Why Vietnam Invaded Cambodia: Political Culture and the Causes of War

FROM THE PUBLISHER

On December 25, 1978, the armed forces of Vietnam launched a full-scale invasion of Cambodia that marked a turning point in the first and only extended war fought between two communist regimes. The Vietnamese forced Pol Pot's Khmers Rouges regime from its seat of power in Phnom Penh, but the ensuing war was a major source of international tension throughout the last decade of the Cold War. This book is the first comprehensive, scholarly analysis of the causes of the Vietnamese invasion, and it is the only study of Southeast Asian affairs by a Western scholar who has made use of the rich archives of the former Communist Party of the Soviet Union.

FROM THE CRITICS

Library Journal

Morris, an experienced academic and journalist, goes beyond earlier work in this cogent and lucid history. Vietnam invaded Cambodia (on Christmas Day, 1978) in an effort to eliminate the odious Pol Pot regime but instead got involved in a disastrous war with China that threatened to draw in the Soviet Union and the United States. Morris's interest in examining this event is twofold. First, he uses newly available Soviet archives, long-term research, and interviews to chronicle the origins of the war, its roots in the 1930s, and the breakdown of relations between former revolutionary allies. But his larger purpose is to critique contemporary international relations theory as being too narrowly rational. He argues that theories of political culture use leader psychology, the ethic of paranoid regimes, and the international system of Communist nations to explain these wars (and, by extension, others), which were not in any rational national interest. Recommended for university and larger public collections.--Charles Hayford, Evanston, IL Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.

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