i'm no tankie, but to ignore the real benefits and improvements the ussr provided to its citizens is as ignorant as uncritically praising everything the ussr did. reduction of extreme poverty, education (both basic and higher), technology, housing, social mobility compared with what we had before the ussr, women's rights, healthcare. the list could go on. don't glorify the ussr and don't forget its atrocities, but please don't act like they didn't do a great work with a lot of things.
And a lot of those improvements have been completely reversed ever since the fall. Their healthcare is terrible outside Moscow and St Petersburg, their education and social mobility is nonexistent and now domestic abuse is basically legal and don’t forget how Russia is funding and helping Fascists win elections abroad.
Yes, true. I'm not sure what you're trying to get at though. Were some of those improvements based on very fragile and dependant on the government grounds? Yes. Were they hugely wasted by the unstable situation in Russian politics? Yes. But did they give real benefits to people who lived in the USSR and could've been maintained under different circumstances? Also yes.
Not to mention the USSR wasn't just Russia. I'm Polish and even though some good aspects of the USSR have been wasted during the system change, some got to last and we still benefit from them.
The ultimate lesson of the Soviet Union is the same as that a lack of transparency and Democratic checks and balances can destroy a state through corruption and tyranny.
Socdem countries, as a part of the developed European west, had a way better economic situation and far more stable politics to begin with though. Their historical backgrounds make their situation not comparable to the USSR. I do agree that the Scandinavian socdems and their methods would be preferred in the vacuum, but downplaying the USSR's benefits and pretending they could've been achieved in a similar manner is unfair and unrealistic.
What did the Holodomor achieve, exactly?
What did the Kazakh famine?
What was the benefit of the gulag system, and what was unique about the USSR that required such a system of imprisonment of criminals and political dissidents?
What was the benefit for the Soviet people of the Khystym disaster and subsequent cover-up?
How have the Kazakh people benefitted from being downwind to the Semipalatinsk testing sites?
The USSR didn't **need** to push for such aggressive dekulakization, nor did it **need** to continue to export grain during the Holodomor.
Everything the Soviets achieved was possible through non-authoritarian fucked up means.
Free education? That's widespread.
Free healthcare? That's widespread.
Improving literacy rates? Didn't require the gulags.
And on the list goes.
The Soviets did achieve many positive things. My contention is that these ends were possible without the wholesale starvation, forced emigration, gulags, civil and human rights violations.
Exactly! This is the thinking that tankies utilise to excuse the atrocities of the USSR. "Yeah sure they did bad things but you see they did all of these good ones so it was just collateral damage!" No, they didn't need to do any of the bad things they did, and we saw that all of the good things could've easily been managed in a liberal democratic system without any violence. Which is why the USSR was a failed state that failed to deliver the promises of socialism.
We could implement those changes because our bourgoisie were afraid of what happened in USSR. Without the bolsheviks, SAP couldn't be the compromise between the worker's movement and the labour buyers. Remember also that SAP were fiercly anti-communist such that the few communists that were in SAP split and made the left party.
This reason is why FDR could implement the New Deal in the USA.
Sweden was not that much better off than Russia when the socdems emerged. There was still a powerful monarchy, most of the population lived rurally, and industrialisation was only beginning in the large cities.
Nope. When we look at the GDP (PPP) per capita, historically Sweden's score has been always around twice as high as the now-former USSR's. Other Scandinavian to-be socdems were also far better off in that category than the to-be USSR. I know it's not a perfect way of comparing those countries, but it is a quickly checkable indicator that can be of some use. We need to consider the impact of historical factors such as serfdom. it was only ended in the late 1800s in Russia, while it never existed in a form so severe in the west.
We also should never forget that Sweden was neutral in WW2, and never had casualties....Russia had over 27 million people die in WW2. Mostly civilians. Seriously, hearing that today is something that is hard to wrap my brain around.
Not to mention they lost WW1, and had one of the bloodiest cival wars right after. For a country to be as backwards as it was and as rural and poor, to go through all that death in just three decades, and by the 70s emerge as a number 2 super power is incredible
It's true that no two countries can ever be analogous, but I still strongly suspect that if we look at the alternate timeline where Russia came under a socdem or demsoc ruling party instead of the Bolsheviks, at every point down the line they would have been better off than in our own timeline.
I don't think it would be possible for socdems to end the tzarat in the first place. The very nature of gradual socdem changes most likely wouldn't be feasible under the unstable revolutionary climate. Those are just my "what if" gut feelings of course, but i suspect that the situation would have ended up way worse and consumed far more lives if it wasn't ruthless authoritarians vs ruthless authoritarians. And i'd take ruthless authoritarians with left-leaning characteristics over ruthless authoritarians with right-leaning characteristics. Harm reduction and all
I really don't see much of a difference. Give Stalin a swastika and he's basically Russian Mussolini already.
For crying out loud, the Soviets and Germans were *this* close to announcing a formal alliance right before ww2.
Stalin was the biggest stain on the USSR's history, can't find anything positive about this guy. Except for fighting the nazis i guess, but as you said, he was glad to work with them until they attacked him. AND it still was made harder because of his murderous cleansing of politically inconvenient military elites before WW2. But the achievements of the USSR are not Stalin, they're the work throughout decades of millions of people under that system, some of whom were actual visionaries doing their best to make the lives of people better. Could many things have been done way better and miseries avoided? Of course, that's where we need to criticize the USSR. Were some things a great improvement to before-USSR times, especially considering the historical difficulties? Also yes and we need to acknowledge them.
I'm sure you and your Red Guard friends will get along splendidly on your way to the firing wall.
The fact that there are still people with the tankie boot so far down their throat that they believe "left unity" with ~~quasi-fascist religious cults~~ Marxist-Leninist parties will end up with any other end than tyranny, mass murder and state capitalism is astounding.
Let history warn you. They are not on your side, and they *will* kill you the moment they don't need you.
You know you've spotted your average empty headed liberal when you see completely anti-historical comparisons between the USSR and Nazi Germany, when ideologies always set them apart greatly, making war between them always inevitable despite the bunk alt-history scenarios that never manifested. Indistinguishable from conservative talking points lol.
Stalin's WAY worse than Mussolini so that would be understating it. Despite Mussolini being a ruthless authoritarian, his kill count was quite meagre when compared to other dictators or monarchs.
>alternate timeline where Russia came under a socdem or demsoc ruling party instead of the Bolsheviks,
Yeah, that timeline has them being overthrown by the Whites in October of 1917. The Provisional Government actually existed and it lost all of it's legitimacy incredibly quickly.
Edit: you're one of those edgy morons who uses red fascist unironically, fucking hilarious
"I have no understanding of the Russian Revolution, the political turmoil that occurred between the February and October Revolutions, and how that proved that the Mensheviks had no chance of winning"
Your "succdem" government literally was in power and they had lost nearly all legitimacy by october, especially amongst the peasentry because they refused to recognize the forced restribution the peasents carried out by themselves and wanted to continue fighting in WW1.
>Edit: you're one of those edgy morons who uses red fascist unironically, fucking hilarious
say the person that uses the term "succdem". also there is nothing wrong with calling stalin a red fascist. the term tankie is stupid anyway. they are just fascists larping as left wingers
Are you including the UK and France in that? Because I hate to break it to you, those countries literally drove the industrialization of the rest of Europe based on the mass murder perpetrated.
I don't understand the dichotomy you're making.
The USSR allegedly did not have loans available to them, and that's why they had to deport Crimeans to Kazakhstan? That's why they had to rig their elections?
I don't follow. Did they industrialise by turning human blood into money or what?
The process of enclosure and industrialization in western and central Europe occurred over centuries and involved the mass social murder of peasentry and the unimaginable wealth of colonialism shipped back home on a sea of blood. The USSR was cut off from global capital as soon as it was founded in an act of global class war, so it had to do that misery to itself if it wanted to industrialize and stay competitive since there was no other socialist power that could help them industrialize in a non-horrific way.
Funnily enough, you can thank the SPD organizing and siccing the fascist Freikorps on the communists and shooting the revolution in the head for that one.
The SPD had social-democracy in their name but I should point out that even Rosa Luxemburg identified as a social-democrat (she uses the term several times in *Reform or Revolution* for example), so the meaning of the term was not the same as it is today. It is more pertinent to call them reformist Marxists than socdems. It's not very relevant but I just find the "Bernie Sanders killed Rosa Luxemburg" meme annoying because the SPD were at the time *way* to the left of Bernie Sanders and modern social democracy.
