The gates of the great walled city of Angkor Thom are carved with stone faces, believed to modelled on Jayavarman’s, gazing down upon the mortals below. Each face bears an enigmatic smile. At another Angkorian temple, the Bayon, more than a hundred more faces adorn each of its towers. Wherever you turn at least one pair of eyes follows you. The faces represented the all-knowing, all-seeing god King as he kept watch over his subjects. The Khmer Rouge used to say that ‘The Organisation sees all’. The faces of the Bayon appear on Khmer Rouge bank notes, which were printed but never issued. Black-clad peasants can be seen transplanting rice next to an image of one of these faces.
Jayavarman imposed upon his subjects Mahayana Buddhism, which followers believed was the universal way to salvation. Merit was made by doing works for the greater good and it was perhaps an unconscious echo of Mahayana which found expression under the guise of communist theory. Mahayana believed that only by following this example could people reach true liberation. Theravada Buddhism by contrast, which arrived later and dominates today, believed salvation was to be attained through rituals and ceremonies for the individual.
The centrepiece of this once powerful nation is the magnificent Angkor Wat complex built in the twelfth century. As tall as Notre-Dame cathedral, it is the largest religious monument in the world. Its five towers rising above the surrounding jungle canopy are visible for miles. These silhouetted towers have been used by successive Cambodian regimes to adorn their flags, including the Khmer Rouge.
Like the Khmer Rouge when they were in power, Cambodians today constantly look to the past. While Angkor is a source of great pride, it is also a burden. It is both a celebration of Cambodia’s past greatness and a reminder of its subsequent decline–a symbol of a deep national insecurity when the empire was overrun by Cambodia’s traditional foes–the Thais and the Vietnamese.
The majority of Cambodia’s settlements were situated along rivers and waterways that snaked their way across the plains. Houses were shaded from the searing heat by the stately fruit trees that grew tall along the lush banks. Village life had changed little over the centuries and, although beautiful, it was an unforgiving landscape and life was hard. The heavy tasks were carried out by water buffalo. The roads–really nothing more than tracks–became potholed quagmires in the rainy season, only adding to the isolation of rural life. Behind the villages were well-irrigated paddy fields that spread towards the horizon, petering out into the uncultivated land beyond. But it was these arid swathes of the country that constituted the majority of Cambodia’s agricultural potential, and it went untended. The farmers relied on unpredictable monsoon weather rains for their family’s survival.
Kompong Thom sits in the centre of Cambodia. This sparsely populated province is bound by thick forests to the north, dissolving into the swampy shores of the Great Lake to the south. The provincial capital, which goes by the same name, is marooned in a sea of paddy fields.
Strategically located, Kompong Thom province was fiercely contested by the Khmer Rouge and government forces in the early 1970s. All along Route 6, the only road linking it with Phnom Penh, battles raged, with thousands of government troops routed by the Khmer Rouge and their allies, the North Vietnamese. The province had been devastated by B-52 bombers sent on the secret orders of Nixon and Kissinger, a campaign of destruction which the Khmer Rouge would exploit. Kompong Thom was also the birthplace of Pol Pot and Comrade Duch.
Duch was born Kaing Geuk Eav on 17 November 1942 in a hut on the banks of the River Stoung. The eldest and only son of a family of five, both his mother and father were Chinese Khmers and had lived their entire lives in the village. The family was poor. By the time Duch was born, Cambodia had begun its steady economic decline, with large landowners driving farmers into a vicious spiral of debt. Many Cambodians had become slaves in their own land, a humiliating position for the descendants of the Angkorian empire.
When Duch was nine years old, a dispute over land forced the family to move to a plot left by Duch’s great-grandmother, where the family house now stands. Their fortunes changed when Duch’s father, Kaing Ky, got a job as a clerk with a local Chinese fishery company. He was hired because he spoke Chinese, but the work was seasonal and he could never put money aside. To supplement their income his mother, Siew, sold orange cakes and fried bananas in the market. Their neighbours regarded Duch’s family as honest and hard-working people who helped others in need.
The young Duch began studying in the next village at the Po Andeth (‘floating banyan’) school, a small wooden building shaded by a pagoda. Every day, along with the other village children, Duch made the ten-minute walk from his home along a sandy pathway to school and back. He then moved to Kompong Chen primary school next door. There, his teacher Ke Kim Huot was a popular figure who often gave money to the poorer students so that they could continue their studies. It is almost certain Ke Kim Huot later helped Duch go on to study in Phnom Penh. Duch continued to progress well at his studies, passing all his exams with ease.
Duch grew up in an isolated world bound by tradition and stifling codes of conduct. Most peasants were deeply conservative, and had been for centuries. Strong attachments remained with the family and there was deep reverence for the traditional way of life. The pillars of Khmer life–the nation, the Sangha and the King–remained absolute and, for the most part, the people accepted their lot.
