Stalin

[blackemma]

I'm curious as to why people here support Stalin. As a libertarian and someone with socialist sympathies, I find it difficult to comprehend people's acceptence of what is generally accepted to be a tyrannical and despotic ruler. Now, I'm well aware that capitalists would spread dirt about enemies, but what do people make of those who have lived under Stalin and condemned his rule? What of anarchists and other left libertarians who have condemned him? To imply such people are capitalists is absurd. Having heard stories of people who lived in the former Soviet Union and the accounts of various anti-capitalist historians, I find it incredibly challenging to see what allows people to embrace this man as a hero. I think many of you are likely intelligent, so please explain this phenomenon to me. I'm most curious - and I mean that sincerely. I only wish to understand, not dismiss.

[{scarface87}]

We all kno Stalin was a bell end to all of his people. However they did recognise that he did drag them thro the 2nd world war to victory so he was hailed as a kind of churchill figure. He also created the 5 year plans that were set to get the Soviet Union on the top of things. Sure he did kill quite allot of his army and i cant excuse that but he did do allot of good to the Soviet economy.

[Looter]

Stalin is very popular in Russia, so I pretend that the Russian people know what really happened in their own country wheras people in the West are kept in the dark and fed BS, not just about Russia but about the whole World, which I know to be true because I live here.

[Hawker]

I don't support him at all.I think he was just a second-rate Hitler because he killed most of his people and political rivals out of pure parannoia.And he was going to kill all the Jews in Russia because he believed that a Jewish doctor was going to try and poison the political Cabinet,but luckly he died before he could make another purgeing.

[shakermaker]

I totally agree with Hawker!

[gawkygeek]

stalin was definitely a class A asshole, but it cannot be forgotten that he industrialized the soviet union and brought them into the new world with some strength and clout, without him they might never have been able to ammount to the superpower that they were

[Soviet power supreme]

but what do people make of those who have lived under Stalin and condemned his rule?

Millions of Russians mourned for comrade Stalin when he died.Here are current stats.


In Russia, the Public Opinion fund has conducted a poll to find out the most popular politicians in July 2002. Russians mainly consider their former Communistic leaders as the most outstanding public figures. The winner of the poll was Vladimir Ulyanov (Lenin), who took 14 percent of the vote. He is followed by Iosif Stalin with nine percent. The correposnding share for Vladimir Putin was 2 percent.


In March 2003 Josif Stalin was in Russia widely honoured because of his death´s 50th anniversary.

Do you think that Russians are brainwashed?Then why in a current capitalist Russia they dont tell what he was and did and capitalism could flourish better?Because those things are lies and Russians dont believe them.


I don't support him at all.I think he was just a second-rate Hitler because he killed most of his people and political rivals out of pure parannoia

Most of his people? :lol:

Are you an social democrat?What do you with capitalists?Form a goverment where cappies and communists are in together.That has tried in Scandinavian countries and it doesnt work.They are as capitalist states as any others.

And could you give me info of Stalin being a paranoid?

[Hawker]

Originally posted by Soviet power [email protected] 21 2003, 06:19 PM
Are you an social democrat?What do you with capitalists?Form a goverment where cappies and communists are in together.That has tried in Scandinavian countries and it doesnt work.They are as capitalist states as any others.

And could you give me info of Stalin being a paranoid?
I'm a die hard Marxist and a Communist,what I would do with cappies is to reducate them to communism,but if they refuse then hell,I'll have to kill them.

Stalin was paraniod,he thought everyone was out to get him,that's why he had his secret police roam throughout Russia looking for people who didn't like him,rounded them up and shot them them.One of his political rivals for control was Leon Trotsky,was a perfect example of how paranoid he was because he had him banished to Alma Ata in Kazakhstan, and from there deported to Turkey in 1929,just because they were rivals.

[BOZG]

Other than the Stalinists and authoritarian socialists, I don't think any defends Stalin himself but rather they defend the gains and progressive elements of the Soviet Union, which may have come about under Stalin, but when it comes down to it, while it may have been on Stalin's orders that these gains where made, it was not Stalin himself that made them but rather the Soviet workers themselves and I think it's important to remember that.

[Soviet power supreme]

I'm a die hard Marxist and a Communist,what I would do with cappies is to reducate them to communism,but if they refuse then hell,I'll have to kill them.


Then why are you bad-mouthing Stalin here?He put them in gulags and if they resisted they got bullet in their head.

[Hawker]

Okay I'll just banish most of them,but the most dangerous and influential cappies I'll kill.Stalin mostly just killed,he rarely banished people,regardless of their influence or threat level.

[blackemma]

Just asking, what do those of you who endorse make of Martin AMis' new book "Koba the Dread," Noam Chomsky's views on the Soviet Union, and the writings of people like Victor Serge who later became critical of the Soviet Union. Again, I don't mean to put down. I'm just interested. I suppose also, what of the 20,000,000 number? I've heard a lot of people say it's exagerated, but I'd be interested in your accounts of what happened during Stalin's reign as well as his policies towards Jews and homosexuals.

[RedComrade]

Anyone who actually beleives that Stalin was going to kill all the Jews is obviously off his rocker. As far as Im aware not even Robert Conquest makes such ridiculous claims; this is completlely unsubstantiated and even capitalist historians admit that there is not even a shred of evidence to support such a ridiculous assertion. The Jews under Stalin were given a privelaged status and were even granted their own autonomous zone known as the J.A.R located in present day Birobidzhan. When many minorities were being forcibly dispersed or deported, coerced to give up their native languages and conform to Russian culture the Jews were being granted autonomous status and allowed to take greater steps toward cultural and political independence then they ever would have under the anti-semitic tsars.

[Comrade Ceausescu]

I totally agree with Hawker!

yeah..Like totally!shut up you dimwit.