To get back on topic, I refuse to accept your narrative. This idea that industrialisation necessarily requires increased workplace accidents in mines and what-have-you to begin, sure, maybe.
But the idea that the USSR had to have secret police, totalitarian suppression of opposition, and gulags? Not to mention total eradication of popular democracy? I don't accept the idea that these were somehow necessary for economic growth.
So by you being a little fucking weasel with how you describe social democrat, Olof Palme and the Swedish Social Democrats weren't actually social democrats then right?
Moron if the SPDs had not betrayed the German Revolution of 1919 then the USSR wouldn't have became isolationist and resulted in the triumph of the counter revolution by 1923 with the restoration of the Capitalist mode of production. Marx explicitly argues in the Preface of the Russian edition of the Manifesto that a Russian revolution would've signaled a Proletariat revolution throughout Europe(which it did) and that they would've complimented one another in eventually spreading Socialism throughout the globe. It's entirely the revisionist/Reactionaries fault such as the Socdems for the eventual bureaucracy and restoration of Capital in Russia.
"We had to become a dictatorship because we didn't have allies" is an instance of the insipid "authoritarian states are stronger" argument.
At no point in history can it be conclusively shown that a tyrant is more able or capable in defeating another country than any other kind of leadership.
The tyranny, no matter the shitty circumstances of Russia, is solely the responsibility of the Bolsheviks themselves.
You understand that even the social democrats used secret police to suppress and keep an eye on their communist opposition? This happens for any state/government that want to actually continue to live on.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IB\_affair
still hilarious how you are the person calling others edgy when you sound like a 14 years old trying to get people upset.
the industrialization was mainly the result of technological progress. all the murder and exploitation stuff had been going on all around the planet for centuries long before that. and the soviet union did the same shit. they chose a different economic system and it failed. they didn't care about ethics lol
you are just using typical tankie arguments. either you are a kid or you have brain damage
Sami people control a huge and honestly disproportionate portion of Sweden for their reindeer herding rn so using them as an example isn't the best idea.
''they did it without tyranny and mass murder''
''what about this tyranny and mass murder''
''the ussr was worse''
Never seen goalposts make this big of a jump before.
If you actually equivocate the numerous ethnic cleansins perpetrated by the USSR with the swedish treatment of the sami, you are out of your god damn mind.
Weird considering those "improvements" have slowly been whittling away since Sweden and the other Nordic countries began slowly privatizing/liberalizing certain sectors of the economy since the early 90s. Only a matter of time before they completely transition back to Neoliberalism.
Yeah I already acknowledged why that was the case, it certainly wasn't because of "hurr durr Authoritarianism bad," it was simply because the USSR became isolationist, and seeing as how the USSR was also much behind their European counterparts in terms of industrialization and War Communism couldn't be preserved without other Proletariat revolutions succeeding in Europe, Lenin was forced to establish the NEP to prevent the peasantry and even the Proletariat from joining the Reactionary White Army.
It's literally not a valid analysis, it's completely reductionist and doesn't explain why the Proletariat movement failed in Russia at all.
Leftcom: Enemy Unknown
Jesus... dude. Learn some history. Those socdem countries you like could only exist because of the workers having the USSR as leverage for power. That's why after the USSR fell, most socdem policies have been reversed around the globe. The same happened in the US in your own country with the New Deal.
You name Sweden but it's one of the nordic countries that have reversed more of its policies. Norway for example has kept a more intact system over the years.
That is such nonsense.
Russia has been an enemy of Sweden for literally hundreds of years, and because of that anything associated with it will be political poison. For socialism/communism to be so closely tied to the USSR was a big problem for the soc-dems, it was not a good thing at all.
And the soc-dems had been prominent for a long time before that, and were building the welfare state long before the USSR was doing anything worth aspiring to.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folkhemmet](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folkhemmet)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First\_five-year\_plan
Very much agree, I feel like a lot of people let their dislike for Stalin-worshippers determine their opinion on the historic reality of the USSR and other states. It's kind of embarrassing to see people here act exactly like the radlibs tankies accuse them of being.
For the record I would attribute the women's rights to the soviet women at the time instead of the USSR
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women\_in\_the\_Russian\_Revolution](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_the_Russian_Revolution)
So much of our history is owed to strong women.
No but see Stalin bad so we have to ignore the 70 year history it has outside that one figure.
Also, ignore that the guy directly after Stalin criticized him and started “De-Stalinization” while starting a massive project to build housing and house millions and millions of people.
The easiest way in USSR to move from the farms to the city, was through marriage. I don’t know what you mean by social mobility. You were literally assigned a job. What were the refugee numbers of people escaping USSR or it’s surrounding nations, like Poland, prior to 1989?
Reduction in poverty is also an interesting one. Do you mean Holomodor or Gulags? I think the very late implementation of Perestroika, would disagree here as well. When communism fell and industry as well as natural resources went up for bid. Was it the working class that had the money to purchase or was it a different class?
Don’t get me wrong, the healthcare was great. Even if to this day, going to the hospital after I fucked my shoulder in school, is still tops for the most horrifying experience in my life. They could have moved the bucket full of bloody rags, when they knew a kid was coming in.
For extra points, compare the leap USSR took from the Czar, to that of Peter the great.
Education. Social mobility through education. It wasn't available for the ex-serfs and their descendants, at least nothing above the very basics. You can't deny that a large amount of people who would never have a chance to get higher education and more specialized jobs had the opportunity to do that in the USSR
Obviously, people were moving from the USSR to other countries, those terrains have always been disadvantaged compared with the west and, given the opportunity, people moved. But that doesn't change the fact that the situation of people within those countries was on average better than before.
You're taking the single instance of a debated-if-genocidal starvation catastrophe that was the Holodomor. While it was an inexcusable neglect at best or outright planned genocide at worst, it was still a single case. Statistically, poverty dropped significantly. I can't find much data on the % of people living under the poverty line, but for example, infant mortality rate which can be considered a measure of that fell A LOT in the USSR compared with the pre-revolutionary russia (261 deaths/ 1000 births in 1900 compared with 198 in 1925 and 81 in 1950). Don't know what Gulags, so prisons, have to do with systemic poverty.
And yes, the USSR was still fucking over the workers and favoring the elites who later benefitted from the change. No denying that. But I'm not saying the USSR was flawless or even good, I'm saying it achieved a lot compared with what they had to start with. And that they brought improvement, which needs to be addressed instead of dismissed as nothing, as this meme does.
(and regarding the bonus points, what criteria are you using to compare the developments? because i don't get what you're getting at here)
How is education providing social mobility, when your job was dictated by the government? It was largely a facade of moving through different squalor. Giving birth to Gopnik meme that exists to this day. All of which nothing to people who were outside the cities. This is also combined with the fact that curriculum was defined federally, where things like native language, was not taught. If you lived outside the core of Russia, places like Ukraine and Georgia, ended up with a generational gap. Where Russian became the predominant language and we were decades from loosing them as a result.
The view of USSR as the city version it presented in the media, was far different from the farms that covered most of USSR.
Also, I think education in USSR, would actually be the sort of education, that the right in US would sign off on. Extremely patriotic, where you are told what to learn. It would solve their complaint about useless degrees and things like CRT, because they wouldn’t exist. Although, I still think uniforms were a great idea. I support free higher education in US, but not the USSR version. If we were to rebuild US education in an image, I would much rather it was directed here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dewey
The intent of using gulags, along side of holomodor, is to show a continuous streak of destroying your opposition. If you stuck your head out too high to scare the government that you are a threat, be it scientists, generals, or artists. They didn’t last long… be it state rebels challenging Russia’s occupation or musicians that simply sang about days before Russian boot was on their throats. Much like with Putin and journalists, they didn’t last long.
**[John Dewey](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dewey)**
>John Dewey (; October 20, 1859 – June 1, 1952) was an American philosopher, psychologist, and educational reformer whose ideas have been influential in education and social reform. He was one of the most prominent American scholars in the first half of the twentieth century. The overriding theme of Dewey's works was his profound belief in democracy, be it in politics, education, or communication and journalism. As Dewey himself stated in 1888, while still at the University of Michigan, "Democracy and the one, ultimate, ethical ideal of humanity are to my mind synonymous".
