On April 17, 1975, the communist Khmer Rouge took control of Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia.

That same day, they ordered the evacuation of the entire city.

The inhabitants were allowed to take only what they could carry.

It didn't matter if you were sick or infirm, young or old, you had to leave.

No exceptions. Where

were you going? The soldiers couldn't tell you. If you protested, you'd be beaten with rifle

butts or simply shot. The Khmer Rouge had a slogan for troublesome people. To keep you as no

profit, to destroy you as no loss. Cambodia's communist revolution would prove to be, per capita, the most radical

bloodiest revolution of the 20th century, maybe of any century. About 2 million people, or 25%

of the Cambodian population, perished during the Khmer Rouge's four years in power. Countless

were murdered outright, countless more were worked or starved to death.

Not even Mao on his worst day could match that ratio.

The Khmer Rouge, the Cambodian Communist Party, was led by the enigmatic figure Pol Pot.

His real name was Salas Tsar, but like his hero, Joseph Stalin, he took a revolutionary

nom de Gaire. Fittingly, Pol Pot has no meaning

in Cambodian. Nothing in his revolution ever made sense. He was born on May 19, 1925, the 8th of 9 children.

Well off by Cambodian standards, he received a private privileged education, including at both Catholic and

Buddhist schools. In 1949, the 24-year-old Tsar went to Paris to study radioelectricity. There,

he quickly fell in with a group of Cambodian communists. Radicalized by their French professors,

their goal was to throw off Cambodia's French colonial past and establish a new socialist

government along Marxist-Leninist lines. In 1953, Sara returned to Cambodia to lead the

revolution. That same year, Cambodia did achieve independence from France, but Sara had nothing to do

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