First Published: The Call, Vol. 7, No. 50, December 25, 1978.
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba
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The Vietnamese “dry season” offensive against Kampuchea is now well underway with heavy backing from the USSR. The goal of the Vietnamese aggression is to topple the socialist government led by Pol Pot and reverse the Kampuchean revolution. By doing this they hope to drop the curtain of Soviet domination over all of Indochina, and establish Vietnam as the regional boss on the scene.
The most treacherous action taken by the Vietnamese leaders to date was an announcement earlier this month that a so-called “Kampuchean National United Front for National Salvation” had been set up to wage a “liberation struggle” in Kampuchea.
This new organization is a creature nurtured and hatched in Hanoi. There is nothing “Kampuchean” about it, except a handful of Kampuchean traitors whom the Vietnamese have hired to lead it.
The radio station which the “united front” claims to run from inside “liberated areas” of Cambodia really broadcasts from Vietnam. The “guerrilla operations” it claims to be carrying out are nothing more than aggressive Vietnamese forays into Kampuchean territory. The “massive support” it claims to have is not from the Kampuchean people but from Vietnam, the USSR and the revisionist parties of the world, including the CPUSA here.
Why was this “united front” set up so suddenly?
It seems that the whole world was beginning to see Vietnam’s true role as the aggressor in the conflict with Kampuchea. International protests have gone up against the vast military campaign the Vietnamese have launched, especially the dropping of anti-personnel cluster bombs and poison gas canisters on the Kampuchean countryside. The establishment of this new “liberation movement” is just a heavy-handed trick by the Vietnamese leaders to pass off their own aggression as the activities of “Kampuchean liberation fighters.”
But the trick won’t work. History is full of lessons on this point. In the 1950s, when the U.S. set up the Khmer Serai “liberation movement,” neither the Kampuchean people nor the people of the world were fooled into thinking that it was anything but a front for U.S. imperialist interests. Similarly, when the U.S. tried to sell the bill of goods that it had been “invited” by the Lon Nol government to invade Cambodia in 1970, world opinion quickly saw this as a stage-managed affair between puppet and master. In 1974 the USSR also used the same tactic promoting a “third force” to oppose the liberation struggle.
Just as U.S. and Soviet efforts to dominate Kampuchea ultimately failed, today’s efforts by Vietnam are doomed to defeat as well. The Kampuchean people’s cause is just. No matter what propaganda is dished up in Hanoi, the people of the world will see the truth for themselves and rally to Kampuchea’s side.