Just asking, what do those of you who endorse make of Martin AMis' new book "Koba the Dread," Noam Chomsky's views on the Soviet Union, and the writings of people like Victor Serge who later became critical of the Soviet Union. Again, I don't mean to put down. I'm just interested. I suppose also, what of the 20,000,000 number? I've heard a lot of people say it's exagerated, but I'd be interested in your accounts of what happened during Stalin's reign as well as his policies towards Jews and homosexuals.

Chomsky is devoutly anti-cimmunist.He is ringing the bell of anti-communism as much as the capitalists are.I read "Koba The Dread" and let me tell you,I'm no Nazi,but I was near burning it.Utter bullshit.As for Stalin and Jews,he supported Israel,he gave victims of the Holacoust the option of setting up their own Soviet Republic.I have not heard that he was rabidly anti-homosexual.His views were that of the American governemt today.Progressive for that time.

[commieboy]

I know a substitute teacher that i speak with about once every two weeks who lived in the USSR....and she loves Lenin, Trotski...but hates Stalin and i'll tell you why....When she was in school under stalin....He said only 20,000 soviets died in WWII.....Twenty thousand! There was more like two hundred million!

I think censorship like this is total bullshit, atleast in the US they didn't try and hide the number of dead that they had.....

And Cheguevara717....good luck on the "Most annoying user" award the the chit chat awards....

God damn stalinists....how can you respect a man that started out as a political hitman?

Cheguevara717 spoke to me on AIM a few months ago because i said Stalin was a good leader during the war....Thats the only good thing i can say about him....Then when i told him how i really felt about Stalin he just kept calling me a moron...and asshole....oh and a cappie...so for that midnight conversation of idiocy i have a good idea of Stalinists...Closed minded pricks!

[Comrade Ceausescu]

Cheguevara717 spoke to me on AIM a few months ago because i said Stalin was a good leader during the war....Thats the only good thing i can say about him....Then when i told him how i really felt about Stalin he just kept calling me a moron...and asshole....oh and a cappie...so for that midnight conversation of idiocy i have a good idea of Stalinists...Closed minded pricks!

This was after you accused me of being a "Nazi' because I didn't believe some bullcrap you saw on the history channel.Goodness,you might as well believe the Bush adminastration.

[Urban Rubble]

Cheguevara717 spoke to me on AIM a few months ago because i said Stalin was a good leader during the war....Thats the only good thing i can say about him....Then when i told him how i really felt about Stalin he just kept calling me a moron...and asshole....oh and a cappie...so for that midnight conversation of idiocy i have a good idea of Stalinists...Closed minded pricks!

Don't base your opinion of Stalinists on a child like Che717. I don't agree with them, but there are many very very smart Stalinists around here. Cassius Clay and Comrade RAF (when we was here) come to mind.

[Comrade Ceausescu]

I actually agree with urban here.I am no Einstein.

[Urban Rubble]

I don't think you're an idiot Che. I actually think you are alot better off than most kids your age, at least you care about this shit. I am just saying you are very young and easily influenced. Someone like Cassius can put up real arguments because they have studied it longer and more extensively.

[Comrade Ceausescu]

I know a substitute teacher that i speak with about once every two weeks who lived in the USSR....and she loves Lenin, Trotski...but hates Stalin and i'll tell you why....When she was in school under stalin....He said only 20,000 soviets died in WWII.....Twenty thousand! There was more like two hundred million!

I think censorship like this is total bullshit, atleast in the US they didn't try and hide the number of dead that they had....

OH MY GOD! :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: I just re-looked this.Wow.There were barely 200 million people alive in the USSR at that time.I will give you the benifit of the doubt and say that you were probobly high while posting that.

[Saint-Just]

Cassius Clay has gone as well as Comrade RAF. People making claims against Stalin here have not researched this subject thoroughly, and probably never will. Instead they choose to accept western imperialist propaganda.


(From another thread, quotes from Ian Rocks, DyerMaker, Drake Dracoli)

-Stalin was married to a jewish woman (whether it was his 1st or 2nd marriage I don't know)

-One of the first orders Stalin gave to the Red Army was that Jews who wanted to should be evacuated East into the safety of the Soviet rear, out of the reach of the advancing Nazi army. A considerable portion of the Soviet railroad capacity, which otherwise would have been used to transport troops and material to the front, was allocated for this purpose.

-"National and racial chauvinism is a vestige of the misanthropic customs characteristic of
the period of cannibalism. Anti-semitism, as an extreme form of racial chauvinism, is the
most dangerous vestige of cannibalism.

Anti-semitism is of advantage to the exploiters as a lightning conductor that deflects the
blows aimed by the working people at capitalism. Anti-semitism is dangerous for the
working people as being a false path that leads them off the right road and lands them in
the jungle. Hence Communists, as consistent internationalists, cannot but be
irreconcilable, sworn enemies of anti-semitism.

In the U.S.S.R. anti-semitism is punishable with the utmost severity of the law as a
phenomenon deeply hostile to the Soviet system. Under U.S.S.R. law active anti-semites
are liable to the death penalty."

J. Stalin
January 12, 1931

[Hawker]

Well I don't really know which one's are true and which one's are false,it's because of all these facts written about him by the people who loved and hated him that really shrouded his entire life.

[commieboy]

Originally posted by [email protected] 22 2003, 01:50 AM

Cheguevara717 spoke to me on AIM a few months ago because i said Stalin was a good leader during the war....Thats the only good thing i can say about him....Then when i told him how i really felt about Stalin he just kept calling me a moron...and asshole....oh and a cappie...so for that midnight conversation of idiocy i have a good idea of Stalinists...Closed minded pricks!

