"genocide" count

[OnlyCommunistYouKnow]

So... How high is the communist "kill count/genocide" at now? The highest I've heard so far is 80,000,000, for Stalin alone. What's the highest you've heard?
Fun fact: Stalin's mustache killed 4 trillion people, in two days, twice.

[Caj]

Zero.

[Tim Cornelis]

Stalin's mustache killed 4 trillion people, in two days, twice.

I hate how people always respond with "Stalin/Mao killed 1 billion people and ate babies!" or "he purged everyone in the universe". Firstly, it is not funny if it is posted for the 101th time. Secondly, it is ridiculing a very serious issue. Rather than point out the real number, you respond with something that seemingly reaffirms the opposite.

[Yefim Zverev]

Stalin killed with his rifle alone 50000 people as far as I know.. he was illuminate member and gifted by satan for 20 more years and some exta über-human abilities. You can find the evidence in bible. Communism is jew creation it was born during freemasonry in jerusalem marx is directly connected to satanic seed. First communist secretly gathered in caves and they had such rituals like eating babies... countless numbers of humans suffered in the name of this evil belief.

Serious fact: Fuck off stupid troll

[Blake's Baby]

Oh good. A thread where Stalinists mock the people who think Stalin was a mass-murderer, in much the same manner as Holocaust deniers mock those who believe the Holocaust happened.

As Caj says, in one sense it's zero; because communism never existed. If you mean, however, what are the estimates of how many have died as a result of the policies of Stalin, Mao and others...

Mao: 70 million
Stalin: 22 million
Pol Pot: 1.5 million

Don't think there are any others who even come close to those.

[Comrade Samuel]

Secratarianism inbound.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Fun fact: Stalin's mustache killed 4 trillion people, in two days, twice.

So that's why the Earth only has six billion people! Thank you, Mr.Troll.

[Ostrinski]

Someone close this thread.

[marl]

I'd hold the purges and gulags against him. Holding famines against him is questionable.

[Ocean Seal]

I hate how people always respond with "Stalin/Mao killed 1 billion people and ate babies!" or "he purged everyone in the universe". Firstly, it is not funny if it is posted for the 101th time. Secondly, it is ridiculing a very serious issue. Rather than point out the real number, you respond with something that seemingly reaffirms the opposite.


Oh good. A thread where Stalinists mock the people who think Stalin was a mass-murderer, in much the same manner as Holocaust deniers mock those who believe the Holocaust happened.

As Caj says, in one sense it's zero; because communism never existed. If you mean, however, what are the estimates of how many have died as a result of the policies of Stalin, Mao and others...

Mao: 70 million
Stalin: 22 million
Pol Pot: 1.5 million

Don't think there are any others who even come close to those.
The reason that we ridicule it is because there are posters who say that Mao killed 70 million people. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to do that? And why? Were there large scale insurrections against Mao? Or did he just devour babies for fun? Unless of course you want to imply that as a direct result of not being able to feed everyone during industrialization Mao is a murderer. In which case, I say that everyone who is against the Maoist method is responsible for starvation in India, because people no longer starve in China and yet they starve in India.

[GoddessCleoLover]

The high number of people attributed to Mao includes the famine caused by the Three Red Banners (Great Leap Forward) campaign and the Cultural Revolution. IMO it is entirely fair to attribute those deaths to Mao, albeit most were more through negligence than malice. Nonetheless we lose all credibility when we deny these realities. My view is that we need a new vision of workers' rule and socialism that acknowledges historical reality and then looks to a future social revolution that establishes workers' democracy.

[Blake's Baby]

... there are posters who say that Mao killed 70 million people...

No, I think you'll find that there are posters who, when asked 'what are the top estimates of the numbers killed by communism?', reply with information on the top estimates of the numbers killed by those regimes that claimed to have some connection with communism.

Do you have much of a guilty conscience? Maybe it's alabiing mass-murderers that does it.

[Drosophila]

"Communism" as an ideology can't have a death toll.

[Yefim Zverev]

Oh good. A thread where Stalinists mock the people who think Stalin was a mass-murderer, in much the same manner as Holocaust deniers mock those who believe the Holocaust happened.

As Caj says, in one sense it's zero; because communism never existed. If you mean, however, what are the estimates of how many have died as a result of the policies of Stalin, Mao and others...

Mao: 70 million
Stalin: 22 million
Pol Pot: 1.5 million

Don't think there are any others who even come close to those.

Bullshit, got your education from capitalist media or what ?

[Comrade Samuel]

Secratarianism inbound.



No, I think you'll find that there are posters who, when asked 'what are the top estimates of the numbers killed by communism?', reply with information on the top estimates of the numbers killed by those regimes that claimed to have some connection with communism.

Do you have much of a guilty conscience? Maybe it's alabiing mass-murderers that does it.

come in Huston, Eagle has landed.

[Blake's Baby]

Bullshit, got your education from capitalist media or what ?

Well durr, did you even read the question? What are the biggest estimates? So there I go and give the biggest estimates... do you know how to answer questions? Can you read, or construct a coherent argument?


come in Huston, Eagle has landed.

You think the estimates are bigger?

I don't get your point.

