“Kampuchea, Splendid Victory” is the name of an article which I came across from 1979 in the magazine “Vietnam.”

In fact, articles and pictures about post-invasion Cambodia appear in a few issues of this magazine, and like the representations of minorities discussed in the previous post, there is plenty here which someone who studies media representations would find interesting.

I remember reading about the representation of the movement of peoples from North to South Vietnam in 1954 in the American press. That event was labelled at the time by some in the American media as “The Flight From Tyranny,” and the images often showed American sailors, who provided some ships to move people, helping grateful women, children and the elderly. . . with few if any images of men. Interestingly, that is what one finds in these images of post-invasion Cambodia as well.

The only men one sees in these pictures are Vietnamese soldiers who are happily and dutifully going about their work of saving Cambodia.

And while there are some pictures of people in need, the ones which stand out the most are big close-ups in color of the faces of what appear to be relieved and grateful girls and women.

Most striking of all, for me, was this shot below which made up the entire back cover of one issue of the magazine.

At first glance I thought I was looking at an advertisement for skin lotion or something like that. Then below this image I saw a caption which states in bold text, “GONE IS THAT HELL ON EARTH, GONE IS THE THREAT OF NATIONAL EXTERMINATION! SMILES AGAIN BLOSSOM IN THE LAND OF FREE KAMPUCHEA!”