Talk:Allegations of United States support for the Khmer Rouge

Removal of sourced information

You must stop removing sourced information.

1. Here you remove sourced information claiming that it is not a RS (how is it not?), but you ignore the fact that the other sources in the article are saying the same thing. Instead of re-ordering the references you simply remove it.
2. Here you claim that the source's information is based on a fake quote, and as proof cite a letter to NYT written by someone who participated in the U.S. government (how reliable!). But the source is not based on a fake quote, so what are you going on about here?
3. Here you remove a sourced fact because you claim that the order is not logic. Then re-order the information, not remove it.
4. Here you remove a sourced information just because you think it "adds nothing", also adding that it is "out of order".
5. Here you claim that the source is "simply wrong" and back your allegation up with nothing.
6. Here you remove a key quote from the U.S. Secretary of State which is referenced in a book written by Cambodian genocide expert Ben Kiernan and published by Yale University Press. You also remove a sourced fact about the U.S. bombing of Cambodia.

And you move "United States support for the Khmer Rouge" to the POV title "Allegations of United States support for the Khmer Rouge". What a great idea - why not also move "Holocaust" to "Allegations of Nazi mass murder"? This is apologism, pure and simple. The original title should not even have been changed, but you could also have chosen a more neutral one such as "Involvement of the U.S. in...". But no, you must remove everything which does not agree with your view.

Illyfifi2 (talk) 00:57, 26 January 2015 (UTC)

Even nominally reliable sources have to be trimmed for readability and due weight. You apparently want to use this article as a platform to throw any number of largely unrelated allegations at the U.S., but the U.S. did not bomb the Khmer Rouge at the request of Cambodia's government as part of some secret plan to intentionally trigger anti-American blowback and bring their true communist allies to power—regardless of if you can find sources criticizing the efficacy of the bombing campaign. Kissinger's quote, in early 1975, about wanting better relations never resulted in any diplomatic relations actually being established. As written, the entire first paragraph after the one sentence on the bombing is original research implying that the U.S. supported the Khmer Rouge during the genocide, and indeed provided military assistance, which is not only wrong but also a misuse of the sources. That your text is out-of-order and incoherent is obvious, as when you jump from discussing food aid to Cambodia in 1979 back to "Operation USA provided $7 million of aid to Cambodia under Pol Pot's rule". What actually happened in 1979 is that there was a vast international effort to relieve what many feared might be the mass starvation of millions of Cambodians with humanitarian aid, a campaign William Shawcross wrote an entire book about. According to Shawcross, the aid "undoubtedly helped save thousands of vulnerable people, including children and the sick". Ben Kiernan, former Khmer Rouge apologist, then switched to being an apologist for the Vietnamese puppet regime led by Khmer Rouge defector Heng Samrin as it attempted to starve out any resistance, therefore pretending that the international famine relief effort was actually "support" for "Pol Pot."TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 05:00, 26 January 2015 (UTC)

Clymer's assertion that the U.S. somehow tacitly supported Chinese and Thai assistance to the Khmer Rouge appeared to be based on a misquotation frequently attributed to Brzezinski, who of course denies ever saying anything of the kind. Certainly, it would be acceptable to use Clymer to criticize the aid campaign in 1979, though the alternative view should also be presented.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 05:09, 26 January 2015 (UTC)

"Kissinger's quote, in early 1975, about wanting better relations never resulted in any diplomatic relations actually being established." Yes, what a coincidence that Kissinger said this quote when everything else the sources describe happened! (which is obviously related and should be included) "the entire first paragraph after the one sentence on the bombing is original research implying that the U.S. supported the Khmer Rouge during the genocide" Not really - it's exactly what the references said. Every single assertion is taken from the sources. "and indeed provided military assistance, which is not only wrong but also a misuse of the sources" Whether you believe it is wrong is irrelevant. The sources are saying that - so how is it a misuse? "That your text is out-of-order and incoherent is obvious" Then re-order it - not use it as an excuse to delete information. "What actually happened in 1979 is that there was a vast international effort to relieve what many feared might be the mass starvation of millions of Cambodians with humanitarian aid" This article is based on independent reliable sources, not pro-U.S. explanation of the events. This can be explained in a "differing views" section though. "Clymer's assertion that the U.S. somehow tacitly supported Chinese and Thai assistance to the Khmer Rouge appeared to be based on a misquotation frequently attributed to Brzezinski" Clymer is asserting that the U.S. did this not discussing quotes. Either way what Brzezinski himself says is irrelevant, what independent sources say is relevant. Illyfifi2 (talk) 17:47, 26 January 2015 (UTC)

