Log in

View Full Version : Some information about the extent of repression in Eastern Bloc states



Toppler
18th May 2011, 21:20
http://www.soviet-empire.com/ussr/viewtopic.php?f=110&t=37738

Examples:


In Hungary the number of political prisoners stood at 7,093 in 1953, while Czechoslovak jails had held some 25,000 "politicals" (proportionately, two and a half times as many as in Hungary) as early as 1949.


In Hungary some 500 individuals were executed for political reasons in the 1946-1956 period. From 1945 to 24 February 1951, 227 executions took place. Of the 227 persons in question, 146 had been sentenced for war crimes and crimes against humanity.


The scale of executions proved quite similar in the other East European countries: 178 in Czechoslovakia between October 1948 and the end of 1952, 137 in Romania from 1945 to 1964, and 20 in Poland between 1950 and 1953.


The greatest purge the Vietnamese Workers' Party ever experienced took place in the course of the 1953-1956 land reform campaign, which was patterned after the Chinese model. By December 1955 the rent-reduction campaign had affected 7,77 million people, i.e., 63 per cent of the population. Of the 44,444 "landlords" identified, 3,939 were tried and 1,175 executed.


The second stage of the campaign (the land reform proper) had affected 4 million people by December 1955, of whom 18,738 were "revealed" as "concealed landlords" (these "revelations" led to further 3,312 trials and 162 executions). The scope of the repression can be gauged from that during the "correction" of the land reform's "errors" (1956-1957), the authorities released 23,748 political prisoners. By contrast, the North Korean land reform, though partly inspired by Chinese examples, proved essentially bloodless, as did the East European land reforms.

So much for the burgeois lie that wherever a communist party takes power, millions are butchered. Most of the Eastern Bloc states killed less people than a single American air raid over Iraq. Perhaps Stalin and Mao's terror cannot be misunderstood to be typical of communist party rule in general?. Of course, the answer to this question is clear: no.

I would be surprised if the same did not apply to the USSR after 1950, by the way.

This also explains why anybody over 30 who is not a rapid rightwinger here in Slovakia would spit in your face if you compared communism to nazism. So much for the "communism is worse than nazism" bullshit. It also explains why I know about multiple Holocaust survivors around me, but no "victim of communism", even if it supposedly killed 250 million people (which is so stupid that it warrants a punch in the face).

Sorry for "Soviet masturbation" thread, but I am pissed off because one of my friend's friends has become a full blown neo-Nazi (he calls himself a "patriot", but is a clear Nazi, he thinks Adolf Hitler had a "good idea", and when my friend confronted him with Hitler's crimes, he says it is irrelevant because "communists killed more than World War 2", of course, he is not even an adult less alone having any idea of what communist rule here was actually like) and I am pissed off about how truth was raped by the parasitic burgeois media.

Compare these numbers with Suharto's genocide:

http://www.thepeoplesvoice.org/TPV3/Voices.php/2009/07/07/suharto-monster-of-the-cia-and-u-s-empir-1


Backlands army units are reported to have executed thousands of Communists after interrogation in remote jails…Armed with wide-blade knives called parangs, Moslem bands crept at night into the homes of Communists, killing entire families and burying the bodies in shallow graves…The murder campaign became so brazen in part of rural East Java that Moslem bands placed the heads of victims on poles and paraded them through villages. The killings have been on such a scale that the disposal of the corpses has created a serious sanitation problem in East Java and Northern Sumatra, where the humid air bears the reek of decayed flesh. Travelers from these areas tell of small rivers and streams that have been literally clogged with bodies; river transportation has at places been seriously impeded.[1]


In order to justify this campaign of extermination, the army told people in the towns and villages that the PKI was about to go on a killing spree against all non-communists. PKI members were accused of digging mass graves, compiling lists of people to be executed, and stockpiling special instruments to gouge out eyeballs.[2]

The massacres, which were most intense in East and Central Java and on Bali, spread to Aceh in northern Sumatra, Sulawesi (the Celebes) and Kalimantan (Borneo). It is not known exactly how many were killed, but Indonesian activists estimate the number at from one to three million people. The only recent massacre of this magnitude was the Rwandan government’s attempted genocide of the Tutsi people in 1994, which left 800,000 dead.

