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0 pointszaybqp4y ago0 comments

Most of the unexploded ordinances in this country were dropped from big planes. Think clustered munitions and such. Those big planes came from a far away land.

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jussij4y ago

While Cambodia did suffer from this, Laos by comparison was hit much harder:

https://quod.lib.umich.edu/t/tap/7977573.0003.107?view=text;...

Vaslo4y ago

Source?

bugbuddy4y ago

The still-incomplete database (it has several “dark” periods) reveals that from October 4, 1965, to August 15, 1973, the United States dropped far more ordnance on Cambodia than was previously believed: 2,756,941 tons’ worth, dropped in 230,516 sorties on 113,716 sites.

US Air Force bombers like this B-52, shown releasing its payload over Vietnam, helped make Cambodia one of the most heavily bombed countries in history — perhaps the most heavily bombed.

To put 2,756,941 tons into perspective, the Allies dropped just over 2 million tons of bombs during all of World War II. Cambodia may be the most heavily bombed country in history.

https://gsp.yale.edu/sites/default/files/walrus_cambodiabomb...

wahern4y ago

That's a great link. I didn't realize how heavily the U.S. bombed Cambodia.

That said, it seems the bigger problem in Cambodia is landmines, and AFAICT most of those were buried during Cambodia's internecine conflicts by various domestic factions and by the Vietnamese. See https://www.halotrust.org/where-we-work/south-asia/cambodia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_mines_in_Cambodia, and https://www.dw.com/en/clearing-cambodias-leftover-land-mines... According to that last article a large number of them were planted along Cambodia's western border by the Vietnamese to keep the Khmer Rouge at bay. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K5_Plan

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bootyfarm4y ago

Thanks for posting this link, I had no idea the relationship between the covert war in Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge.

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