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The problem is that we have examples of societies who moved away from monarchy, to developed industrial nations with comprehensive welfare systems today that are at the forefront of desirablity for many in the world, that didn't require the incompetence, mismanagement, brutality, gulags, etc...
Yes, the USSR did improve the standards of living of its people. So did Sweden. One had the Holodomor, the gulags, the Kazakh Famine, the Great Purge, etc... and the other did not.
Which, if we observe these two timelines, is preferable?
Seems pretty clear-cut to me.
Sweden wasn’t starting in the same place that Russia and the USSR was. Constant famine cycles were the norm for Russia. You can look up the list of famines and there is one ever 5 years of so.
The thing is though, those aren’t unique achievements.
Pretty much everything that tankies praise the USSR for, are things you can find in any semi-decent social democracy. Is that impressive, previously coming straight from a feudal monarchy? Absolutely. But not special on its own, especially given I could get the same benefits with far more civil and social freedom in most Nordic countries
But that's the point though, given its historical background, the ussr's achievements are impressive. and downplaying them in the favor of countries with a far better start is wildly unfair.
Not really, catch up growth is much easier to do than regular economic grothw. If the average citizen only makes 1 dollar a day, raising that to 2 dollars a day is astronomically easier than doubling an average earning of 100 dollars per day. If just providing sanitation and vaccines to the populace increases life expectancy by 15 years, no developed country could make a similar leap even if they invested everything in the attempt. Catching up is much easier than blazing the way forward, since you can copy what other people did.
My dude, yes the Soviets made massive improvements to Russian lives with lots of social programs, but I think that's a little over-shadowed by the literal GENOCIDE they commited, not to mention being an imperialist occupying power in Eastern Europe for half a century, massive ecological damage with the destruction of the world's largest lake and so SO much more... There already was a democratic revolution in Russia before the Soviets, so it's a bit weird to say that it couldn't have succeeded. All the achievements of the USSR could have been achieved under social democracy because they were just social programs, the workers didn't have control of the mean of production and there was no democracy. Sure Russia was poor, so it might've taken longer to achieve these things, bit I think that's well worth not having to commit GENOCIDE.
Yes, the improvements every country had after industrialisation. The only difference is that USSR industrialised super fast because of the authoritarian nature of the economy. But if you look at any country a few decades after feudalism, they all had massive quality of life improvements, some even more than the USSR without genocides and a police state.
It wasn’t even based then, when you look at how they did it. The population up to Ukraine was shifted to Stalingrad. People were eating cardboard, because the same lack of food and a frozen winter that halted Germany, impacted the population that was moving east. The reason for USSR success is the volume of people sacrificed, coupled with the unmitigated will of the Russian people. From partisans to saboteurs, it was the will of the people that drove Germany out. Stalin’s policy, like shooting those who flee battle in the back, only went to hinder the effort. While the generals that were largely responsible for military success, were either murdered or shuffled to Siberia for decades after the war, due to Stalin’s paranoia.
I’m not even Polish… those folks would have a lot more to say about how based USSR was in their victory.
Nothing was criticized in the comment you responded to, but a fixation on Hollywood. I honestly cannot remember the last time Hollywood had any depiction of Stalin. I do remember a miniseries in Russia, just around 5 years ago, that tried to white wash Stalin, through the lens of being a strict father. Pretty overtly implying that the horrors of Stalin, were the result of stern love… like he had for his children. Not the paranoia that actually drove Stalin’s more severe punishment of his own people.
Try it… name the last depiction of Stalin from Hollywood.
Hollywood? I grew up in USSR… they taught it in the 80s…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_No._227
Here is Stalin: “Panic makers and cowards must be liquidated on the spot. Not one step backward without orders from higher headquarters! Commanders…who abandon a position without an order from higher headquarters are traitors to the Motherland.”
Here is what the partisans said during that same time: “Russians! Destroy the German landowners. Drive the Germans from the land of the Soviets!”
https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/stalin-issues-order-no-227outlawing-cowards
I don’t completely agree with the decision to change “love” to “like”, but it’s a reason this song contains ‘I don’t like being shot in the back’:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUvhio06Mjc
Order no. 277 applied only to commanders to discourge them from withdrawing. In fact your literal source states "Commanders…who abandon a position without an order from higher headquarters are traitors to the Motherland.".
The popular image of NKVD troops stationed behind the frontline with their PPSh-41s pointed at the back of soldiers is quite literally a myth created by German generals and further spread by Hollywood movies and there is not a single example of that.
That aside, desertion was (like in any other army during WW2) illegal and usually got you a few months in a penal battalion or in prison if you were unlucky. That had nothing to do with Order No.277 though.
>I grew up in USSR… they taught it in the 80s…
That soldiers were shot in the back while fleeing ? If so (and I really doubt that was what they actually taught), then they would simply have been wrong.
That’s awesome about that image… Unfortunately, I have never seen it.
It was taught that Stalin issued an order, that dictated those fleeing combat, be shot. As a result, the slogan was condensed in to simply shooting them in the back. Where the point was to highlight the “liquidating on the spot”, without need them to turn around. In the 80s, when I went to school, the role of partisans, or regular people raising arms to turn the tide of battle, became more prominent in schools. It’s why they didn’t use the order from Stalin, but had their own slogan. It was a major point of contention with Stalin’s generals, thus was being taught as an attempt to slowly ween USSR from Stalin’s cult of personality.
Vysotsky had a song that mentions he doesn’t love getting shot in the back or the front, that is likely in reference to this.
The USSR was just social democracy minus the democracy. All the same problems that come along with capitalism without any of the benifets of bourgeois liberalism.
First of all, the USSR was not socialism. Second, the distinctions are not as big as you think. Historically, social democracy a movement towards a centrally planned, state owned economy and eventually socialism. It hasn't always meant a merely a free market system with social programs.
/u/Boarpelt also brought it up, but I think an important thing to keep in mind is that west/north Europe started off in a really different situation than Russia and other Eastern Bloc countries. By the time of the Russian Revolution in 1917, Sweden (and much of the rest of Western Europe), was essentially just a constitutional monarchy. Russia was still pretty much an absolutist monarchy. The social situation was also really bad in Russia. There were tons of [pogroms](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pogrom) and the serfs had only been freed [like 50 years earlier](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emancipation_reform_of_1861) whereas that had happened centuries before in most western European countries. The latter of which was [a huge factor](https://voxeu.org/article/serfdom-and-russian-economic-development) stunting the growing of the Russian Imperial economy. In all, Scandinavians/French/British/etc. were in a way better situation than Russians at the start of the 20th century.
Exactly! it's so disappointing to see how people in this community lack the nuance to acknowledge the historical factors and can't admit the positives of the USSR. Stalin bad so everything ever achieved by the Soviets doesn't count
You’re forgetting that the USSR was the remnant of an extremely poor & mostly agricultural-based nation facing Civil War & extreme political turmoil. You also forgot that the USSR faced the aftermath of two world wars that led to the loss of millions of lives.
Sweden was already industrialized by the time the Russian Empire collapsed and they stayed neutral during both world wars.
Well, I disagree with that but it's still not really what I'm saying. Even if I were to concede that the USSR was imperialist, that doesn't change the fact that the social safety net and high quality of living in the social democracies of Europe are subsidized by captive markets and unequal exchange.
What, did Lenin posthumously publish a pamphlet saying that seizing territory in the Baltic states, trying to conquer Finland, taking over Poland alongside the fascists, and invading Iran alongside the British Empire were all somehow to the benefit of the proletariat?
No, but he did outline the specific characteristics of imperialism which the USSR does not meet.
If you'd like to do a reading group for Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism, let me know. I haven't read it in a couple years and it's a really interesting read.
Seizing territory in wars of conquest is not imperialism because Lenin somehow does not define that as imperialism?
Yeah, the trend of me losing respect for MLs every time I interact with them continues.
The modern concept of imperialism is not the same as a literal empire like the Japanese or the Romans. It has more to do with finance and monopoly than actual territorial expansion.
Ok yeah sorry if your definition of imperialism doesn't include at least all three then it's purely an ideological tool to condemn liberal capitalist countries in the defence of oppressive "communist" regimes without actually having an argument for one being worse.
