I'm considering becoming a tankie, not in terms of economic policy or social organization, but in terms of the historical narrative and anti-imperialism. However, I want to be well-informed about what Trotsky, Lenin, Stalin, and Khrushchev REALLY did. What are your best arguments (and refuted counterarguments) on the following topics?
Thanks in advance!
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oneparty.co.uk
marxism.halkcephesi.net
twitter.com
>>>/marx/
Fascist counterevolutionaries
Kulaks deserved it
Exactly none but they all deserved it.
Everyone who got purged deserved it.
Support Donetsk in their fight against imperialism
Ukraine is run by fascists
Holodomor is a western myth
There is none because it didn't happen
Lenin and Stalin have the same interpretation.
Trotsky is counter-revolutionary drivel
Stalin did nothing wrong.
Support North Korea against imperialism.
confirmed for being a moron who likes soviet aesthetics
calling for NATO, murdering communists
it was a failed CIA plot
Bruno Winzer, a Bundeswehr (west german army) general who deserted into east germany laid out plans like played out on June 17th 1953, hungary and many other places in later history
around 15 % were rehabilitated
only a very small minority were punished by death
the wiki article itself states that there is no proof of it being "man made"
it's a nazi myth by someone who used images from tsarist period and the times of revolution, published in nazi press
J. V. Stalin 1924
Trotskyism or Leninism?
marxists.org
Moscow 1937
My Visit Described for My Friends
By Lion Feuchtwanger
6. Stalin and Trotsky
revolutionarydemocracy.org
From: A talk given to the Stalin Society, and then printed in 1991
By: Bill Bland
Published: ‘The Lie of The ‘Lenin Testament" – by North Star Compass in Toronto in 1997.
themarxist-leninist.tumblr.com
"Uneven economic and political development is an absolute law of capitalism. Hence, the victory of socialism is possible first in several or even in one capitalist country alone. After expropriating the capitalists and organising their own socialist production, the victorious proletariat of that country will arise against the rest of the world—the capitalist world—attracting to its cause the oppressed classes of other countries, stirring uprisings in those countries against the capitalists, and in case of need using even armed force against the exploiting classes and their states. The political form of a society wherein the proletariat is victorious in overthrowing the bourgeoisie will be a democratic republic, which will more and more concentrate the forces of the proletariat of a given nation or nations, in the struggle against states that have not yet gone over to socialism. The abolition of classes is impossible without a dictatorship of the oppressed class, of the proletariat. A free union of nations in socialism is impossible without a more or less prolonged and stubborn struggle of the socialist republics against the backward states."
Socialism in one country confirmed by Lenin
The economic foundation of the socialist construction in one country, confirmed by Lenin
Restoration of Capitalism in the Soviet Union (1980)
oneparty.co.uk
I'm very sleepy so I'll read through your sources and reply more thoroughly later. However I'll object to a few things to see if you can give more evidence:
Your PDF concerns the prewar years of the GULAG program. I think the GULAG program hit its height during the war.
Where is your evidence that this fabrication took place?
This description of world revolution, where "the victory of socialism is possible first in several or even in one capitalist country alone," sounds like common sense. Is this implying that Trotsky's view of revolution was that it had to happen simultaneously around the world? And how does this tie into "permanent revolution"?
Read this comrade and you should have a comprehensive view of the bourgeois slander against comrade Stalin and how to counter the revisionist scum.
marxism.halkcephesi.net
Don't forget he killed 100 billion people
are trots really tankies?
There is absolutely nothing Stalin ever wrote that comes close to the theory of Bukarhin. The cult of personality is still alive and well I see.
I'm reading the PDF provided in , and for some reason I can't for the life of me figure out you somehow believe, that just because Stalin wasn't "literally Soviet Hitler", that somehow justifies the actions of the Soviet Regime. You do realize no matter which way you slice it the political repression of the Purges was on a much larger scale than Franco, Pinochet or the Tsar ( and I don't mean the Romanov's - I mean greater than Ivan the terrible).
How do you plan to secure a revolution if you don't expunge the reactionary elements?
Read: someone who looked at me funny.