[Comrade Samuel]

You think the estimates are bigger?

I don't get your point.

I'm saying this entire thread will be/ already is a pointless pile of "stalinists killed this" and "capitalist propaganda says that". It only serves to divide us further and I suggest we do what Brospierre said and close this antagonistic load of it before heads start to roll and the bans start to fly.

and no, I'm not even going to state my opinion on this.

[Bostana]

So... How high is the communist "kill count/genocide" at now? The highest I've heard so far is 80,000,000, for Stalin alone. What's the highest you've heard?
Fun fact: Stalin's mustache killed 4 trillion people, in two days, twice.

Where did you hear that?

The same people who do the very thing you talk about maybe?

For years American Media has covered the true meaning of Communism so that way they can remain rich.

[Yefim Zverev]

Well durr, did you even read the question? What are the biggest estimates? So there I go and give the biggest estimates...

if u think the thread is stupid why bring numbers here...? u re not only feeding the troll you troll here yourself to flame marxist-leninists

1,428 posts and still flame baiting m-l s ? grow up... who cares if you cut my reputation with a stupid comment ?

[Ostrinski]

http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcS68t-gctGtdtoPlCcf09oA_fVFCApm38uj-sV4EzwzbUtJCQloBw

[CommunityBeliever]

Those people who believe that diseases, starvation, or dehydration kill people have been effected by communist propaganda. The truth that these communists are hiding from you is that all of the nearly 100 billion deaths that have ever happened were a personal decision between Stalin and Mao. You may then wonder why it is that people still die all the time even after Stalin and Mao are dead? That is a foolish question, Stalin and Mao obviously can't die because they are the arbiters of death.

On a serious note, all of the claims that comrades Stalin and Mao killed people are based upon blaming them for all the people that died around them. All the claims of genocide on their hands is akin to claiming that they are supernatural arbiters of death. These claims are so ridiculous they deserve to be parodied.

[Blake's Baby]

if u think the thread is stupid why bring numbers here...? u re not only feeding the troll you troll here yourself to flame marxist-leninists

1,428 posts and still flame baiting m-l s ? grow up... who cares if you cut my reputation with a stupid comment ?

I don't think the thread is 'stupid'. The thread itself is posing a reasonable question - "what are the estimtes for the numbers who died under Stalin, Mao, and other 'communist' leaders?"

I think the way the question is posed is stupid, and I think many of the answers are stupid; and I think your inability to tell the difference between supplying information and endorsing that information is worrying. And I didn't cut your reputation with a stupid comment, I cut your reputation for a stupid comment.

As for 'flame-baiting M-Ls'... seriously? I regard M-Ls as counter-revolutionaries who support capitalism, and in this thread I see them ridiculing mass-murder. I see no reason to be particularly nice about it.

[Tim Cornelis]

If you mean, however, what are the estimates of how many have died as a result of the policies of Stalin, Mao and others...

Mao: 70 million
Stalin: 22 million
Pol Pot: 1.5 million

Don't think there are any others who even come close to those.

Mao 70 million? Roughly 13 million died in the Great Famine, 1,500,00 during the Cultural revolution.

Stalin:

Holodomor: 4 million
Gulag: 1,5 million
Great Purge: 1,5 million
(additional, such as genocide on Polish: 500,000-1 million)

total: 7-8 million people.

Pol Pot 1 to 2 million people.

Hitler 11-12 million people.

Taiping Rebellion 1850 to 1864 killed between 20-60 million people.

[Blake's Baby]

And again someone not getting the point.

The original question asks for the top estimates. I gave the top estimates. Prove that no-one has estimated the figures, or provide higher ones. Don't try to do your own estimations if they're lower, that's not what the question is.

[Prometeo liberado]

if u think the thread is stupid why bring numbers here...? u re not only feeding the troll you troll here yourself to flame marxist-leninists

1,428 posts and still flame baiting m-l s ? grow up... who cares if you cut my reputation with a stupid comment ?

I may not agree with everthing you said but good for you for not taking shit from anybody.:thumbup1:

[NorwegianCommunist]

"Communism" as an ideology can't have a death toll.

That is true!
And if ideologies had death tolls, then capitalism would probably be responsible for the 25,000 hungry children that dies every day? Thats almost 11 million each year.

[Bolshevik_Guerilla_1917]

Communism never killed anyone cuz there was never pure communism

[Invader Zim]

No true Scotsman, anyone?

As for Stalin, according to the historian of genocide William D. Rubinstein, who as I understand it is typically pretty politically conservative and zionist in outlook, suggests that the old numbers school is unsustainable in the light of modern evidence and that the figure is likely no more than 7 million.

Still, a horrifying figure.

[Amal]

No true Scotsman, anyone?

As for Stalin, according to the historian of genocide William D. Rubinstein, who as I understand it is typically pretty politically conservative and zionist in outlook, suggests that the old numbers school is unsustainable in the light of modern evidence and that the figure is likely no more than 7 million.

Still, a horrifying figure.
How much horrifying in comparison to the death toll in Iraq, Afghanistan?