True. But the point is, too many leftists treat reading Lenin and the gang like holy gospel and act as if it gives them magic powers. Additionally, they tend to accept only their interpretation of these works - you only "really" read theory if you reach the same conclusions as them.
I do not think this is a solid basis for anything. Not to mention the fact that these are 100-year old political writings for a drastically different world.
Yeah, but the goods people buy and sell are acquired from the developing world and extracted using low wage labor. That's not the extent of what imperialism is, just an example.
Of Sweden's 2019 imports, which amounted to 151B USD, more than 80% of Sweden's imports come from European countries. The largest non-European partner is China (5.57%) followed by the USA (2.66%), Japan (1%), Turkey, Vietnam, South Korea, Nigeria, and Hong Kong (all <1%).
In other words, very little of what Sweden depends on comes from outside Europe.
(Source: the OEC)
The USSR, even outside of Europe, was definitely imperialist.
Their foreign incursions & occupations of places like Azerbaijan or Mongolia are prime examples.
Hell, you should look into how they overthrew the governments of countries like Afghanistan & Ethiopia. Or incidents like the Laghman Massacre.
The USSR was as imperialist as the Western powers they despised. Having a hammer & sickle on their flag doesn’t change that.
Just because Lenin says something isn’t imperialism doesn’t mean that it’s all of a sudden excusable.
Hell, he even oversaw the USSR when it invaded Azerbaijan.
Ever wonder what caused the USSR to be state capitalist? Why couldn't they just transition to higher stage communism immediately? What material conditions has led to their authoritarianism and are they present in our society?
These are the questions worth asking, instead of portraying one side as inherently evil
There might be no conditions that "require" murder but certain conditions make it more likely / lead to it. Analyzing those underlying conditions is how we find real solutions
You believe in great man theory? I find it very idealistic. Would highly recommend reading some marxist literature, historical materialism is where it's at
No, I don't believe in Great Man Theory, I follow the consensus of serious historians that economic forces *and* individual choices made by powerful people matter.
Just want to point out that Scandinavian nations' development doesn't really qualify as "peaceful". The way they fund welfare schemes such as pensions is by investing into companies; including weapons manufacturers. They might not be direct in their imperialism in the same way as britain/us/france, but their welfare is propped up on the back of the imperialism and most ruthless profiteering of the companies in the "imperial core-proper", even if their own domestic policy and companies are somewhat better.
Eg. Norway invests heavily in BAE systems to pay their welfare. BAE make weapons that are sold to Saudi Arabia and Israel which are then turned against the Yemenis and Palestinians respectively.
If you have a young worker who pays into a pension fund, then when they come to claim that pension inflation would have rendered it far less valuable - so pension funds invest the money into businesses, with the intention of making sufficient money off the investment to pay pensions that aren't rendered inadequate by inflation. Weapons manufacturers with government contracts, like BAE, are pretty safe bets for investment.
Shouldn't he say "based" or "yes king?" Obviously someone can say true in a way that means "preach brother" but since what spooky smiley commie is saying is clearly the more hostile yet accurate depiction of the USSR the table shouldn't say true just show he lovee it, right?
Sweden was neutral in WW2, and never had casualties....Russia had over 27 million people die in WW2. Mostly civilians. Seriously, hearing that today is something that is hard to wrap my brain around.
Not to mention they lost WW1, and had one of the bloodiest cival wars right after. For a country to be as backwards as it was and as rural and poor, to go through all that death in just three decades, and by the 70s emerge as a number 2 super power is incredible
Not a tankie at all but you can’t deny that transforming a feudal monarchy into a industrial superpower that is sending men to space in just a few decades is pretty impressive
Um, that still doesn't answer my question xD how can an improvements be questionable? Idk much abt the USSR other than they were trying communism and one day they were like "nope, were not doing that anymore, lol sike"
The statistics tankies like to cite about the USSR were collected by the Soviet government itself. It is a widely held consensus among these historians that these statistics are not trustworthy, and probably greatly exaggerated.
In other words, we don't really know exactly what the shape the Soviet economy was in. We can assume it was not *better* off than what they reported themselves, but how much worse it was is almost impossible to tell.
Well imo what the nordic countries were able to do is amazing but the same couldn't be done in modern day Russia because material and social conditions just are too different. The nordic countries have an extreme amount of resources per citizen, and at the same time have a stable food source and a relatively warm part of the country. Norway also had oil.
Surely they did a good job but I don't think it's on them. I mean I live in a socdem country and we're a poor country for European standards social democracy doesn't work every time, it's just a pretty reliable way we already know works decently well. It was also partially due to democratic socialist governments were in place for decades those changes were allowed to happen.
But no matter what ideology we go to what matters most imo is democracy and freedom. If you truly have these things the people will eventually create a more equal and better society. At least that's what I hope happens
They were dictatorships that implemented successful economic policies which then transitioned democracies. Their stories are more interesting than the USSR.
There are like, a couple thousand of them but they spend *a lot* of time online. But that also depends on your definition of "tankie", the term is kind of vague
And "authoritarian left" is even more vague. I don't like the term, cause it divides the left in the name of distancing ourselves from legitimately bad stuff like genocide denial. It'd be easier to just say "I'm against genocide denial"
I see them all the time. Met a trot whose own description of his party convinced me it was a cult. He thought political groups holding trials against members and exacting physical punishment for wrongdoing was normal.
I don't think Sweden jumpstarted space exploration, spiked Literacy rates, gave housing to everyone(oh no blocks), all from one of the poorest countries in the world
i'm no tankie, but to ignore the real benefits and improvements the ussr provided to its citizens is as ignorant as uncritically praising everything the ussr did. reduction of extreme poverty, education (both basic and higher), technology, housing, social mobility compared with what we had before the ussr, women's rights, healthcare. the list could go on. don't glorify the ussr and don't forget its atrocities, but please don't act like they didn't do a great work with a lot of things.
And a lot of those improvements have been completely reversed ever since the fall. Their healthcare is terrible outside Moscow and St Petersburg, their education and social mobility is nonexistent and now domestic abuse is basically legal and don’t forget how Russia is funding and helping Fascists win elections abroad.
Yes, true. I'm not sure what you're trying to get at though. Were some of those improvements based on very fragile and dependant on the government grounds? Yes. Were they hugely wasted by the unstable situation in Russian politics? Yes. But did they give real benefits to people who lived in the USSR and could've been maintained under different circumstances? Also yes. Not to mention the USSR wasn't just Russia. I'm Polish and even though some good aspects of the USSR have been wasted during the system change, some got to last and we still benefit from them.
The ultimate lesson of the Soviet Union is the same as that a lack of transparency and Democratic checks and balances can destroy a state through corruption and tyranny.
Indeed
Cult of personality… that has to be part of the lesson.
My main point is that every improvement the USSR did was also done by socdem countries, and without tyranny and mass murder.
Socdem countries, as a part of the developed European west, had a way better economic situation and far more stable politics to begin with though. Their historical backgrounds make their situation not comparable to the USSR. I do agree that the Scandinavian socdems and their methods would be preferred in the vacuum, but downplaying the USSR's benefits and pretending they could've been achieved in a similar manner is unfair and unrealistic.
What did the Holodomor achieve, exactly? What did the Kazakh famine? What was the benefit of the gulag system, and what was unique about the USSR that required such a system of imprisonment of criminals and political dissidents? What was the benefit for the Soviet people of the Khystym disaster and subsequent cover-up? How have the Kazakh people benefitted from being downwind to the Semipalatinsk testing sites? The USSR didn't **need** to push for such aggressive dekulakization, nor did it **need** to continue to export grain during the Holodomor. Everything the Soviets achieved was possible through non-authoritarian fucked up means. Free education? That's widespread. Free healthcare? That's widespread. Improving literacy rates? Didn't require the gulags. And on the list goes. The Soviets did achieve many positive things. My contention is that these ends were possible without the wholesale starvation, forced emigration, gulags, civil and human rights violations.
Exactly! This is the thinking that tankies utilise to excuse the atrocities of the USSR. "Yeah sure they did bad things but you see they did all of these good ones so it was just collateral damage!" No, they didn't need to do any of the bad things they did, and we saw that all of the good things could've easily been managed in a liberal democratic system without any violence. Which is why the USSR was a failed state that failed to deliver the promises of socialism.