Size doesn't actually have anything to do with justification. Just for an extreme example, killing 300,000 unarmed slave-owners at the end of the American Civil War would have been totally justified, but killing even a single slave should be seen as a crime against the workers of the world. In Russia at the time, the conditions for peasants in serfdom were very comparable to slave conditions. Anyone responsible for maintaining those conditions could be justifiably mass-slaughtered.
So this brings me to another question I have for tankies, which is who were the owners and exploiters of the peasants, how many were there, and how accurately did Stalin/Lenin target them in their killings and purges? Were kulaks really like slave masters, were they like the petite-bourgeoisie, or were they more just like the so-called "middle class" proles in modern capitalist society, who inhabit the same basic class as other proles, but enjoy extra benefits?
They were petty-bourgeois.
Stalin originally had no plans to harm them. He came to them and said "here's a work force that you don't need to pay, here's machinery you don't need to pay for, and in return the state will buy your crops, albeit at a much lower price that you're used to, but you will also be provided with free education, free health care and free food." The Kulaks responded by burning their farmlands and most of their food (they hid the rest of the food underground for themselves). This in turn helped usher in famine and disease. Stalin responded by throwing most of them in mines so that they Soviet Union would be able to afford to buy food.
And if he didn't do all that, the Nazis would have never been defeated. Never forget that 80% of Nazi deaths were caused by Russian soldiers using Russian weapons made by Russian workers.
They also killed millions of livestock, and livestock numbers never recovered which greatly contributed to other famines.
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Not a tankie but a lot of people in gulags were actual thieves, rapists, murderers, POWs, whites and counterrevolutionaries
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Read Marx and Engels to start. You can't really understand the thought process of Lenin and why he did what he did without first knowing Marx and the circumstances he was facing. Really, to understand Lenin's mistakes, Trotsky and Stalin's retardation, and the direction the Soviet Union took you will need to read a lot more theory both derived from Marxism and on its periphery. Also, the history and development of Russia, WWI, and really the whole of European capitalist development.
Your asking for simple answers to something it would take at large stack of books to really understand. If you just want to fap to Stalin you can parrot the local tankies and Soviet propaganda. LARPing is easy. If you want to actually develop intellectually first READ and then discuss. Also, for the love of god, don't just read Stalin and think you know fucking anything about Marxism. You can only learn Marx by actually reading him.
Stop calling yourself "tankie", for starters. It's Marxist-Leninist. Even "Stalinist" is unwarranted, unless you actively take interest in USSR of 1930s: Stalinism is not an ideology, but its practical application. Frankly, even calling this practice Stalinism is wrong, but it's impossible to change at this point.
Opinions. Arguments require a long discussion, a stuff that is better suited for >>>/marx/
The final straw that caused uprising was Khrushchev purges against Stalinists (they caused immense destabilization and, consequently, weakening of Socialist positions around the world). In Hungary specifically somewhat popular Stalinist faction got replaced by absolutely incompetent - and unpopular - people. Which is why it is retarded to refer to Stalinists as tankies.
That said, tanks were the only solution once the uprising begun: backbone of uprising was completely Fascist (Horthyist) and it was supported by anti-Socialist forces - a fact modern historians aren't denying (but trying to ignore). It was not going to end in some kind of True non-Soviet Socialism. As one user a week or so noted, modern example would be Maidan (except Maidan was practically non-violent - compared to 1956 - and not as openly Nazi).
Firstly, it's "GULag", not "GULAG".
Secondly, it's "work camps". "GULag" refers to the administration of the penitentiary system, not the actual places with prisoners.
Thirdly, there is so much propaganda around it, it's safe to assume that everything is bullshit, unless it is thoroughly sourced by actual Soviet sources. Especially, if Solzhenitsyn is mentioned, while Zemskov is not.
For example, compared to modern working conditions in many places (infamous iPhone factories, for example) Soviet work camps were actually better ("better" as in "i'd rather spend 10 years there, instead of working for Apple"). After all, the idea was to build a village, a community where people would live. Rehabilitation through honest labour. It wasn't a complete success, but results were good: ability of prisoners to fit back into society was higher than in modern times.