Before the French colonised the country in the nineteenth century, the King was at the top of the social scale; below him were his various officials, and at the bottom were the villagers. The Sangha bound these worlds together and the authority of the monks, like the King, was beyond question. The King had arrived at his position from accumulation of good karma in previous lives and he ruled ‘like an axe from heaven’. He was largely a reclusive figure, and like the spirits and gods, was revered as a god King by his people. As with the legend of King Arthur, the King and the land were inseparable, the fortunes of both inextricably linked. Life, for most rural folk, was precarious. Beyond the village were evil spirits, animals and marauding bandits and other unseen dangers. Outsiders were viewed with suspicion. As in Buddhist teachings, humans were imperfect and in need of guidance and protection. Alone they were helpless and vulnerable and it was considered safer to remain as part of a group. A strict hierarchy was maintained through a patron–client system. People were expected to serve those in authority and those in authority expected to be served. Outside of the family, alliances were formed and it was believed that ‘The rich must protect the poor, just as clothes protect the body.’ To have a patron meant having protection.
In 2002, I visited Duch’s old home. It was a modest but substantial house, perched on stilts and shaded by mango, longan and palm trees. The shutters had recently been painted blue. The walls were a greying white of mud-andwattle and the exposed beams gave it an almost mock-Tudor appearance. The air was thick with the scent of jasmine and wood smoke mixed with pig dung. The house had a steep, rather ostentatious concrete staircase suggesting that Duch’s family had been, by local standards, a family of some means.
There was nobody in, but the door was open. A man in his early thirties then appeared and immediately I could see the family resemblance: it was Duch’s nephew. His mother was now living in Siem Reap, further to the west, the nephew said, and he was looking after the house. (Duch’s father survived the war and the Khmer Rouge but died of natural causes in the mid-eighties). With a smile he invited me in and leaving our shoes at the foot of the staircase we climbed the steps. The interior was dark and musty, I had to wait for my eyes to adjust after the intense glare of the sun outside. The nephew, pulling out some mats to sit on, served some lukewarm Chinese tea. The house was dirty and unlived in. There was an old Singer sewing machine in the main room where guests would have been received and meals eaten. The teak floor–worn smooth over the years by thousands of footsteps–felt cool beneath my bare feet. Burnt stubs of incense protruded from a bowl in a traditional Chinese shrine set above the door. Propped up against the back of the cabinet behind the grimy glass sat a framed black-and-white photograph of a wedding. Dead insects had imprinted themselves on the paper in between the glass and the image. About thirty people were stiffly lined up, blank expressions on their faces as they stared out at me from the cabinet.
The photograph had been taken at the foot of the stairs that I had just climbed. It could have been taken yesterday–the house had changed little. All those seated had been told to place their hands on their knees as though on their best behaviour. A cluster of people, clearly not part of the group, possibly cooks, sat in the open window relaxed and smiling in sharp contrast to those below. The photographer had used flash to illuminate the scene. I scanned the faces for Duch, but he was nowhere to be seen. I had attended Khmer weddings before and had noticed how the occasion was taken over by the incessant need to document every moment as if the whole ceremony were laid on for the purpose of having it photographed. It was as though the photographs were needed to somehow legitimise the proceedings. Before the days of machine printing, people could only afford one formal portrait. It was a serious business and in the resulting photographs people looked solemn and self-conscious, as though they were attending a funeral and not a wedding. This photograph was no different.
Next to it lay a formal portrait of a teenager. It was Duch at about seventeen. Part of the image had been eaten away by white ants and the bottom had rotted in the humidity. It didn’t detract from the smooth-skinned, neat, almost angelic youth under the glass. It was the first time that I had seen an image of him without his Khmer Rouge uniform. Unsmiling, hair carefully combed, his eyes were focused somewhere in the distance beyond my right shoulder, past the chipped frame that now contained it. The image embodied a certain idealism, as these kind of studio photographs of young teenagers often do. It had survived all the years of upheaval.
I drove on to Siem Reap to find Duch’s mother. It grew dark, and the world narrowed to the LandCruiser’s headlight beams and the potholes they illuminated. Three years before, it would have been impossible to take this route. Then the night belonged to the Khmer Rouge. Now the road was deserted. I strained to make out the houses in the trees, but they were concealed in darkness.
After driving for hours, the glow of Siem Reap appeared on the horizon. Taxis overladen with goods and people hurtled past at frightening speeds. After the countryside, where life had changed little since medieval times, arriving in Siem Reap left me in a daze. There were brightly lit internet cafés, hotels, chic restaurants housed in old colonial buildings and noisy karaoke lounges.
Duch’s mother lived with her daughter and granddaughter in a small shack down a Siem Reap alley. When I arrived Kaing Kim Siew was cradling her great-granddaughter in a hammock in the corner, while Duch’s sister was busy in the kitchen.
