Defending Communist History in Practice
ON APRIL 3, 2016 BY VNGIAPAGANDA
Introduction

Communists in the global North have typically gone through several progressing periods of disillusionment with bourgeois historical perception and a growing recognition of its general untruth. Unlearning anti-communism is a long and difficult process full of twists, turns, and even an occasional catharsis of immediate negation. “Wait, so it was the Dalai Lama that was bad?” All of this unlearning involves a scale of study that most people would recoil from, even to get a degree in one or another bourgeois indoctrination scheme. Communist history is the most slandered political history that exists, and for reasons that Marxists should readily understand. After all, if you were in the ruling class of a system that exists through exploitation of the rest of the population and general murderous domination, wouldn’t you also produce an endless stream of lies about an alternative system that posed an existential danger to you?

And isn’t that last sentence, at least in the global North, seen as actually a dynamic evidenced not by capitalism, but by communism? A common strategy of the bourgeois ideologists is to project the deficiencies of capitalism onto other social systems. Regardless of to what degree this is done consciously or unconsciously, its effects on the ideology of the global North is a constant obstacle to effectively advocating for Marxism-Leninism. Below I hope to show why obstacles like these shouldn’t be fought with any manner of argumentation that involves concession to bourgeois ideology, but instead should be fought through a respectable defense of the communist project based in a real study of its history that doesn’t shrink when confronted. This style of defense has to be an approach in study as well, even when the works involved are sympathetic to Marxism-Leninism.


Limitations in the Book Human Rights in the Soviet Union

As I was reading the final few chapters of the brilliant Human Rights in the Soviet Union (HRSU), by Albert Szymanski, the importance of defending communist history without any conciliation or compromise to bourgeois historiography became clear. The strategy of HRSU is to defend the Soviet Union through using sources that can be perceived as unbiased towards the USSR in an effort to stand up to bourgeois scrutiny. This approach has its appeal, but when it comes to summarizing political repression in the USSR, this leads to a large distortion of history because no true historiography that would stand up to bourgeois scrutiny on these matters exists. For instance, the best one can say about the Moscow Trials while accepting the narrative that they were falsified, which must be done under these circumstances, is that while under the pressures that the USSR was, it isn’t surprising that the leadership tried to consolidate power in a kind of paranoid reaction to pressures in the lead-up to World War 2. This is basically the argument put forth in HRSU.

To be more specific on HRSU’s perspective on political repression, the argument used is essentially that any state will respond to internal threats through repressing sources of destabilization. In revolutionary periods, political repression is especially acute and involves all manners of abridgments to civil rights. (Bourgeois ideologists in the US tend to overlook how much repression took place in its own history during the Revolutionary War and the Civil War. Comparisons to these periods do not occur because it would reveal the fundamental hypocrisy and shallowness of the US’s human-rights-imperialism racket.) There is truth to this hypothesis, and the theory has a certain sense of dialectical materialism about it. But what gets lost in these general dialectics of political repression is that often in the case of communist history what is being admitted to did not in fact occur, or at least didn’t occur in the sense that is being argued. HRSU’s theory also focuses too much on form – a moral defense is avoided for an apparently scientific point. But science doesn’t exist in a vacuum, and the ethics of communism informs its science (not in a way that distorts, but in giving a proletarian direction). The defense of a communist project through means of political repression is more morally defensible than it is in a bourgeois project, and this point shouldn’t be abandoned in argumentation. Bourgeois repression exists to prop up exploitation, and the dictatorship of the proletariat exists to build an alternative society without exploitation.

While the above method of political abstraction causes issues in how some of the history is interpreted, more problematic is that the main sources used for the sections on political repression in the 1930s are from people with a strong anti-“Stalinism” bias. This is used to further the ability of the text to stand up to bourgeois scrutiny, as the author explicitly states, but is this actually an objective position to take? Roy Medvedev and Isaac Deutscher, the two main sources, are firmly part of anti-communist lore. These sources present a more positive assessment of the Soviet Union than NATO’s mercenary historians, which can actually at first come as a relief to someone exploring revolutionary history, but this is always interspersed with propaganda, and it can be difficult to pull one from the other. For instance, Furr convincingly shows that Medvedev lied in his writing on Bukharin, purposefully fabricating a story about his “last plea.” Furr writes,


All the evidence we have points to one conclusion: the Snegov-Medvedev story of the “Letters in Stalin’s desk” is a fabrication. That must be so even if, as he claims, Medvedev actually does possess taped conversations with Snegov in which the latter relates this story. In that case Medvedev has simply been phenomenally careless in transcribing Snegov’s tale. But “tale” is what it is. Like “Tito’s letter to Stalin,” “Bukharin’s last plea” is a fake.

