Sihanouk was out of the country when he received news of the demonstrations. Angered, he sent a telegram demanding an investigation. Lon Nol saw the prince’s request as license to crack down on people Lon Nol viewed as Communists. When Sihanouk returned to the capital in early March, Lon Nol gave him a list of thirty-four men he had decided were subversive. The list was a hodgepodge of journalists, activists, and noncommunist liberals like Keng Vannsak. Alarmingly, it also included the names of Saloth Sar and Ieng Sary—probably because they taught at leftist schools.41

By then, Sar and Sary were both high-ranking members of the party. Their positions had been confirmed at a special party congress convened in the wake of the Siem Reap demonstrations, but before Sihanouk’s return. At the meeting, Sar replaced Tou Samouth as secretary of the party. Nuon Chea kept the second position, although it is likely that he had hoped to obtain the first; the third position was occupied by either Sao Phim or Ieng Sary. Recent research, based on Vietnamese Communist sources, suggests that Chea was kept out of the top position by rumors, spread by Saloth Sar, that he had recently received a sum of money from his cousin Sieu Heng. Nuon Chea himself, on the other hand, claimed in 1997 that “the Pracheachon group accused me of betrayal because I was a relative of Sieu Heng.” Chea went to discuss the issue with Saloth Sar, who “said to let him become secretary and I would be deputy secretary.” A 1974 party history noted that the congress had set new tasks and outlined new directions for the party, but this is doubtful, given the constraints of political struggle and the numerical weakness of the party. What was important about the congress was that it locked Saloth Sar, Nuon Chea, and Ieng Sary into positions in the party hierarchy that they retained for many years. Son Sen, who had studied with them in France, joined them on the Central Committee.42