It was an awkward encounter for me, and a deeply uncomfortable one for them. They knew I had come to talk about Duch. Once she had relaxed a little, his mother recalled an obedient but earnest son. She described how Duch’s father made the boy a tiny boat and dragged him around the house in it. This was his favourite game. As a young boy, Duch often accompanied her to the market or to visit relatives nearby. But, at the age of three, Duch fell sick. ‘I was frightened, very frightened,’ she recalled. ‘He was my only son.’
Cambodia had a high infant mortality rate and medicines were scarce. Most people relied on traditional healing and distrusted modern drugs, which they couldn’t in any case afford. Life expectancy for most didn’t extend much beyond forty-five years. Diseases such as malaria, tuberculosis, polio and dysentery were widespread. Drinking water came from wells and had to be boiled to avoid a multitude of parasites and diseases. Hence Duch’s mother’s terror when he fell sick.
As he grew older he helped his parents around the home. ‘Because he was the oldest,’ said his mother, ‘I used to call him to help when I had no time.’ Every day, after school, he went to fetch water from the river and watered all the trees and plants in the garden. The family grew and sold vegetables and fruit. Duch also chopped firewood and helped his mother prepare food, and sometimes helped his father with his accounts. He spent most of his free time at home–an intense, rather lonely figure who preferred books to the company of others. Maths books were his favourite, but he also read Khmer and French literature. ‘Even when he went to work like this, he would bring a book and when he felt tired, he’d stop and read,’ said his mother. She described a serious boy who rarely smiled and hardly ever laughed. But nor was he without humour. His sister recalled him dancing the Ram Khbach, a traditional Khmer dance, and sending the entire family into fits of laughter.
His three other sisters attended school but, as tradition dictated in poorer families, the eldest stayed at home to help run the household. ‘He was very sorry for me,’ said Kim Hiep, ‘because I was the only one who never had the benefit of an education, so I was the “ignorant” sister.’ She began to work as a seamstress to help pay off family debts. ‘We were poor,’ said his mother. ‘Life was terribly difficult.’
The photograph I had found at the house in Stoung had shown Kim Hiep’s wedding in 1969. Duch was not in the picture. He was serving an unspecified sentence for his communist activities at the time, in a prison near Phnom Penh called Prey Sar. Later, when the Khmer Rouge took power, the same prison was to come under his direct control as commandant of S-21.
Kim Hiep’s marriage only lasted eight years. By the end of Pol Pot’s reign, Kim Hiep’s husband and most of those in the photograph were among the two million missing. Even friends and family from the Khmer Rouge’s upper echelons weren’t spared. Nearly a quarter of a century later, she still had no idea what had happened to her husband. He had been arrested in 1977 somewhere in Kompong Thom and sent to Phnom Penh. Later a former executioner from Tuol Sleng told me that he had been taken to the prison and executed.
Looking at the other houses along Stoung’s riverbank, there was little to distinguish Duch’s home from the others. To their neighbours and relatives they were much the same as everyone else. They were tomada–ordinary. But their large wooden house with its tiled roof was a far cry from the impoverished hovels that made up much of rural Cambodia–and they had even owned a small plot of land. But here in the village there was nothing remarkable about them. Nor was the fact that Duch spent his time alone, separate from other children, considered strange. And perhaps that was all there was to it, that Duch really was a recluse. He was studious, polite and unremarkable–or perhaps remarkable in his lack of distinction. There was only one side of him that ever found expression and that was the bookish loner who rarely emerged from his parent’s home.
Traditionally in Cambodia, the family was all-important and much stock was placed upon outward appearances, particularly among the ethnic Chinese. Clearly Duch’s mother and sister were anxious to preserve the appearance of a harmonious family, concealing any discord that may have existed with all the formal decorum of the wedding photograph. The more time I spent with them the more I sensed a protective fence being weaved before me, unsure as they were of my intentions. Duch would have been well aware of the expectations of his family and of the importance of his position within it. Later, like many Khmer Rouge cadres, his Chinese-Khmer lineage would set him apart from the ranks of ethnic Khmers that the revolution claimed to champion. As an outsider, he might have felt trapped by his own limitations on one side and his family’s ambition on the other. With his academic ability, he was perfect material for a cadre of a revolution.
His mother and sister knew something of his role during the Khmer Rouge but how much was difficult to say. And they certainly weren’t going to tell me. They naturally wanted to discourage further investigation by painting a flawless image of him. The family had invested all their hopes in Duch. No doubt they were also protecting themselves from that painful time and from what the family favourite had become. It was as though they were holding the photograph of the schoolboy up to me, using it to protect themselves and the image of the family. I could sense their confusion. They remembered a son and brother; not the executioner of S-21.