1.6 billion murdered by capitalism

[OnlyCommunistYouKnow]

Note: I did not make this list myself. It was created by a friend. I do disagree with some things on it and some numbers seem to be over exaggerated, but here is the whole thing.

The true mass murdering evil of capitalism exposed: 1.6 billion Killed
United States Imperialism:
Hurricane Katrina (deliberate faulty construction) 1,836
NATO Intervention in Libya 2011 15,000
Tamils killed by US backed Sri Lankan Gov. 30,000
US Revolutionary War 35,700 (If Russa removes a Monarch its bad right?)
Spanish-American War 100,000
US Made Famine in Bangladesh 1974 100,000
NATO Intervention in Libya 100,000
Guatemala 300,000
US Bombing of Yugoslavia 300,000
Iraq (US Selling Poison Gas to Saddam) 400,000
Iraq (Desert Storm) 500,000
US Bombing Iraq Water Supply in 1991 500,000
Invasion of the Philippines 650,000
US Civil War 700,000
US imposed sanctions on Iraq 1,000,000
Afghanistan (War on Terrorism) 1,200,000
US Backed Dictator General Suharto 1,200,000 (Anti-commmunist dictator)
Iraq (War on Terrorism) 1,300,000
1898 American War vs Philippine 3,000,000
US Intervention in the Congo 5,000,000
US Aggression on Latin America 6,000,000
Vietnam War* (including Cambodia & Laos) 10,000,000
Korean War* 10,000,000
Native American Genocide 114,000,000
African Slave Trade 150,000,000
* both wars caused by the us
Japanese Imperialism:
Japanese Occupation of East Timor 70,000
Japanese Bombing of China 71,105
Japanese Massacre of Singapore 100,000
Japanese Germ Warfare in China 200,000
Japanese Democides 5,964,000
British Imperialism:
Second Boer War 75,000
Irish Potato Famine 1,500,000
The Bengal Famine of 1943 10,000,000
British Occupation of India 20,000,000
Famine in Held British India 30,000,000
Misc. Capitalist nations:
Massacre of the Paris Commune 20,000
Dutch East Indies 25,000
Somali Child Famine Deaths 29,000
French Madagascar 80,000
Indonesian Anti-Communist Purges 1965-1966 100,000,000
Philippine Insurrection 220,000
Franco Regime 300,000
Benito Mussolini regime 300,000
Rebelling Shia Killed by Saddam 300,000
Nanking Massacre 300,000
Spanish Civil War 400,000
Mussolini’s Ethiopia 700,000
Palestinians Killed by Israel 1947-2002 826,626
Nigerian Civil War 1,000,000
Stateless Capitalist Somalia 1,000,000
Iraq-Iran War 1,000,000
Rawandan Genocide 1,000,000
Belgian Congo Colonization 1,000,000
Feudal Russia 1,066,000
First Indochina 1946-1954 1,750,000
Khmer Rouge (not communist) 2,035,000
South African Apartheid 3,500,000
Chiang Kai Shek regime (China) 7,000,000
Congo 1886-1908 8,000,000
Nazi Holocaust 12,000,000
Post-Soviet Capitalism in Russia 15,000,000
World War One 16,500,000
World War One 60,000,000
General Disasters by Capitalism:
Union Carbide Bophal Disaster 15,000
Industrial Revolution Kids & Adults USA 100,000
Burma-Siam Railroad Construction 116,000
Famine of 1932-33 (Kulak policy and weather) 7,000,000
Great Depression (America alone) 12,000,000
Children Killed by Preventable Diseases Since 9/11 208,000,000
Children Killed by Hunger 2001-2008 9/11 235,000,000
Children Died from Hunger 2009 5,256,000
Children Died from Hunger 2010 6,000,000
Children Killed by Hunger during the 1990s 100,000,000
Capitalist Policy in India 1947 – 1990 120,000,000
Ciggarette Related Deaths Worldwide (1960 – 2011) 306,000,000

This was created by MaoistRebelNews. He has a Youtube account of marxist news if anyone's interested or wants to contact him. He can also be found on Facebook, his name is Jason Unruhe.

[#FF0000]

i'd like to see sources for some of these is all.

particularly the 100,000,000 in the Phillipines

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Often times these lists are inflated so I too would like to see some sources.

[Tim Cornelis]

Yep, I refuted this list already once, he did not reply.

