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rfmcdonaldNoam Chomsky's opinions on Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge have helped to discredit him in my mind as any kind of credible expert in world political affairs. As Bruce Sharp wrote:
In the years since the Khmer Rouge were deposed, Chomsky has openly acknowledged their crimes. However, to the best of my knowledge, he has never publicly admitted his own mistakes. His frequent collaborator, Edward Herman, seems intent on avoiding the issues through silly semantic games: in an scowling critique of a review of Haing Ngor's book "A Cambodian Odyssey," Herman accuses the reviewer of "resuscitating an especially foolish propaganda claim" ... specifically, that the Khmer Rouge "'tried to exterminate... a majority of the population.'" He writes, "... if the Khmer Rouge aim was 'autogenocide,' it was unable to come anywhere near meeting its objective. The best overall survey of the period, by Michael Vickery, estimates 750,000 excess deaths in the Khmer Rouge era from all causes... on a population base of six to eight million." Apparently, as Sophal points out, Herman's logic is this: Since a paltry 750,000 victims did not constitute a "majority," then there was no autogenocide.
