I have recently been reading about the Khmer Rouge and the atrocities they commited, and I've been wondering where a similar regime could arise. A regime similar in that it executes intellectuals, evacuates the cities and makes people work as peasants on farms, commits acts of genocide against ethnic minorities and where an extremely high amount of the population die due to the regime. Where else could this arise? Africa? Other parts of Asia? Maybe even Latin America?
Where else could Khmer Rouge-esque regimes arise?
- Thread starter Bobbbcat2
- Start date
Maoist China comes pretty close with the Great Leap Forward, the Anti-Rightist Campaign and the Cultural Revolution among other things.
I have an extremely hard time seeing anything vaguely similar to the Khmer Rouge in a developed country, it's only really possible in very poor countries IMO.
Religion could probably do the job. Look at Jim Jones and other cult leaders. Give them larger influence and they can do a lot of things. A prolonged great depression could probably make people desperate enough to follow a death cult.
sprite
Donor
A country that has no democratic tradition, multiple nationalist factions fighting for control.
A campaign of bombing by a third party to which is supported by the faction in power. This stalls the powerless faction from gaining any power, which also radicalises those groups.
Withdrawal of third party support, overall dissatisfaction with the current regime, no strategic resources and no geopolitical significance.
Regime overthrown and the new rulers are left in control of a severely disrupted country and esoteric hardliners in charge.
So maybe, these conditions could happen, with the right alternate historical pressures;-
Afghanistan
Syria
Sri Lanka
Yemen
Cuba
Peru
Mozambique
Zimbabwe
Congo (Kinsasha)
Just off the top of my head. I'm sure there are more, broadly you just need to delay a popular movement enough for the hardliners to take control.
A campaign of bombing by a third party to which is supported by the faction in power. This stalls the powerless faction from gaining any power, which also radicalises those groups.
Withdrawal of third party support, overall dissatisfaction with the current regime, no strategic resources and no geopolitical significance.
Regime overthrown and the new rulers are left in control of a severely disrupted country and esoteric hardliners in charge.
So maybe, these conditions could happen, with the right alternate historical pressures;-
Afghanistan
Syria
Sri Lanka
Yemen
Cuba
Peru
Mozambique
Zimbabwe
Congo (Kinsasha)
Just off the top of my head. I'm sure there are more, broadly you just need to delay a popular movement enough for the hardliners to take control.
Richard Osborne
Banned
A Afro-Communist Zimbabwe that decides to purify their culture they need to kill all the city slickers.
I can see some sort of afro-communist state with an ideology about "going back to life before colonisation" and "returning to the communism the Europeans took from us". Kill anyone who speaks western languages, kill whites, kill or deport those who have a different tribal identity.
Maoist China has committed many atrocities, but it’s still very far from a regime that killed one third of its own populace and forced its city-dwellers into the farms.
I remember that Mao supported Pol Pot, but I wouldn’t say that China Uncensored is a reliable source of information. It’s not even funny.
I'll be honest, I do watch the show regularly, but sometimes I wonder if they know what they're talking about.
Taleban was a similarly absolutely anti-modern political movement. Though I suspect they've softened up a bit since the Americans are willing to negotiate with them now (and vice versa).
How about a civil war following the 1991 Soviet coup attempt leading to a violent disintegration of the USSR, and a young Alexander Dugin setting up a 'National Bolshevist Cossack Republic' in the Caucasus with the help of a few extreme reactionary generals and avant-garde Moscow art students. Men must have navel-length beards, the official language is Church Slavonic and everybody lives in a kolkhoz named after a saint. Heil Mother Eurasia!
How about a civil war following the 1991 Soviet coup attempt leading to a violent disintegration of the USSR, and a young Alexander Dugin setting up a 'National Bolshevist Cossack Republic' in the Caucasus with the help of a few extreme reactionary generals and avant-garde Moscow art students. Men must have navel-length beards, the official language is Church Slavonic and everybody lives in a kolkhoz named after a saint. Heil Mother Eurasia!