Viewed objectively, “Bukharin’s last plea” would be of little importance even if it were genuine. It would not bear upon Bukharin’s guilt or innocence, for it does not contain any claim of innocence, only of despair.

The final writings of Bukharin that we do have – his appeal of his conviction, his final letter to his young wife Larina – contain no claim of innocence either. In fact, in the two statements in which he framed his appeal for clemency to the Soviet Supreme Court Bukharin fully reaffirms his own guilt.21

Also used in HRSU is J Arch Getty, who seems to have a lot of credence in some Marxist-Leninist circles despite his liberalism. While those in the school of “revisionist” historians of the USSR like Getty are certainly useful for debunking some anti-communism (for instance, see Getty’s work on gulags), none of it can be read uncritically because it does come from a bourgeois historical perspective and any historical materialism that is in evidence is incidental rather than studied. Similarly and more recently, some communists have looked towards Kotkin’s new work on Stalin in the hopes that, as one of these apparently objective bourgeois “revisionist” historians, he’ll have produced something they can finally trust. In his blog Stalin’s Mustache, Roland Boer put out a series of posts about Kotkin’s work that shows the extent of its anti-communist bias. (Worth noting is that Boer has read through Stalin’s Works and has already outlined a book he is writing on Stalin and religion.) Though these historians do put serious study into Soviet history, everything they write is colored by liberalism and anti-communism, and this structural factor in what is written needs to be constantly attended to when reading these sorts of works, or else the reader risks coming towards thinking absurdities about the peasantry being an enslaved class or that people working for each other in difficult circumstances is actually a terrible thing done simply because of propaganda. These sorts of ungrounded understandings are super-imposed on the research in these works almost as a rule.

To expand on the above point on how a point on history is argued, taking a detour into how the DPRK is discussed should be informative. As presented in my previous post comparing democracy in the US and the DPRK, the history of the DPRK is brutal, and the US is behind the vast majority of the misery the country has endured and is likely to endure in the near future. For the most part, those in the global North have none of this context in mind when discussing the DPRK. Now, if I critique Kim Jong Un from a socialist perspective to a liberal under the current circumstances, they wouldn’t have any of the context that would be necessary to actually understand where my critique is coming from. They’ll take every negative and use it to build on their ideological construction of anti-communism, and whatever positives that might come across will likely either not be taken seriously, not be remembered, or maybe not even be heard. This is essentially how Trotsky’s anti-communism was taken in the global North and what made it so appealing for the bourgeois press to spread. After all, why should a communist take seriously a person who would have a (counter-)trial organized with liberal anti-communists as Trotsky did with the Dewey Commission? And isn’t such collusion suggestive of the possibility of a tendency towards fascist collaboration? But more on that later.

Before delving into a more specific discussion on how the above affected how a particularly important topic was approached, I do want to note that HRSU does, even when relying on the dissident Medvedev and Trotskyist Deutscher, debunk a lot of anti-communist propaganda. In fact, it often manages to come across as even more positive than Furr’s work due to its overarching dialectical theory of repression that softens the blows. There is, for instance, evidence produced that shows that the purges around the trials were relatively small (smaller than some previous purges), and that the percentage of the population detained even at the height of the repression of the 30s (about 0.5%) was actually about half of percentage of African Americans in jail in the US in the 70s (about 1%). The figure for incarcerated African Americans right now is more around 2%. In other words, right now in Amerikkka four times as many African Americans are incarcerated relative to the percentage of those incarcerated in the Soviet Union at the height of its repression.

The Moscow Trials as Example

Let’s explore further through focusing on the Moscow Trials, a pillar of anti-communist mythology. In his recent work Trotsky’s ‘Amalgams’: Trotsky’s Lies, the Moscow Trials as Evidence, the Dewey Commission, Grover Furr repeatedly claims, and backs up through his research, that not only were the Moscow Trials in fact not fabricated, but no material evidence exists to show that they were fabricated, nor that any torture or extra-judicial coercion occurred. Instead of evidence there is mere repetition of assertions and demonization of alternative perspectives. Communists quickly become acquainted with how such narratives can dominate global North ideology despite a complete lack of empirical evidence – we come up against it so often!