Just look at this:


Feudal Russia 1,066,000

Feudal Russia.... on a list of the capitalist death rate.


Irish Potato Famine 1,500,000

A potato disease that killed many had nothing to do with capitalism.

We should make an accurate list though.

[Münchhausen]

It seems strange to me that capitalism would be responsible for smoking-related deaths. I'm quite sure that people also smoked (and will smoke) cigarettes in socialist countries. It's more a health-issue and doesn't primarily depend on the way cigarettes are distributed.

Or is it just a misunderstanding on my part?

[ВАЛТЕР]

Yeah...MRN isn't a very good source for anything. As much as I hate capitalism, I'm not going to support outright lies. It makes us look bad.

Although, a solid list could be compiled. If proper research was done.

[Bronco]

I think death toll lists like these are always pretty pointless and stupid, whether the deaths are being attributed to Capitalism, Communism, Fascism or anything else

[Tim Cornelis]

Accurate list:


US invasion and occupation of Philippines: 1,000,000 deaths.
Bengal Famine 1943: 3,000,000
Indonesian anti-communist purge: 500,000
Congo Free State: 10,000,000
US-backed dictatorship South Vietnam: 15,000
Right-wing paramilitaries Colombia: 20,000
Allied bombings of civilian population, WW2: 1,000,000
US invasion of Vietnam: 500,000

[l'Enfermé]

I stopped reading after the American-Indian genocide and slave trade, 114mill and 150mill? Come on.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

I stopped reading after the American-Indian genocide and slave trade, 114mill and 150mill? Come on.

That one is probably more or less accurate (though still inflated). Throughout the centuries of the slave trade as many as thirty to Sixty million Africans were taken from Africa.The American Indian genocide likewise produced a death toll in the millions throughout the years of colonization.

[Thetwoterrors]

This list is pretty inflated. But on the other hand, the 'terrors' of communism is often vastly exaggerated in the capitalist press. And without defending authoritarian communist regimes, whatever their crimes they did represent a counter-movement to capitalism that was for a brief period of time successful in challenging capitalism and repressing some of its worse excesses.

I think some of this stuff might be just outright wrong but good on Urhue for attempting to compile a list regarding the body pile of capitalism. That context often gets lost when many scholars talk about the violence of communist regimes.

Someone really needs to compile a better list though...

[Lobotomy]

Making a death toll seems like kind of a weak argument tbh. Most of us get annoyed when cappies try to discredit communism by simply saying "but Stalin killed millionz!1," so i don't see why we should play the same game.

[lombas]

A potato disease that killed many had nothing to do with capitalism.


I don't really agree with you there, as you should look into why the Irish were planting potatoes in the first place...

[Omsk]

Posting things that are simply wrong,such as this one:



US Bombing of Yugoslavia 300,000

Basically gives the right-wingers the right to make up millions who died during the 'komhuneest terurs'.

[lombas]

The American Indian genocide likewise produced a death toll in the millions throughout the years of colonization.

Are you talking US-Indians or all American indigenous people?

Because it seems hard to believe the death toll of US indians because of deliberate policies went in the millions if the total indigenous population of North America at best numbered a couple of million people.

Also, we shouldn't use the word "genocide" to describe something resembling it before the concept was even thought of. For all we can say, Caesar was a genocidal maniac in that way.

[lombas]

Allied bombings of civilian population, WW2: 1,000,000


This number to me seems to be the very maximum of estimates...

[Yefim Zverev]

by the way the list is very short. most of other things caused by global capitalist system were not mentioned..

poor working conditions have caused lots of deaths. It may be millions so far.

Capitalism is also responsible for many murders for robbery etc.

on and on countless deaths...

many other us/eu backed dictatorships and regimes are not mentioned.. which caused millions of deaths

[Tim Cornelis]

This number to me seems to be the very maximum of estimates...


305,000-600,000 civilians in Germany, including foreign workers
330,000-500,000 Japanese civilians
50,000 Italians killed by Allied bombing

The very maximum would be 1,150,000

[marl]

This shit is pointless, it makes us as bad as a certain black book. And yes, capitalism does kill many people in lots of new & exciting ways.

[ColonelCossack]

I don't think we can really put a very accurate figure on how many people Capitalism has killed; apart from anything else, the causes of death are often hard to attribute to any particular thing. But many of these are blown way out of proportion.