[Blake's Baby]

Iraq, after 10 years of UN sanctions in the '90s, the Gulf War (II) and the Insurgency - less than 2 million in 22 years. Even accepting the figure of 7 million, Stalin would have had to have been in power until 2001 to get a rate that low (1 million every 11 years). If one accepts the 22 million figure, he'd have to be in power for 231 years - until 2151.

No idea about the Afghan death tolls. Haven't ever checked the figures.

Norwegian Communist - yes, 25,000 or 30,000 chldren die every day from preventable causes (including hunger and lack of clean water) because we have capitalism. Which rather demonstrates the flaw in the idea of using figures like these to 'demonstrate' personal responsibility.

All this taken together rather demonstrates that we're not comparing like for like. The US-backed destruction of Iraq has been a 22-year process overseen by Bush, Clinton, Bush Jr and Obama, in conjunction with Thatcher, Major, Blair, Brown and probably Cameron, Sarkozy and Chirac, Schroeder and Merckel, the Saudis, and a whole bunch of other people including for chunks of it the majority of the UN. Who then is 'responsible'? Who's shoulders do we put the numbers of dead onto?

In the meantime what about all the other dead elsewhere? The millions who have died because the US would rather spend trillions of dollars on warmachimnnes rather than millions of dollars on water supplies, sewerage systems, medical care... it's been estimated that 3 days of the US's military budget would be enough to provide clean safe water for every person alive that doesn't already have it.

In a way, Stalin and Mao are easy targets; everything that happened in their countries can be seen as directly being their responsibility. In other parts of the world it's more difficult to find out who's to blame because policies are persued over different administrations and aren't counted together - are all the dead from Afghanistan and Iraq on both sides 'Bush Jr's dead'? Or as Bush Sr was the one who launched Gulf War I, and Clinton was the one who kept up sanctions during 8 years in office, are they Bush Sr's or Clinton's dead? Is Obama guilty of allowing millions to die by not switching money from the US's military budget into public health schemes? Are the people who made billions of dollars from the rising markets and debt-boom of the 1990s-2000s guilty of skimming the money from the world economy which could 'in theory' have been used to save lives?

The fragmented nature of control in bourgeois democracy and global capitalism make apportioning individual blame a bit of a pointless excecise. In the end 'capitalism is to blame' for the deaths in Iraq, Afghanistan, Rwanda, Somalia, Yugoslavia, Chechnya, Syria, Libya, Pakistan, Philipines... the list is not quite endless because there are only about 200 countries in the world. But capitalism is responsible, ultimately, for the genocides and starvation and fatal but preventable disease and crappy building controls that mean people die in earthquakes and the stupi search for cheaper power that result in nuclear catastrophes... all of it.

[Amal]

Iraq, after 10 years of UN sanctions in the '90s, the Gulf War (II) and the Insurgency - less than 2 million in 22 years. Even accepting the figure of 7 million, Stalin would have had to have been in power until 2001 to get a rate that low (1 million every 11 years). If one accepts the 22 million figure, he'd have to be in power for 231 years - until 2151.

No idea about the Afghan death tolls. Haven't ever checked the figures.

Norwegian Communist - yes, 25,000 or 30,000 chldren die every day from preventable causes (including hunger and lack of clean water) because we have capitalism. Which rather demonstrates the flaw in the idea of using figures like these to 'demonstrate' personal responsibility.

All this taken together rather demonstrates that we're not comparing like for like. The US-backed destruction of Iraq has been a 22-year process overseen by Bush, Clinton, Bush Jr and Obama, in conjunction with Thatcher, Major, Blair, Brown and probably Cameron, Sarkozy and Chirac, Schroeder and Merckel, the Saudis, and a whole bunch of other people including for chunks of it the majority of the UN. Who then is 'responsible'? Who's shoulders do we put the numbers of dead onto?

In the meantime what about all the other dead elsewhere? The millions who have died because the US would rather spend trillions of dollars on warmachimnnes rather than millions of dollars on water supplies, sewerage systems, medical care... it's been estimated that 3 days of the US's military budget would be enough to provide clean safe water for every person alive that doesn't already have it.

In a way, Stalin and Mao are easy targets; everything that happened in their countries can be seen as directly being their responsibility. In other parts of the world it's more difficult to find out who's to blame because policies are persued over different administrations and aren't counted together - are all the dead from Afghanistan and Iraq on both sides 'Bush Jr's dead'? Or as Bush Sr was the one who launched Gulf War I, and Clinton was the one who kept up sanctions during 8 years in office, are they Bush Sr's or Clinton's dead? Is Obama guilty of allowing millions to die by not switching money from the US's military budget into public health schemes? Are the people who made billions of dollars from the rising markets and debt-boom of the 1990s-2000s guilty of skimming the money from the world economy which could 'in theory' have been used to save lives?

The fragmented nature of control in bourgeois democracy and global capitalism make apportioning individual blame a bit of a pointless excecise. In the end 'capitalism is to blame' for the deaths in Iraq, Afghanistan, Rwanda, Somalia, Yugoslavia, Chechnya, Syria, Libya, Pakistan, Philipines... the list is not quite endless because there are only about 200 countries in the world. But capitalism is responsible, ultimately, for the genocides and starvation and fatal but preventable disease and crappy building controls that mean people die in earthquakes and the stupi search for cheaper power that result in nuclear catastrophes... all of it.
I don't have any idea that a country, which has now brought near stone age stage and lacking even the minimal civic facilities, the death toll can be below 2 million in last 22 years.
It's pretty simple that you, like many other, are using double standards for two countries here. Probably you are saying those who have killed directly during war or incidents aftermath. What about the deaths by starvation, lack of minimum medical and civic facilities etc. I am pretty sure that such deaths are also counted for Stalin and Mao.

