Democratic Kampuchea Democratic Kampuchea ( Khmer : កម្ពុជាប្រជាធិបតេយ្យ , " Kâmpŭchéa Prâcheathippadey " ) , was the name of the Khmer Rouge - controlled state that , between 1976 and 1979 , ruled the Southeast Asia n country of Cambodia . It was founded when the Khmer Rouge forces defeated the Khmer Republic of Lon Nol . After losing control of most of Cambodian territory to Vietnamese occupation , it survived as a rump state supported by the West and China . In June 1982 , the Khmer Rouge formed the Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea with two non - communist guerilla factions , which retained international recognition . The state was renamed Cambodia in 1990 in the run up to the UN - sponsored Paris Peace Agreement conference of 1991 . The Khmer Rouge were heavily influenced by Maoism , the French Communist Party and the writings of Marx and Lenin , as well as ideas of Khmer racial superiority . This resulted in the drive to create both an ethnically pure and classless Khmer society , which made the Khmer Rouge regime reminiscent of both Communism and National Socialism , or fascism , according to some scholars . Others reject the notion that the regime was fascist on the basis that the Khmer Rouge lacked protection for private property . The governing body was referred to as " Angkar Loeu " ( " upper organization " ) . The Communist Party of Kampuchea ( CPK ) leadership referred to themselves as " Angkar Padevat " during this period . Its constitution defined it as a " State of the people , workers , peasants , and all other Kampuchean labourers " Under the leadership of Pol Pot , cities were emptied , organized religion was abolished , and private property , money and markets were eliminated . An unprecedented genocide campaign ensued that led to annihilation of about 25 % of the country ' s population , with much of the killing being motivated by Khmer Rouge ideology which urged " disproportionate revenge " against rich and powerful oppressors . Victims included such class enemies as rich capitalists , professionals , intellectuals , police and government employees ( including most of Lon Nol ' s leadership ) , along with ethnic minorities such as Chinese , Vietnamese , Lao , and Cham . The genocide was essentially stopped only in 1979 by invasion of Kampuchean United Front for National Salvation and People ' s Army of Vietnam troops , following which the People ' s Republic of Kampuchea ( PRK ) was installed . The PRK had a pro - Soviet government , which started to recreate the totally devastated country . This process was significantly hampered by defeated Khmer Rouge forces , which regrouped along the border with Thailand and retained the structure of the Democratic Kampuchea state in the regions they controlled . The situation was exacerbated by the fact that the People ' s Republic of China , the Khmer Rouge ' s strongest supporter , and most Western nations continued to recognize Democratic Kampuchea as the legitimate government of the country . History . In 1970 , Premier Lon Nol and the National Assembly deposed Norodom Sihanouk as the head of state . Sihanouk , opposing the new government , entered into an alliance with the Khmer Rouge against them . Taking advantage of Vietnamese occupation of eastern Cambodia , massive U . S . carpet bombing ranging across the country , and Sihanouk ' s reputation , the Khmer Rouge were able to present themselves as a peace - oriented party in a coalition that represented the majority of the people . With large popular support in the countryside , they were able to take the capital Phnom Penh on 17 April 1975 . They continued to use Sihanouk as a figurehead for the government until 2 April 1976 when Sihanouk resigned as head of state . Sihanouk remained under comfortable , but insecure , house arrest in Phnom Penh , until late in the war with Vietnam he departed for the United States where he made Democratic Kampuchea ' s case before the Security Council . He eventually relocated to China . In January 1976 the Communist Party of Kampuchea ( CPK ) promulgated the “ Constitution of Democratic Kampuchea ” . The Constitution provided for a “ Kampuchean People ' s Representative Assembly ” ( “ KPRA ” ) to be elected by secret ballot in direct general elections and a State Praesidium to be selected and appointed every five years by the KPRA . The KPRA met only once in April 1976 . The members of the KPRA , however , were never elected ; the Central Committee of CPK appointed the chairman and other high officials both to it and to the State Praesidium . Plans for elections of members were discussed , but the 250 members of the KPRA were in fact appointed by the upper echelon of CPK . Actually all power belonged to the Standing Committee of CPK , the membership of which was comprised by the Secretary and Prime Minister Pol Pot , his Deputy Secretary Nuon Chea and seven others . Its daily work was conducted from Office 870 in Phnom Penh . Office 870 and the Standing Committee were known also as the “ Centre ” , the “ Organization , ” or “ Angkar ” . The Khmer Rouge destroyed the legal and judicial structures of the Khmer Republic . There were no courts , judges , laws or trials in Democratic Kampuchea . The “ people ’ s courts ” stipulated in Article 9 of the Constitution were never established . The old legal structures were replaced by re - education , interrogation and security centres where former Khmer Republic officials and supporters , as well as others , were detained and executed . Immediately after the fall of Phnom Penh , the Khmer Rouge evacuated the city , spreading rumours that American soldiers were planning to bomb the city . The roads out of the city were clogged with evacuees . Phnom Penh — the population of which , numbering 2 . 5 million people , included as many as 1 . 5 million wartime refugees living with relatives or in urban center — was soon nearly empty . Similar evacuations occurred at Battambang , Kampong Cham , Siem Reap , Kampong Thom , and in other towns . The Khmer Rouge was determined to turn the country into a nation of peasants in which the corruption and " parasitism " of city life would be completely uprooted . Communalization was implemented by putting men , women and children to work in the fields , which disrupted family life . The regime claimed to have “ liberated ” women through this process , and according to Zal Karkaria , " appeared to have implemented Engels ' s doctrine in its purest form : women produced , therefore they had been freed . " On the surface , society in Democratic Kampuchea was strictly egalitarian . This was not the case in practice , however . Members and candidate members of the CPK , local - level leaders of poor peasant background who collaborated with the Angkar , and members of the armed forces had a higher standard of living than the rest of the population . Ironically , considering the intensity of their revolutionary ideology , the Khmer Rouge leadership practiced nepotism to a level that nearly matched that of the Sihanouk - era elite . Family ties were important , both because of the culture and because of the leadership ' s intense secretiveness and distrust of outsiders , especially of pro - Vietnamese communists . Greed was also a motive . Different ministries , such as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Industry , were controlled and exploited by powerful Khmer Rouge families . Administering the diplomatic corps was regarded as an especially profitable fiefdom . The Khmer Rouge regime was one of the most brutal in recorded history , especially considering how briefly it ruled the country . Based on an analysis of mass grave sites , the DC - Cam Mapping Program and Yale University estimated that the Khmer Rouge executed over 1 . 38 million people . If deaths from disease and starvation are counted , as many as 2 . 5 million people died as a result of Khmer Rouge rule . This included most of the country ' s minority populations . For instance , the country ' s ethnic Vietnamese population was almost completely wiped out ; nearly all ethnic Vietnamese who didn ' t flee immediately after the takeover were exterminated . One prison held 17 , 000 people at one time or another , of which only seven survived . Immediately following the Khmer Rouge victory in 1975 , there were skirmishes between their troops and Vietnamese forces . A number of incidents occurred in May 1975 . The following month , Pol Pot and Ieng Sary visited Hanoi . They proposed a friendship treaty between the two countries , an idea that met with a cool reception from Vietnam ' s leaders . Faced with growing Khmer Rouge belligerence , the Vietnamese leadership decided in early 1978 to support internal resistance to the Pol Pot regime , with the result that the Eastern Zone became a focus of insurrection . War hysteria reached bizarre levels within Democratic Kampuchea . In May 1978 , on the eve of So Phim ' s Eastern Zone uprising , Radio Phnom Penh declared that if each Cambodian soldier killed thirty Vietnamese , only 2 million troops would be needed to eliminate the entire Vietnamese population of 50 million . It appears that the leadership in Phnom Penh was seized with immense territorial ambitions , i . e . , to recover the Mekong Delta region , which they regarded as Khmer territory . Massacres of ethnic Vietnamese and of their sympathizers by the Khmer Rouge intensified in the Eastern Zone after the May revolt . In November , Vorn Vet led an unsuccessful coup d ' état . There were now