[Omsk]

And i don't know if you should list both the WW2 death toll,plus the death toll of many crimes that happened during WW2.

[lombas]

The very maximum would be 1,150,000

The sources on that Wikipedia page, apart from Rummel, are not very impressive for those statistics...

[lombas]

And i don't know if you should list both the WW2 death toll,plus the death toll of many crimes that happened during WW2.

Why not?

[Omsk]

Because he is 'merging' all the numbers,and because the deaths of WW2 include the deaths caused by these crimes.

[lombas]

Oh I see. This brings us to the next problem of the list: lack of respect for chronology.

[MotherCossack]

and some of it is so arbitary
and it makes the deaths meaningless.....
far more effective to choose just a very few.... and give their story flesh... detail... bring it to life.... has a much greater impact and means something

[Amal]

A potato disease that killed many had nothing to do with capitalism.
We should make an accurate list though.
Well, a drought in Ukraine MUST have something to do with STALINISM!

[Amal]

Note: I did not make this list myself. It was created by a friend. I do disagree with some things on it and some numbers seem to be over exaggerated, but here is the whole thing.

The true mass murdering evil of capitalism exposed: 1.6 billion Killed
United States Imperialism:
Hurricane Katrina (deliberate faulty construction) 1,836
NATO Intervention in Libya 2011 15,000
Tamils killed by US backed Sri Lankan Gov. 30,000
US Revolutionary War 35,700 (If Russa removes a Monarch its bad right?)
Spanish-American War 100,000
US Made Famine in Bangladesh 1974 100,000
NATO Intervention in Libya 100,000
Guatemala 300,000
US Bombing of Yugoslavia 300,000
Iraq (US Selling Poison Gas to Saddam) 400,000
Iraq (Desert Storm) 500,000
US Bombing Iraq Water Supply in 1991 500,000
Invasion of the Philippines 650,000
US Civil War 700,000
US imposed sanctions on Iraq 1,000,000
Afghanistan (War on Terrorism) 1,200,000
US Backed Dictator General Suharto 1,200,000 (Anti-commmunist dictator)
Iraq (War on Terrorism) 1,300,000
1898 American War vs Philippine 3,000,000
US Intervention in the Congo 5,000,000
US Aggression on Latin America 6,000,000
Vietnam War* (including Cambodia & Laos) 10,000,000
Korean War* 10,000,000
Native American Genocide 114,000,000
African Slave Trade 150,000,000
* both wars caused by the us
Japanese Imperialism:
Japanese Occupation of East Timor 70,000
Japanese Bombing of China 71,105
Japanese Massacre of Singapore 100,000
Japanese Germ Warfare in China 200,000
Japanese Democides 5,964,000
British Imperialism:
Second Boer War 75,000
Irish Potato Famine 1,500,000
The Bengal Famine of 1943 10,000,000
British Occupation of India 20,000,000
Famine in Held British India 30,000,000
Misc. Capitalist nations:
Massacre of the Paris Commune 20,000
Dutch East Indies 25,000
Somali Child Famine Deaths 29,000
French Madagascar 80,000
Indonesian Anti-Communist Purges 1965-1966 100,000,000
Philippine Insurrection 220,000
Franco Regime 300,000
Benito Mussolini regime 300,000
Rebelling Shia Killed by Saddam 300,000
Nanking Massacre 300,000
Spanish Civil War 400,000
Mussolini’s Ethiopia 700,000
Palestinians Killed by Israel 1947-2002 826,626
Nigerian Civil War 1,000,000
Stateless Capitalist Somalia 1,000,000
Iraq-Iran War 1,000,000
Rawandan Genocide 1,000,000
Belgian Congo Colonization 1,000,000
Feudal Russia 1,066,000
First Indochina 1946-1954 1,750,000
Khmer Rouge (not communist) 2,035,000
South African Apartheid 3,500,000
Chiang Kai Shek regime (China) 7,000,000
Congo 1886-1908 8,000,000
Nazi Holocaust 12,000,000
Post-Soviet Capitalism in Russia 15,000,000
World War One 16,500,000
World War One 60,000,000
General Disasters by Capitalism:
Union Carbide Bophal Disaster 15,000
Industrial Revolution Kids & Adults USA 100,000
Burma-Siam Railroad Construction 116,000
Famine of 1932-33 (Kulak policy and weather) 7,000,000
Great Depression (America alone) 12,000,000
Children Killed by Preventable Diseases Since 9/11 208,000,000
Children Killed by Hunger 2001-2008 9/11 235,000,000
Children Died from Hunger 2009 5,256,000
Children Died from Hunger 2010 6,000,000
Children Killed by Hunger during the 1990s 100,000,000
Capitalist Policy in India 1947 – 1990 120,000,000
Ciggarette Related Deaths Worldwide (1960 – 2011) 306,000,000

