How can film help raise the awareness of "Armed Conflict" in the region?
- Chanraksmey Veal
- Mar 12, 2022
- 4 min read
Updated: Mar 14, 2022
Armed Conflict is not a word that we heard often in our daily conversation. Most of us only hear this word on the news or article. So I would like to ask the reader here how often do you hear this word?
Definition of "Armed Conflict"
When someone mention the word "armed conflict", we normally assume that it has same meaning as the war. However, the meaning of this term have a deeper and more specific meaning than just a war. According to Uppsala Conflict Data Program (UCDP), The term "armed conflict" refer to a contested incompatibility that concerns government. and/or territory where the use of armed force between two parties, of which at least one is the government of a state, results in at least 25 battle-related deaths in one calendar year.
Cambodia Armed Conflict
Cambodia is one of the oldest countries in the Southeast Asia region. It has a really long history. It had been through many historical event through both the peak and the valley ranging from the rise of Khmer Empire to its fallen period. And Khmer Rouge in the recent decade is a perfect example for armed conflict issue. Khmer Rouge is the darkest period for most of Cambodian. It was the genocide against our Khmer race. And it is also an armed conflict issues.
So how does Khmer Rouge consider as armed conflict? Before I can answer whether the Khmer Rouge war was an armed conflict or not, we should explore Cambodia's history from 1970 as the big picture. In 1970, Lun Nol successfully starts the coup against King Sihanouk with support from the West and gained control of the Cambodian government. Seeing the coup of power is possible, Khmer Rouge formed a political alliance with King Sihanouk. For the next five years, a civil war between Lun Nol and the alliance of Khmer Rouge and King Sihanouk emerged across Cambodia. Eventually, the Khmer Rouge controlled the increasing amount of territory in the countryside and successfully took over Phnom Penh city in 1975. But King Sihanouk was cut out of the deal. He was exiled by Pol Pot.
So based on the definition that we agreed on earlier, I believed it is safe to say that “Khmer Rouge Regime” is considered an Armed Conflict. It was an armed conflict between Khmer Rouge fighters and the Lun Nol Government. The fight started over the period of 5 years with hundreds of small battles if not thousands and consequently took the lives of 250,000 Cambodians. So technically, it is absolutely an Armed Conflict. As I look through our classmate contents and works in the past few month, I believe some of our classmate also believe that in the movie First They Killed My Father also portrayed the armed conflict issued as well. In the group assignment video by Chan Rithy's team (click on the hyperlink to see the video), our classmate Siveang Seng also agree that Armed Conflict is one of the theme covered in the movie (start @8:30). She said " Armed Conflict is another theme in the film. As armed conflict is related to incompatible competition between two parties that concerns the government and territory of where the conflict happens. Armed conflict usually caused bad effects on the people and the region. As we can see in the film, First they killed my father, there was an armed conflict between Cambodian and Vietnamese troops which lead to forced migration and refugee flow."
Even though she took the example between Cambodian and Vietnamese troop as the example, our point that this movie illustrate armed conflict is still strongly held.
Moreover, it is worth to mention one of interesting idea in our classmate's blog, Chutema, she wrote:
As Spivak sayings go, “All knowledge is never innocent, and it often sources the interest of the producer”.
And I totally agree with this statement. In fact, it is such a coincidence that US decided to abandoned Lun Nol government just a few week after they declare to lose Vietnam War. So from my perspective I believe US only use Cambodia as the military base for their operation in the Vietnam War. And once we are no longer important for them, they abandoned us. But they framed it as they are trying to help Cambodia's democracy.
I think George Lamming could also agree with that perspective too that the West speaks for post-colonial people. The US creates those framing narratives just to justify their exploitation of us.
As our blog is focusing on how film and literature spread the knowledge in the region to all people around the world, I would like to point out how can a film "First They Killed My Father" could illustrate this armed conflict issue that happened in our region to the international in our talkshow below. Without further ado, I will attach a video discussion between me as the local film director and the host of AUPP talk show:
Feel free to drop your opinion in the comment below! Thank you!
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