Now, I still believe in Dubcek's vision of socialism with a human face (and no, it is not capitalism, it worked until Soviet tanks came in August 1968, and no, he was not present in the post-1989 goverment, well, for a short time because of popular vote until he died in a car accident under "mysterious circumstances" [possible car trapping by corrupt pigs like Meciar]), but I don't blame Klement Gottwald for executing some people. When I see what capitalist and fascist pigs do to us and to their own people, I understand why someone might think some people have to be executed. At least Gottwald executed only politicians, and did it at least civilizedly, not by a frenzied mob of Islamic thugs who murder you and thrown your body into a river until corpses stop its flow.

Toppler
18th May 2011, 21:29
Note this too:


In one area of Central Java known as a stronghold of the party, one-third of the population died in the massacre.

One-third means 35 percent. That makes it significantly worse in the worst affected areas than the Cambodian genocide. Even the worst of Stalin's Yezhovchina in the 1930s USSR (the only period along with Russian Civil War and Maoist China where communits have killed any significant number of people) was not so horrible. At least even Stalin or Mao did not engage on such mass murder that it clogs up the waterways and makes air stink of human flesh. Rot in hell, Suharto.

Revolutionair
18th May 2011, 21:51
Suharto was not as bad as direct Dutch colonial rule though.

I've read somewhere that Dutch merchantmen once executed a complete island. The slaves refused to labor so they were transported without food or water to remote places. The healthy ones were killed, the weak ones were left to suffer and rot. But I can't find the source now.

PhoenixAsh
18th May 2011, 21:54
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7915

Imposter Marxist
18th May 2011, 23:26
omg lolol

pranabjyoti
19th May 2011, 06:11
Note this too:

One-third means 35 percent. That makes it significantly worse in the worst affected areas than the Cambodian genocide. Even the worst of Stalin's Yezhovchina in the 1930s USSR (the only period along with Russian Civil War and Maoist China where communits have killed any significant number of people) was not so horrible. At least even Stalin or Mao did not engage on such mass murder that it clogs up the waterways and makes air stink of human flesh. Rot in hell, Suharto.
Do you believe in the BS told by imperialist bustards about USSR under Stalin and Mao's China? In this history section, there is a thread related to the "great famine during the Great Leap Forward period". And I myself have repeatedly put books and information regarding the Moscow trial, which were held in open court before eyewitnesses around the world, most from USA, UK and other "western" countries. The eye-witnesses themselves wrote books about the trials and those are very good sources of information.

Toppler
19th May 2011, 07:05
I am not talking about the GLP, I am aware it was not a "planned man made famine", rather the 1950s purges and the GPCR.

pranabjyoti
19th May 2011, 16:40
I am not talking about the GLP, I am aware it was not a "planned man made famine", rather the 1950s purges and the GPCR.
Well, I don't know how much do you know about the purging of the 50's, but I want to inform you that all the trials had been done on open court before eyewitnesses around the world. A huge of lot books had been written by eyewitnesses and others and I have many times posted the list in many of my threads at revleft.
It seems that you are nurturing some wrong ideas about the happenings of USSR during the late 30's. Kindly delete all preconceived ideas and start learning with fresh mind.

Toppler
19th May 2011, 16:48
Are we talking about the same purges? I mean the 1950s purges in China ... that and the Cultural revolution and the 1930s purges in the USSR.

bailey_187
19th May 2011, 16:58
Do you believe in the BS told by imperialist bustards about USSR under Stalin and Mao's China? In this history section, there is a thread related to the "great famine during the Great Leap Forward period". And I myself have repeatedly put books and information regarding the Moscow trial, which were held in open court before eyewitnesses around the world, most from USA, UK and other "western" countries. The eye-witnesses themselves wrote books about the trials and those are very good sources of information.

i think the OP is refering to the fact that ~700,000 were executed in the Soviet Union when Stalin was in power

Toppler
19th May 2011, 16:59
omg lolol

What the fuck is this supposed to mean?Troll?

bailey_187
19th May 2011, 17:02
In response to the OP though, no one with just a basic knowledge of the Eastern Bloc states claims they killed millions.

