>>17915115
Communism is generally not a very smart belief system in most ways, but Pol Pot's belief system was one of the particularly retarded strains of Communism (dwarfed possibly only by Posadism), and incidentally one which Mao Zedong had great respect and admiration for, because Mao was a bloodthirsty lunatic who thought up such a thing as the Cultural Revolution.
If Mao could have fully had his way, he would likely have wanted China to go down the path of Cambodia under the Khmer Rogue, meaning even more extensive bloodshed, barbarity, and destruction of culture and knowledge, ergo turbocharging the Cultural Revolution.

Being so aggressively self-destructive, it's not too surprising that this destruction would turn outwardly, so they began picking a fight with Vietnam. Vietnam were definitely weary after the war with the Americans, but they were also very seasoned after all that warfare with literally the world's strongest military power, and they had a lot of equipment.

While they were also Communists, they're a decidedly less retarded kind (one of the kinds which actually want to have industry and economy, and some degree of commodities), and they were not gonna tolerate the Khmer Rogue's bullshit for very long. The Khmer Rogue, by intent, wanted their own society to be really retarded and simple, which means that the state of Cambodia's military was in turn a fucking disaster, so what you're looking at is some of the most hardened veterans of the day, well armed, being deliberately provoked by the dumbest fucking yokels imaginable who had deliberately dumbed down their military and industry.

In the end, the Khmer Rogue's virulent retardation forced Vietnam to do the Cambodian people a massive favor by making them come over to kick Pot's ass.