Cambodia background & history - overview

The Mekong & Tonle Sap – Lifeline and River
When the Mekong swells in summer, it backs up into Tonle Sap, filling a 60 mile channel and lake near Angkor that feeds a nation. It almost triples in size to 3 thousand square miles. Tonle Sap is a wonder of hydrology that prevents flooding on the Mekong delta, provides irrigation for crops and enriches a lake with an abundant supply of freshwater fish.

Angkor – the Ancient Empire of Cambodia
Angkor, the ancient capital of the Khymer empire is one of the archeological wonders of the world. Angkor Wat covers 200 acres and is the largest religious monument ever built. French naturalist Henri Mouhot stumbled upon the ruins in 1860 and wrote that "it is grander than anything in Greece or Rome.
ANGKOR WAT Angkor Wat was the "mountain temple" at the heart of the city, home of the Hindu gods and center of the earthly kingdom in which the king was regarded as sacred. It was built by Suryavarman II in the 12th century . Perhaps the greatest treasure of Angkor Wat is bas-relief that surrounds the walls of the outer gallery. It is the world's longest such continuous carving and narrates stories from the Ramayana and Mahabharata, legends of Vishnu and is adorned with hundreds of carvings of devatas and asparas -- celestial women.
ANGKOR THOM Angkor Thom, built in the late 11th century. The moat surrounding it was once stocked with crocodiles.
Its five monumental gates, each more than 65 feet high, are dominated by four carved faces of the Buddhist bodhisattva Avalokitesvara, facing north, south, east and west. In front of each gate are giant statues of 54 gods on the left, 54 demons on the right.
THE BAYON The Bayon rests in the center of Angkor Thom. It is a massive cluster of towers carved with 172 faces of the bodhisattva. Its interior walls are covered with bas-reliefs showing 11,000 figures engaged in battles, ceremonial pageants or the everyday life of 12th century Angkor.

WATERWAYS
One of the major success of the Angkor Empire was due to its mastery over the control of water from the Mekong River. Being situated in the tropical Monsoon zone, the Angkor was subjected to a wet season with heavy rainfall during Monsoon and a dry season during the off-Monsoon period.
Due to their engineering genius, the ancient Khmer built extensive irrigation and drainage system in order to manage the excessive water from the flood. This water was stored in the huge reservoirs such as the East and West Baray, and irrigated to the farmlands during the dry period. In this way, the Angkor were able to cultivate and harvest rice crops two or three times in one year. Such a high productivity of rice crops in a year helped to strengthen the country's economy significantly, and thus enhanced its prosperity. This enabled the god-king of the Angkor Empire to mobilize large number of laborers and slaves to undergo temples construction, several of which required over ten thousands of laborers and took them from two to three decades to complete.
In addition, the Angkor kings were able to recruit manpower to serve in military which play a major role, not only in defending the throne, but in invading the neighbors. The Angkor kingdom expanded its territory vigorously and became a strong regional empire.
The two major reservoirs at the Angkor are the East and West Baray. The East Baray has long been dry whereas the West Baray is still in use today. Two more reservoirs had been discovered recently by the aerial photographs.
It was estimated by George Grosliers, a French archaeologist, that the total agricultural land of the Angkor Empire was about 70,000 hectares. Being used to cultivate crop two or three times in one year, the land was able to support the densely populated Angkor kingdom. This mastery over the water is one of the major factor for the rise of Khmer Civilization.

HISTORY OVERVIEW
Most Cambodians consider themselves to be Khmers, whose Angkor Empire extended over much of Southeast Asia and reached its zenith between the 10th and 13th centuries. Subsequently, attacks by the Thai and Cham (from present-day Vietnam) weakened the empire ushering in a long period of decline. In 1863, the king of Cambodia placed the country under French protection; it became part of French Indochina in 1887. Following Japanese occupation in World War II, Cambodia became independent within the French Union in 1949 and fully independent in 1953. After a five-year struggle, Communist Khmer Rouge forces captured Phnom Penh in April 1975 and ordered the evacuation of all cities and towns; at least 1.5 million Cambodians died from execution, enforced hardships, or starvation during the Khmer Rouge regime under POL POT. A December 1978 Vietnamese invasion drove the Khmer Rouge into the countryside, led to a 10-year Vietnamese occupation, and touched off almost 13 years of civil war. The 1991 Paris Peace Accords mandated democratic elections and a ceasefire, which was not fully respected by the Khmer Rouge. UN-sponsored elections in 1993 helped restore some semblance of normalcy and the final elements of the Khmer Rouge surrendered in early 1999. Factional fighting in 1997 ended the first coalition government, but a second round of national elections in 1998 led to the formation of another coalition government and renewed political stability. The July 2003 elections were relatively peaceful, but it took one year of negotiations between contending political parties before a coalition government was formed. Nation-wide local elections are scheduled for 2007 and national elections for 2008.