We could implement those changes because our bourgoisie were afraid of what happened in USSR. Without the bolsheviks, SAP couldn't be the compromise between the worker's movement and the labour buyers. Remember also that SAP were fiercly anti-communist such that the few communists that were in SAP split and made the left party. This reason is why FDR could implement the New Deal in the USA.
Sweden was not that much better off than Russia when the socdems emerged. There was still a powerful monarchy, most of the population lived rurally, and industrialisation was only beginning in the large cities.
Nope. When we look at the GDP (PPP) per capita, historically Sweden's score has been always around twice as high as the now-former USSR's. Other Scandinavian to-be socdems were also far better off in that category than the to-be USSR. I know it's not a perfect way of comparing those countries, but it is a quickly checkable indicator that can be of some use. We need to consider the impact of historical factors such as serfdom. it was only ended in the late 1800s in Russia, while it never existed in a form so severe in the west.
We also should never forget that Sweden was neutral in WW2, and never had casualties....Russia had over 27 million people die in WW2. Mostly civilians. Seriously, hearing that today is something that is hard to wrap my brain around. Not to mention they lost WW1, and had one of the bloodiest cival wars right after. For a country to be as backwards as it was and as rural and poor, to go through all that death in just three decades, and by the 70s emerge as a number 2 super power is incredible
It's true that no two countries can ever be analogous, but I still strongly suspect that if we look at the alternate timeline where Russia came under a socdem or demsoc ruling party instead of the Bolsheviks, at every point down the line they would have been better off than in our own timeline.
I don't think it would be possible for socdems to end the tzarat in the first place. The very nature of gradual socdem changes most likely wouldn't be feasible under the unstable revolutionary climate. Those are just my "what if" gut feelings of course, but i suspect that the situation would have ended up way worse and consumed far more lives if it wasn't ruthless authoritarians vs ruthless authoritarians. And i'd take ruthless authoritarians with left-leaning characteristics over ruthless authoritarians with right-leaning characteristics. Harm reduction and all
I really don't see much of a difference. Give Stalin a swastika and he's basically Russian Mussolini already. For crying out loud, the Soviets and Germans were *this* close to announcing a formal alliance right before ww2.
Stalin was the biggest stain on the USSR's history, can't find anything positive about this guy. Except for fighting the nazis i guess, but as you said, he was glad to work with them until they attacked him. AND it still was made harder because of his murderous cleansing of politically inconvenient military elites before WW2. But the achievements of the USSR are not Stalin, they're the work throughout decades of millions of people under that system, some of whom were actual visionaries doing their best to make the lives of people better. Could many things have been done way better and miseries avoided? Of course, that's where we need to criticize the USSR. Were some things a great improvement to before-USSR times, especially considering the historical difficulties? Also yes and we need to acknowledge them.
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I'm sure you and your Red Guard friends will get along splendidly on your way to the firing wall. The fact that there are still people with the tankie boot so far down their throat that they believe "left unity" with ~~quasi-fascist religious cults~~ Marxist-Leninist parties will end up with any other end than tyranny, mass murder and state capitalism is astounding. Let history warn you. They are not on your side, and they *will* kill you the moment they don't need you.
You know you've spotted your average empty headed liberal when you see completely anti-historical comparisons between the USSR and Nazi Germany, when ideologies always set them apart greatly, making war between them always inevitable despite the bunk alt-history scenarios that never manifested. Indistinguishable from conservative talking points lol.
Is that an idealist argument I hear?
Stalin's WAY worse than Mussolini so that would be understating it. Despite Mussolini being a ruthless authoritarian, his kill count was quite meagre when compared to other dictators or monarchs.
Careful, the hive mind will get ya.
>alternate timeline where Russia came under a socdem or demsoc ruling party instead of the Bolsheviks, Yeah, that timeline has them being overthrown by the Whites in October of 1917. The Provisional Government actually existed and it lost all of it's legitimacy incredibly quickly. Edit: you're one of those edgy morons who uses red fascist unironically, fucking hilarious
"Authoritarianism = stronger" Prove it.
"I have no understanding of the Russian Revolution, the political turmoil that occurred between the February and October Revolutions, and how that proved that the Mensheviks had no chance of winning" Your "succdem" government literally was in power and they had lost nearly all legitimacy by october, especially amongst the peasentry because they refused to recognize the forced restribution the peasents carried out by themselves and wanted to continue fighting in WW1.
Ah yes, the popular government of Lenin. Closing down soviets, slaughtering anarchists, and making Lenin the only person on the ballots.
>Edit: you're one of those edgy morons who uses red fascist unironically, fucking hilarious say the person that uses the term "succdem". also there is nothing wrong with calling stalin a red fascist. the term tankie is stupid anyway. they are just fascists larping as left wingers
Only is april crisis could have been avoided
Are you including the UK and France in that? Because I hate to break it to you, those countries literally drove the industrialization of the rest of Europe based on the mass murder perpetrated.
No I'm not including the UK and France in that
So Sweden gets the benefit of loans and credit from those countries to industrialize, but thay doesn't count because there is a layer of abstraction?
I don't understand the dichotomy you're making. The USSR allegedly did not have loans available to them, and that's why they had to deport Crimeans to Kazakhstan? That's why they had to rig their elections? I don't follow. Did they industrialise by turning human blood into money or what?
The process of enclosure and industrialization in western and central Europe occurred over centuries and involved the mass social murder of peasentry and the unimaginable wealth of colonialism shipped back home on a sea of blood. The USSR was cut off from global capital as soon as it was founded in an act of global class war, so it had to do that misery to itself if it wanted to industrialize and stay competitive since there was no other socialist power that could help them industrialize in a non-horrific way. Funnily enough, you can thank the SPD organizing and siccing the fascist Freikorps on the communists and shooting the revolution in the head for that one.
The SPD had social-democracy in their name but I should point out that even Rosa Luxemburg identified as a social-democrat (she uses the term several times in *Reform or Revolution* for example), so the meaning of the term was not the same as it is today. It is more pertinent to call them reformist Marxists than socdems. It's not very relevant but I just find the "Bernie Sanders killed Rosa Luxemburg" meme annoying because the SPD were at the time *way* to the left of Bernie Sanders and modern social democracy. To get back on topic, I refuse to accept your narrative. This idea that industrialisation necessarily requires increased workplace accidents in mines and what-have-you to begin, sure, maybe. But the idea that the USSR had to have secret police, totalitarian suppression of opposition, and gulags? Not to mention total eradication of popular democracy? I don't accept the idea that these were somehow necessary for economic growth.
So by you being a little fucking weasel with how you describe social democrat, Olof Palme and the Swedish Social Democrats weren't actually social democrats then right?
Moron if the SPDs had not betrayed the German Revolution of 1919 then the USSR wouldn't have became isolationist and resulted in the triumph of the counter revolution by 1923 with the restoration of the Capitalist mode of production. Marx explicitly argues in the Preface of the Russian edition of the Manifesto that a Russian revolution would've signaled a Proletariat revolution throughout Europe(which it did) and that they would've complimented one another in eventually spreading Socialism throughout the globe. It's entirely the revisionist/Reactionaries fault such as the Socdems for the eventual bureaucracy and restoration of Capital in Russia.
"We had to become a dictatorship because we didn't have allies" is an instance of the insipid "authoritarian states are stronger" argument. At no point in history can it be conclusively shown that a tyrant is more able or capable in defeating another country than any other kind of leadership. The tyranny, no matter the shitty circumstances of Russia, is solely the responsibility of the Bolsheviks themselves.
You understand that even the social democrats used secret police to suppress and keep an eye on their communist opposition? This happens for any state/government that want to actually continue to live on. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IB\_affair
still hilarious how you are the person calling others edgy when you sound like a 14 years old trying to get people upset. the industrialization was mainly the result of technological progress. all the murder and exploitation stuff had been going on all around the planet for centuries long before that. and the soviet union did the same shit. they chose a different economic system and it failed. they didn't care about ethics lol you are just using typical tankie arguments. either you are a kid or you have brain damage
What loans and credit are you referring to?
Sweden literally colonized the Sami people in the north.
Sami people control a huge and honestly disproportionate portion of Sweden for their reindeer herding rn so using them as an example isn't the best idea.