This was after you accused me of being a "Nazi' because I didn't believe some bullcrap you saw on the history channel.Goodness,you might as well believe the Bush adminastration.
i said you have the same god damn mentality of a nazi....everyone you dont agree with, you start calling a capitalist prick......Just like every fucking nazi would call everyone who didn't agree with them a jew....

I dont like you....

youre a cold person.....

[El Brujo]

*yawn*

[Comrade Ceausescu]

i said you have the same god damn mentality of a nazi....everyone you dont agree with, you start calling a capitalist prick......Just like every fucking nazi would call everyone who didn't agree with them a jew....

I dont like you....

youre a cold person.....

Sigh...do you think i care if someone who thinks 200 million soviets were killed in world war 2 likes me? :lol:

[schumi]

200 million??? you probably mean 20 million.... :)

[MaD HaTTeR]

Stalin was just as bad as Hitler and he was not a communist in any aspect, he was a ruthless dictator that killed off millions of innocent people in the name of communism and was a paranoid totalitarian. Lenin said on his death bed not to let stalin become leader because he knew this would happen. Stalin banished Trotsky from the USSR! I mean Trotsky was one of the most loyal communist ever.If you denounce Lenins beliefs then you need to look a little closer at why you label yourself a communist. TROTSKY AND LENIN!!!!

[MiniOswald]

actually to round it off it was around 25 million, i think 5 million of those where at leningrad, messy.

[Subversive Pessimist]

she loves Lenin, Trotski...but hates Stalin and i'll tell you why....When she was in school under stalin....He said only 20,000 soviets died in WWII.....Twenty thousand! There was more like two hundred million!


:unsure:

[elijahcraig]

I'm curious as to why people here support Stalin.

I’d have to know what you mean by “support.” I think “support” of someone who has been dead for half a century is a little sketchy. I merely say that the crimes he is accused of committing, for the most part, did not happen in the way they were portrayed, and can only be viewed as “tyrannical” if you ignore the historical factors throughout the world during his reign as leader of the party.


As a libertarian and someone with socialist sympathies, I find it difficult to comprehend people's acceptence of what is generally accepted to be a tyrannical and despotic ruler.

Other things that are “generally accepted”:

Creationism, the “good will” of America, the greatness of Capitalism, the war in Iraq, the war in Afghanistan, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism (though I like Buddhism the most of any religion), and other world religions. Feudalism was “generally accepted,” what Hitler told the Germans was “generally accepted,” Reagan being “pro-life” is “generally accepted.” What myths the ruling class push on the populace really has no effect on our opinion of something—and “general acceptance” means nothing when you are speaking of a population which is generally stupid and irrational.


Now, I'm well aware that capitalists would spread dirt about enemies, but what do people make of those who have lived under Stalin and condemned his rule?

Like who?


What of anarchists and other left libertarians who have condemned him?

Anarchists and “left libertarians” are tools of the ruling class. For example, during the Russian Revolution, when a civil war and a mass famine was occurring, Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman traveled to Russia. They were disgusted by the reality of Revolution. What did they do in a time of complete and total war and destruction, a time in which the people were literally starving and dying in the streets, a time when revolution is at its most authoritative…? What did they do? They asked Lenin for “free speech.” Lenin laughed at their naïve request, knowing full well that such a ridiculous thing cannot exist in a revolution, ever. The Anarchists condemned the Russian revolution based on this and other “betrayals” which were similarly ridiculous.


To imply such people are capitalists is absurd.

They aren’t capitalists—they are TOOLS of the Capitalist class. Just as priests are.


Having heard stories of people who lived in the former Soviet Union and the accounts of various anti-capitalist historians, I find it incredibly challenging to see what allows people to embrace this man as a hero.

I certainly don’t consider him a hero. He was a good leader that’s it. There is no reason to call any leader or politician a “hero,” they’re all corrupt to some extent. It’s the nature of the beast.

What anti-capitalist historians?

What people?


Millions of Russians mourned for comrade Stalin when he died.Here are current stats.

I also do not think this can serve as a “statistic” on what Stalin did or didn’t do. The herd of people can be led astray very easily, brainwashed, whatever. I’m not saying Stalin did this; I am saying if we were to judge it objectively, we couldn’t use this as a factor. The results of Stalin’s rule and what it should be judged by are the facts and objective knowledge which are aware of.


Just asking, what do those of you who endorse make of Martin AMis' new book "Koba the Dread," Noam Chomsky's views on the Soviet Union, and the writings of people like Victor Serge who later became critical of the Soviet Union. Again, I don't mean to put down. I'm just interested. I suppose also, what of the 20,000,000 number? I've heard a lot of people say it's exagerated, but I'd be interested in your accounts of what happened during Stalin's reign as well as his policies towards Jews and homosexuals.

20,000,000 number is way out of order; it’s not even possible if you look at population growth over the period.

Chomsky is an Anarchist, and his opinion on Stalin matters to me only slightly. Though I’ve never seen his analysis on the subject, just offhand comments in various interviews or books.

I haven’t read Martin Amis.

Stalin’s policies towards homosexuals reflected the Russian population. Blame them, he’s only their representative.

Jews? I’m not aware of any of this. Stalin was born in a Jewish town, so I have high doubts as to his supposed “persecution.”


Don't base your opinion of Stalinists on a child like Che717. I don't agree with them, but there are many very very smart Stalinists around here. Cassius Clay and Comrade RAF (when we was here) come to mind.

Che717 is a fucking idiot. Look at his avatar for god’s sake. I’ve had my PM arguments with this jackass.

[Pawn Power]

stalin was popular because he brought Russia up to a world power. He had his flaws be he had to overcome many obstacles to bring Russia and keep Russia cummunist. Thier were many problems like spys from capitalist countries like the US and they Stali9n had to deal with this

[synthesis]

They aren’t capitalists—they are TOOLS of the Capitalist class. Just as priests are.

