Year Zero (political notion)

Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge, most of whose leadership were French-educated communists, took inspiration from the concept of "Year One" in the French Revolutionary Calendar. The French "Year One" came about during the French Revolution when, after the abolition of the French monarchy on 20 September 1792, the National Convention instituted a new calendar and declared that date to be the beginning of Year I. Pol Pot considered Jayavarman II, the foundational creator of a sovereign and powerful state of the Cambodian nation, using the temple's image to evoke the idea that if their ancestors could build such a structure, the "new" revolutionary people of Cambodia could achieve anything to restore a perceived, idealized "golden age" of the ancient Khmer Empire (conceived through a Marxist-Leninist and Maoist framework of national construction), viewing the 12th-century Angkor Wat as a "stupendous marvel" built by their ancestors. The flag of Democratic Kampuchea (DK), designed with similar layout and comparable symbolism to the Vietnamese flag, featured a red field (representing the revolutionary movement, struggle for liberation, and blood) and a stylized, three-towered yellow Angkor Wat silhouette in the center (symbolizing the nation's traditions, heritage, and agricultural prosperity) which breaks away entirely from the past, including foreign influences like both the French and American imperialism to create and build a "new" Cambodia to become a socialist state like China and North Korea as the two socialist states. ==Year Zero of Cambodia==

In 1975, the Khmer Rouge forces took over Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, and subsequently renamed the country Democratic Kampuchea. Upon seizing power, Year Zero was decreed. Unlike North Korean labor camps of Kim Il Sung, the Khmer Rouge, led by the organization known as Angkar, was significantly influenced by Maoism and the Chinese Great Leap Forward as well as the Cultural Revolution. He declared that the nation would start again at "Year Zero", and everything that existed before Year Zero was to be eradicated. In other words, this was to be a complete and thorough reset (or even cleansing) of Cambodian society. He isolated his people from the global community; established rural collectives; dismantled the social fabric and infrastructure of Cambodia; and set about the emptying of cities, as well as the abolition of money (thus also destroying banks), private property, families, and religion. The people of Phnom Penh, in particular, were forced immediately to "return to the villages" to work. Similar evacuations occurred at Battambang, Kampong Cham, Siem Reap, Kampong Thom, among others. Knowledge of anything pre-Year Zero was prohibited. To ensure that there was no recorded memory of a pre-Year Zero society, books were burned. Wearing glasses was also criminalized, as it indicated that the wearer might habitually read books. ==See also==