Regime or Revolution?

Chaz Wyche
Anthropology 21:070:321
April 20, 2016
Currently there is a large scale political discussion surrounding the ways that I.S.I.S. has
committed acts of genocide in Syria and Iran. Even the Secretary of State John Kerry weighted
in on the debate saying There have been increased, forced evacuations.1 He then goes on to say
No, its not- they are killing them in that case- but its a removal and a cleansing, ethically and
Religiously that is equally disturbing2Here we can see that political figures understanding of
I.S.I.S. leans more toward an understanding of the Islamic State as being a genocidal regime.
If we look closer to the rhetoric surrounding I.S.I.S. as committing crimes against humanity we
can see how these claims are very similar to the claims made about Democratic Kampuchea in
the late 1970s.Very often when describe I.S.I.S. they relate it to what is known as the

1 Michael Isikoff Kerry weighs genocide label for Islamic State, Yahoo Politics.
February 25, 2016. https://www.yahoo.com/politics/kerry-weighs-genocide-label-forislamic-state-014813753.html
2 ibid

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Cambodian genocide making the claim that I.S.I.S. is not far off from the DK regime in the sense
that they have both committed acts of genocide. This discussion has emerged recently in light of
the Khmer Rouge tribunal where Kang Kek Lew, Nuon Chea and Leng Sary are on trial for
violation of international law for committing massive crimes during the Cambodian genocide.
This parallel points to the idea that the Islamic State should be trialed for committing acts of
genocide against groups in Syria and Iran.
Counter to the popular belief that I.S.I.S. and Democratic Kampuchea have committed
acts of genocide there is the understanding that both of these organizations are not terroristic
genocidal regimes rather they are revolutions against the oppressive structures that existed in the
1970s and against the structures of todays society. Noun Chea has proposed that people should
not understand DK as an oppressive regime but rather as a revolution and defense against
Vietnams plan to take total control over Cambodia. Recently a lot of new Middle Eastern
scholarship has emerged and taken a radical different stance on I.S.I.S. as not being a terrorist
organization but rather a revolution against the western order of democracy and sovereignty.
These new understandings of the Islamic State and Democratic Kampuchea have challenged the
traditional understandings of these organizations indicating that understanding these societies in
its totality as oppressive regimes rather than a revolutionary movement is a shallow
understanding that is doomed to miss the very foundation in which these two establishments
were built upon.
Before there can be any claims made about I.S.I.S. there must first be an understanding of
what the Islamic State is and how it functions in Syria and in Iraq. I.S.I.S. stands for the Islamic
State of Iraq and Syria. There are about twenty to thirty thousand people that belong to the
organization. They are considered to be the richest terrorist organization on earth receiving funds
for the organization by selling oil and sex slaves on the black market. The goal of the

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organization is to create an Islamic state where the region is run based upon the Muslim religion
including the Sharia law. This particular organization has created a new wave of jihad where as
they are the first organization to try and create an Islamic State without becoming popular
amongst the region. The Islamic State wanted to impose a caliphate regardless of what the
masses thought.3 I.S.I.S. believes that everyone outside of the Sunni religion are traitors and
will be a barrier to creating the Islamic state. This is the reason why the organization has waged
war against other religious populations like the Shiites and the Yazidis.
As a prerequisite to understanding DK as a revolution there must first be an understanding its
creation and practices in Cambodia. Democratic Kampuchea ruled over Cambodia from 1975 to
1979. DK attempted to make a classless society where money was no longer important. The
people of DK were forced to work in rice fields for 12 hours a day without any breaks. There
were two classes of people being the people who were against capitalism and then there were the
new people who were allegedly against Democratic Kampuchea and where working with
Vietnam to destroy DK. The new people were seen to be traitors and a barrier for the society so
they were sent to S-21 a mass prison where thousands of people were killed. This concept of the
new people being traitors are similar to the way that the Islamic State view Shiite Muslims and
the Yezidi population in Iraq and Syria today.
As these understanding of I.S.I.S. being barbaric and medieval are on face and very
shallow there is a more nuanced understanding of I.S.I.S. as a revolution against western
ideology in the Middle East. There are three pillars to Western international order which include
territory, sovereignty and secularism. The Islamic State of the Middle East provides a serious
rupture to these three pillars. I.S.I.S. is exposing the limits of nationalism, State monopolies and
legitimization through its emergence of a non-state.
3 William McCants, The ISIS Apocalypse The History, Strategy, and Doomsday
Vision of the Islamic State (New York: St. Martins Press, 2015) 3.

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The organization has created a revolution against the western political order as the state
started dissolve along the lines of religion and ethnicity. The Islamic States uprising in the
Middle East has created the hijrah of people flocking to join the so-called Islamic Caliphate in
the form of foreign fighters.4 The order of the Islamic state creating the caliphate being
governed by Sharia law which is predicated upon the Muslim religion challenges the hegemonic
western ideology that the territory should be ran by the nation state separate from religion.
As I.S.I.S. has gained control in large portions of Syria and Iraq it has created a limitation to
western state sovereignty. The idea that the only sovereignty being of the state is a problematic
ideology for I.S.I.S. because this idea means that there is a limitation to sovereignty for the
Muslim population because the state is not predicated upon a religion. Particularly after the
sudden rise of ISIL as a politico-military entity claiming successful control over considerable
parts of eastern Syria and western Iraq, the decline of state sovereignty became prominent. The
rise of ISIL helped to transform a homogeneous and absolute understanding of sovereignty into
multiple sovereignties.5 As the Islamic State is created in the Middle East it has established its
own sovereignty that runs counter to the western ideologys that rule the world today which
excluded the Muslim ideology.
Understanding Democratic Kampuchea as a revolution as opposed to an oppressive regime
would allow an understanding of what happen in Cambodia in its entirety as opposed to just the
S-21 camp.DK was created as resistance to overthrow the existing order of Lon Nol who had
been allegedly perpetuating crimes against humanity. After Prince Sihinouk was no longer in
4 Murat yesiltas and Tunkay Kardas, The New Middle East ISIL and the 6th Revolt
Against the West, Insight Turkey Vol. 17, No. 3, (2015) : 65-83
file.insightturkey.com/Files/Pdf/kardas-yesiltas-son.pdf

