Santebal

The Santebal (Khmer: សន្តិបាល, "Keeper of Peace") was the secret police and security apparatus of Angkar (The Organization) in Democratic Kampuchea (DK). It was an integral part of Marxist-Leninist and Maoist structure of the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK), which serves the party—referred to "Angkar" by purging "traitorous" elements which targets anyone including all foreigners (westerners) had suspected of opposing the party, including intellectuals, ethnic minorities (Vietnamese). The Khmer Rouge captured Phnom Penh on 17 April 1975, declared "Year Zero," and began the forced evacuation of all urban centers. Like the Imperial Japanese Army’s Kempeitai, the regime — one predicated on violent ethnonnationalism — was obsessed with "foreign influence." Prisoners were routinely forced to confess to being agents for the CIA or Vietnam, accused of being "traitors" or "hidden enemies" of Angkar. The name is a portmanteau of two Khmer words: sântĕsŏkh (សន្ដិសុខ), meaning "security," and nôkôrôbal (នគរបាល), meaning "police". It was frequently described as Angkar's "thought police". Literally, the name translates to "keeper of peace". While it shared functional similarities with Imperial Japan's Tokubetsu Kōtō Keisatsu (Tokkō) in terms of ideological control and suppressing "dangerous thoughts." On 1 May 1976, the Santebal had transformed the Tuol Svay Pray High School into a clandestine interrogation, human slaughterhouse and torture facility that managed a network of over 150 such centers, with "Tuol Sleng" (S-21) being the most notorious execution and detention center, which estimates between 18,000 and 20,000 people who entered S-21, only 12 survived. S-21 had focused on extracting political confessions through state-sponsored terror which often compared to Unit 731 due to its absolute disregard for human life and the systematic nature of its atrocities. Most were killed on-site or transported to the Choeung Ek Killing Fields to be executed with farm tools to save ammunition. While most victims were Cambodian, several hundred foreigners, including the Vietnamese and a small number of Westerners (such as the American and French nationals), were also imprisoned and executed there.