Toppler
19th May 2011, 17:05
i think the OP is refering to the fact that ~700,000 were executed in the Soviet Union when Stalin was in power

That's it. That's also the problem with the left communist narrative (not that I have anything against it) that every existing state ruled by a communist party was "Stalinist". Most of these states executed around 1000x less people that actual Stalin regime. And the 700 000 executed is not burgeois propaganda, that's the number from the Soviet archives (which I trust unlike the overinflated bullshit from capitalist propaganda such as Stalin killed 60 million etc.).

Plus, during the 1930s and until 1948, even disregarding the 2 famines, nutritional deficiences prevailed. Only in the early 1950s did the food situation got back to normal. Look the per capita calorie consumption data from ComradeOm and how the life expectancy jumps up in 1950, see it on gapminder.org . Life in the Soviet Union? Good, normal, but only from 1950s onwards.

Toppler
19th May 2011, 17:08
In response to the OP though, no one with just a basic knowledge of the Eastern Bloc states claims they killed millions.

The common Westerners has no such knowledge, instead, they just extrapolate Stalin's and Mao's crimes to every communist ruled state that ever existed. That, and they think North Korea or some other modern day closed isolated dictatorship is a standard socialist state (it is not standard and not even socialist).

pranabjyoti
19th May 2011, 18:04
That's it. That's also the problem with the left communist narrative (not that I have anything against it) that every existing state ruled by a communist party was "Stalinist". Most of these states executed around 1000x less people that actual Stalin regime. And the 700 000 executed is not burgeois propaganda, that's the number from the Soviet archives (which I trust unlike the overinflated bullshit from capitalist propaganda such as Stalin killed 60 million etc.).

Plus, during the 1930s and until 1948, even disregarding the 2 famines, nutritional deficiences prevailed. Only in the early 1950s did the food situation got back to normal. Look the per capita calorie consumption data from ComradeOm and how the life expectancy jumps up in 1950, see it on gapminder.org . Life in the Soviet Union? Good, normal, but only from 1950s onwards.
Well, the question is what is the % of total population that 700,000 people consist of? Remember that class struggle was most intensified in USSR and also it had to suffer from more than 95% of the attacks done against socialist countries. Comrade Toppler, can you give a comparative analysis of workers and revolutionaries died in USSR and in other eastern European countries? I am sure that the ratio would be more than 1000.
Life expectancy and other factors began to improve at 1950 onwards because 1945 is the end of imperialist attacks started from 1917 November onwards and (amazingly) it would take 5 years to normal stage after such a prolonged period of internal and external war.

Omsk
19th May 2011, 19:29
You can't compare the casualties of the Socialist countries like the USSR with the western imperialist countries losses,as ww2 took a much harder toll on the USSR than on the western countries (in terms of people and economy)

Red Future
19th May 2011, 20:35
You can't compare the casualties of the Socialist countries like the USSR with the western imperialist countries losses,as ww2 took a much harder toll on the USSR than on the western countries (in terms of people and economy)

Indeed and there was an added racial emphasis to killings as we all know

Toppler
21st May 2011, 23:18
By the way, notice this:

In Hungary some 500 individuals were executed for political reasons in the 1946-1956 period. From 1945 to 24 February 1951, 227 executions took place. Of the 227 persons in question, 146 had been sentenced for war crimes and crimes against humanity.


sentenced for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Now, Rakosi was a notorious asshole and a liar who branded many of his opponents as fascist, but considering Hungary's fascist regime just a few years before, some of these executions were certainly done on actual fascist war criminals.

So much for the "every "victim of communism" is an innocent dissident" lie.

Also, the number of political executions in most Eastern Bloc (except for Romania, but, well, I don't even consider that whacked out psychopath Caucescau to be a legitimate leftist much less a communist) states after 1961 is probably zero. There was still a lot of unjustified repression after that, but most of the time, not even jail, just a "friendly warning" or "your kid will not go into high school if you continue writing samizdats" kind of stuff. No bloodshed.