[Blake's Baby]

I don't have any idea that a country, which has now brought near stone age stage and lacking even the minimal civic facilities, the death toll can be below 2 million in last 22 years...

I'm fairly sure that those figures were derived from the reliable sources. From memory, the UN sanctions were supposed to have killed in excess of 600,000 and the Gulf War II and subsequent actions and problems with medicine, supplies etc to have killed about the same since. More than 1.5 million and less than 2 million is my recollection. I can check if you like (though I'd rather not). OECD figures claim that the population increased from 18.1 million on 1990 to 28.9 million on 2009, so that's a vast increase (>50%) for a 'stone age' country.



It's pretty simple that you, like many other, are using double standards for two countries here. Probably you are saying those who have killed directly during war or incidents aftermath. What about the deaths by starvation, lack of minimum medical and civic facilities etc. I am pretty sure that such deaths are also counted for Stalin and Mao.

Yes, that's what


...All this taken together rather demonstrates that we're not comparing like for like....

means, and why I go on to say


...In a way, Stalin and Mao are easy targets; everything that happened in their countries can be seen as directly being their responsibility. In other parts of the world it's more difficult to find out who's to blame ... The fragmented nature of control in bourgeois democracy and global capitalism make apportioning individual blame a bit of a pointless excecise. In the end 'capitalism is to blame' ...

That doessn't mean that no-one is to blame, just that blame is more correctly portioned out to 'the capitalist class' as a whole.

In democracies, leaders are figureheads. Bush or Obama, Blair, Brown or Cameron, Schroeder or Merckel, it doesn't really matter; leaders pursue 'the national interest' no matter what party they're from or how long they're in office. 'Politics' is formally seperated from 'economics' so corporations all do their own thing, more or less subject to government controls or incentives. But they're all bourgeois, the CEOs and Directors and VPs who approve slave labour in SE Asia to get their trainers made 40c a unit cheaper; the politicians who support big government contracts to the local weapons factory to support local jobs and get kick-backs from the company; the ministers who decide to go to war to protect commercial interests and to check the manouevres of their rivals; the arms dealers who want a war so they get on with selling more product; the oil-billionaires who want to control supplies. All of them, capitalism and the state machinery, are the ruling class, and they're all to blame for the countless millions of deaths under capitalism.

[Invader Zim]

How much horrifying in comparison to the death toll in Iraq, Afghanistan?

A moronic question. It is like asking, who was worse, Ed Gein or Ted Bundy? Neither, if you're the victim.

But to reduce it to crass numerical terms then we are talking a difference of a couple of orders of magnitude.

[Invader Zim]

Iraq, after 10 years of UN sanctions in the '90s, the Gulf War (II) and the Insurgency - less than 2 million in 22 years.

2 million? Where did you pull that one from? The US invasion of Iraq has led to the deaths of about 100,000 individuals as did Desert Storm. And the 'sanctions killed x' argument could be pulled apart by a toddler. It is based not on actual fact but a purely artificial notion of 'ordinary' mortality rate. And ordinary, under a despotic regime, with or without sanctions imposed, is an oxymoron.

[Blake's Baby]

2 million? Where did you pull that one from? The US invasion of Iraq has led to the deaths of about 100,000 individuals as did Desert Storm. And the 'sanctions killed x' argument could be pulled apart by a toddler. It is based not on actual fact but a purely artificial notion of 'ordinary' mortality rate. And ordinary, under a despotic regime, with or without sanctions imposed, is an oxymoron.

Right. You think it's lower? You're only calling the number of deaths as 200,000 there. My figures (derived from NGOs that opposed the UN sanctions for the first period, and later from UN figures (as far as I recall) for the post-2003 period) would be nearly 10 times higher than that.

And yes, I am using figures that assume a certain death rate and then try to calculate what the 'extra' is. That's the only reasonable way of trying to calculate what the consequences of an action on population are, I think.

Before 1990, Iraq had a fairly well-developed health-care system and good infrastructure. After 1991, not so much, and it got worse for years as the sanctions took their toll. So it's possible in theory to extrapolate what the death rate 'should' be (assuming that the relatively good infrastructure and health care is a baseline, and seeing how much deviation there was from that) - which leaves approximately 2/3 million people 'extra' who died between 1991-2003.

But again, am I comparing like with like? No, probably not. How can I tell? I'm reporting statistics, I'm not producing them. I haven't and can't check either all the data or all the methodologies of collection.

[Invader Zim]

Right. You think it's lower? You're only calling the number of deaths as 200,000 there. My figures (derived from NGOs that opposed the UN sanctions for the first period, and later from UN figures (as far as I recall) for the post-2003 period) would be nearly 10 times higher than that.

