by the Khmer Rouge's successor regime, the People's Republic of Kampuchea (PRK), is generally considered to be an exaggeration; among other methodological errors, the PRK authorities added the estimated number of victims that had been found in the partially-exhumed mass graves to the raw survey results, meaning that some victims would have been double-counted. An estimated 300,000 Cambodians starved to death between 1979 and 1980, largely as a result of the after-effects of Khmer Rouge policies. Fall of Democratic Kampuchea In December 1976, the Kampuchean Communist Party Central Committee's annual plenum proposed the country ready itself for the prospect of war with Vietnam. Pol Pot believed that Vietnam was committed to expansionism and thus was a threat to Cambodian independence. There were renewed border clashes between Cambodia and Vietnam in early 1977, continuing into April. On 30 April, Cambodian units, backed by artillery fire, entered Vietnam and attacked a series of villages, killing several hundred Vietnamese civilians. Vietnam responded by ordering its Air Force to bomb Cambodian border positions. Several months later, the fighting resumed; in September, two divisions of the Cambodian Eastern Zone entered the Tay Ninh area of Vietnam, where they attacked several villages and slaughtered their inhabitants. That month, Pol Pot travelled to Beijing, and from there to North Korea, where Kim Il Sung spoke out against Vietnam in solidarity with the Khmer Rouge. In December, Vietnam sent 50,000 troops over the border along a 100-mile stretch, penetrating 12 miles into Cambodia. Cambodia then formally broke off diplomatic relations with Vietnam. Cambodian forces fought back against the invaders, who had withdrawn to Vietnam by 6 January 1978. At this point, Pol Pot ordered Cambodia's military to take an aggressive, proactive stance, attacking Vietnamese troops before the latter had the chance to act. In January and February 1978, the Cambodian Army launched raids on various Vietnamese villages. The Vietnamese Politburo then concluded that it must not leave Pol Pot in power, but must remove him from power before the Cambodian military strengthened further. In 1978, it established military training camps for Cambodian refugees in southern Vietnam, forming the nucleus of a future Cambodian regime. The Cambodian government also readied itself for war. Plans for a personality cult revolving around Pol Pot were drawn up, based on the Chinese and North Korean models, in the belief that such a cult would unify the population in wartime. Large photographs of