Os Cangaceiros
22nd May 2011, 01:14
That's it. That's also the problem with the left communist narrative (not that I have anything against it) that every existing state ruled by a communist party was "Stalinist". Most of these states executed around 1000x less people that actual Stalin regime.

I don't think that anyone in the left-communist side thinks that mass executions are a defining point of "Stalinism", though.

bailey_187
22nd May 2011, 01:47
Its not hard to destroy arguments not held by anyone who has botherd to look into the history of the Eastern Bloc

Ismail
22nd May 2011, 09:58
Perhaps Stalin and Mao's terror cannot be misunderstood to be typical of communist party rule in general?. Of course, the answer to this question is clear: no.I don't think the comparison is fair in regards to Stalin. In the 1930's the USSR had to overcome various remnants of feudalism and capitalism whilst building its industry and preparing for war. The Great Purge itself had anti-bureaucratic aspects and was mainly directed against right-wingers within and outside the party. The way it went about was not efficient and tons of innocents winded up dead, but you can't divorce it from the situation existing at the time.

To give a comparison, you'd probably consider Enver Hoxha a horrible evil totalitarian madman or whatever, and he was certainly the most pro-Stalin leader ever, but there was nothing like the Great Purge done under him. There was the Cultural and Ideological Revolution that was partially inspired by the GPCR, but it winded up being very different from the GPCR and obviously Albania wasn't driven into chaos like most of China was. Albania didn't have the various problems the USSR in the 1930's had. The USSR in the 1930's stretched over a gigantic landmass with a huge and inefficient bureaucratic system which couldn't even keep reliable check on who was where and who was in the party or not. The 1930's USSR was afraid of these security problems being exploited to create spies and terrorists, whereas Albania was more concerned about foreign invasion owing to its secure borders and party organization.

After the 1950's, after the rise of revisionism, there was no more talk of class struggle or even much about capitalist encirclement, just how the USSR was awesome, how communism was the immediate goal, how the CPSU was totally without error and had gloriously uncovered the "Stalinist distortions of Leninist norms" and what not, how world peace is great and how the USA wants nuclear war, etc.

Kinda different from Stalin saying in 1931, "We are fifty or a hundred years behind the advanced countries. We must make good this distance in ten years. Either we do it, or they will crush us." Or as he is reported to have privately said to Vyshinsky a month before he died in 1953, "We are afraid of no one, and if the imperialist gentlemen feel like going to war there is no more favorable moment for us than the present."


Now, I still believe in Dubcek's vision of socialism with a human face (and no, it is not capitalism, it worked until Soviet tanks came in August 1968,In what way did it "work" and in what way was it "socialism"?


and no, he was not present in the post-1989 goverment, well, for a short time because of popular vote until he died in a car accident under "mysterious circumstances" [possible car trapping by corrupt pigs like Meciar]),He became a bourgeois politician who was praised by Gorbachev. In 1992 Radio Free Europe noted that, "In an interview with the daily Rudepravo in November 1991 he said that he was 'inspired by social democratic examples' and predicted that social democracy would have a great future in Czechoslovakia... Dubcek declared that Sweden provided a good example of his vision of society."

Toppler
22nd May 2011, 12:01
I don't think that anyone in the left-communist side thinks that mass executions are a defining point of "Stalinism", though.

Yes. However the post-Stalin countries also lacked the coercive Gulag based economy of the Stalinist period and so on...

Ismail
22nd May 2011, 13:03
Yes. However the post-Stalin countries also lacked the coercive Gulag based economy of the Stalinist period and so on...You seem to follow ComradeOm quite a bit. There was no "Gulag based economy." The Gulag system was, overall, a drain on the economic system and was being phased out by the time Stalin died as noted in The Economics of Forced Labor: The Soviet Gulag. Robert W. Thurston in Life and Terror in Stalin's Russia also noted that the image of the USSR having an economy based on prison labor is incorrect.