Move

Someone please move this article to "United States support for the Khmer Rouge", removing "Allegations of". This is undisputed in reliable independent sources. Illyfifi2 (talk) 04:51, 27 January 2015 (UTC)

Hey, buddy! I checked the US–Cambodia relations page, and there seems to be dispute in RS about US support after 1975. I'm open to persuasion otherwise, so please feel to swing me round to your view! --YeOldeGentleman (talk) 19:10, 27 January 2015 (UTC)

Read this article's sources (before TheTimesAreAChanging deletes them). What is written here is undisputed in independent reliable sources. Also, thank you for improving the citation format, but I had to revert TheTimesAreAChanging's irrational information deletion (with no argumentation on talk page). Illyfifi2 (talk) 21:49, 27 January 2015 (UTC)

If the US had been so supportive of the Khmer Rouge, they never would've fought against them during the Vietnam War. ---------User:DanTD (talk) 17:39, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

Several RS cited at some length in the article provide unequivocal documentation of US support. The only "refutations" are the self-serving non-denial denials by Brezinsky and Kissinger, each one contradicting his own earlier statements, and Thayer saying he personally did not see any US-provided weapons used by the KR. Unless someone has RS refuting US support (other than US govt apologists, who should be noted as such but should not prevent us from listing facts as facts), we should change the title back to US support for KR.

Also, the section should be broken out into diplomatic support (e.g. UN seat) and military aid.--NYCJosh (talk) 03:17, 21 February 2018 (UTC)

That is a very... strange train of logic. There are countless examples of states providing aid and then turning on former allies. Look no further than US-Iraqi relations, or Sino-Soviet. Wikipedia is supposed to be an encyclopedia, not a site where anyone can revise history to how they see fit. I think most people would agree the addition of "Allegations of" is appalling and disrespectful and has no place on this page. Wamzy8047 (talk) 01:31, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

I definitely agree, how has this not been fixed yet? Is it just an honest mistake that "Allegations of" has been left in since 2015? Why has this not been corrected yet? 136.56.45.130 (talk) 19:27, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

Fully agree, this article is flirting with genocide denial. I removed "allegations of" from military support, but the entire article should be renamed given everything we know for sure about the CIA's sponsoring of Khmer Rouge and Pol Pot. Jester6482 (talk) 14:49, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

The support the USA and Britain provided for the Red Khmer in the 1980s (when the record and legacy of the genocide was well known) is abundantly clear. Sure, they all routed their aid through 'non Red Khmer parties' but they knew full well that the Red Khmer was the only group in that 'coalition' with the manpower to do anything. It is beyond belief that some would continue to play on technicalities to contend that 'the USA did nothing to support or aid the Red Khmer' when it so clearly did. Reagan knew of the genocide, Thatcher knew of the genocide and yet they supported the Red Khmer anyway. Indirectly, to be sure, since that genocide was just a little too embarrassing to directly associated with. But it was done anyway, out of spite, since the USA was salty it had suffered a humiliating defeat in the Vietnam war.

Conservative politicians throughout the 1960s-70s-80s supported hosts of genocidal, mass murdering and repressive regimes (dictatorships) just as long as they said the magic words 'I hate communism'... in this case, it was the magic words 'We hate Vietnamese communism' but supporting Cambodian communists who genocided 25% of the population was something conservatives were fine with.85.145.207.2 (talk) 23:39, 11 November 2024 (UTC) 85.145.207.2 (talk) 23:39, 11 November 2024 (UTC)