Yet couldn't you say the same about any Leninist group which has held power?

After all, what did the Chinese revolution ultimately accomplish other than creating a more modern-oriented capitalism?

The Russian revolution?

The omnipotent state that Leninism inherently creates will fall prey to its own unaccountability to the general will, as intra-Party power struggles are practically inevitable. If the Russian people or the Chinese people had more say in the matters of state, and then had widely supported their governments in the first place, they could have prevented Kruschchev or Xiaopeng from ever gaining power and starting their nations on the road to industrial capitalism.

But it wouldn't happen. To create revolution without mass support and participation, one must have an ultimately self-destructive elite vanguard in control. The creation of non-vanguardist socialism depends on the masses' consciousness of just how bad capitalism is, and they can't have that until the country in question is actually capitalist, rather than simply backwards and feudal.

It all fits together rather nicely, I think.

[elijahcraig]

Yet couldn't you say the same about any Leninist group which has held power?

After all, what did the Chinese revolution ultimately accomplish other than creating a more modern-oriented capitalism?

The Russian revolution?

The omnipotent state that Leninism inherently creates will fall prey to its own unaccountability to the general will, as intra-Party power struggles are practically inevitable. If the Russian people or the Chinese people had more say in the matters of state, and then had widely supported their governments in the first place, they could have prevented Kruschchev or Xiaopeng from ever gaining power and starting their nations on the road to industrial capitalism.

But it wouldn't happen. To create revolution without mass support and participation, one must have an ultimately self-destructive elite vanguard in control. The creation of non-vanguardist socialism depends on the masses' consciousness of just how bad capitalism is, and they can't have that until the country in question is actually capitalist, rather than simply backwards and feudal.

It all fits together rather nicely, I think.

I think we've had the "Leninist vs. Anarchist" discussion about 500000 times on this site, I'm tiring of the recurrence.

[atlanticche]

Originally posted by [email protected] 21 2003, 09:56 AM
I'm curious as to why people here support Stalin. As a libertarian and someone with socialist sympathies, I find it difficult to comprehend people's acceptence of what is generally accepted to be a tyrannical and despotic ruler. Now, I'm well aware that capitalists would spread dirt about enemies, but what do people make of those who have lived under Stalin and condemned his rule? What of anarchists and other left libertarians who have condemned him? To imply such people are capitalists is absurd. Having heard stories of people who lived in the former Soviet Union and the accounts of various anti-capitalist historians, I find it incredibly challenging to see what allows people to embrace this man as a hero. I think many of you are likely intelligent, so please explain this phenomenon to me. I'm most curious - and I mean that sincerely. I only wish to understand, not dismiss.
well post modernists here would only believe that he only did good things for the nation and helped the people, as they do not believe that he killed anyone

also even if you accept everything he did, his ideas were working he was creating one class and making the actual socialists by his sides happy of what they saw, as he was not a socialist

[Mike Fakelastname]

My views on Stalin are mixed, I don't hate what he did, but at the same time I don't really like it. I believe that things would have worked out better if Trotsky had received the power that Stalin had received. But, at the same time, I recognize that most of the "bad stuff" historians typically say of him is either exaggerated or completely made up. And what "bad stuff" he did that can be historically proven, he did out of sheer necessity.

[Salvador Allende]

I must say that I think Comrade Koba is a hero. The generation that grew up under him was the first Russian generation to have universal health-care and education, women became equal to men, Russia herself experianced the fastest industrialization and biggest economic boom in history, Fascism in europe for the most part was crushed and 700 million more people came under Socialism and out of Capitalism.

Also, I believe Trotsky would have never done half the things Koba did. Maybe he would have done the health-care and education and equality in the work-place and not executed anyone. But, do you really think someone who couldn't defeat Poland could have successfully led the USSR to victory over Germany? Also, there is no way Russia could have industrialized like that under Trotsky, so he would have had even less to work with against Germany. Many people criticize Koba for not going with international revolution, but all Koba wanted to do was stabilize Socialism in one country so it could be the base for an international revolution. the USSR became a base for all other Socialist movements and even equipped the Republican Army in Spain during their war.

[konev]

well the war in Polnad is not something you can blame on Trotskij. Trotskij and Tutatjeviskij (i dont know who to spell his name) held overall command but Budjennin and Stalin held command of the 1 red cavalery army. The strategy of the red army was marching straight on Warsaw while leaving the flank protection to the 1 red cavalery army. Stalin however disobeyed his orders from the high command and marched to far south whitour informing the forces marching on Warsaw. Thus he left them whitout flank protection and the poles outflanked them at the Vistula river.

By the way: your glorius hero Koba did many things but one such thing was outlawing homosexuals, hardly a progresive thing to do

[Zmal]

Stalin was motivated by nothing but a desire for personal power. Any good he did was a side effect of this desire. In addition to this he was also quite insane. Everyone close to him that he had sent to death he mourned. He wasnt a sociopath, he was simply willing to kill for his own needs. Not to mention his parinoia.
On the other hand without his total ruthlessness the soviet union would not have survived WWII. I believe that had Trotsky taken power and somehow survived WWII the soviet union may well still be alive and kicking today. But Im probably a moron.


Stalin by Edvard Radzinsky, for all your Stalin related needs. The guy grew up under Stalins rule and actualy seems to like the guy to a degree. Hes pretty fair and the book seems very well researched.

[Louis Pio]

Stalin removed party democracy by killing all the old bolshevic leaders and still people call him a hero :(
That's personality cultism quite obviously.

[Salvador Allende]

Please remember that many of the "Old Bolsheviks" such as Kamenev, Zinoviev and Bukharin were tryed and found guilty in Soviet courts for aiding Trotsky and trying to overthrow the Soviet government. I believe it was Kamenev who admitted he did it and also admitted to helping assassinate Sergei Kirov.

