If the attack was destined to fail, it isn't just that the rebels were poorly trained, insufficiently armed and far too few, or even that the plan was absurd. (News reports indicated that some insurgents got high on rice wine and perhaps even opium to screw up their courage. That couldn't have helped.)
The real problem was that Operation Volcano blew into a trap. The government obtained the ragtag bunch's attack plan well before they arrived; Kiri Kim made the mistake of sharing copies of the plan with some of his men in a country where selling such information to authorities is lucrative.
Hun Sen wasn't just ready to defeat them; he was ready to use them. A day after the attack, authorities had rounded up at least 58 people, some of whom Chhun referred to as his heroic colleagues. Cambodia's strongman quickly raised the specter of terrorism emanating from U.S. soil, warning his enemies in both countries that they would be put on trial. "Do not think that you can escape," he warned. "The United States is cooperating with us."
Officials at the American Embassy in Phnom Penh, however, were circumspect. One official there told The Cambodia Daily that the rebels were "the gang that couldn't shoot straight." Many of the supposed insurgents testified in court that they had been physically intimidated into making false confessions.
American skepticism only increased in September 2001, after the 9/11 attacks, when Hun Sen promised to collaborate with Washington in the antiterror fight — and then he arrested another 64 "terrorists," including a host of peaceful political opponents who supposedly were linked to Operation Volcano. (Chhun didn't know who they were.) At least five members of the political opposition remain in prison more than a decade later. Chhun's attack was, as democratic opposition leader Sam Rainsy tells the Weekly, "the greatest gift to Hun Sen."
CAMBODIA'S PRINCE OF EGYPT
I contacted Yasith Chhun soon after Operation Volcano. Speaking via cellphone from a "secret location" near the Cambodian border, he told me he was "very regretful" about the deaths in Phnom Penh, but he didn't see any other way to change Cambodia.
A zealous anti-communist, Chhun was convinced that Hun Sen — who had already morphed into a nouveau riche, postcommunist, Mafia-style kingpin — remained a Maoist ideologue. "We will never change the nature of the Communist dictatorship with rallies," Chhun said. "Communists are like cows. The cow never respects what we say. We sing a song, the cow never listens, never understands, so we have to use force or guns."
His peculiar bovine theme likely made more sense to rural Cambodians. But the odd mix of Chhun's Cambodian and Angeleno lives became even clearer when I asked him what triggered a Long Beach accountant to launch the overthrow effort. It was, he said, "God's mission" for him to free his people. God communicated to Chhun, a Buddhist-born convert to the Seventh-Day Adventist Church, via the animated 1998 Disney film The Prince of Egypt. Chhun interpreted the film's message as he saw it: "Moses tried to liberate the slaves of Egypt. Like him, I am not afraid of anything."
If necessary, Chhun could handle punishment for his efforts, he said, but he doubted it would be necessary. He was fighting against tyranny, and what could be more American than that?
THE SCARS
In California, Chhun ate to his stomach's content, drove an air-conditioned car, raised his children and tallied the incomes of American taxpayers, but he was haunted by Cambodia. "I have a business in Long Beach with 3,000 clients," Chhun told me. "I earn almost a million dollars a year. I have kids, a wife and a family to take care of. So why am I coming here to suffer? Because I cannot ignore the bloodshed of my people."
Perhaps more than anything, the fate of Chhun's father, Yem Kong, defined such bloodshed for him. Upon seizing power in 1975, the Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia ordered the executions of nearly every person linked to the previous U.S.-backed military regime. Yem Kong was particularly vulnerable. He hadn't merely been an active supporter of that government: He had reported on the Khmer Rouge revolutionaries' rural activities.
Chhun's family were evicted from their home in a town in Banteay Meanchey province in the northwest, and his siblings were sent off to work camps. Chhun was a sickly child, so he was permitted to stay with his parents. They moved to a collectivized farm and labored there until one day, while Chhun was bathing in a nearby river, a dozen armed Khmer Rouge soldiers arrived. "They pulled my father out of the hut," Chhun wrote in a letter to the judge, "and beheaded him."