Transcripts from the trials have been researched by Furr, and he convincingly posits that that the progression of the trials, the mass of documentation collected (in particular, the fabrication of the amount of transcripts that are known to exist from the period of investigation would involve an absurd amount of effort and would probably be impossible), the nature of the confessions, and the corroboration between confessions indicate that it is actually very unlikely that trials could have been fabricated. In the trial transcripts that Furr has investigated, the defendants (e.g., Bukharin, Radek, Zinoviev) tended to only admit to the extent of the conspiracies against the Soviet leadership that they were involved in after others had already provided testimony of it, and they in fact did hide important facts when it was expedient. For instance, Bukharin did not confess to his knowledge of Ezhov’s (head of the NKVD at the time) role in the conspiracy, which allowed for Ezhov to lead a campaign of arbitrary repression in the country in an effort to destabilize the political situation. (And, of course, this is all blamed on Stalin, though it must also be admitted that Stalin does bear some responsibility for being in his leadership role and not being able to see how misled he was when signing documents enabling these criminals to engage in their campaign of terror.) Many of the confessions made by of those higher up in the Soviet leadership were simply confirmations. In addition to this, Furr gathers evidence from outside of the trials that corroborates the existence of these conspiratorial groups. Evidence outside of the USSR for the existence to these groups was actually found in Trotsky’s own archives, in which there was an evident attempt at cleansing such documentation (this was found out by Getty), but this attempt wasn’t completely successful. The arguments that the Moscow Trials were fabricated rely on the denial of the existence of these groups, so these arguments are fundamentally incompatible with the evidence Furr puts forth.

The KKE’s Resolution on Socialism from their 18th Congress, which defends socialism as a mode of production and communist history in general through a lengthy scientific study, briefly goes over the conflicts occurring in the society and how these became reflected in the leadership.


16. The policy of “socialism’s attack against capitalism” was carried out under conditions of intense class struggle. The kulaks (the bourgeoisie in the village), social strata that benefited from the NEP (NEPmen) and sections of the intelligentsia that originated from the old exploiting classes reacted in many ways, including acts of sabotage against industry (e.g. the “Shakhty affair” [15]) and counter-revolutionary activities in the villages. These class-based, anti-socialist interests were reflected within the C.P, where opportunist currents developed.

The two basic “opposition” tendencies (Trotsky – Bukharin), that operated during that period, had a common base in absolutiizing the elements of backwardness in Soviet society. During the 1930s their views converged to the thesis that the overcoming of capitalist relations in the USSR was premature. Their positions were rejected by the AUCP (Bolshevik) and were not confirmed by reality.

Along the way, several opportunist forces established contacts with openly counter-revolutionary forces that were organizing plans to overthrow Soviet power in cooperation with secret services from imperialist countries.

The prevailing conditions dictated the direct and resolute confrontation of these centers with the trials of 1936 and 1937, trials that revealed conspiracies with elements in the army (the Tukhachevsky case, who was rehabilitated following the 20th Congress), as well as with the secret services of foreign countries, particularly of Germany.

The fact that some leading cadre of the Party and of Soviet power spearheaded opportunist currents proves that it is possible even for vanguard cadre to deviate, to bend when faced with the sharpness of the class struggle and to finally sever their ties with the communist movement and pass over to the side of the counter-revolution.

If the Moscow Trials are thought to be false, clearly the wrong lesson is taken from the history. The lesson that leftists that accept this narrative take (most obviously Trotskyists) is that there is a danger of the revolution being hijacked by a monster, either due to simple selfishness or because of an entrenched and conservative bureaucracy (even though Stalin was vehemently anti-bureaucracy and his favorite Soviet poet, Mayakovsky, famously wrote this). Even more dangerously, the lesson might be a confirmation of the bourgeois idea that corruption is a necessary extension of power, and that any effort to establish a dictatorship of the proletariat will devolve into one or another kind of top-down oppression.