Kissinger quote

I'm not happy with it. "We would support this." What is "this"? As used, it sounds as though "this" is "the Cambodian genocide, which between 1975 and 1979 killed nearly 25% of Cambodia's population". Is this right? Can someone check the source? Sounds pretty incredible, even if it is Kissinger. YeOldeGentleman (talk) 21:41, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

I checked on Google Books, and am now even less happy: p. 11. Kissinger isn't even mentioned on that page. What's going on here? --YeOldeGentleman (talk) 21:43, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

OK, so I'm prepared to accept a simple mistake (the person meant p. xi), but the quote reads simply, "You should also tell the Cambodians that we will be friends with them. They are murderous thugs, but we won't let that stand in our way." The words "We would support this" do not appear at all on that page. What are you playing at, Illyfifi2? --YeOldeGentleman (talk) 21:53, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

"They are murderous thugs, but we won't let that stand in our way." is actually several orders of magnitude worse than "we (would) support this". It conveys clear knowledge of war crimes and a willingness to be complicit in that, so that doesn't help your argument. 136.56.45.130 (talk) 19:29, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

As I suspected, Illyfifi2 decided to add in "We would support this" from the source Kiernan uses (p. 8 of this. Totally unacceptable, especially as at had been juxtaposed with "the Cambodian genocide, which between 1975 and 1979 killed nearly 25% of Cambodia's population". The "We would support this" is absolutely nothing to do with the genocide, nor could it have been: the Kissinger–Thai FM conversation is taking place on 26 November 1975; the genocide was 1975–79. This is totally unacceptable, Illyfifi2. --YeOldeGentleman (talk) 22:06, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

The sentence I wrote says: "In a meeting with the Thai foreign minister, U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger explained the position on the Khmer Rouge", not the position on genocide. The "we would support this" is unrelated to the genocide, and was added in only to preserve the full quote. Either way, it has now been removed to avoid creating confusion. Illyfifi2 (talk) 22:23, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

So I never meant to imply that they supported the genocide, User:YeOldeGentleman. You are right, however, that the mass removal of RS by the other "editors" here is wrong. Illyfifi2 (talk) 22:28, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

I was finally able to check your incredible claim that "Operation USA provided $7 million of aid to Cambodia under Pol Pot's rule." While I stand by my initial statement that Wikipedia should not repeat blatantly false assertions from nominally reliable sources, Haas' Faustian Pact says the opposite: "Operation USA quietly provided $7 million in relief aid to Cambodians under PRK rule". That's "PRK", as in the "People's Republic of Kampuchea", the Vietnamese puppet regime led by KR defectors.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 01:45, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

You're right - this is an error. Illyfifi2 (talk) 03:52, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Nothing on Haas page 17 says or implies "The U.S. was instrumental in ensuring the deposed Khmer Rouge received a seat in the United Nations". Page 236 of Forsythe's Encyclopedia of Human Rights has absolutely nothing to do with Cambodia (it's actually part of the bibliography for a chapter on "Right to Food and Adequate Standard of Living"). Page 97 of Emmers' Cooperative Security and the Balance of Power could only be used to support a far weaker claim than "The U.S., along with China, rejected a plan to disarm the Khmer Rouge in order to support its regional and its allies' interests" (i.e., Emmers claims the U.S. "accepted" the Chinese position due to "a need to consolidate ties with Beijing after the opening of relations in January 1979"--if the Chinese were on the opposite side of the ASEAN states, what other U.S. allies could you be referring to?) Your text is incoherent, out-of-order, and riddled with errors. As you have been reverted by three other users, I advise you to cease edit warring. There is clearly no consensus for your changes.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 02:34, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

Here the error is yours - Haas quite clearly highlights the role of the U.S. in acquiring Khmer Rouge's saet in the UN. The sentence that the U.S. refused the plan to disarm is sourced by both Haas and Emmers. It quite clearly is an appropriate source for this sentence: "The U.S., along with China, rejected a plan to disarm the Khmer Rouge in order to support its regional allies' interests" (allies in the region being China, this sentence should be improved). Page 236 of the encyclopaedia source quite clearly says exactly what it is used to source. Illyfifi2 (talk) 03:52, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

