Historian Henri Locard explains how Cambodia's communists differed from their counterparts in Vietnam.

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The fall of Indochina to communism in 1975 sharply changed the political dynamics of Southeast Asia within the framework of the Cold War. North Vietnam annexed the South, ending a decade of conflict but in Cambodia the arrival of the Khmer Rouge resulted in disaster.

Pol Pot and his henchmen inflicted unprecedented carnage, genocide, forced labor camps, and sickness, claiming about 2 million lives, or about a third of this country’s population, after seizing Phnom Penh on April 17 and evacuating the capital. South Vietnam fell on April 30.

The Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia in late 1978 ended Pol Pot's tyrannical rule but civil war continued for another two decades, Paris Peace Accords and the 1992-93 United Nations peacekeeping operation that enabled Cambodia’s first democratic elections.

At 85 years of age, French historian Henri Locard ranks among the best academics who have made Cambodia their life’s work. He first arrived here in 1964, and lived through some tumultuous years, authoring many books, including "Pol Pot’s Little Red Book."

As the 50th anniversary of the Khmer Rouge takeover approaches, Locard spoke with The Diplomat’s Luke Hunt about the differences that separated the Vietnamese and Cambodian communists, including the importance of Nuon Chea who was "brother number two" to Pol Pot.

He talks at length about the role former monarch Norodom Sihanouk played throughout the conflict, his relationships with neighboring countries and the United States, and the importance of Catholicism within the context of Vietnamese communism.

Also important was Sihanouk’s relationship with friends like Nhiek Tioulong, the Cambodian politician who featured in many of his movies, and – like many of Sihanouk’s confidants – did not support communism.

Since 2000, after retiring from the Université Lumière – Lyon 2, Locard has lived in Phnom Penh and worked as a consultant with the Khmer Rouge Tribunal. He is now a visiting professor at the Royal University of Phnom Penh lecturing in history.