tens of thousands of Cambodian and Vietnamese exiles in Vietnamese territory . On December 3 , 1978 , Radio Hanoi announced the formation of the Kampuchean National United Front for National Salvation ( KNUFNS ) . This was a heterogeneous group of communist and non - communist exiles who shared an antipathy to the Pol Pot regime and a near total dependence on Vietnamese backing and protection . The KNUFNS provided the semblance , if not the reality , of legitimacy for Vietnam ' s invasion of Democratic Kampuchea and for its subsequent establishment of a satellite regime in Phnom Penh . In the meantime , as 1978 wore on , Cambodian bellicosity in the border areas surpassed Hanoi ' s threshold of tolerance . Vietnamese policy makers opted for a military solution and , on December 22 , Vietnam launched its offensive with the intent of overthrowing ' Democratic Kampuchea ' . An invasion force of 120 , 000 , consisting of combined armor and infantry units with strong artillery support , drove west into the level countryside of Cambodia ' s southeastern provinces . After a seventeen - day blitzkrieg , Phnom Penh fell to the advancing Vietnamese on January 7 , 1979 . The new administration was supported by a substantial Vietnamese military force and civilian advisory effort . As events in the 1980s progressed , the main preoccupations of the new regime were survival , restoring the economy , and combating the Khmer Rouge insurgency by military and political means . Armed Forces of Democratic Kampuchea . The 68 , 000 - member Khmer Rouge - dominated CPNLAF ( Cambodian People ' s National Liberation Armed Forces ) force , which completed its conquest of Cambodia in April 1975 , was renamed the RAK ( Revolutionary Army of Kampuchea ) . This name dated back to the peasant uprising that broke out in the Samlot district of Batdambang Province in 1967 . Under its long - time commander and then Minister of Defense Son Sen , the RAK had 230 battalions in 35 to 40 regiments and in 12 to 14 brigades . The command structure in units was based on three - person committees in which the political commissar ranked higher than the military commander and his deputy . Cambodia was divided into zones and special sectors by the RAK , the boundaries of which changed slightly over the years . Within these areas , the RAK ' s first task upon " liberation , " as a calculated policy , was the peremptory execution of former Khmer National Armed Forces ( FANK ) officers and of their families , without trial or fanfare . The next priority was to consolidate into a national army the separate forces that were operating more or less autonomously in the various zones . The Khmer Rouge units were commanded by zonal secretaries who were simultaneously party and military officers , some of whom were said to have manifested " warlord characteristics " . Troops from one zone frequently were sent to another zone to enforce discipline . These efforts to discipline zonal secretaries and their dissident or ideologically impure cadres gave rise to the purges that were to decimate RAK ranks , to undermine the morale of the victorious army , and to generate the seeds of rebellion . Foreign relations . The orientation of the Khmer Rouge was highly xenophobic , emphasizing an idealized , isolated , and self - sufficient version of Cambodian society . Democratic Kampuchea maintained embassies in only three countries : the People ' s Republic of China , the Democratic People ' s Republic of Korea ( North Korea ) , and Vietnam . ( Relations with the latter soured and were suspended in 1977 . ) One of the few foreign policy priorities for the regime was recognition by the United Nations , which was ultimately successful . Administrative divisions . In 1975 , the Khmer Rouge government did away with all former Cambodian traditional administrative divisions . Instead of provinces , Democratic Kampuchea was divided into geographic zones , derived from divisions established by the Khmer Rouge when they fought against the ill - fated Khmer Republic led by General Lon Nol . There were seven zones : The Northwest , the North , the Northeast , the East , the Southwest , the West and the Center , plus two " Special Regions " : The Kratie Special Region no 505 and ( before mid - 1977 ) the Siemreap Special Region no 106 . The regions were subdivided into smaller areas or " damban " . These were known by numbers , which were assigned without a seemingly coherent pattern . Villages were also subdivided into ' groups ' ( " krom " ) of 15 – 20 households who were led by a group leader ( " Meh Krom " ) . This practice continued after the Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia . It is no longer part of the official administrative system and is now unevenly applied .