Prince Sihanouk and the New Order in South-East Asia
PRINCE SIHANOUK AND THE NEW ORDER IN SOUTHEAST ASIA
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Various French cabinets, viewing Cambodia as part of the Indo-China whole, fearedthat an "independent" Cambodia would be quickly absorbed by the Viet Minh, and were dubious concerning the quality of Cambodia's political leadership. Early experimentswith parliamentary democracy-.-were unpromising, and corrupt ion was endemic among
Cambodian officialdom. Politically-aware Cambodians tended to divide in their allegiance, with some supporting Sihanouk and others favoring Son Ngoc Thanh, an ex-premier whose underground independence movement tended to attract leitist and anti - royalist elements.
In June 1952, Sihanouk discharged the incumbent premier and assumed personal powerfor a period limited to three years. The years of the "royal mandate" were fruitful ones:grants of amnesty depleted the ranks of Thanh's Khmer Issarak (Free Cambodia)adherents, and threats of drastic action by Sihanouk led France to grant full independence in November 1953, Sihanouk succeeded in discrediting the once-popular Son Ngoc Thanhto most of his five million countrymen, and in so doing reinforced the prestige of the throne.
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No such doubts disturbed Sihanouk's main rival as a Cambodian, nationalist, Son Ngoc Thanh. Thanh had been born in 1908 of a Cambodian father and a Vietnamese mother, and had studied in Saigon and Paris. In 1936 here turned to Cambodia to found a nationalist newspaper, but was continuously harassed by the French and
In 1942 went into exile, first; to Thailand and then to Japan. Following Sihanouk'spremature independence declaration in March 1945, Thanh made his way back toCambodia and--during a brief honeymoon with Sihanoub-was appointed Foreign Minister and subsequently Prime Minister. Thanh was jailed by the French in October, buthis prestige was such in Cambodia that he was removed to house arrest in France. His followers took to the jungle. Thanh was pardoned in 1951, and returned to the
newspaper which he had founded 15 years earlier. But he was no longer preminentamong Cambodian nationalists . Sihanouk's always-great prestige had beenfurther enhanced when the French secured the return to Cambodia of three western prdvinces lost to Thailand during World War 11. Moreover, the King had takenup the cause of' Cambodian independence--albeit with a great deal more caution than
had Thanh many years before. When the French once again closed down his newspaper, Thanh defected to the Khor Issarak in March 1952...........