When the Bombs Stopped. The Legacy of War in Rural Cambodia (Erin Lin, 2024)
Reviewed by Ariane Bélanger-Vincent, Ph.D., California State University, Chico.
When the Bombs Stopped opens on an ethnographic vignette that encapsulates the central problem exposed in the book. The author converses with two experienced farmers living on the fertile land of Cambodia’s western province of Ratanakiri. Yet, they can barely feed themselves, let alone sell their products at the market. The reason? Ratanakiri is one of the regions that was bombed by the United States in the context of the Vietnam war. Almost 3 million tons of explosives were dropped on Cambodia alone (Laos and Vietnam were also targeted). Fifty years later, the region remains strewn with unexploded ordnance, which lies dormant in the ground and can still explode when manipulated or disturbed. This ongoing situation hinders farming, livestock raising, foraging, and everyday life. When the Bombs Stopped contributes to a growing body of anthropological literature that examines the complex and often unforeseen consequences—sometimes even the unintended benefits—of living with the remnants of past conflicts.
The author, a political scientist, employs an approach that emphasizes inductive and ethnographic methods, while also incorporating statistical analysis in one of the chapters. Inspired by the late James Scott’s work, a key strength of the book is to showcase people’s agency, portraying them not as passive victims of a past conflict but as active agents. The book is structured into five chapters, including the introduction and the conclusion.
Lin’s most significant contribution is to show that, although unexploded ordnance keeps small farmers trapped in poverty and fear, they also offer a form of protection from predatory practices. This dynamic is evident in parts of Cambodia where professional deminers have already cleared the land or where bombing never occurred. In the second chapter, Lin statistically verifies her informants’ local and experiential knowledge that connects good and fertile soil with a higher concentration of unexploded ordnance. As she explains, cluster bombs are designed to detonate on impact, but many failed to do so—a technological failure of which the Pentagon was aware. Lin found that the soil conditions in which the cluster bombs fall influence their detonation rate: fertile soil tends to be softer, which means it tends to contain more unexploded ordnance. Her ethnographic findings also reveal that in these conditions, farmers minimize risks in various ways. For example, they cultivate only a fraction of the total land they own—the part they consider safe—and rely on safer, but less efficient farming methods, such as hand tools rather than machinery. By testing these findings with statistical analysis, Lin shows that the presence of unexploded ordnance neutralizes the advantage of fertile soil, leading to a 40% loss in income when compared to farmers working on land that has not been bombed.
Chapter 4 examines the impact of humanitarian demining on small farmers who were pushed into poverty due to the presence of unexploded ordnance on their land, as well as how people use land once it has been cleared. The author spent two months traveling through remote parts of Cambodia and conversed with small landowners, tenants, and villagers. From these conversations emerged the argument of the book: “mine-removal programs recalibrate the environmental milieus in rural Cambodia, where unexploded ordnance is seen as a source of both fear and protection […]” (128-129). As the author notes, the mine action community holds a strong assumption that explosive removal leads to rural development. Lin questions this assumption, highlighting that clearance is not only a technical solution to a technical problem, but one with profound political, social, and economic consequences. For instance, she uncovers that the mere presence of deminers in an area has raised the value of the land, which may or may not benefit small landowners. She also shows how cleared land becomes the target of land-grabbing practices adopted by the country’s governmental and military elite.
This book is well-written and accessible, making it suitable for both students and the general public. Scholars and students interested in issues of military waste, land tenure, the aftermaths of the Vietnam War, or contemporary Cambodia will find it particularly insightful. Additionally, it offers valuable perspectives for those involved in the mine action community globally.