> we hadn't bombed the shit out of eastern Cambodia during the Vietnam war.
To put that in more concrete terms, the US dropped more 2.7 million tons of bombs on Cambodia. I spoke not too long ago with some Cambodian men in Kompong Thom, which is a central province, who related how as children they would disassemble unexploded ordnance and sell the scrap materials. This particular village didn't have much awareness of or contact with the KR regime as I understand it, but after the bombing they resorted to eating tree bark and leaves for a period of multiple years.
I didn't realize it until recently, but Laos was bombed even more heavily than Cambodia. Apparently, there are still 80 million unexploded US bombs littered across Laos. It's hard to even imagine that.
To put that in more concrete terms, the US dropped more 2.7 million tons of bombs on Cambodia. I spoke not too long ago with some Cambodian men in Kompong Thom, which is a central province, who related how as children they would disassemble unexploded ordnance and sell the scrap materials. This particular village didn't have much awareness of or contact with the KR regime as I understand it, but after the bombing they resorted to eating tree bark and leaves for a period of multiple years.
I didn't realize it until recently, but Laos was bombed even more heavily than Cambodia. Apparently, there are still 80 million unexploded US bombs littered across Laos. It's hard to even imagine that.