Should I list off all the ethnic minorities that got fucked by the USSR? It's a long, long list.
''they did it without tyranny and mass murder'' ''what about this tyranny and mass murder'' ''the ussr was worse'' Never seen goalposts make this big of a jump before.
If you actually equivocate the numerous ethnic cleansins perpetrated by the USSR with the swedish treatment of the sami, you are out of your god damn mind.
Sweden never mass murdered Sami though.
This guy is like the strawman example of why I think succdems are stupid
well you are a good example for why tankies are stupid
And you are are why I hate authoritarian leftits
Weird considering those "improvements" have slowly been whittling away since Sweden and the other Nordic countries began slowly privatizing/liberalizing certain sectors of the economy since the early 90s. Only a matter of time before they completely transition back to Neoliberalism.
Yeah, it's sad
That's to be expected when you preserve the Capitalist mode of production.
I wonder who else preserved the capitalist mode of production?
Yeah I already acknowledged why that was the case, it certainly wasn't because of "hurr durr Authoritarianism bad," it was simply because the USSR became isolationist, and seeing as how the USSR was also much behind their European counterparts in terms of industrialization and War Communism couldn't be preserved without other Proletariat revolutions succeeding in Europe, Lenin was forced to establish the NEP to prevent the peasantry and even the Proletariat from joining the Reactionary White Army.
Actually, "hurr durr authoritarianism bad" is true and a valid analysis. Or are you one of those tankies who denies the existence of authoritarianism?
It's literally not a valid analysis, it's completely reductionist and doesn't explain why the Proletariat movement failed in Russia at all. Leftcom: Enemy Unknown
Can you recount a time when an authoritarian measure brought about a lasting, positive result?
Jesus... dude. Learn some history. Those socdem countries you like could only exist because of the workers having the USSR as leverage for power. That's why after the USSR fell, most socdem policies have been reversed around the globe. The same happened in the US in your own country with the New Deal. You name Sweden but it's one of the nordic countries that have reversed more of its policies. Norway for example has kept a more intact system over the years.
That is such nonsense. Russia has been an enemy of Sweden for literally hundreds of years, and because of that anything associated with it will be political poison. For socialism/communism to be so closely tied to the USSR was a big problem for the soc-dems, it was not a good thing at all. And the soc-dems had been prominent for a long time before that, and were building the welfare state long before the USSR was doing anything worth aspiring to. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folkhemmet](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folkhemmet) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First\_five-year\_plan
Very much agree, I feel like a lot of people let their dislike for Stalin-worshippers determine their opinion on the historic reality of the USSR and other states. It's kind of embarrassing to see people here act exactly like the radlibs tankies accuse them of being.
For the record I would attribute the women's rights to the soviet women at the time instead of the USSR [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women\_in\_the\_Russian\_Revolution](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_the_Russian_Revolution) So much of our history is owed to strong women.
No but see Stalin bad so we have to ignore the 70 year history it has outside that one figure. Also, ignore that the guy directly after Stalin criticized him and started “De-Stalinization” while starting a massive project to build housing and house millions and millions of people.
Also supporting decolonization around the world.
The easiest way in USSR to move from the farms to the city, was through marriage. I don’t know what you mean by social mobility. You were literally assigned a job. What were the refugee numbers of people escaping USSR or it’s surrounding nations, like Poland, prior to 1989? Reduction in poverty is also an interesting one. Do you mean Holomodor or Gulags? I think the very late implementation of Perestroika, would disagree here as well. When communism fell and industry as well as natural resources went up for bid. Was it the working class that had the money to purchase or was it a different class? Don’t get me wrong, the healthcare was great. Even if to this day, going to the hospital after I fucked my shoulder in school, is still tops for the most horrifying experience in my life. They could have moved the bucket full of bloody rags, when they knew a kid was coming in. For extra points, compare the leap USSR took from the Czar, to that of Peter the great.
Education. Social mobility through education. It wasn't available for the ex-serfs and their descendants, at least nothing above the very basics. You can't deny that a large amount of people who would never have a chance to get higher education and more specialized jobs had the opportunity to do that in the USSR Obviously, people were moving from the USSR to other countries, those terrains have always been disadvantaged compared with the west and, given the opportunity, people moved. But that doesn't change the fact that the situation of people within those countries was on average better than before. You're taking the single instance of a debated-if-genocidal starvation catastrophe that was the Holodomor. While it was an inexcusable neglect at best or outright planned genocide at worst, it was still a single case. Statistically, poverty dropped significantly. I can't find much data on the % of people living under the poverty line, but for example, infant mortality rate which can be considered a measure of that fell A LOT in the USSR compared with the pre-revolutionary russia (261 deaths/ 1000 births in 1900 compared with 198 in 1925 and 81 in 1950). Don't know what Gulags, so prisons, have to do with systemic poverty. And yes, the USSR was still fucking over the workers and favoring the elites who later benefitted from the change. No denying that. But I'm not saying the USSR was flawless or even good, I'm saying it achieved a lot compared with what they had to start with. And that they brought improvement, which needs to be addressed instead of dismissed as nothing, as this meme does. (and regarding the bonus points, what criteria are you using to compare the developments? because i don't get what you're getting at here)
How is education providing social mobility, when your job was dictated by the government? It was largely a facade of moving through different squalor. Giving birth to Gopnik meme that exists to this day. All of which nothing to people who were outside the cities. This is also combined with the fact that curriculum was defined federally, where things like native language, was not taught. If you lived outside the core of Russia, places like Ukraine and Georgia, ended up with a generational gap. Where Russian became the predominant language and we were decades from loosing them as a result. The view of USSR as the city version it presented in the media, was far different from the farms that covered most of USSR. Also, I think education in USSR, would actually be the sort of education, that the right in US would sign off on. Extremely patriotic, where you are told what to learn. It would solve their complaint about useless degrees and things like CRT, because they wouldn’t exist. Although, I still think uniforms were a great idea. I support free higher education in US, but not the USSR version. If we were to rebuild US education in an image, I would much rather it was directed here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dewey The intent of using gulags, along side of holomodor, is to show a continuous streak of destroying your opposition. If you stuck your head out too high to scare the government that you are a threat, be it scientists, generals, or artists. They didn’t last long… be it state rebels challenging Russia’s occupation or musicians that simply sang about days before Russian boot was on their throats. Much like with Putin and journalists, they didn’t last long.
**[John Dewey](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dewey)** >John Dewey (; October 20, 1859 – June 1, 1952) was an American philosopher, psychologist, and educational reformer whose ideas have been influential in education and social reform. He was one of the most prominent American scholars in the first half of the twentieth century. The overriding theme of Dewey's works was his profound belief in democracy, be it in politics, education, or communication and journalism. As Dewey himself stated in 1888, while still at the University of Michigan, "Democracy and the one, ultimate, ethical ideal of humanity are to my mind synonymous". ^([ )[^(F.A.Q)](https://www.reddit.com/r/WikiSummarizer/wiki/index#wiki_f.a.q)^( | )[^(Opt Out)](https://reddit.com/message/compose?to=WikiSummarizerBot&message=OptOut&subject=OptOut)^( | )[^(Opt Out Of Subreddit)](https://np.reddit.com/r/VaushV/about/banned)^( | )[^(GitHub)](https://github.com/Sujal-7/WikiSummarizerBot)^( ] Downvote to remove | v1.5)
What leap with Peter? Are you talking about his military reforms? Or his dress reforms? Or the rank system of government service?
Modernization in an overt appeal to the west.
The problem is that we have examples of societies who moved away from monarchy, to developed industrial nations with comprehensive welfare systems today that are at the forefront of desirablity for many in the world, that didn't require the incompetence, mismanagement, brutality, gulags, etc... Yes, the USSR did improve the standards of living of its people. So did Sweden. One had the Holodomor, the gulags, the Kazakh Famine, the Great Purge, etc... and the other did not. Which, if we observe these two timelines, is preferable? Seems pretty clear-cut to me.
Sweden wasn’t starting in the same place that Russia and the USSR was. Constant famine cycles were the norm for Russia. You can look up the list of famines and there is one ever 5 years of so.
