K5 Plan

The wasteful K5 border defence project would cast a destructive shadow over the otherwise largely constructive image of the PRK/SOC.

Background

From their position of security in hidden military outposts along the Thai border, the Khmer Rouge militias launched a relentless military campaign against the newly-established People's Republic of Kampuchea state. Even though the Khmer Rouge was dominant, it fought against the Kampuchean People's Revolutionary Armed Forces (KPRAF) and Vietnam People's Army along with minor non-communist armed factions which had formerly been fighting against the Khmer Rouge between 1975 and 1979.

The border war followed a wet season / dry season rhythm. Generally, the heavily-armed Vietnamese forces conducted offensive operations during the dry seasons, and the Chinese and US-backed Khmer Rouge held the initiative during the rainy seasons. In 1982, Vietnam launched a largely unsuccessful offensive against the main Khmer Rouge base at Phnom Malai in the Cardamom Mountains.

The major consequence of the border civil war was that the PRK was hampered in its efforts to rebuild the much-damaged nation and consolidate its administration. The new republic's rule was tenuous in the border areas owing to persistent sabotage by the Khmer Rouge of the provincial administrative system through constant guerrilla warfare.

The K5 Plan began on the 19th July 1984 . It became a gigantic effort that included clearing long patches of tropical forest by felling a great number of trees, as well as slashing and uprooting tall vegetation. The purpose was to leave a continuous broad open space all along the Thai border that would be watched and mined.

In practice the K5 fence consisted of a roughly 700 km-long, 500 m-wide swath of land along the border with Thailand, where antitank and antipersonnel mines were buried to a density of about 3,000 mines per kilometre of frontage.

Consequences

Unforeseen by the planners of the project, from the military point of view the K5 Plan was also disastrous for the PRK. It did not deter the Khmer Rouge fighters who found ways to cross it, for it was impossible to effectively police the long border. Besides, maintenance was difficult, as the razed jungle left a scruffy undergrowth that, in the tropical climate, would grow again yearly to about a man's height.

The K5 Plan was counterproductive for the image of the PRK, as a republic bent on reconstructing what Pol Pot's rule had destroyed in Cambodia. Despite the magnitude of the effort, the whole project was ultimately unsuccessful and ended up playing into the hands of the enemies of the new pro-Hanoi republic. Thousands of Cambodian peasants, who despite the Vietnamese invasion had welcomed the release from the Khmer Rouge's interference in traditional farming and the absence of taxes under the PRK government, Owing to unsanitary conditions and the abundance of mosquitoes in areas of difficult access, badly fed and badly lodged workers on the K5 project fell victims of malaria and exhaustion.

Many of the mines remain to this day, making the vast long area dangerous. The K5 zone became part of the great landmine problem in Cambodia after the end of the civil war. In 1990 alone, the proportion of Cambodians that had a leg or foot amputated as a result of an injury caused by a land mine reached around 6,000.

See also

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