And yes, I am using figures that assume a certain death rate and then try to calculate what the 'extra' is. That's the only reasonable way of trying to calculate what the consequences of an action on population are, I think.

Before 1990, Iraq had a fairly well-developed health-care system and good infrastructure. After 1991, not so much, and it got worse for years as the sanctions took their toll. So it's possible in theory to extrapolate what the death rate 'should' be (assuming that the relatively good infrastructure and health care is a baseline, and seeing how much deviation there was from that) - which leaves approximately 2/3 million people 'extra' who died between 1991-2003.

But again, am I comparing like with like? No, probably not. How can I tell? I'm reporting statistics, I'm not producing them. I haven't and can't check either all the data or all the methodologies of collection.

You're spouting shit. Fiearly, not even the regime itself claimed that the sanctions killed 2 million, its own figure was 25% less. Secondly the 1995 lancet paper that suggested a child mortality rate responsible for 500,000 excess deaths has been euston, even its own author accepted that. Realistically the number is probably only half that. It also places responsibility whilst with the sanctions as opposed to the regime that deliberately failed to distribute the food and medical supplies and refused to accept the proposed humanitarian aid plan for at least five years. So your stats are about 150% too high and your attribution of responsibility for that is nothing short of foolish.

[Blake's Baby]

You're spouting shit. Fiearly, not even the regime itself claimed that the sanctions killed 2 million, its own figure was 25% less. Secondly the 1995 lancet paper that suggested a child mortality rate responsible for 500,000 excess deaths has been euston, even its own author accepted that. Realistically the number is probably only half that. It also places responsibility whilst with the sanctions as opposed to the regime that deliberately failed to distribute the food and medical supplies and refused to accept the proposed humanitarian aid plan for at least five years. So your stats are about 150% too high and your attribution of responsibility for that is nothing short of foolish.

Man, you're full of rage are you not?


You're spouting shit. Fiearly, not even the regime itself claimed that the sanctions killed 2 million, its own figure was 25% less...

On the subject of spouting shit... I never said anyone claimed they had killed 2 million, I said that it was claimed that they killed in excess of 600,000. How do you get to '2 million' from 600,000?


You're spouting shit. Fiearly, not even the regime itself claimed that the sanctions killed 2 million, its own figure was 25% less. Secondly the 1995 lancet paper that suggested a child mortality rate responsible for 500,000 excess deaths has been euston, even its own author accepted that...

So, I'm talking about 'mortality' and you're talking about 'child mortality'? You do realise that there were also dead adults, don't you? As there is more than one of these, it must make the total number bigger than the number of dead children, yes?

What the fuck does "500,000 excess deaths has been euston" mean? Unless you use words that other people can understand, you're not going to very well at this communication lark.


... Realistically the number is probably only half that. It also places responsibility whilst with the sanctions as opposed to the regime that deliberately failed to distribute the food and medical supplies and refused to accept the proposed humanitarian aid plan for at least five years...

You didn't read the bits where I said 'we're not comparing like with like' did you?

Nor did you read the bit where I was arguing that if Stalin was responsible for any number of deaths in the millions (7 or 22 for the purposes of this matters little) that was many times more than the last 22 years of Iraqi history - contra those who were arguing that the death count from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan was higher. Even with the 11 years of sanctions (whether you lay those deaths at the door of the western bourgeoisie or the Iraqi regime or a bit of both), the death toll (whether that's less than 2 million as I claim or less than 1 million as you seem to be claiming) from 1990-2009 (years I have figures for) is massively lower than the death toll under Stalinism.


... So your stats are about 150% too high and your attribution of responsibility for that is nothing short of foolish.

As my stats add up to around 1.5 million (660,000 + 100,000 + about 700,000 = 1.46 million over 22 years) and you reckon that's about 150% too high, I'm guessing your estimate for all those who died in Gulf War I, the sanctions, Gulf War II and the Insurrection is about 600,000 in total? That seems low to me. But I'll happily say you're right if you can point me at figures that would suggest that.

My attribution of responsibility for those deaths is 'with capitalism'. You may consider that foolish, you may totally love capitalism and think it's smashing and want its babies; but if you do, my advice is fuck off and don't post on any thread I might see you on.

[Invader Zim]

Man, you're full of rage are you not?

Not at all.


On the subject of spouting shit... I never said anyone claimed they had killed 2 million, I said that it was claimed that they killed in excess of 600,000. How do you get to '2 million' from 600,000?

You: "More than 1.5 million and less than 2 million is my recollection"


So, I'm talking about 'mortality' and you're talking about 'child mortality'?

The issue with the sanctions was its effetcs on child mortality, specifically the probability that a child would like to the age of 5.


You do realise that there were also dead adults, don't you?

Comparatively small numbers.



What the fuck does "500,000 excess deaths has been euston" mean? Unless you use words that other people can understand, you're not going to very well at this communication lark.

I responded on my mobile phone and the predictive text is fucked and I was in a rush so I didn't go back through it to check it.


You didn't read the bits where I said 'we're not comparing like with like' did you?

Irrelevent, because you still implicity accused the sanctions of being the cause of decreasing life expectancy and increasing mortality rates. That assumption fails to adequatly apportion blame to a regime that refused to allow aid into the country for political purposes and failed to allow food and medicine to be distributed properly. It is worth pointing out that the autonomously governed regions of Iraq saw decreasing child mortality during the same period.



