With hindsight, it is easy to dismiss Nguyen Thanh Son’s analysis of Cambodia as contradictory, demeaning, and unworkable and to see the Khmer People’s Revolutionary party as a lapdog of the Vietnamese. Given France’s refusal to grant independence to Indochina, however, and given the Communist victories in China and eastern Europe, armed struggle was seen as a necessity, and a worldwide Communist victory was thought to be a matter of time. Thus Son’s proposals seemed attractive and feasible to his listeners. In 1950-1951 hundreds of Cambodians joined the Khmer People’s Revolutionary party, and later, after extensive training, a handful became members of the Indochina Communist party.

Turning to the Left

In the meantime, Saloth Sar had been joined in Paris by Ieng Sary. Sary had been involved in a student strike—labeled “Communist” by panicky French authorities—at the Lycée Sisowath after Sar had left for France. Democratic officials in the Ministry of Education had rewarded Sary and another ringleader, Rath Samoeun, for standing up to the French by giving them scholarships to study in France. One of Sary’s first moves when he arrived in Paris was to look up his mentor Keng Vannsak, who helped him get settled. Soon after, Sary introduced Vannsak to Saloth Sar. In early 1951 Vannsak found Sar a furnished room on the rue Letellier, across the street from his apartment in the fifteenth arrondissement. Sar lived there until he returned to Cambodia. Vannsak, who saw a good deal of him, recalled that Saloth Sar “spent most of his time reading.” Another contemporary, Mey Mann, said that Sar had “an interest in going to the movies.” Pol Pot confirmed Vannsak’s recollection when he told Nate Thayer in 1997:

I looked for secondhand books that were on sale along the Seine, the old books that I loved to read. When I got money for my scholarship, I had to spend it on rent and food, so I only had 20 or 25 francs to spend, but I got a lot of books to read. For example La grande revolution française. I didn’t understand it all, but I just read.... I started as a nationalist and then a patriot and then I read progressive books.12