The radical Communist movement that ruled Cambodia, renamed Democratic Kampuchea, from 1975 to 1979 under Pol Pot and the secretive party known as Angkar. On taking power it emptied the cities at gunpoint, declared a new beginning it called Year Zero, abolished money, schools, religion, and private property, and drove the whole population into rural forced labor. Roughly 1.5 to 2 million Cambodians — about a quarter of the country — died from execution, starvation, overwork, and disease before a Vietnamese invasion ended the regime in 1979.
In four years a single government tried to abolish the modern world. It emptied Cambodia's cities at gunpoint, marched millions into the fields, and abolished money, markets, schools, and open religious life, while breaking the authority of the family. It announced a radical new beginning it called Year Zero. Wearing glasses, speaking French, or having soft hands could mark a person for death as an enemy of the new order. By the time a foreign army ended it in 1979, roughly a quarter of the country was dead — killed by execution, starvation, and overwork. It remains one of the fastest and most total social catastrophes in modern history.