It is of course, totally wrong of you to use one minor error as an excuse to go on with your plan of obliterating sourced information. You claim that people revert me, but perhaps you forgot what one editor said: Surely the answer is to put the relevant tag on the offending parts, then add the material to provide what you deem to be necessary balance? The sources are unquestionably RS – OUP, Yale etc. Remember, Wiki is a place to find all the points of view!! :D Illyfifi2 (talk) 03:53, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

TheTimesAreAChanging has for a long time been a pro-US, right-wing POV editor. The US support for the Khmer Rouge is well-proved. Everything that you removed was sourced. I would advice you to stop your clearly biased editing. If you want to edit from a pro-US perspective, that's OK. But please use Conservapedia instead of Wikipedia. Te og kaker (talk) 20:06, 10 March 2015 (UTC)

I've striked out the above inappropriate ad hominem attack, which contributes nothing to the above discussion and is in violation of WP:CIVIL and WP:AGF. There is no consensus, so there will be no change.

I grant only that the edition of the encyclopedia that I checked did not line up with your page number, and I jumped to the wrong conclusion that you fabricated the entire citation without looking any further. (Of note, however, is that even Forsythe includes the US denial.) Haas page 17 only tells us how the US voted; Haas does not offer commentary regarding whether or not this vote was "instrumental". If you admit that one of your sentences should be reworded, I'm baffled as to why you refuse to make the appropriate tweaks.

More importantly, you are misusing your sources with your synthesis on the bombing. None of your sources say that the US bombed Cambodia to support the KR, as you lead the reader to believe they do. The blowback theory is a contested issue (Pol Pot biographer David Chandler, for example, credits the bombing with preserving the Khmer Republic for two additional years) best left to the articles that already cover it.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 01:49, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

"There is no consensus" = "we ignore the consensus". We've been saying since 2015 this title is wrong, keeping around right wing editors with a pro US agenda specifically to avoid arriving at a rational consensus is a self-fulfilling prophecy. 136.56.45.130 (talk) 19:34, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

Everyone can read everything here and see how lllyfifi2 and others were dismissed with irrational arguments that didn't hold water in the end. What is the hold up here?

Is there a good reason we're stalling on this? Because I'll gladly go ahead and make a video with all of this information from the talk page included and post it to my channel to expose this 8-year long neglect that just so happens to favor revisionist, ahistorical lies. I hate to go that route but I'm getting pretty sick of the abuse of power here at this point. 2605:A601:A6A4:9A00:83:AC92:5CAC:FC5C (talk) 11:58, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

CovertAction Quarterly?

CAQ is cited as a source multiple times in this article, but CAQ's Wikipedia page states that the Mitrokhin archive revealed CAQ as a KGB propaganda operation. Cold-War era propaganda probably isn't a reliable source. Ollie Garkey (talk) 19:02, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

Ollie Garkey: I agree that CovertAction Quarterly is an unreliable source for contentious matters of fact and that anything sourced solely to it should be tagged or removed.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 12:23, 28 March 2021 (UTC)

Requested move 7 August 2023

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: No consensus. After two relists, there is no apparent consensus here. Both sides presented strong cases for their respective opinions (both based in policy). But, in the end neither argument was sufficiently stronger than the other to form consensus. (closed by non-admin page mover) estar8806 (talk) ★ 14:02, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

---

Allegations of United States support for the Khmer Rouge → United States support for the Khmer Rouge – In the 1980's the US supported the Khmer rouge via CIA money funneled through Thailand (1). "50 CIA agents were running Washington’s Cambodia operation from Thailand" (4). It is also shown that the United States voted for Pol Pot to have a UN seat (2). "Allegations of" in this title, given what we know, amounts to a deliberate obfuscation of the truth and revision of history. Even if both the US government and CIA had the best of intentions in doing so, the support for Khmer Rouge is, as a matter of fact, not "alleged", and as you can see in the talk page, all arguments for keeping the current title rely on a dispute about why the United States and CIA gave this money to the Cambodian regime or what Kissinger really meant when he said X, well that's not relevant. Sources: 1. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1985/07/08/cia-covertly-aiding-pro-west-cambodians/819db513-b2a7-4518-9d69-1efa0b46381c/, 2. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1980/09/16/us-to-support-pol-pot-regime-for-un-seat/58b8b124-7dd7-448f-b4f7-80231683ec57/, 3. https://gsp.yale.edu/case-studies/cambodian-genocide-program/us-involvement/united-states-policy-khmer-rouge-regime-1975, 4. https://msuweb.montclair.edu/~furrg/pol/pilgerpolpotnus.pdf Jester6482 (talk) 13:42, 7 August 2023 (UTC) — Relisting. — DaxServer (t · m · e · c) 09:04, 14 August 2023 (UTC) — Relisting. BilledMammal (talk) 10:12, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