Nor did you read the bit where I was arguing that if Stalin was responsible for any number of deaths in the millions (7 or 22 for the purposes of this matters little) that was many times more than the last 22 years of Iraqi history

No I saw it just fine, but I didn't respond to it because that isn't the part of your post I take issue with. Rather I take issue with the 1.5-2 million stat that you produced because more recent studies have vastly revised the mortality figures downwards (maximum of 350,000) and the wars killed perhaps 300,000, bringing the actual death toll to perhaps 650,000 at most, way lower than 2 million.



My attribution of responsibility for those deaths is 'with capitalism'. You may consider that foolish, you may totally love capitalism and think it's smashing and want its babies; but if you do, my advice is fuck off and don't post on any thread I might see you on.

I suggest you re-read what I said, I attacked your attribution of the increased mortality rate to the sanctions, your shallow and largely meaningless attribution of that to 'capitalism', which doesn't actually tell us anything or explain anything, isn't worthy of comment.

[Brosip Tito]

Zero, considering Stalin, Mao, etc, were no communists.

[Blake's Baby]

Not at all...

Ah, I see, just full of shit then.




You: "More than 1.5 million and less than 2 million is my recollection"...

Yes. Recollection of what? Combined deaths from Gulf War I, sanctions, Gulf War II, and Insurrection. And yet, though you can successfully quote me as saying 'less than 2 million' for those four things combined, you still claim that I said sanctions killed 2 million. Not unless you think Gulf Wars I & II and the Insurrection managed to create up to 1/2 million extra people, pal. And you haven't commented on the fact that I pulled out figures that the population of Iraq actually rose by more than 50% in the period.


...

The issue with the sanctions was its effetcs on child mortality, specifically the probability that a child would like to the age of 5.



Comparatively small numbers...

But real numbers nevertheless. The figures I saw reckoned 660,000 or thereabouts over 11 years. Do you have different figures, or do you just want to shout 'bullshit!' and claim 660,000 is the same as 2 million?




...
I responded on my mobile phone and the predictive text is fucked and I was in a rush so I didn't go back through it to check it...

And this is up to me to sort out because..?



...
Irrelevent, because you still implicity accused the sanctions of being the cause of decreasing life expectancy ...

I fucking love that word. I can claim you 'implicitly' love murdering children. Why else would you be getting defensive over sanctions that kill kids? Oh, you 'implicit' child murderer. Sanctions killed people. Get over it.


...
and increasing mortality rates. That assumption fails to adequatly apportion blame to a regime that refused to allow aid into the country for political purposes and failed to allow food and medicine to be distributed properly. It is worth pointing out that the autonomously governed regions of Iraq saw decreasing child mortality during the same period. ..

Show me one quote out of the 1,400 or posts I've made on this board where I claim that the Iraqi regime was anything other than murderous and tyrannical, and Saddam Hussein was anything other than a bloodthirsty hatchet-man. Go on; find one.



... I take issue with the 1.5-2 million stat that you produced because more recent studies have vastly revised the mortality figures downwards (maximum of 350,000) and the wars killed perhaps 300,000, bringing the actual death toll to perhaps 650,000 at most, way lower than 2 million...

Interesting that you don't quote the part of my post where I say: "... your estimate for all those who died in Gulf War I, the sanctions, Gulf War II and the Insurrection is about 600,000 in total? That seems low to me. But I'll happily say you're right if you can point me at figures that would suggest that..." and even more interesting that you don't do it.



...
I suggest you re-read what I said, I attacked your attribution of the increased mortality rate to the sanctions, your shallow and largely meaningless attribution of that to 'capitalism', which doesn't actually tell us anything or explain anything, isn't worthy of comment.

I don't hold the regime blameless in how the sanctions affected the population. Nor do I hold the American government and the British government and the UN and everybody else concerned blameless. What I'm getting at is that it's meaningless to say 'it's all X's fault' (whether that's Saddam Hussein's or Bill Clinton's) because it isn't all their fault, though they are all to blame.

[Luís Henrique]

I don't think the thread is 'stupid'. The thread itself is posing a reasonable question - "what are the estimtes for the numbers who died under Stalin, Mao, and other 'communist' leaders?"

No, man. The thread is trollery. Pay attention:


So... How high is the communist "kill count/genocide" at now? The highest I've heard so far is 80,000,000, for Stalin alone. What's the highest you've heard?
Fun fact: Stalin's mustache killed 4 trillion people, in two days, twice.

See? The purpose is not to discuss "body counts" seriously, but exactly to start a Stalinist sectarian fest.

Somebody please close and trash this mitt, please.

Luís Henrique

[bad ideas actualised by alcohol]

The highest I heard?
Billions and billions but to be fair that was from Glenn Beck.

[Blake's Baby]

No, man. The thread is trollery. Pay attention:



See? The purpose is not to discuss "body counts" seriously, but exactly to start a Stalinist sectarian fest.

Somebody please close and trash this mitt, please.

Luís Henrique

Don't be a dick Luis.

The question the thread was posing was reasonable.

