Khmer Enigma

Historians of modern Cambodia must be praying that Pol Pot remains alive and in reasonable health, so that he can be brought to proper trial, perhaps as part of a deal between Hun Sen and the remnants of the Khmer Rouge holding him captive. Although Pol Pot failed to wipe out history, he certainly left a four-year gap in it. He is unique among modern revolutionary leaders for having left so little trace of himself. It was at least two years into the revolution before even his brothers realised that Pol Pot (an assumed name without any meaning, unlike Stalin, which means steel) was none other than their very own Saloth Sar, who had gone into hiding soon after his return from Paris in 1953. Most remarkably, according to his biographer David Chandler, he is universally described as polite, charming, deferential and a gifted teacher, even by defectors and survivors. The man is clearly an enigma. Only a trial will help us better understand how his personality and misguided vision came to cause the suffering it did. Phrases like "genocidal maniac" and "worse than Hitler" fail to explain anything.