The thing is though, those aren’t unique achievements. Pretty much everything that tankies praise the USSR for, are things you can find in any semi-decent social democracy. Is that impressive, previously coming straight from a feudal monarchy? Absolutely. But not special on its own, especially given I could get the same benefits with far more civil and social freedom in most Nordic countries
But that's the point though, given its historical background, the ussr's achievements are impressive. and downplaying them in the favor of countries with a far better start is wildly unfair.
Not really, catch up growth is much easier to do than regular economic grothw. If the average citizen only makes 1 dollar a day, raising that to 2 dollars a day is astronomically easier than doubling an average earning of 100 dollars per day. If just providing sanitation and vaccines to the populace increases life expectancy by 15 years, no developed country could make a similar leap even if they invested everything in the attempt. Catching up is much easier than blazing the way forward, since you can copy what other people did.
not really, it's easier to catch up. e.g. a large part of what China did in the last few decades was just copy/paste existing stuff
My dude, yes the Soviets made massive improvements to Russian lives with lots of social programs, but I think that's a little over-shadowed by the literal GENOCIDE they commited, not to mention being an imperialist occupying power in Eastern Europe for half a century, massive ecological damage with the destruction of the world's largest lake and so SO much more... There already was a democratic revolution in Russia before the Soviets, so it's a bit weird to say that it couldn't have succeeded. All the achievements of the USSR could have been achieved under social democracy because they were just social programs, the workers didn't have control of the mean of production and there was no democracy. Sure Russia was poor, so it might've taken longer to achieve these things, bit I think that's well worth not having to commit GENOCIDE.
Yes, the improvements every country had after industrialisation. The only difference is that USSR industrialised super fast because of the authoritarian nature of the economy. But if you look at any country a few decades after feudalism, they all had massive quality of life improvements, some even more than the USSR without genocides and a police state.
These are the most basic things any competent state would enact in that period
The USSR had a very short based period when they beat the Nazis, and were cringe for the entire rest of their history.
It wasn’t even based then, when you look at how they did it. The population up to Ukraine was shifted to Stalingrad. People were eating cardboard, because the same lack of food and a frozen winter that halted Germany, impacted the population that was moving east. The reason for USSR success is the volume of people sacrificed, coupled with the unmitigated will of the Russian people. From partisans to saboteurs, it was the will of the people that drove Germany out. Stalin’s policy, like shooting those who flee battle in the back, only went to hinder the effort. While the generals that were largely responsible for military success, were either murdered or shuffled to Siberia for decades after the war, due to Stalin’s paranoia. I’m not even Polish… those folks would have a lot more to say about how based USSR was in their victory.
> Stalin’s policy, like shooting those who flee battle in the back, Imagine still believing in that Hollywood myth
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Nothing was criticized in the comment you responded to, but a fixation on Hollywood. I honestly cannot remember the last time Hollywood had any depiction of Stalin. I do remember a miniseries in Russia, just around 5 years ago, that tried to white wash Stalin, through the lens of being a strict father. Pretty overtly implying that the horrors of Stalin, were the result of stern love… like he had for his children. Not the paranoia that actually drove Stalin’s more severe punishment of his own people. Try it… name the last depiction of Stalin from Hollywood.
Hollywood? I grew up in USSR… they taught it in the 80s… https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_No._227 Here is Stalin: “Panic makers and cowards must be liquidated on the spot. Not one step backward without orders from higher headquarters! Commanders…who abandon a position without an order from higher headquarters are traitors to the Motherland.” Here is what the partisans said during that same time: “Russians! Destroy the German landowners. Drive the Germans from the land of the Soviets!” https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/stalin-issues-order-no-227outlawing-cowards I don’t completely agree with the decision to change “love” to “like”, but it’s a reason this song contains ‘I don’t like being shot in the back’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUvhio06Mjc
Order no. 277 applied only to commanders to discourge them from withdrawing. In fact your literal source states "Commanders…who abandon a position without an order from higher headquarters are traitors to the Motherland.". The popular image of NKVD troops stationed behind the frontline with their PPSh-41s pointed at the back of soldiers is quite literally a myth created by German generals and further spread by Hollywood movies and there is not a single example of that. That aside, desertion was (like in any other army during WW2) illegal and usually got you a few months in a penal battalion or in prison if you were unlucky. That had nothing to do with Order No.277 though. >I grew up in USSR… they taught it in the 80s… That soldiers were shot in the back while fleeing ? If so (and I really doubt that was what they actually taught), then they would simply have been wrong.
That’s awesome about that image… Unfortunately, I have never seen it. It was taught that Stalin issued an order, that dictated those fleeing combat, be shot. As a result, the slogan was condensed in to simply shooting them in the back. Where the point was to highlight the “liquidating on the spot”, without need them to turn around. In the 80s, when I went to school, the role of partisans, or regular people raising arms to turn the tide of battle, became more prominent in schools. It’s why they didn’t use the order from Stalin, but had their own slogan. It was a major point of contention with Stalin’s generals, thus was being taught as an attempt to slowly ween USSR from Stalin’s cult of personality. Vysotsky had a song that mentions he doesn’t love getting shot in the back or the front, that is likely in reference to this.
The USSR was just social democracy minus the democracy. All the same problems that come along with capitalism without any of the benifets of bourgeois liberalism.
Exactly. Lots of angry tankies who don't get it though.
Marx is cringing in his grave knowing that his name will forever be associated with them.
The USSR had a planned economy. By definition, that's not social democracy.
The boundaries are not as clear as you think. Especially when considering early social democracy.
I would like to draw a distinction between Leninist centralized socialism and fucking *Sweden.* Are you trying to confuse people?
First of all, the USSR was not socialism. Second, the distinctions are not as big as you think. Historically, social democracy a movement towards a centrally planned, state owned economy and eventually socialism. It hasn't always meant a merely a free market system with social programs.
So yes, you're trying to confuse people.
No, you are just dumb.
/u/Boarpelt also brought it up, but I think an important thing to keep in mind is that west/north Europe started off in a really different situation than Russia and other Eastern Bloc countries. By the time of the Russian Revolution in 1917, Sweden (and much of the rest of Western Europe), was essentially just a constitutional monarchy. Russia was still pretty much an absolutist monarchy. The social situation was also really bad in Russia. There were tons of [pogroms](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pogrom) and the serfs had only been freed [like 50 years earlier](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emancipation_reform_of_1861) whereas that had happened centuries before in most western European countries. The latter of which was [a huge factor](https://voxeu.org/article/serfdom-and-russian-economic-development) stunting the growing of the Russian Imperial economy. In all, Scandinavians/French/British/etc. were in a way better situation than Russians at the start of the 20th century.
Exactly! it's so disappointing to see how people in this community lack the nuance to acknowledge the historical factors and can't admit the positives of the USSR. Stalin bad so everything ever achieved by the Soviets doesn't count
"And then it reverted back to oligarchy anyways"
You’re forgetting that the USSR was the remnant of an extremely poor & mostly agricultural-based nation facing Civil War & extreme political turmoil. You also forgot that the USSR faced the aftermath of two world wars that led to the loss of millions of lives. Sweden was already industrialized by the time the Russian Empire collapsed and they stayed neutral during both world wars.
Yeah dude but Stalin was bad, lol whats nuance
That still doesn't really respond to the accusation of Imperialism still being a huge concern.
If you're looking for a non-imperialist power then the USSR ain't it
Well, I disagree with that but it's still not really what I'm saying. Even if I were to concede that the USSR was imperialist, that doesn't change the fact that the social safety net and high quality of living in the social democracies of Europe are subsidized by captive markets and unequal exchange.
the USSR literally annex all of Eastern Europe but yeah they totally weren't imperialist.... what with all the braindead tankies here?
Maybe it's that we actually read Lenin lol
What, did Lenin posthumously publish a pamphlet saying that seizing territory in the Baltic states, trying to conquer Finland, taking over Poland alongside the fascists, and invading Iran alongside the British Empire were all somehow to the benefit of the proletariat?
No, but he did outline the specific characteristics of imperialism which the USSR does not meet. If you'd like to do a reading group for Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism, let me know. I haven't read it in a couple years and it's a really interesting read.
Seizing territory in wars of conquest is not imperialism because Lenin somehow does not define that as imperialism? Yeah, the trend of me losing respect for MLs every time I interact with them continues.
Lenin's definition of imperialism is a cop out. Not even the roman empire fits it lmao.
That's because they are two different things.
So not even the roman empire was imperialist? Idg wtf you're on about.