The way it was posing the question was trollish.

[NorwegianCommunist]

Mao 70 million? Roughly 13 million died in the Great Famine, 1,500,00 during the Cultural revolution.

Stalin:

Holodomor: 4 million
Gulag: 1,5 million
Great Purge: 1,5 million
(additional, such as genocide on Polish: 500,000-1 million)

total: 7-8 million people.

Pol Pot 1 to 2 million people.

Hitler 11-12 million people.

Taiping Rebellion 1850 to 1864 killed between 20-60 million people.


Almost correct, but we can't blame the Holodmor on Stalin.

During the Plenum of the Party Central Committee in October 1931, regional Party secretaries insisted that grain collection quotas be decreased due to a bad harvest. In response, Stalin called a meeting of Party secretaries in the grain regions and reduced the amount of grain that was to be collected. In the May of 1932, Stalin introduced a grain collection plan that required lower amounts than the last year (Davies and Harris, 132).

“But bear in mind that an exception must be made for the districts in Ukraine which have specially suffered.” – Stalin, letter to Kaganovich and Molotov, 1932 (ibid)

Any possible natural causes of a Ukrainian famine are always ignored by anti-Soviet scholars. They never mention natural occurrences like droughts. Nor do they ever mention saboteurs within the Soviet Union. In the book A History of Ukraine by Mikhail Hrushevsky , a man who was described by Ukrainian Nationalists themselves as Ukraine’s leading historian, the author states that a drought spread throughout Ukraine. But nowhere does he mention any man-made famine-genocide in the book. However, the book was published posthumously and updated by Ukrainian anti-communist Nationalists (Tottle, 91).

University professors Nicholas Riasnovsky and Michael Florinsky both mention a drought in their writings as well as saboteurs.

What really caused the conditions that could be misconstrued to look like a famine was the fact that farming was still privatized in Ukraine as well as the use of antiquated, backwards farming methods. When the time of collectivization came, the Kulaks, the class that owned the land the peasants farmed, resisted fiercely. They slaughtered livestock and destroyed crops. Their resistance even reached Civil War proportions in some areas of Ukraine. Frederick Schuman, a professor of government at Williams College, traveled through Ukraine at this time and noted that the Kulaks were doing these things (Tottle, 93). Some Kulaks torched the collective farms and many more Kulaks refused to sow or reap their fields. All according to Schuman (Tottle, 94).

Because of the Kulak resistance and their sabotage technique of livestock slaughter, the number of horned cattle in the Soviet Union went from 70 million to only 38 million, and hogs decreased from 20 million to 12 million (Tottle, 94).

Some Nationalists even give enthusiastic descriptions of sabotage against agriculture that Kulaks and themselves carried out. Isaac Mazepa, for example, was the former Premier of a Nationalist government in Ukraine. He himself admits that sabotage by the Kulaks caused a significant portion of the so-called genocide famine.

“At first there were disturbances in the collective farms or else the communists officials and their agents were killed, but later a system of passive resistance was favored which aimed at the systematic frustration of the Bolsheviks’ plans for the sowing and gathering of the harvest. Whole tracts were left unsown….in many areas, especially in the south, 20, 40, even 50 percent was left in the fields, and was either not collected at all or ruined in the threshing.” - Isaac Mazepa (Tottle, 94)

Local organizations in charge of collectivization sometimes even issued incorrect instructions (Tottle, 96). This, coupled with the fact that peasants who were used to backwards farming techniques were being quickly transitioned into a newer form of farm and equipment also made things in Ukraine a little rough (Tottle, 95).

The first news of the Ukrainian famine, this supposed genocide, appeared in the press of Nazi Germany in 1933 (Tottle, 2). Hardly a reliable source given the strong anti-communist views and policies of the Hitler regime. The tales of the supposed genocide were propagated even further when Ukrainian Nationalists, who were far right-wing and even Nazi collaborators, arrived in North America (Tottle, 3).

It was Thomas Walker, a journalist employed by American media baron William Hearst, who provided the first American documentation of the so-called famine-genocide in Ukraine when he visited the USSR for thirteen days. He was hyped as a known journalist who studied Russian affairs (Tottle, 5). Louis Fischer, an American writer for the New Republic and The Nation, had also traveled to the Soviet Union. He was also interested in the Soviet Union, but he had never heard of Walker nor did he know anyone who did. Fischer did some research of his own and found out that Walker did go to the USSR, but not during the times he said he did (Tottle, 7). Walker claims to have visited the famine-suffering areas of Ukraine in late spring, but Fischer pointed out that several of Walker’s photographs of the supposed famine victims show winter and fall seasons in the background (Tottle, 8).

At the same time Fischer noted that Lindsay Parrott, a Hearst correspondent who also went to Ukraine, claimed he never saw any signs of a famine (Tottle, 8). James Casey, an American investigative writer, found that the Art department under Hearst was ordered to search the archives for old pictures from before the Ukrainian famine so that they could be touched up and relabeled as being from Soviet Ukraine. One photo was actually discovered to have been from World War I, showing an Austro-Hungarian soldier next to a dead horse (Tottle, 9). Some of the photos used by the Hearst media originally appeared in a London Daily Express article about a supposed famine in Belgorod, located in Russia proper as opposed to Ukraine (Tottle, 11).