Overall, I would say the creation of different penitentiary system (full wages for prisoners, yearly vacations, etc.) was an improvement. Imo, the only coherent argument against "work camps" (gulags) is the grand idea of not having a prison system in Socialist society, which is, in my opinion, retarded. At least, within foreseeable future.
Provably? None. You don't call a judge that might've (or might've not) wrongly convicted someone a murderer, do you?
In Stalin's case, he wasn't even a judge: the only semi-serious accusations of "murder" are the permissions - jointly signed by several people; Stalin wasn't even always among the signatories - for NKVD to investigate some people (accused of terrorist activities - literally "against terrorist organizations and acts of terrorism") under special conditions, which bypassed parts of Soviet legal system.
I.e. legal actions undertaken in accordance with the Soviet equivalent of Patriot's Act (except much more limited in scope).
In 1934-1953 (since the introduction of procedure after Kirov's murder) 44.5 thousand people got investigated this way, but not all were accused of execution-worthy crime, not all were found guilty, and not all were executed (exact numbers unknown; especially, exact numbers of wrongly convicted).
The word "purging" refers to the Soviet practice of manager (or any post of note) being evaluated and then being dismissed (from the post; no prison sentence/execution implied) - if found lacking - by his subordinates. The whole process was generally conducted for the whole management and often under Party oversight, as a countermeasure against disinformation, blackmail or threats by counter-revolutionary elements - Game of Thrones has nothing on early USSR.
That said, I assume you are talking about people being sent to prison. Moreover, being sent to prison for political (counter-revolutionary) crimes. Unfortunately, Soviets had a very broad definition of counter-revolutionary (58th article). Any organized crime is automatically counter-revolutionary. Money counterfeiting? Counter-revolutionary. Desertion? Counter-revolutionary. Armed uprising? Extra heretical
Well, you get the idea.
Total number of imprisoned in 1921-1953 for counter-revolutionary activities is 2.369.220 (according to 1954 MVD report).
Lots. Many. There were at least 4 significant waves of rehabilitation:
1) Beria's rehabilitations (primarily 1939-1941) - actual re-investigation to release wrongly accused - targeted those who are alive at the time.
2) Khrushchev's rehabilitation (1954-1961) - initially, an attempt to "restore historical justice" and rehabilitate everyone wrongly accused (including already dead), but quickly got subverted by the actual perpetrators of the 1937/38 into "Let's blame Stalin for everything" campaign with suppression of evidence. Primary focus was on rehabilitation of military and on people who were part of the 1937/38, but got caught abusing their rights (i.e. purging personal rivals) and were arrested by Beria and subsequently executed. Actual opponents of orthodox ML ideology - initial targets of 1937/38 (Kamenev, Zinoviev, Rykov, Bukharin, etc.) - were not rehabilitated and were considered justly convicted for their "anti-Soviet activity" (Central Committee decision of 1956).
3) Gorbachev's rehabilitation (1986-1991) - predictably, no longer concentrated on shifting blame, but on discrediting orthodox ML to justify Perestroika (and increase of Gorbachev's personal power). Thus, everyone - except Trotsky, since he wasn't ML - was considered "innocent". Especially Bukharin, whose ideas Gorbachev was using for Perestroika.
4) Post-Soviet rehabilitation (1991) - everyone gets rehabilitated. Even if you were caught pillaging and murdering by Bolsheviks in 1918, you'll probably get rehabilitation for being victim on unjust regime - because revolutionary tribunals were illegal. As one might've guessed, the idea is to discredit the whole of USSR (and Socialist ideas in general).
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The whole inglorious story of Ukrainian nationalism? It's ugly and boring. If you ask me, Soviets were too lenient on them (cue conspiracy theories about Khrushchev's ties to Bandera followers).
A book-worthy answer is necessary. There were several reasons, not the least of which was the refusal of West to sell grain to USSR in 1932 (Soviets managed to get some only from Iran), and - yes - actual sabotage (primarily, by playing dumb).
We don't start talking about conspiracy theories if resistance of Republicans within administration against Democrat reforms is mentioned, do we? Soviets had this kind of political infighting in spades - after all, the whole of economy was politicized.
Lenin collected and codified most of additions to Marxism into a coherent whole, and then improved it further himself. Enough to consider his input equal to Marx's.