— Jester6482 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 16:04, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

I've edited Wikipedia for years, just not with this account which I only created in February this year. Jester6482 (talk) 09:58, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Relisting comment: requesting more comments based on policy. Note: WikiProject Cambodia, WikiProject International relations, WikiProject United States, have been notified of this discussion. — DaxServer (t · m · e · c) 09:05, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Absolutely, thank you! Policy references will be underlined here. The facts alone beg the name change but the name change would also happen to improve the title's naturalness and conciseness a great deal as well.

I don't know anyone who would naturally think to search for " 'Allegations of' United States Support for Khmer Rouge". It's too cumbersome. Just through the course of revisiting the page to gather information and prepare a formal request, I failed to find this page several times because I forgot to add "allegations of" and it would not show up in Wikipedia's search at all at the time if you entered this proposed title or any of the previous redirects for that matter. This may be partially a programming issue (queries for redirects should probably return the current version of the page in search, though that may not be all that doable without a good couple of weeks of code refactoring etc.) but the effect is still the same; it's harder to find the page from Wikipedia's search. Edit: just performed a recent test and this bug seems to be partially fixed ("US support" still only returns two articles so you sort of have to type out the whole country), but I noticed that when typing "United States Support for" in search, this is the only quick result that uses "Allegations of", so that it sticks out like a sore thumb in that regard is another great argument that this move would improve consistency.

I can maybe understand a compromise position here like "United States Proxy Support for the Khmer Rouge" but "Allegations of" is not only clunky and lengthy, but misleading in a pretty significant way, and it's certainly a lot less concise. I admit consistency could maybe be taking a hit here (since there are so many titles that have "Allegations of"; some appropriate, many not) but prefixing articles with "allegations of" should not be the default response to any topic that turns out to be controversial anyway. Many of these articles should have more clarifying, more concise titles instead, not just this one. Jester6482 (talk) 07:26, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

Partly off-topic comment: the article can be made easier to find by creating redirects for various possible search terms. For example, I just created a redirect at US support for the Khmer Rouge. Now, if you type "US support" in the search box, that link shows up in the list immediately (as the 4th item). —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 17:14, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

Hey thanks, I appreciate that. Definitely does help make the article easier to find regardless of which way the discussion goes. Jester6482 (talk) 11:59, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

Relisting comment: Relisting per request on my talk page. @BarrelProof and FOARP: BilledMammal (talk) 10:12, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose - The proposed changes are POV-pushing and reduce accuracy, principally for the POV that it is the US that is responsible for the Cambodian Genocide. The article does recite allegations, that are disputed as seen in the article-content. In reality the entire article needs a massive edit and is basically just a POVFORK of Cambodian–Vietnamese War. FOARP (talk) 11:07, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

  The allegations are "disputed" by the US Government and the CIA. Do we trust soviet sources that dispute information about the USSR? No we dismiss them outright, so it at once becomes clear who's position is pushing a particular POV. 2605:A601:A6A4:9A00:4B6A:6E14:79F3:365B (talk) 16:53, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

  Yea, that the allegations are disputed by the US government and the CIA is an enormous conflict of interest. I have made my argument on the basis of both historical facts and Wikipedia's Title policy, so I would appreciate it if someone here would engage with the substance of this formal request instead of trying to deflect in all of these various ways. Jester6482 (talk) 17:00, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

  "Supported the Khmer Rouge" sans allegedly, is not the same thing as saying: "entirely responsible for the Khmer Rouge." Jester6482 (talk) 17:02, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

  Even the one pro CIA journalist who disputes the "allegations" said "little, if any, American aid actually reached the Khmer Rouge."