5 Murat yesiltas and Tunkay Kardas, The New Middle East ISIL and the 6th Revolt
Against the West, Insight Turkey Vol. 17, No. 3, (2015) : 65-83
file.insightturkey.com/Files/Pdf/kardas-yesiltas-son.pdf

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charge of Cambodia Vietnam had plans to swallow up little Kampuchea just [like] a starving
boa constrictor.6 Vietnam tried to gain control over the region is two ways the first being trying
to insinuate an armed rebellion in Cambodia by indicting to the people that Pol Pot was a CIA
spy sent to sabotage the revolution."7 The second way being a military coup that would "take
over the revolution and form a union with Vietnam."8 As a way to resist against Vietnam
Democratic Kampuchea had to carefully investigate who inside the organization was carrying
out these plans and place them in the prison S-21. This new way of thinking about DK as a
revolution against the oppressive regime of Lon Nol and a defense against Vietnam as opposed to
understanding DK has just recklessly throwing the people of Cambodia into S-21 to be executed
ignores the way that there were traitors amongst the revolution that could end up making
Cambodia a victim of a Vietnam regime as a threat to existence of DK.
As there is a deeper meaning behind I.S.I.S. as just a terrorist organization and DK as just
committing genocide there should always be a deeper exploration that understands an
organization in its totality as opposed to only how the society may have violated international
law. Bell Hooks would describe this process as critical thinking as where we should use our
imagination, seeing things from perspectives other than our own and envisioning the likely
consequences of our position.9 Critical thinking is required he to understand how these
6 Nuon Chea Defence Team, NUON CHEA'S SIXTH REQUEST TO CONSIDER AND
OBTAIN ADDITIONAL EVIDENCE IN CONNECTION WITH THE APPEAL AGAINST THE
TRIAL JUDGEMENT IN CASE 002/01 (presentation, BEFORE THE SUPREME COURT
CHAMBER EXTRAORDINARY CHAMBERS IN THE COURTS OF CAMBODIA, Angk Snuol,
Cambodia, September 11, 2015)
7 ibid
8 Ibid,.13.
9 Bell Hooks Teaching Critical Thinking: Practical Wisdom (Abingdon, United
Kindom: Taylor & Francis, 2009) 11.

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organizations may have come to rise in the first place. This is not to say that genocide was not
committed by I.S.I.S. or DK but rather that using critical thinking is key to understand these
organizations are a resistance and in some ways purposeful to avoid a shallow interpretation of
societies.

Appendix
This essay gives a vivid description of the ways in which the typical understandings of I.S.I.S. in
todays society only extends so far as interpreting the Islamic State as a terrorist organization that
engages in crimes against humanity. This interpretation is one of the western modes of thought
that does not recognize I.S.I.S. as its only political sovereignty because it is not democratic
enough for America. This understanding is very simplistic and does not account for the way that
I.S.I.S. was created is resistance against the west and is about creating sovereignty in the Middle
East for the Muslim population a opposed to only being Sovereignty amongst the nation state.
There are also connections made to the status quos understanding of democratic Kampuchea as
being a genocidal regime that had no potential for revolutionary change or any productive
forums of a society. This paper also explains the necessity of critical thinking in terms of
understanding these societies because without critical thinking we can never understand the
organizations and there totality rather only being able to explain how genocide may have been

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committed ignoring the revolutionary potential that existed in DK and exist right now within the
Islamic State.

Bibliography
Hooks, Bell. 2009. "Teaching Critical Thinking: Practical Wisdom". Abingdon: Taylor &
Francis.
Kardas, Murat and Tunkay Kardas." The New Middle East ISIL and the 6th Revolt
Against the West Insight Turkey Vol. 17, No. 3, (2015): 65-83
file.insightturkey.com/Files/Pdf/kardas-yesiltas-son.pdf
Kikoler, Naomi. 2015. Our Generation Is Gone The Islamic States Targeting of
Iraqi Minorities in Ninewa. Washington, D.C.: United States Holocaust
Memorial Museum.
Mc Cants, Willaims. 2015. The ISIS Apocalypse The History, Strategy, and
Doomsday Vision of the Islamic State. New York : St. Martins Press.
Nuon Chea Defence Team.NUON CHEA'S SIXTH REQUEST TO CONSIDER AND
OBTAIN ADDITIONAL EVIDENCE IN CONNECTION WITH THE APPEAL AGAINST
THE TRIAL JUDGEMENT IN CASE 002/01." Presented before THE SUPREME
COURT CHAMBER EXTRAORDINARY CHAMBERS IN THE COURTS OF
CAMBODIA, Angk Snuol, Cambodia, September 11, 2015.