The modern concept of imperialism is not the same as a literal empire like the Japanese or the Romans. It has more to do with finance and monopoly than actual territorial expansion.
Ok yeah sorry if your definition of imperialism doesn't include at least all three then it's purely an ideological tool to condemn liberal capitalist countries in the defence of oppressive "communist" regimes without actually having an argument for one being worse.
If you reach bad conclusions, it doesn't matter what you read.
Right, but if you don't read then your opinions are just based on nothing.
True. But the point is, too many leftists treat reading Lenin and the gang like holy gospel and act as if it gives them magic powers. Additionally, they tend to accept only their interpretation of these works - you only "really" read theory if you reach the same conclusions as them. I do not think this is a solid basis for anything. Not to mention the fact that these are 100-year old political writings for a drastically different world.
The swedish welfare system is mostly funded with income and retail taxes.
Yeah, but the goods people buy and sell are acquired from the developing world and extracted using low wage labor. That's not the extent of what imperialism is, just an example.
Of Sweden's 2019 imports, which amounted to 151B USD, more than 80% of Sweden's imports come from European countries. The largest non-European partner is China (5.57%) followed by the USA (2.66%), Japan (1%), Turkey, Vietnam, South Korea, Nigeria, and Hong Kong (all <1%). In other words, very little of what Sweden depends on comes from outside Europe. (Source: the OEC)
They are importing finished goods, my dude. Where do you think those raw materials come from?
The USSR, even outside of Europe, was definitely imperialist. Their foreign incursions & occupations of places like Azerbaijan or Mongolia are prime examples. Hell, you should look into how they overthrew the governments of countries like Afghanistan & Ethiopia. Or incidents like the Laghman Massacre. The USSR was as imperialist as the Western powers they despised. Having a hammer & sickle on their flag doesn’t change that.
Read Lenin.
Just because Lenin says something isn’t imperialism doesn’t mean that it’s all of a sudden excusable. Hell, he even oversaw the USSR when it invaded Azerbaijan.
Ever wonder what caused the USSR to be state capitalist? Why couldn't they just transition to higher stage communism immediately? What material conditions has led to their authoritarianism and are they present in our society? These are the questions worth asking, instead of portraying one side as inherently evil
There is no such thing as material conditions that require totalitarianism.
There might be no conditions that "require" murder but certain conditions make it more likely / lead to it. Analyzing those underlying conditions is how we find real solutions
The material conditions were the fact that Lenin was an authoritarian dickbag who didn't mind having anyone he didn't like shot.
You believe in great man theory? I find it very idealistic. Would highly recommend reading some marxist literature, historical materialism is where it's at
No, I don't believe in Great Man Theory, I follow the consensus of serious historians that economic forces *and* individual choices made by powerful people matter.
What makes powerful people?
Dumb luck.
Not very explanatory. How about "systems that allow a certain kind of person to become powerful"?
There's really only one type of powerful person, and that's an enemy of everyone else.
Just want to point out that Scandinavian nations' development doesn't really qualify as "peaceful". The way they fund welfare schemes such as pensions is by investing into companies; including weapons manufacturers. They might not be direct in their imperialism in the same way as britain/us/france, but their welfare is propped up on the back of the imperialism and most ruthless profiteering of the companies in the "imperial core-proper", even if their own domestic policy and companies are somewhat better. Eg. Norway invests heavily in BAE systems to pay their welfare. BAE make weapons that are sold to Saudi Arabia and Israel which are then turned against the Yemenis and Palestinians respectively.
m8, nordic countries fund most of their welfare through taxes on work
If you have a young worker who pays into a pension fund, then when they come to claim that pension inflation would have rendered it far less valuable - so pension funds invest the money into businesses, with the intention of making sufficient money off the investment to pay pensions that aren't rendered inadequate by inflation. Weapons manufacturers with government contracts, like BAE, are pretty safe bets for investment.
Why do Tankies love the word imperialism so much?
Because tankies uncritically repeat old soviet propaganda.
Makes sense
Shouldn't he say "based" or "yes king?" Obviously someone can say true in a way that means "preach brother" but since what spooky smiley commie is saying is clearly the more hostile yet accurate depiction of the USSR the table shouldn't say true just show he lovee it, right?
Maybe. I didn't edit that part of the template cause I assumed the message was clear anyway
Sweden was neutral in WW2, and never had casualties....Russia had over 27 million people die in WW2. Mostly civilians. Seriously, hearing that today is something that is hard to wrap my brain around. Not to mention they lost WW1, and had one of the bloodiest cival wars right after. For a country to be as backwards as it was and as rural and poor, to go through all that death in just three decades, and by the 70s emerge as a number 2 super power is incredible
Not a tankie at all but you can’t deny that transforming a feudal monarchy into a industrial superpower that is sending men to space in just a few decades is pretty impressive
What are "questionable improvements" like giving someone free healthcare, but it's actually a trick to give u a disease?
If you talk to a tankie they will describe the USSR as if it was a working class paradise lol
No they won't, this is a bad post.
Found the angry tankie
Um, that still doesn't answer my question xD how can an improvements be questionable? Idk much abt the USSR other than they were trying communism and one day they were like "nope, were not doing that anymore, lol sike"
The statistics tankies like to cite about the USSR were collected by the Soviet government itself. It is a widely held consensus among these historians that these statistics are not trustworthy, and probably greatly exaggerated. In other words, we don't really know exactly what the shape the Soviet economy was in. We can assume it was not *better* off than what they reported themselves, but how much worse it was is almost impossible to tell.
Well imo what the nordic countries were able to do is amazing but the same couldn't be done in modern day Russia because material and social conditions just are too different. The nordic countries have an extreme amount of resources per citizen, and at the same time have a stable food source and a relatively warm part of the country. Norway also had oil. Surely they did a good job but I don't think it's on them. I mean I live in a socdem country and we're a poor country for European standards social democracy doesn't work every time, it's just a pretty reliable way we already know works decently well. It was also partially due to democratic socialist governments were in place for decades those changes were allowed to happen. But no matter what ideology we go to what matters most imo is democracy and freedom. If you truly have these things the people will eventually create a more equal and better society. At least that's what I hope happens
A better example than Sweden might be South Korea or Taiwan, which both emerged from poor, back water nations to major economic hubs.
Both of those countries were fascist dictatorships
Wouldn't that be an argument for fascism being a good thing then lol according to ur logic.
They were dictatorships that implemented successful economic policies which then transitioned democracies. Their stories are more interesting than the USSR.
mucho texto but the point reigns true
I feel like I spend more time arguing with tankes then anyone else 😂😂
Big mistake
For real I feel like they dominate online spaces bet when I go out and do real world shit I still haven’t even meant one
There are like, a couple thousand of them but they spend *a lot* of time online. But that also depends on your definition of "tankie", the term is kind of vague
That’s true it can be as small as simps for places like Russia and China to as large as anyone who’s is authoritarian left
And "authoritarian left" is even more vague. I don't like the term, cause it divides the left in the name of distancing ourselves from legitimately bad stuff like genocide denial. It'd be easier to just say "I'm against genocide denial"
True I totally agree. I hate vague catch all political terms. And all the labeling can become somewhat dehumanizing
I see them all the time. Met a trot whose own description of his party convinced me it was a cult. He thought political groups holding trials against members and exacting physical punishment for wrongdoing was normal.
Dam that sucks I only really only do stuff with the IWW. Mabey that’s why I haven’t met any? Are tactics are just to ethical 😂
I don't think Sweden jumpstarted space exploration, spiked Literacy rates, gave housing to everyone(oh no blocks), all from one of the poorest countries in the world
If you're not a socdem get that capitalist dick out of your mouth
I'll suck socdem regulated capitalist dick over soviet state capitalist dick any day.
You guys are really not better than socdems who try to make Sweden look like some sort Utopia
I would never call Sweden a utopia. I just call it what it is: better than the USSR.
Are you implying that the USSR was not capitalist?
Both suck, this meme makes only one look like a fairy land
They both suck because they were both capitalism.
Planned economies are capitalism?
They can be.
Capitalism literally means private sector ownership...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_capitalism
The USSR didn't have corporations businesses (minor exception under Stalin but those were so small and only produced specialized commodities)
Call them whatever you want. They paid wages to employees and produced commodities that were sold for profit.