  Well even if absolutely none of it reached the Khmer rouge, that still doesn't make the proxy financial support that was sent "alleged", see?

  " 2605:A601:A6A4:9A00:B905:B05D:1795:815D (talk) 18:48, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

Support The academic sources say the US collaborated, not that there was allegations of collaborations. The counter claim states that "I never once encountered aid", not that aid didn't exist. If we're going to stay true to the source, we should remove the "allegations".Stix1776 (talk) 10:27, 29 August 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Requested move 12 November 2024

Allegations of United States support for the Khmer Rouge → United States support for the Khmer Rouge – Reopening discussion. According to the above backlog, editors have overwhelmingly voiced support for the requested move. I fail to understand @Estar8806's decision to close the discussion and sideline the consensus that is apparent.

As I wrote him on this user talk:

Multiple statements in the article are factual and undisputed and correspond to US support of the Khmer Rouge:

1) U.S. voted for the Khmer Rouge and the Khmer Rouge-dominated Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea (CGDK) to retain Cambodia's United Nations (UN) seat until as late as 1993, long after the Khmer Rouge had been mostly deposed by Vietnam. = diplomatic US support

2) I encourage the Chinese to support Pol Pot, said Zbigniew Brzezinski, the national security adviser at the time. The question was how to help the Cambodian people. Pol Pot was an abomination. We could never support him, but China could. = diplomatic US support has admitted by a member of the then US government (quoted here from the NYTimes source of ref 20)

I will not even go on investigate the claims of political scholars quoted in the wiki article since this much is already tantamount to US support. NokGradten (talk) 08:59, 12 November 2024 (UTC)

— NokGradten (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 19:33, 12 November 2024 (UTC)

Comment - I don't take well to the arguably bad faith accusation that I "sidelined" an allegedly apparent consensus (that did not exist). In hindsight, the last discussion should've been plainly closed as "not moved", given that the oppose !vote was the only one truly rooted in policy. The nominations there and here appear to be rooted in a WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS mindset. While occasionally a noble effort, 'righting great wrongs' is not a reason to request a move. estar8806 (talk) ★ 19:42, 12 November 2024 (UTC)

I briefly hesitated to use that word tbh, but for me the consensus above is clear so whether it is out of carelessness or what not it doesn't matter. I don't mean to say you are editing in bad faith but I can't understand why you stalled and closed the discussion.

Additionally let me quote WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS "So, if you want to:[...] Explain what you are sure is the truth of a current or historical political, religious, or moral issue, or [...]...you'll have to wait until it's been reported by reliable sources or published in books from reputable publishing houses. [...] if you have the reliable sources to support it, then [...] if you have the reliable sources to support it, then please do update the articles".

The two events above are attested respectively by the UN and by a newspaper of record, the NYTimes, so your WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS accusation is actually beside the point. NokGradten (talk) 22:16, 12 November 2024 (UTC)

My point about RIGHTGREATWRONGS wasn't an accusation- it was a comment on appearances. The problem is that even if reliable sources support 'righting a great wrong' to some degree, we have to remain neutral. I personally do not have the breadth of knowledge about this specific topic to judge whatever POV may be overrepresented, hence why I won't !vote or express an opinion in favor or opposition to the request. I am, however, concerned that neither this discussion (as of yet) nor the last one have properly addressed the NPOV concerns raised by other editors. NPOV will trump (almost) any other policy, unless a relatively strong consensus forms for a WP:POVTITLE, which clearly did not happen last time.

I appreciate you pointing out that you didn't mean to say that I was editing in bad faith. Yet, claiming that I sidelined consensus, potentially out of "carelessness", and that I "stalled and closed the discussion" very much sound like you're trying to say just that. As for the stalling point, the discussion had been open for 23 days, longer than we leave most open for. Apart from the single 11th-hour support !vote, the discussion had been stale for eight days, so there was very much no stalling of the discussion. estar8806 (talk) ★ 04:47, 13 November 2024 (UTC)

@Estar8806 says: "neither this discussion (as of yet) nor the last one have properly addressed the NPOV concerns raised by other editors." What? Reliable sources generally treat "United States support for the Khmer Rouge" as a matter of fact, not as allegations. I already provided four high-quality sources that document this; two are authored by relevant expert academic scholars (Maguire and Kiernan), and the other is an acclaimed journalist who won a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting on Cambodia (Brinkley).