Don't forget that many times Koba was checked by the congress, but most people forget about that and just remember the times when Kalinin supported him.

[Guest1]

Originally posted by Salvador [email protected] 23 2004, 09:13 PM
the USSR became a base for all other Socialist movements and even equipped the Republican Army in Spain during their war.
Maybe, but they refused to equip them until they broke up the worker's collectives, returned to capitalism and a state and set up a regular army rather than a guerrilla force.

The Anarchists decided to work with them, so they shared a new government with the Stalinists and Capitalists, until orders from Moscow came in that they should be arrested and slaughtered across the country.

So Spain was betrayed, and soon after, franco over ran the much smaller republican army that had idiotically decided to use regular tactics thanks to Stalin's insistence on hierarchy.

Yes, he helped Spain quite a bit, how else could the Capitalists destroy the most successful Communist uprising in Europe?

[Salvador Allende]

I am not saying Koba was always correct, his views on Guerilla warfare were absolutely wrong. Mao was the one who pointed out the flaws of Koba and Lenin, namely that they do not take into consideration to urban working class and do not support guerilla warfare to begin revolution.

[Guest1]

It wasn't just his views on guerrilla warfare though, he pushed the Anarcho-Communists to dismantle the Collectives that had been built across the country and reinstitute wage labour and boss ownership.

[Salvador Allende]

some sort of conversion has to take place, it can't be immediately. Lenin saw this and thus, the New Economic Plan.

[Louis Pio]

Please remember that many of the "Old Bolsheviks" such as Kamenev, Zinoviev and Bukharin were tryed and found guilty in Soviet courts for aiding Trotsky and trying to overthrow the Soviet government. I believe it was Kamenev who admitted he did it and also admitted to helping assassinate Sergei Kirov.


I don't really think you can take these trials seriously, nor would I put much faith in "confessions" made under torture.
What you are saying is that all the old bolshevics were traitors and Stalin was the only "real" leader. Sorry but that's just extremely stupid in my oppinion.

[Guest1]

Originally posted by Salvador [email protected] 28 2004, 02:10 AM
some sort of conversion has to take place, it can't be immediately. Lenin saw this and thus, the New Economic Plan.
But it worked, class consciousness was at an all time high, it was organized leaderless revolution. If it was working why wait for some sort of conversion? The people were excited about their society and fought well for it. To turn around and take it from them because it didn't fit the Leninists paradigm doesn't make sense.

Spain was eons ahead of the Soviet Union in eliminating Capitalism, russia could have learned alot from it.

[Salvador Allende]

Very true, but do you really think that a leaderless movement could have fought the Spanish Nationalists, Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy at once? In all reality, Koba had no past experiance to go on, he was really just going on Leninist theory and tactical guesses. Either way, I sincerly doubt Barcelona or the rest of Republican Spain could have survived for nearly 4 years without Soviet aid.

[Guest1]

Originally posted by Salvador [email protected] 28 2004, 10:05 PM
Very true, but do you really think that a leaderless movement could have fought the Spanish Nationalists, Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy at once?
They did, for 4 years. Though it wasn't exactly leaderless, the unions had leaders. However, it was not lead by them, the people ran the collectives independently.


In all reality, Koba had no past experiance to go on, he was really just going on Leninist theory and tactical guesses.
True, and I'm saying that failed. We have to be able to look at a situation and say "hell, this is working, let's try to see how we can keep it working". Rather than relying on dogma and rigid blueprints.


Either way, I sincerly doubt Barcelona or the rest of Republican Spain could have survived for nearly 4 years without Soviet aid.
They did, the Soviet Union stepped in only at the end, as I explained. The Communist party (Stalinists) and the Bourgeoisie were on the sidelines from the very beginning. The state collapsed and it was the unions, the workers and the people who took up the cause. They setup voluntary, non-hierarchical militias, collectivized the factories and rescued the economy.

Far from the country collapsing with the government, they stood their ground.

Obviously they would have lost eventually, but Stalin's involvement was only at the very end, when he did much more to end the revolution than support it.

The end came when it did because of the reforms Stalin insisted on, a return of shared government with the Bourgeoisie, the "Communist" party and the Anarchists. Though the blame does not rest solely with him. The union leadership centralized and accepted "putting the revolution on hold" so that they could show "a united front against Fascism".

We must never again put the revolution on hold. The arrogance of leadership made them think they could.

[Skeptic]

Comrades this is a very interesting thread. Here is what I found out about questions concerning Joseph Stalin (especially criticism of Stalin by Mao Tse Tung) on the 'Another World Is Possible' website:

The Stalin Question
« Thread started on: Nov 3rd, 2003, 5:52pm »
Everyone knows that Joseph Stalin, the leader of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union is controversial.

He led the Soviet revolution, and the world communist movement, for almost thirty years, towering over the politics of the world and deeply influencing the development of revolution and socialism.

The anti-communist gospel describes him as a "monster" and "murderer."

The experience of the Soviet Union is first profoundly falsified and distorted -- and then this distorted history is given as "proof" that communism is a nightmare (and that capitalism is preferable to radical change).

So unraveling the Stalin years is important.

Here is a sophisticated summation of those experiences by the RCP,USA (it was posted on the site I moderate: http:2changetheworld.info)

RCP chairman Bob Avakian writes:

"It is necessary, in summing up the stage that has ended and the historical experience of socialism so far, to speak once again to this question. I made a rather extensive analysis of the positive contributions as well as the serious errors of Stalin in Conquer the World. But right now, especially, with the changes going on the revisionist countries and the increasing repudiation and attacks there directed at Stalin and "Stalinism" from many different quarters, it is necessary to return to this and to make clear what it is we uphold and won't renounce and what we cannot uphold and must criticize in terms of Stalin's role as the leader of the Soviet Union and in the international communist movement over a decisive period of thirty years, from the early 1920s until his death in 1953.