It was later discovered that Thomas Walker was actually an escaped convict named Robert Green. Here is an excerpt from a July 16, 1935 article regarding his arrest after being discovered as a fraud. “Robert Green, a writer of syndicated articles about the conditions in Ukraine, who was indicted last Friday by a Federal grand jury on a charge of passport fraud, pleaded guilty yesterday….the judge learned that Green was a fugitive from Colorado State Prison, where he escaped after having served two years of an eight-year term for forgery.” A journalist covering Green/Walker’s trial noted that Green himself admitted that his photos of the Ukrainian famine were faked (Tottle, 11).

Hearst was known for years as “America’s Number One Fascist.” As a matter of fact, he once employed Mussolini as a writer. William Hearst visited Nazi Germany in 1934 and met with top Nazi officials (Tottle, 13).

Among the Ukrainian Nationalist writers of the book The Black Deeds of the Kremlin is Petro Pavlovich. In Pavlovich’s original account of Stalinist terror in Ukraine, titled Crimes in Vynnitsya, he praises Hitler. As a matter of fact, he collaborated with the Nazis in order to publish his account and unite Ukrainians under the banner of fascism (Tottle, 37). Another Nazi collaborator who helped write The Black Deeds of the Kremlin is former SS member and SS propagandist Oleksander Hay-Holowko (Tottle, 41). As a matter of fact, Hay-Holowko himself describes attending a 1933 New Years party in Ukraine where there was an abundance of food (Tottle, 140).

Post-war testimonies of German soldiers reveals that the unearthing of mass graves in Ukraine was simply Nazi propaganda (Tottle, 37).

According to Israel’s Yad Washem Studies, German Senior Lieutenant Erwin Bingel witnessed the SS and Ukrainian militias commit a mass execution of Ukrainian Jews in Vynnitsya Park. He said the Nazis later returned to the same park in order to examine exhumed mass graves of “Soviet murder victims.” When in reality the dead bodies were Nazi victims (Tottle, 40).

The supposed death toll for Ukraine ranges from estimates of one million up to ten million (Tottle, 45). Why should we trust academics if they can’t even get their numbers straight?

In 1934, the British Foreign Office stated, “But there is no information to support Lord Charnwood’s apparent suggestion that the Soviet government has pursued a policy of deliberate impoverishment of agricultural districts of the country, whether or not their policy is considered to have had that effect” (Tottle, 48).

Works Cited:

Davies, Sarah, and James Harris. Stalin: A New History. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2005. Print.

Tottle, Douglas. Fraud, Famine, and Fascism - The Ukrainian Genocide Myth from Hitler to Harvard. Toronto: Progress Books, 1987.

[Luís Henrique]

Hitler 11-12 million people.

This is quite typical of such genocide counts.

Hitler killed about 11 million people in direct genocidal operations: the Einsatzgruppen industrial-scale shooting of Jews, plus the industrial-scale gassing of Jews, Roma, homosexuals, religious dissidents, "undesirables" (prostitutes, petty thieves) and political oppositonists, plus the minor T4 operation against the mentally ill.

It doesn't include Polish, Soviet, French, etc., regular soldiers killed in action (hey, that's war, not genocide!), it doesn't include Dutch, Yugoslavian, British, French, Belgian, etc. civilians killed in aerial bombings, it doesn't include German soldiers or civilians killed by the allies, it doesn't include German people frozen or starved to death due to poor supply planning, etc., etc., etc. Include this, and Hitler's "body count" quickly goes over 50 million.

Stalin's "body count" on the other hand is calculated through a difference between the expected population and actual population, disconsidering any other possible causes for the difference, such as improved contraception, for instance.

Now Stalin was certainly the greatest killer of communists you can cite. But those were killed in hundreds of thousands, not in tens of millions. So these overboard exaggerations of Stalin's "body count" serve only to hide the political nature of his crimes and the political nature of his victims. Turning him into some kind of psychopatological killer of Ukrainians for the sake of erradicating Ukrainians (like Hitler killed Jews in order to exterminate Jews) is tantamount to ignore his reactionary suppression of bolsheviks.

So while the bourgeois myths about Stalinism are false, they are also useful to Stalinists to divert attention from the actual crimes of Stalinism. That's the reason Stalinists troll about the subject.

Luís Henrique

[lombas]

Instead of talking about genocide, what I think we want to talk about here is democide. Not all democide is genocide; and I do not consider the regimes of Mao or Stalin genocidal in nature (tough they did have certain racist tendencies). However, some of their decisions (un)necessarily sealed the fate of some millions of people which could be considered acts of democide.

[manic expression]

Mao: 70 million
Hahahaha why stop there? I heard Mao killed 70 bajillion gajillion vickychristinabarcelonilion people.


Stalin: 22 million
What, are we including anyone who died in WWII as Stalin's personal fault now? I don't even think Robert "I Use Literature Written by Anti-Communists as Historical Evidence" Conquest puts it there anymore.


Pol Pot: 1.5 million
Not anything close to a communist by his own admission so it's moot.


Don't think there are any others who even come close to those.
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