If anything, I'd argue that the current title of "Allegations of United States support for the Khmer Rouge" violates WP:NPOV; "allegations" make it appear as if there is no proof when the majority of reliable sources state in the affirmative that "United States support for the Khmer Rouge" indeed occurred. Skornezy (talk) 09:43, 13 November 2024 (UTC)

• Leaning oppose: This proposal seems like POV-pushing and over-characterizing of particular events and remarks. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 19:45, 12 November 2024 (UTC)

  This article is literally about "US support of the Khmer Rouge"... how is a vote at the UN over-characterizing of particular events? NokGradten (talk) 22:18, 12 November 2024 (UTC)

Strongly support: @NokGradten makes a very good point, those statements are indeed factual. Moreover, the literature do not appear to treat "United States support to the Khmer Rouge" as mere allegations, but rather a matter of fact:

• Maguire, Peter (2005). Facing Death in Cambodia. Columbia University Press. pp. 70–71.

The United States gave $85 million to the Khmer Rouge between 1980 and 1986. The Carter administration donated more than half (at least $40 million) during the crucial years of 1979 and 1980. President Carter’s ambassador to Thailand, Morton Abramowitz, attempted to justify supporting a genocidal government in exile: “The real question is whether the United States should have bullied the Thais and Peking not to help the Khmer Rouge but to intern them. We never considered this a serious option because (1) we thought the Vietnamese were wrong in Cambodia; (2) the Thais and the Chinese were our friends; (3) they had greater interests in Southeast Asia than we; and (4) we might not have succeeded. What would have happened if we had said to the Thais ‘Take the Khmer Rouge weapons away’ and then the Khmer Rouge had resisted?” Abramowitz seemed unconvinced by his own rationalizations: “Still, I have asked myself a thousand times whether that is what we should have done.” Established in 1980 by the United States, Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore,the Kampuchea Emergency Group provided essential nonmilitary aid to the resistance “coalition” from a field office just across the border in Aranyaprathet. From 1979 to 1981, China and the United States pushed King Sihanouk to head an anti-Vietnamese resistance movement that included the Khmer Rouge and rightist Son Sann. The KEG enabled the United States to maintain an arm’s-length relationship with the Khmer Rouge while officially assisting Cambodian refugees in border camps. ... Ronald Reagan’s election as U.S. President in 1980 meant continued support for the Khmer Rouge as part of his worldwide anticommunist crusade. The new CIA chief, William Casey, according to biographer Bob Woodward, was “willing to dance cautiously with the devil.” ... Vietnamese general Nguyen Vo Giap best described America’s strange new alliance with the Khmer Rouge and China as “an arranged marriage” and quoted a Vietnamese saying about such alliances: “The couple share the same bed but they have different dreams.” A film crew ... happened to be in the Khmer Rouge camp, Site 8, when a Thai helicopter landed and former CIA deputy director Ray Cline emerged from it. The film crew ambushed him in a remarkable 60 Minutes–style interview.When asked why he was in a Khmer Rouge camp, Cline claimed that he was now an academic and produced a card from Georgetown University’s Center for Strategic and International Studies: “My trip to Southeast Asia is practically to just restore my own knowledge, to bring it up to date, and naturally I will report my impressions and my finds about the international problems here to the whole group that is going to be suggesting policies to the president-elect.” When the East Germans asked, “Do you think that it is still advisable to recognize the Pol Pot regime and to support them?” the senior American spy (who had once asked, “Must the United States respond like a man in a barroom brawl who will fight only according to the Marquis of Queensberry rules?”) broke into spontaneous laughter. ... [Senior Khmer Rouge member] Ieng Sary ... broke down the international geopolitical situation for the East Germans in 1980: “First are the aggressors and expansionists headed by the Soviet Union, and the other part is the movement of struggle for independence against the expansionists. It is good that the U.S.A. and China are agreed here. We too are on this team!” Ieng Sary espoused the Reagan Doctrine with a zeal that would have pleased the Gipper himself: “We set our hopes on the Reagan government, that it will implement its declaration to act uncompromisingly with regard to the Soviet Union and only negotiate from a position of strength. That would help us a lot.”