Trotsky was a good journalist, a mediocre Marxist, and a horrible theorist (too much opportunism). Unsurprisingly enough, this means that his followers don't have a firm grasp on theory - which leads to sectarianism.
Stalin's role is similar to Lenin's: codification of the commonly accepted (by Party) additions to Marxism, but with less of his own input. Stalin wouldn't be even relevant, if not for his total unambiguity: practical implementation of Marxism.
Too many things to list.
so you're a larper
what the fuck
1. there were never more people in the entire gulag system than in the fucking US prison population today, but that's not enough for you? that's still "too many"? in a fucking state that was preparing for the biggest war in human history in the nation that had to carry the biggest losses and that was the main target of the aggression?
are you fucking retarded you stupid cunt?
2. now it's the war years that's the focus of the "terror" and "repression"? ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME? you stupid piece of shit, it has always been the fucking claim it has been during the years of the "purges" BEFORE the war, and now you dipshit tell me "well the data provided covers just this time period before the war, but it was actually DURING the war that was excellent"?
you fucking mental piece of shit just fucking kill yourself you lying fucking cunt
your replies are so full of shit, i mean it was to be expected, but jesus fucking christ you really need to fucking off yourself, you insufferable retarded little whiney stupid lying bitch
the main feature of your replies is the following:
not adressing the facts
rhetorical attacks with no substance ("stalin worse than the worst tsar")
flipping the issues ("it's not the pre-war era of the purges but actually during and after the war that's more important")
which goes with blatant historical revisionism and lies, but besides that the whole article DOES adress the entire "stalinist" period till '53 you lying cunt, you didn't even read it
Where is the proof of this? How much did they really do it?
That's a pretty wild claim. Especially with the later shortages.
What is this replying to?
My guess is we have different ideas about living (and working) conditions in Third World.
What shortages? In 1943?
I think it's more of a "incoherent baiting", rather than actual "replying".
See, if you've bought this kind of "great person" narrative, you're halfway to becoming a tankie already - good for you.
The actions of individuals, deaths or "whose to blame", is irrelevant. What matters is the theoretical content and the actual structures of societies (their mode of production foremost). In both instances MLs are in no way or form based on the theories of Marx, but in name. They've abandoned the abolition of the value-form, switched the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat in favour an long "transitional" mode of production (state capitalism) because the "state will wither away with the strengthening of it's organs".
Nor is their analysis of the collapse of their beloved regimes in any way or form based in the materialist conception of history, but reliant upon individual insidious actors that corrupted a system from within, something more akin to the propaganda of Germany in the late 30s.
MLs (i.e. Stalinists) are not Marxist, they're closer to pre-marx socialists like Lassalle or Owen. Their claim to fame is having built an welfare/warfare state of the exact same model as any other capitalist country in the Golden Age of Capitalism.
This guy who was touring the Ukraine says that it was not uncommon in his book, Russia since 1917: Four Decades of Soviet Politics.
Frederick Schuman traveled as a tourist in Ukraine during the famine period. Once he became professor at Williams College, he published a book in 1957 about the Soviet Union. He spoke about famine.
`Their [kulak] opposition took the initial form of slaughtering their cattle and horses in preference to having them collectivized. The result was a grievous blow to Soviet agriculture, for most of the cattle and horses were owned by the kulaks. Between 1928 and 1933 the number of horses in the USSR declined from almost 30,000,000 to less than 15,000,000; of horned cattle from 70,000,000 (including 31,000,0000 cows) to 38,000,000 (including 20,000,000 cows); of sheep and goats from 147,000,000 to 50,000,000; and of hogs from 20,000,000 to 12,000,000. Soviet rural economy had not recovered from this staggering loss by 1941.
`… Some [kulaks] murdered officials, set the torch to the property of the collectives, and even burned their own crops and seed grain. More refused to sow or reap, perhaps on the assumption that the authorities would make concessions and would in any case feed them.
`The aftermath was the ``Ukraine famine of 1932–33 …. Lurid accounts, mostly fictional, appeared in the Nazi press in Germany and in the Hearst press in the United States, often illustrated with photographs that turned out to have been taken along the Volga in 1921 …. The ``famine was not, in its later stages, a result of food shortage, despite the sharp reduction of seed grain and harvests flowing from special requisitions in the spring of 1932 which were apparently occasioned by fear of war in Japan. Most of the victims were kulaks who had refused to sow their fields or had destroyed their crops.'
