And then the Khmers Rouges came. Silently marching in single file, dressed in black, shod with sandals cut from tires, arms, mainly Chinese-made or captured American rifles, at the ready. what struck the people of Phnom Penh most, according to firsthand accounts of those who escaped, which I began gathering shortly after the event, were the youth of the conquering soldiers and their fierce, unsmiling, automatonlike demeanor. Their grimness was frightening. Whatever fears the citizens may have harbored of the Khmer Rouge before, their coming meant to many Cambodians the end of the five years of war, and that was cause enough for gladness. That a Communist regime was arriving was certain, and to most Cambodians no cause for rejoicing. But even to them it meant not merely a future under a regime of unforgiving rigor but also an end to the violent lawlessness and corruption that the Lon Nol government and the war had visited on Cambodians.