It wasn't a clean beheading, Chhun told Dr. William H. Sacks, who provided a psychiatric report to the court. The head was "almost severed but still partially connected by skin." Chhun's mother collapsed onto her husband's corpse in grief, but the Khmer Rouge warned her not to cry for a man who deserved such a fate. They told her that she would be executed, too, if she acted as an enemy spy.
It appeared at the time of the attack that Chhun's story was so implausible that the whole thing had been a conspiracy hatched by Hun Sen to flush out his enemies, and Chhun was acting for him, either deliberately or as, Rainsy says, as his dupe. Do you now think there's any truth to that or is what you see what you get with Chhun. Was much new evidence brought out in the trial?
Interesting. I want to feel sympathy for Chhun, but the story is so one-sided that I'm not sure what to believe. I do believe U.S. foreign policy is fucked though.
By the way, The Prince of Egypt was made by DREAMWORKS ANIMATION and not Disney. It was one of their first productions.
This is the best cover article I've read in LA Weekly since you were taken over by corporate interests! Good work, fascinating story.
I gather from the tone of the article that we are supposed to feel that a miscarriage of justice took place. But the only problem I see is that the individual wasn't arrested once it became apparent that he was responsible for the attack that cost so many lives in Cambodia. The part about his growing up under the Khmer Rouge is indeed very sad, but it doesn't justify his vigilante tactics.
"cost so many lives"... are you kidding me. 3-10 deaths isn't much compared to the of deaths committed by the current political party in Cambodia. Ted Kane what do you know about suffering and oppression, its easy to judge someone thats lived a comfortable bourgeoisie life.
I gather from the tone of the article that we are supposed to feel that a miscarriage of justice took place. But the only problem I see is that the individual wasn't arrested once it became apparent that he was responsible for the attack that cost so many lives in Cambodia. The part about his growing up under the Khmer Rouge is indeed very sad, but it doesn't justify his vigilante tactics.
Educated Individuals will check the true history.The article fails to point out that without Vietnam the KR would have killed many more in Cambodia.The Journalist did not quote US State Dept facts about Hun Sen winning electionsand continued to chant Hun Sen opposition rhetoric propoganda. As far as Yasith making a million USD ,What idiot did not ck Yasith's tax returns?. Many of Yasith's clients according to reports from L.B. had problems with the tax returns reporting false/ incorrect information. Also the reporter should ask Chunn Yasith if he knew how to ballance his own business cking account.Any one asking who the real suckers are? Yasith had a few wives.His children and family lack a stable life style. Whacked out in the head good you pointed out he sees a shrink.Many in L.B. feel Yasith was betrayed by a major Republican Congressman that in the past has also praised or supported Sam Rainsy.Was he motivated a little by the guy who wants to get every Commie? A major Republican in the US Congress made the statement similar to "if Hun Sen wins the election there will be less US Aid to Cambodia"...
Many died because of Yasith.He not only could have ruined relations between the USA and Cambodia but he could have added to Cambodian poverty and hindered relations.With Hun Sen came thousands of schools, bridges, new roads, peace and development.What has Sam Rainsy, Chunn Yasith brought besides deceit and despair.? Does sam Rainsy pay tax on all the money he bleeds from the USA supporters?The Gernade attack 1997 was mis leading when many think Sam Rainsy staged the event to make Hun Sen look bad.1993 Hun Sen at the Paris Accords wanted the KR put on trial for Genocide. 1997&1998 Sam Rainsy joined with the KR to overthrow the faily elected Govt of Cambodia. Please check the US State Dept reports. Shame on you for not reporting all sides of the story.Yasith claims to favor democracy. Did he think of a vote vs using drunk terrorists?Gary Fultheim, UCC Plaza Long Beach Calif
Now that the strong message has been sent, hopefully the 9th Circuit will decide that the sentencing judge gave undue weight to improper criteria and Chhun will be free.
There is a lesson -- however. And people will not like to hear it, but Faith is dangerous. Without his irrational Faith that GOD called him to this mission, Chhun would probably assessed the situation in a more realistic light. Had Chhun assessed Facts rather than relied on Faith, many people would not have died and Hun Sen might not still be in power.
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