Lon Nol’s list, therefore, named three party members on the Central Committee (Saloth Sar, Ieng Sary, Son Sen) and two members who were familiar with the organization’s inner workings (Chou Chet and Siet Chhae). Chou Chet had already left the city, and Siet Chhae was advised to desist from party business. Saloth Sar and Ieng Sary for their part decided to leave the capital and seek refuge in the eastern part of the country. According to Keng Vannsak, Sar had been eager to leave for some time and had accepted Vannsak’s advice to join former Khmer militants near Thboung Khmum in northern Kompong Cham. In fact, he probably concealed his true destination—a Vietnamese military camp known as “Office 100” on the Vietnamese-Cambodian border—from Vannsak, who was not privy to party secrets. Nuon Chea, who knew how to reach the base, transported Sar and other cadre there from Phnom Penh. Talking to Yugoslavian journalists in 1978, Pol Pot said: ”In 1963, I could not stay any more in Phnom Penh. I had to join the maquis. I was not very well known to the public. But Lon Nol’s police followed my activities. They knew me but they did not know exactly who I was. In Phnom Penh I was the general responsible [for] the movement in the capital; I was also in charge of liaison with the countryside.“43

When he fled Phnom Penh, Saloth Sar abandoned the double life he had led since he began teaching at Chamraon Vichea and the identities he had adopted since 1953. He was no longer restrained by his career, by his family connections, or by the exigencies of a united front. From this point on he was a full-time revolutionary. His movements were more restricted, but in his own circle he now had greater freedom to develop his views and to plan the party’s seizure of power.

As a full-time militant, Sar assumed a new set of identities. After 1963 his personality, statements, and behavior became fused with Cambodia’s Communist movement and with his position as “Uncle Secretary” (om lekha) or “Brother Number One” (bong ti muoy) as he came to be called. His later history suggests that either he kept much of himself hidden or he had a protean personality, revealed in his frequent changes of direction. In any case, after March 1963 Saloth Sar’s personality became even more inaccessible and his life story more difficult to write.44

CHAPTER FIVE - “Red Khmer,” 1963—1970

CHAPTER FIVE

“Red Khmer,” 1963—1970