Visiting the Killing Fields

Israel Frank
March 26, 2009

We all had a deep and profound experience. First we went to S-21, the Khmer Rouge’s notorious main prison. It had once been an elementary and high school but was converted into a prison. There was a high wall all around the site, the children’s exercise equipment was disgustingly transformed into torture devices. There was concertina wire up and down all the four story walls, stopping would-be suicide jumps. The place was designed as a place to torture political prisoners -- anyone who fell under Khmer Rouge distaste. It could be a worker who failed to complete a task, an actual defector, or anyone that the local magistrate disapproved of.

The first building was the one that they used to keep more important prisoners. It was also where they tortured and killed many people. Even though the linoleum floors had been wiped clean, there were dark stains on the walls and doors. In all honesty, I was afraid to go in those rooms alone. I could feel the emotions emanating from them. Unhappy spirits lingered there. I thought of what God feels looking at those rooms. I imagined God watching the events that transpired here just thirty short years ago.

In another building, the bottom floor was lined with pictures of prisoners when they were first admitted to the prison. Looking at the photos I saw intelligence behind their eyes. I saw emotion etched on their faces. Some were scared. Some were nonchalant, as if it meant to happen and they can’t escape their fate. I saw some with anger and defiance burning in their hearts. I saw lives in all. I saw hope in none. Moving through the room, there were more pictures, but these were different. These were the pictures that the Vietnamese Army took when they captured Phnom Penh and S-21. These pictures had dead people in puddles of their own blood. Dismembered bodies. People with bullet wounds and slashes across their bodies. I recognized some of the faces from the first room. Some didn’t look human anymore. I wondered who could do these kinds of things to another person? How could they be so… in human?

On the next level, there were many testimonies from people who had worked for the regime. They were just teenagers at the time, and easily molded to the Khmer Rouge. They hadn’t wanted to do it, they are in fact human. But if they had disobeyed their masters they would have found themselves in prison rather than working there. They would have been tortured and killed. Though participating in such a macabre work is a torture all in itself.

Shortly afterwards we drove about twenty minutes away, into the jungle. We arrived at the actual killing field, the place they set up to systematically execute people who had survived S-21 or other prisons long enough to sign fake confessions of treachery or crimes. All of the building had been torn down in anger and disgust when the Vietnamese arrived, but one structure dominated the landscape. A huge memorial built in honor of the lives that had been unjustly taken at the site. It was a tower, and it was filled with the excavated skulls of the fallen. Some had bullet holes. Other were punctured by hammers or other blunt objects. Some chopped by machetes.

The killing field was dotted with holes. Excavated mass grave sites. In one day, the place could murder up to three hundred people. Some of the graves were found with only headless bodies, or only women, or one was found exclusively for children.

I tried to imagine myself in the place thirty years ago, experiencing it firsthand. I imagined myself blindfolded in the back of a truck, my body in agony from the torture. Getting out of the vehicle with the sound of chains clanking. Watching my friends and family die needlessly. Or worse, watching my friends and family murder. I imagined the skulls in the tower to be from my father or mother or my best friend. I imagined watching them being tortured and killed, I tried to think what that would feel like. I realized that that is what God had to witness. His own family tearing itself apart. The terrible agony He must have felt.

I felt that I wanted to promise to God that I would never let something like this happen again. But this kind of thing goes on everyday. In neighboring Myanmar (formerly Burma) there is a systematic genocide going right now. Places in Africa have similar conflicts. In most of the Middle East there is religious oppression. Many places in the world are in conflict and disorder.

Standing there reminded me of my Mother’s country, Honduras, which just barely escaped the scourge of Communism. It fought with two neighboring countries, Guatemala and Nicaragua, and with the help of the Unites States, defended it’s freedom. I remembered my commitment to the United States Marine Corps and why I joined that outfit. To defend freedom against all enemies, foreign and domestic. I don’t believe war is right, but murder and oppression is worse.

Throughout my experience in the killing field and in S-21, I tried to keep a prayerful attitude and really reflect on God’s Heart. It opened my eyes and reminded me of the values I believe in. I had a truly profound experience