This was created by MaoistRebelNews. He has a Youtube account of marxist news if anyone's interested or wants to contact him. He can also be found on Facebook, his name is Jason Unruhe.
Not very accurate. What about the deaths caused by destruction of infrastructure, including medical facilities and lack of life support system in medicine in countries like Iraq, Libya and other places and the rest of the world. DON'T LAUGH! That standard so far has been in use to count the death toll by "Evil Stalin" even that has been caused by imperialist attack or sabotage.
In Iraq, from 1991 onward, babies had died in such diseases, that are even unimaginable in Africa due to sanction on import of medicines. Isn't that genocide?

[Vyacheslav Brolotov]

There is already a Black Book of Capitalism and a Black Book of Colonialism. Go get these books, which are actually made by professionals, and do not trust this stupid list.


Indonesian Anti-Communist Purges 1965-1966 100,000,000


^^^Some lies are so obvious that not even stupid capitalists can miss them.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Are you talking US-Indians or all American indigenous people?

Because it seems hard to believe the death toll of US indians because of deliberate policies went in the millions if the total indigenous population of North America at best numbered a couple of million people.

Also, we shouldn't use the word "genocide" to describe something resembling it before the concept was even thought of. For all we can say, Caesar was a genocidal maniac in that way.

U.S native Americans and most modern scholars estimate that the native American population before the white settlers arrived was in the tens of millions. There was more than enough resources to support such a population.

Genocide is applicable when the U.S was firmly established as it was imperialist policy to make treaties with the natives, break them, push them into a smaller circle, then force them into camps which were so horrendous that Hitler was inspired by them.

Perhaps the term isn't applicable when the settlers first arrived but later on it was more than acceptable to use such a term when describing the effects. Semantics on definitions: if the word fits the situation I see no problem in using it so as long as it doesn't negatively affect a group.

[lombas]

U.S native Americans and most modern scholars estimate that the native American population before the white settlers arrived was in the tens of millions. There was more than enough resources to support such a population.

What are your sources to back the claim that North American native peoples numbered in the tens of millions?

[danyboy27]

Lists like these are not really useful tools beccause they dont take into account the peoples indirrectly affected and the mess it did to the social structures and the environnement.

[Stadtsmasher]

Although the numbers may be lacking in strict accuracy, it is important to counter capitalist lies about how "Communism has been proven false" due to large death-tolls. This kind of list is one good way to do it (provided accuracy can be assured).

[robbo203]

Curious that there does not seem to be any mention in this list of deaths under the state capitalist form of capitalism e.g. Soviet Union or PRC.

That aside, I think there is something a little contrived about the whole exercise.
Take the figure of 306,000,000 who died from cigarette related deaths, for example - in what sense were they "murdered by capitalism". This is anthropomorphism taken to extremes, in my opinion. Capitalism is just a particular system of socio economic relationships. It constrains behaviour to be sure but it is human beings that do the behaving.


I disagree strongly with this depiction of reality that presents us as mere autonomons, cogs in a giant machine. It is disempowering and quite misleading. We can and do chose between options such as whether or not to smoke in this case You might as well argue that death by lung cancer was a case of suicide rather than murder but even that would be misleading. Smokers dont generally desire their own demise. its more a case of taking on a calculated risk

You can say "capitalism kills" but only in the rhetorical sense would this be true. In reality it is a case of people getting killed under capitalism and the attribution of blame to a socioeconomic system as such is only legitimate to the extent that it provides the predisposing factors or appropriate environment that induces people to kill

But in the final analysis it is people that kill. not capitalism per se. It is people that chose to kill and it is people that also chose to stick with or acquiesce in, capitalism. Thats why capitalism continues and why people continue to get needlessly killed in wars under capitalism

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

This seems too "Black Book" to accept by merit of statistics alone.