• Brinkley, Joel (2011). Cambodia's Curse: The Modern History of a Troubled Land. PublicAffairs. pp. 59 63.

Over time charges made the rounds that some of the American aid, $215 million so far, was finding its way to the Khmer Rouge. Congress demanded an investigation, and Tom Fingar, who was in charge of the relevant division in the State Department’s Bureau of Intel ligence and Research, dispatched investigators to have a look. Sure enough, they found some leakage—including sharing of ammunition, joint defense of a bridge, and using one truck to transport both “noncommunist” and Khmer Rouge fighters to a fight. But Fingar saw this whole enter prise as a typical Washington fury about nothing, an “epi-phenomenon in a flea circus.” His investigators, he said, “were trying to sort out exactly what was happening,” while he and others “were also asking: Isn’t the larger objective here defeating the Vietnamese puppets in Phnom Penh? Why are we providing aid? Isn’t it to defeat Hun Sen?” ... Finally, on July 18, 1990, Secretary of State Baker announced a change in American policy—a complete reversal. The United States would end its political and tacit military support of the Khmer Rouge more than eleven years after they had fallen from power, a decade after it had become perfectly clear that Pol Pot and his minions had murdered “at least 1.7 million” people, 25 percent of Cambodia’s population.

• Kiernan, Ben (1998). The Pol Pot Regime: Race, Power, and Genocide in Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge, 1975-79. Yale University Press. pp. xii.

Indeed, from 1979 to 1992, the United Nations, at the insistence of China and the United States, had legitimized Pol Pot's anti-Vietnamese cause and supported his exiled Khmer Rouge as Cambodia's representatives.

• Kiernan, Ben (2004). How Pol Pot Came to Power: Colonialism, Nationalism, and Communism in Cambodia, 1930-1975. Yale University Press. pp. xxix.

China's position [on backing the Khmer Rouge] enjoyed US support. ... US officials pushed through international aid to Khmer Rouge-controlled camps on the Thai border.

Nate Thayer, the only opposing/denying source cited in this article, writes that "I never once encountered aid given to the [non-communist resistance] in use by or in possession of the Khmer Rouge," yet even the U.S. State Department—which would have every motivation to downplay/deny the connection—"found some leakage" in aid. Thayer is clearly the minority/fringe viewpoint here. Skornezy (talk) 00:10, 13 November 2024 (UTC)

• There is probably a better title than the current one, but it seems possible that "United States support for the Khmer Rouge" is intended to be misleading. After all, the US bombed the Khmer Rouge for years (Operation Menu and Operation Freedom Deal). Srnec (talk) 03:49, 13 November 2024 (UTC)

  That can be easily remedied by specifying the time period; United States support for the Khmer Rouge (1979–1992) looks good to me. Skornezy (talk) 03:57, 13 November 2024 (UTC)

Support—As has been pointed out, there are multiple instances in the article where the United States clearly expressed support for the Khmer Rouge, and I think that Skornezy has convincingly shown that there is (at least) substantial support in the literature for treating US support as a (perhaps temporally bounded) fact. While I recognize that some editors might feel that it is an NPOV issue, I don't think there is an option that avoids taking a POV. As the debate surrounding the title demonstrates, many interpret the current title as itself bearing a denialist POV. Unless more scholarly literature presenting a contradictory opinion is unearthed, ignoring both the text of the article and the scholarly literature is imposing a WP:FALSEBALANCE.

I think the alternative title proposed by Skornezy ("United States support for the Khmer Rouge (1979–1992)") is also reasonable, or possibly something like "Khmer Rouge-United States Relations". However, I do think the current title should to be changed. Spookyaki (talk) 00:44, 14 November 2024 (UTC)