210 { China’s Quest
ethnic Chinese leadership and the Kachins who supplied the bulk of the
fighting forces undermined the revolutionary forces.CambodiaSihanouk’s policy of cooperation with China and North Vietnam’s war effort in
South Vietnam meant that the beginning of China’s support for a Cambodian
communist drive to seize power came later than elsewhere in Indochina.
Beijing nurtured Sihanouk’s “neutralism” as long as Sihanouk remained in
power (he was overthrown by a coup in March 1970), but simultaneously made
preparations for an eventual communist-led revolutionary uprising.
When diplomatic relations between the PRC and Cambodia were estab-
lished in 1958, the new PRC embassy in Phnom Penh had a large staff under the
control of Chinese intelligence rather than the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and
was responsible for contacts with Cambodian revolutionary organizations.^24
PRC agents supported creation of a Chinese Association in Cambodia to serve
as a base for the Cambodian Communist Party. Some of that Association’s
activities were open: newspapers, schools, athletic competitions, and com-
merce. Other activities were semi-secret. Still others were completely secret,
for example those involving use of money, manpower, and publicity to mobi-
lize the masses to support the Cambodian revolution. All activities were under
the direct leadership of the PRC embassy according to Zhou Degao, who says
he was responsible for media in this arrangement. Eventually, by 1972, the
leaders of the Kampuchean Communist Party (with Pol Pot as the paramount
leader) concluded that China wanted to control the Cambodian revolution via
the Chinese Association. Consequently, in 1972 that Association was “volun-
tarily self-dissolved” and its members assigned “virgin land” in areas under
Khmer Rouge control. Most simply disappeared.^25
With the onset of CCP-CPSU rivalry within the international com-
munist movement in the late 1950s, Beijing began supporting a group of
French-trained and urban-based Maoist Cambodian communists, the group
that eventually became the Khmer Rouge. The mainstream of the Cambodian
Communist Party was too Soviet-trained, too pro-VWP, and too moderate
for Beijing’s taste. This led in 1960 to the formation of a new communist group
in which the returned French students played a prominent role. This group
was implacably hostile to Sihanouk and called for his overthrow. In February
1962, Pol Pot became Secretary General of this new group, later renamed the
Kampuchean Communist Party (KCP). In May 1963, the leadership moved to
a rural border area in preparation for armed struggle. This group had China’s
patronage.^26 At that point, neither the CCP nor the VWP had an interest in
supporting armed struggle against Cambodian leader Norodom Sihanouk.
This was partially a function of the struggle underway for South Vietnam.