"Mao used the formulation that Stalin's achievements were 70 percent and his errors 30 percent of his overall role. The essence here is not the quantitative analysis-- not the percentages, 70 percent positive, 30 percent negative -- but the overall assessment this suggests: Stalin mainly should be upheld, but he did make errors, including serious errors."

This excerpt is relevant to the discussion going on in the "1984 and communism" thread.

Bob Avakian on the Question of Stalin and "Stalinism"

It is necessary, in summing up the stage that has ended and the historical experience of socialism so far, to speak once again to this question. I made a rather extensive analysis of the positive contributions as well as the serious errors of Stalin in Conquer the World. But right now, especially, with the changes going on the revisionist countries and the increasing repudiation and attacks there directed at Stalin and "Stalinism" from many different quarters, it is necessary to return to this and to make clear what it is we uphold and won't renounce and what we cannot uphold and must criticize in terms of Stalin's role as the leader of the Soviet Union and in the international communist movement over a decisive period of thirty years, from the early 1920s until his death in 1953.

Mao used the formulation that Stalin's achievements were 70 percent and his errors 30 percent of his overall role. The essence here is not the quantitative analysis-- not the percentages, 70 percent positive, 30 percent negative -- but the overall assessment this suggests: Stalin mainly should be upheld, but he did make errors, including serious errors.

First on the positive side -- the reasons why it is correct to uphold Stalin overall -- his contributions to the international communist movement that outweigh his negative side:

Following Lenin's death in 1924, Stalin led the Soviet Union in taking the socialist road in opposition to right and 'left' opponents whose lines would have led to openly abandoning the goal of socialist transformation or in any case would have led to socialism being overwhelmed and defeated by the forces of capitalism, inside the Soviet Union and internationally.

Stalin led in the complex and acute struggles to carry out collectivization of agriculture and to socialize the ownership of industry, putting the economy on a whole new foundation. This was something that had never been done before. While some significant mistakes were made, the fact is that, contrary to the slanders of the defenders and apologists of the old order, this monumental upheaval was marked by the enthusiasm and initiative of millions and millions of people in the countryside, especially the poor peasants, who were radically transforming centuries-old relations of oppression and casting off thousands of years of enslaving, mind-numbing tradition.

Stalin gave emphasis to the revolutionary struggle and the formation and development of communist parties in the East -- that is, the colonial world -- which was a very important development for the international communist movement. Along with this, Stalin made very valuable contributions in developing Marxist theory concerning the national and colonial question and the liberation struggles of the oppressed nations.

Stalin led the Soviet people in arduous and heroic struggle to defeat German imperialism, led by Hitler, in World War 2.

In the last years of his life Stalin not only refused to buckle under to the imperialists, who were threatening the Soviet Union with atomic weapons, but he continued to grapple with the problems of how to carry forward the socialist transformation of society and what would be the transition from a socialist economic system to a communist one.

All this is more than enough reason to continue to uphold Stalin's historical role as a leader of the Soviet Union and in the international communist movement.

As I wrote in Mao Tsetung's Immortal Contributions, in noting some of Stalin's main historic achievements and putting his errors in historical context:

"To bring about socialist collectivization together with socialist industrialization and transform the Soviet Union from a relatively backward to an advanced country economically -- all of which was accomplished in the two decades between the end of the civil war in Russia and WW2 -- was a great achievement of the Soviet working class and people under the leadership of Stalin. And it had much to do with the Soviet Union's ability to defeat the Nazi invaders in WW2, another great achievement of the Soviet people carried out under Stalin's leadership.
"All the same time, in giving leadership to an unprecedented task of such tremendous proportions--the socialization, transformation and rapid development of the economy of such a large and complex country as the Soviet Union under the conditions where it was the only socialist state in the world still dominated by imperialism -- Stalin did make certain errors. To a significant degree this is explainable by the very fact that there was no historical precedent for this task, no previous experience (and previous errors) to learn from. On the other hand, as Mao has summed up, certain of Stalin's errors, including in the sphere of political economy, economic policy and socialist construction, arose because and to the extent that Stalin failed to thoroughly apply materialist dialectics to solving problems, including many genuinely new problems that did arise." (Mao Tsetung's Immortal Contributions, pp. 89-90)

It would be extremely wrong to negate Stalin's positive side and refuse to uphold his historical role overall. It would be extremely wrong to underestimate his errors or refuse to thoroughly criticize them. As we know, Mao spoke of Stalin's errors representing "30 percent" of Stalin's overall role. But when Mao speaks of the actual content of this "30 percent," it is clear that he is not talking about minor mistakes with minimal consequences. Here are some of the things he says concerning the negative side of Stalin:

The Chinese revolution was made by acting contrary to Stalin's will! "If we had followed Wang Ming's, or in other words Stalin's, methods the Chinese revolution couldn't have succeeded. When our revolution succeeded, Stalin said it was a fake. We did not argue with him, and as soon as we fought the war to resist America and aid Korea, our revolution became a genuine one [in his eyes]." (Schram, Mao's "Talks at Chengtu," pp. 102-103)

"Stalin felt that he had made mistakes in dealing with Chinese problems, and they were no small mistakes. We are a great country of several hundred millions, and he opposed our revolution, and our seizure of power." (Schram, Mao's "Talks at Questions of Philosophy," p. 217)

While recognizing Stalin's great achievement in leading the collectivization of Soviet agriculture, Mao was at the same time sharply critical of important aspects of Stalin's policy toward the peasants and the effect of this on the relations (contradictions) between workers and peasants, industry and agriculture, and the city and the countryside. Here is how I characterized this criticism in Conquer the World:

"As Mao put it, you want the hen to lay eggs but you don’t feed it; you want the horse to gallop but you don't give it fodder and so on. Basically they took a tremendous amount from the peasantry as the basis for a breakneck industrialization program at the same time as they were carrying out rapid and widescale collectivization of agriculture, …. In the comments and criticisms made by Mao in places like Ten Major Relationships and consistently throughout… Volume 5 of Mao's works and also in the CIA-collected Miscellany of Mao Tsetung Thought and in the Chairman Mao Talks to the People collection there is a consistent thread of criticism of the Soviet policy toward the peasantry. If you want to put it in a rather stark form, to a significant degree, they carried out industrialization on the backs of the peasantry while at the same time carrying out collectivization." (Conquer the World, Revolution #50, p. 19)

Mao also criticized Stalin for placing too much emphasis on technique and technically trained personnel and not enough reliance on unleashing the initiative of the masses in carrying out socialist construction and transformation of the economy. For example, in commenting on Stalin's Economic Problems of Socialism in the USSR, Mao said: "Stalin emphasized only technology, nothing but cadre; no politics, no masses. This too is walking on one leg!"

This was linked with a more general problem of orientation that Mao summed u: Stalin's tendency to rely on administrative procedures rather than relying on and mobilizing the masses. This tendency asserted itself and became more pronounced the more Stalin's leadership was consolidated and the more the Soviet Union made gains in socialist construction. As Mao put it, "At that time [the 1920's] Stalin had nothing else to rely on except the masses, so he demanded all-out mobilization of the party and the masses. Afterwards, when they had realized some gains this way, they became less reliant on the masses." (See Mao Tsetung's Immortal contributions, p. 147).

And I think we must call attention to the fact that Stalin's "top-down" tendency became very pronounced in the way he attempted to bring socialism to Eastern Europe after World War 2.

Through the course of summing up the triumph of revisionism and the restoration of capitalism in the Soviet Union after Stalin's death, Mao made the pathbreaking analysis that in socialist society, even after ownership of the means of production is in the main socialized, there are still classes and class struggle and most centrally the antagonistic contradiction and struggle between the proletariat in power and the bourgeoisie which still exists and is constantly regenerated out of the contradictions of socialist society overall. This was in direct opposition to Stalin, who by the mid-1930s was declaring that antagonistic class contradictions had been eliminated in the Soviet Union, that all exploiting classes had been eliminated. (See for example Stalin's report, "On the Draft Constitution of the USSR," in 1936, and Stalin's report to the 18th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1939.) This was a most serious error on Stalin's part and it was bound to do damage to the proletariat in carrying out the class struggle against the bourgeoisie in Soviet society -- which objectively did exist.

This was connected to a tendency on Stalin's part of mix up what Mao referred to as the two different types of contradictions in class society -- those between the people and the enemy, and those among the people themselves. The first, said Mao, are antagonistic and must be dealt with by the methods of dictatorship. The second, contradictions among the people, are not antagonistic and must be dealt with by democratic means -- through ideological struggle, criticism and self-criticism, and so on.

Stalin's tendency to mix up these two fundamentally different types of contradictions meant that methods of repression and dictatorship were used against people who were not enemies but were merely making mistakes or simply expressing disagreement with the policy of the Soviet government. At the same time, relating back to the fact that Stalin failed to recognize the continuing existence (and constant regeneration) of the bourgeoisie within socialist society, Stalin tended too much towards seeing opposition as all externally based -- as being a matter of imperialist agents at work within the Soviet Union. All this contributed to a situation where, on the one hand, the target of repression and dictatorship tended to be too broad -- including no only actual enemies, who should have been repressed, but also individuals and groups among the people whom it was wrong to repress -- and on the other hand the decisive class struggle against the actual bourgeois forces existing and being constantly regenerated within socialist society itself was not carried out as correctly and powerfully as it should have been. Again there was a growing tendency not to rely fully on the masses -- both to recognize and repress actual enemies and to carry out struggle to resolve contradictions within the ranks of the people themselves.

Linked to all these errors were certain tendencies toward woodenness and a mechanical approach to problems in Stalin's outlook and methodology. Mao put this rather strongly: "Stalin had a fair amount of metaphysics in him and he taught many people to follow metaphysics." (Mao, "Talks at a Conference of Secretaries of Provincial, Municipal and Autonomous Region Party Committees," Selected Works, Vol. 5 p. 367.)

This connects up with Stalin's tendency toward one-sidedly insisting on 'monolithic unity.' Mao strenuously argued against this kind of outlook: 'To talk all the time about monolithic unity [he said], and not to talk about struggle, is not Marxist-Leninist" (Schram, Mao's "Talks at Chengtu," p. 107). While Mao does not refer specifically to Stalin in this particular statement, it is clear that this criticism applies to Stalin's outlook and method -- particularly in his later years when the Soviet Union had 'realized some gains' and 'they became less reliant on the masses,' as Mao put it.

This is tied in with the fact that, during Stalin's later years especially, things became rather 'cold' in the Soviet Union and initiative was seriously stifled. Contrast this with the whole spirit of Mao, who says, 'Whenever the mind becomes rigid, it is very dangerous,' and 'Unless you have a conquering spirit it is very dangerous to study Marxism-Leninism. Stalin could be said to have had this spirit, though it became somewhat tarnished.' Mao also said that 'If you are too realistic you can't write poetry" (Schram, Mao's "Talks at Chengtu," pp. 110, 115, 123). And I would add, in keeping with the thrust of what Mao is saying here, that if you don't have a poetic spirit -- or at least a poetic side, it is very dangerous for you to lead a Marxist movement or be the leader of a socialist state.

