If Congress has its way and withdraws support from Iraq, what happened to Cambodians will happen to Iraqis.

"One of the results of the short American invasion of Cambodia was that the US Congress brought several new laws, including one that massively limited the ability of the President to deploy US military in a war against foreign countries. The other result from this short adventure was the further development of what meanwhile became known as “Nixon’s Doctrine”: this was to see the replacement of US troops by the local forces, equipped with considerable amounts of US-built arms. The US military attaché in Phnom Penh was ordered to prepare a study of what was now the Aviation Nationale Khmère (AVNK), and how it could be improved."

Nixon kept on supporting Cambodians by having US pilots train Cambodian pilots, even after the US Congress declared such actions illegal. This was a top secret mission known only to the President and the Pentagon and the troops involved.


"Known by their radio-code name of “Rustic”, this special and secret unit received their order directly from the President and the Pentagon and bypassed all levels of command between him and the 7th Air Force and MACV. Recruited among volunteers, and using O-2 and OV-10 aircraft drawn from the five Tactical Air Supprt Squadrons deployed in South Vietnam, the Rustic operated mostly from Bien Hoa and later Ubon in Thailand.The VNAF also deployed a Tactical Air Control Center in June 1970 to Pochentong to supervise South Vietnamese air operations. Furthermore, until 1972, VNAF deployed an average of 40 helicopters in Cambodia, mostly at Pochentong and Neak Luong. They were put at disposal of the Cambodian Army until the KhAF was able to field a sizeable helicopter force. VNAF operations over Cambodia represented more than a third of the total sorties flown by the service in 1970 and 1971, but Cambodia also often served as a test-ground for the huge VNAF expansion program by experiencing new forms of operations - like enemy road traffic interdiction at night or complex combined airborne assaults. During the period 1970-1972, ARVN continued to launch a series of incursion inside Cambodia, each time heavilly supported by allied air power. The last South Vietnamese incursion occured in 1974 in the Parrot Beak Area. Meanwhile, the Thai air support remained largely limited in geographical scope and size. The RTAF still attacked only targets on the western part of the country and had engaged only some T-28Ds and AC-47Ds and a few F-86F sorties before they were withdrawn from service. The RTAF also flew RF-5A reconnaissance sorties in profit of the Cambodians."

Of course, we all know what happened after US support was entirely withdrawn from the Cambodians. The killing fields.