thing about the group's goals. Khmer tradition expected peasants to obey authority, and few asked questions or criticized the guerrillas.Another of Pol Pot’s main goals, which is directly tied to the country’s religion, was to purify Cambodia by ridding it of all but Khmer people. DK outlawed all religion except Buddhism and forbade the practice of cultural traditions of other races. All languages other than Khmer were banned.An anti-Vietnamese fixation was one of the major features of the Khmer Rouge's radical nationalism. The problem between the two nations resulted partly from a growing conflict between the Soviet Union and China. Vietnam had ties with the Soviet Union while Cambodia backed China. DK provoked Vietnam into a bizarre border war by massacring border villages, claiming several islands, and urging each Cambodian to kill 30 Vietnamese. The population of the Eastern Cambodian Zone, bordering Vietnam, was said to have been contaminated by Vietnamese influence. They were marked with blue scarves and sent to work camps and torture centers in other regions. In 1975, all Vietnamese Cambodians were ordered to leave by DK, and all those who remained were executed.By mid 1978, Vietnam and Cambodia were engaged in heavy combat. Later that year a new Cambodian government was formed in Vietnam. Before the government could be enforced, in early 1979, Vietnam invaded and captured Phnom Penh. The Khmer Rouge and DK fled toward the Thai border. A puppet government controlled by Vietnam was established in Phnom Penh, and the nation was renamed the People’s Republic of Kampuchea. The PRK had opposition, and in 1991, the UN gained control of Cambodia, providing them with their first free elections. The election’s result was a multiparty democracy within a constitutional monarchy. By 1997, the Khmer Rouge had almost completely collapsed and Pol Pot was removed from its leadership. Overall, the estimated death toll unde...