To these criticisms Mao made of Stalin, our Party has added a sharp criticism of the United Front Against Fascism (UFAF) line adopted by the Communist International (Comintern) in 1935 and the related lines and policies of Stalin in carrying out a united front with the 'democratic' imperialists against the fascist imperialist bloc of Germany, Italy and Japan in World War 2. Some of Stalin's errors of that time were really rather extreme and even smacked of rank opportunism -- including appeals to Great Russian chauvinism and to a patriotism that was tied in with a number of reactionary things, such as patriarchy and 'traditional relations' between men and women (it was during the period leading up to World War 2 that Soviet law was reversed on abortion and it was made illegal, to cite one significant example). These serious deviations from Marxist-Leninist principle jump off the pages of Stalin's speeches On the Great Patriotic War, and I have made fairly extensive analysis, in Conquer the World and elsewhere, of serious errors of principle in the UFAF line, so it is not necessary to go into this at greater length here.

It is necessary, of course, when making such sharp criticisms, to keep in mind the objective situation and the very extreme and dire necessity faced by the Soviet Union -- at that time the world's only socialist state surrounded on all sides by hostile imperialist states and their allies and forces to deal with a massive all-out invasion from what was, at the start of World War 2, the most powerful and seemingly invincible imperialist armed force -- Nazi Germany. And here I can only add that in reading over histories of World War 2, particularly the battles n the Russian front with the Nazi armies, there war incredible stories of how soldiers on both sides died of such things as going out in the dead of the Russian winter to relieve themselves and literally having their bodies freeze to death. And you can also recall the stories and accounts, so vivid, of the masses of people who died of starvation by the thousands and hundreds of thousands in Soviet cities such as Leningrad -- and they literally had almost no clothes and perhaps actually in fact no food -- along with the thousands of people, the tends and hundreds of thousands of Soviet citizens, who died in the war directly from bombardments and so on. When you read these accounts you get a very vivid sense of the dire necessity that was involved here and that Stalin and the Soviet Union were up against, and you get extremely angry at those people who flippantly criticize Stalin without taking into account in any kind of serious way the tremendous difficulties that he had to deal with and that he could foresee on the horizon even before World War 2 broke out.

But even keeping all that in mind, and even allowing for the fact that Stalin and the Soviet Union had n other previously existing socialist states whose experience they could learn from -- even making the necessary allowance for that -- it is still necessary to criticize Stalin for very serious errors along the lines I have indicated here.

Of course, it is even more necessary to maintain the fundamental distinction between our criticism of Stalin and the unprincipled and in many cases totally unfounded slanders of the reactionaries against Stalin and "Stalinism." Our criticism is fundamentally different from theirs -- ours is a revolutionary criticism, made from the standpoint of the proletariat, not from the standpoint of the bourgeoisie, the imperialists and reactionaries. We make unsparing criticism of Stalin's mistakes and shortcomings because this is in accord with reality and it is necessary to make this criticism in order to serve the proletarian world revolution; and we continue to uphold Stalin's historical role overall for exactly the same reasons. It is something worth pondering seriously that those who treat Stalin as, on balance, a negative figures -- or as someone who may have initially more positive but then became essentially negative -- themselves either from the start oppose the revolutionary interests of the international proletariat or degenerate into such a position. More specifically, those who attempt to approach things as Marxists but negate Stalin's role overall end up as social-democrats (socialists in name, bourgeois democrats in fact) or plan and simple bourgeois-democrats or more openly reactionary defenders of the exploiting system. As Mao pointed out very insightfully in responding to Khrushchev's slanderous denunciations of Stalin as far back as 1956, when the sword of Stalin is dropped -- as they were then openly doing in the Soviet Union -- it will not be long before the sword of Lenin too is dropped (and, we can add, the sword of Mao as well).

As for “Stalinism”, here too we must have a very critical approach to criticism. That is, we must distinguish between those aspects of Stalin’s methods and policies that deviated from Marxist-Leninist principle and were harmful to the interests of the international proletariat, on the one hand, and those aspects of “Stalinism” that are in accord with and further the fundamental interests of the proletariat. In reality, there is no such thing as “Stalinism,” scientifically speaking. Stalin advocated and in the main upheld Marxism-Leninism, not “Stalinism.” I have used this term here-and have put it in quotation marks-to refer to how the bourgeoisie and reactionaries generally use this term, “Stalinism,” to describe anyone and anything that is identified, rightly or wrongly, with the leadership and influence, with the historical legacy, of Stalin in building socialism, in building communist parties, and generally in the experience of the international communist movement. When the imperialists, the revisionists, and other reactionary fools attack “Stalinism,” they include in this attack the exercise of state power by the proletariat and the central and decisive role of the proletarian state in building a socialist economic system, and they include the leading role of the communist party, the vanguard party of the proletariat. And when we see the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in China and Mao’s basic line and methodology attacked as “Stalinism” as well, we know there are definitely very important things about “Stalinism” that we must uphold!

In conclusion on this point, it is correct and necessary, from an historical standpoint, to uphold Stalin’s role overall to counter the slanderous attacks of the reactionaries against Stalin, and to vigorously respond to their attacks on communism in the form of attacks on “Stalinism.” But, at the same time, it is also correct and necessary to learn from not only the achievements but the very serious errors of Stalin-and more than that, to really strive to avoid repeating such errors.

A repeat of the “Stalin Experience” is not what the international proletariat needs-that is not aiming high enough. Things advance in spirals. The historical experience of the Soviet Union and the international communist movement under Stalin’s leadership, with its positive and negative aspects, is part of the synthesis we have achieved, it is part of the concentrated summation of that experience that is integrated into our ideology, Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.


Here is a mind-clearing summation of the positive contributions by stalin:

<http://2changetheworld.info/disc/view.php?site=changetheworld&bn=changetheworld_test01&key=1047340964&first=1048043215&last=1041029035>

Skeptic