OP here, this poster makes a number of compelling criticisms. How do tankies respond to this? I've seen some tankies who really do take this stuff at face value (IE, Stalin did everything good, Trotsky was a terroristic saboteur), but I think I have seen others who actually do point out that "Stalin" is often just a label placed on actions of the whole bureaucracy.
If you believe in the state capitalism meme, where exactly does the surplus value extraction happen? You know, when a capitalist shareholder reaps the profits of labor to enrich himself.
This must be a joke. Unemployment in ML countries was almost 0% almost all the time.
He must have got these numbers from somewhere, right? Was it just state propaganda, or was there a real survey behind this?
This is confusing. Why would the "petite-bourgeois" peasants, the Kulaks, be the ones who would starve? Weren't they better off?
"Hurr durr Russian revolution was a fluke, let's throw Russia under bus and focus on making revolutions in countries that matter"
"Screw other countries, we're making Russia great again"
"Stalin was ba-a-ad, that's why I will focus on heavy industry just like Stalin did, but without paying any attention to why he focused on heavy industry in the first place. Also let's do opposite of what Stalin did in agriculture, whoops, fertile soil just flew away."
"Blood in the pool" is a good metaphor. Hungary talks shit, gets punched, cries crocodile tears.
Most of GULAG prisoners were actual criminals. Note that infamous Article 58 covered banditism as well.
Around a million. Because they were criminals.
Made-up nationality with made-up language (actually just a southern dialect of Russian) invented by Bolsheviks. See "ukrainization".
Holodomor was caused by Ukrainians being greedy retards who thought that hiding grain and killing cattle will destroy Soviet power and then West will give them replacement cattle for free. When they began starving, containment was put in place to prevent them from moving into other places and bringing famine there as well. Famines in other places were caused by combination of growing pains of collectivism, bad climate, focus on keeping workers fed because building industry ASAP was vital. I also read somewhere that at some point Western countries refused to sell equipment to USSR for gold, and required grain instead, but I haven't researched that claim.
Who fucking cares, if cat catches mice - it's a good cat.
"Stalin is nationalist" is a meme made up by Russian nationalists.
Basically all his criticism is based on hurrdurr state capitalism which is a meme being spread by Richard D. Wolff and Holla Forums loves sucking up every catchphrase their idols spout out
No, I mean the content of his criticism towards the "great men" view of Stalin, Trotsky, etc.
Also, didn't Lenin call the USSR "state capitalism" at some point? Was he referring to the NEP, or to the top-down central planning?
No, he doesn't.
Great man theory is used by anti-Soviet propagandists. It's the crux of their argumentation. Why should Marxists take it seriously? Much more importantly, it doesn't even make sense in Marxist discourse. What kind of moron would believe that this - explicitly anti-Soviet and explicitly anti-Marxist - theory is actually the core of Marxism-Leninism?
This is not criticism. This is simple strawmanning.
Stalin was one of the politicians - undoubtedly, the most popular and respected in 1930s, yes; but still one of, not the only one - that were active in USSR. As I've already mentioned - we shouldn't even be using the word "Stalinism" to describe the period. We are simply stuck with it, because of public perception of the era.
To the NEP. And Central Planning in USSR was not top-down.
What the fuck is surplus value extraction? Surplus value is produced, and it's only possible to produce it within capitalism where goods are sold on a market.
The USSR sold goods on a world market, it operated under the capitalist production process.
Holy fuck please read Critique of the Gotha Programme, it's not a very long document.
Hint: it includes the entire system of state eduction, healthcare etc.
You've not actually responded to any of my critique. You've just sidestepped the issue by saying it's a mistake to presume your dogmatic defence of everything written by Stalin… is a defence of Stalin himself.
Pathetic.
If you use your powers of observation, you might notice that I did not respond to you.
Trust me, I'll put down your "arguments" even when you shy away from debating me directly.
Though I do feel quite proud you've learnt to cower like a dog, maybe there's hope for you yet.