But all of that is useless. A real lesson to take is that the contradictions in society, including those external to the country the party operates in, will become reflected in even the most successful and disciplined of parties. Though this is in agreement with the more formal aspect of the theory put forth by HRSU, the content of it is completely different, and a strategy for maintaining the dictatorship of the proletariat among the sharp contradictions of revolutionary periods can only be successfully formed with a knowledge of the particularities of how contradictions in society become reflected in the party. A focus on form here merely means that political repression should be expected to be necessary at certain points – this leaves a party vulnerable to how the political repression would cause shifts in societal contradictions and how those shifts can cause splits in the party, leading to a subversion of the dictatorship of the proletariat due to ideological differences that become rifts.

Also noted in HRSU, though this point isn’t developed as it should be due to the denial of the legitimacy of the Moscow Trials, is that those in the party that were put on trial (and also many that were purged around this time) were mostly of a petty-bourgeois type of background. Reading transcripts reproduced by Furr in both part one of his work on Trotsky – which includes transcripts from many of those put on trial, as well as Trotsky himself at the Dewey Commission and in other contexts – and his works on Bukharin (here and here), one can see this influence on the arrogance of the defendants in reaction to their loss of influence on the party and country (though, due to Bukharin’s desperate position, his arrogance is mostly visible only in his own hindsight). After this period, these vacant positions were filled with people from more proletarian backgrounds. HRSU quotes Isaac Deutscher:


This was the new intelligentsia whose ranks filled the purged and emptied offices. Its members . . . were either hostile to the men of the old guard or indifferent to their fate. They threw themselves into their work with a zeal and enthusiasm undimmed by recent events.

So there is a lesson lost here, and this is a telling loss: those of a petty-bourgeois type of background are potentially a fatal danger for sustaining a proletarian dictatorship, to the point even of pursuing concessions to fascists through conspiracy. Lenin pointed out the vacillating nature of the petty bourgeois class in his work on “Left-Wing” Communism, and the dynamic he presented there is displayed here (though in a more subtle, professional manner – these were, after all, leaders of discipline). The reasoning behind these concessions were that they would lessen the contradictions between the fascist powers and the Soviet Union (for instance, they involved ceding territory to Germany and Japan in exchange for more peaceful relations) and could help the dissident factions within the party come to be the leadership, which was now seen by them as necessary because only they could really save Soviet power. I’ll suggest that it was the latter quasi-delusional determination that produced the former perceived need for concession. It is worth noting that this danger was also found in the experience of the Chinese Communist Party and was fought against in (probably all) other parties as well.

Instead of the above lesson, HRSU gives us an excuse (and an excuse that really is an excuse and will seem like one to someone not already convinced of the ubiquity of anti-communist propaganda) that this was all simply paranoia. That after Kirov’s murder, the “Stalinist regime” became completely unhinged for a few years and lashed out at phantoms not only directly through mass political repression, but vicariously through elaborately fabricated trials of some of the most important party and military officials in the country. Though this might seem like a satisfactory answer to someone of a communist leaning who is seeing history through the lens of post-Stalin revisionism, the collection of evidence produced by Furr is, at least in my opinion, much more convincing and logically consistent. This is especially true once one considers the possibility that, seeing how widespread the dissident faction(s) were in the party, the death of Stalin produced an opportunity for those more sympathetic to Bukharin and/or Trotsky’s views to do exactly what those people aimed for: an attempt to lessen the contradictions with the imperialists (now armed with nuclear weapons) through concessions. Is it not possible that one of these concessions, one also fitting in with past aims, would be to denounce Stalin? It’s worth noting that Stalin’s allies were sidelined in the period following his death, and this denunciation in the party would allow for a sweeping under the rug of past collusion with the indicted factions.

While getting historical lessons right is important for a scientific understanding of revolution, as required by Marxism-Leninism, there is a more quotidian aspect to anti-revisionism that is probably more immediately relevant to those who are reading this.

Everyday Anti-Revisionism

The inspiring Eric Draitser of stopimperialism.org recently defended Stalin temperately by way of W.E.B. DuBois on Facebook:

(Facebook screen shot, see link)

Draitser almost immediately makes an ambiguous concession: “I’m not an uncritical defender of Stalin (not even close)….” This is one of the discursive strategies that has to be avoided: nothing of substance is said, and whatever remnants of vague anti-Stalin ideology that a reader holds onto is maintained. This sort of strategy, at least from my experience, is mostly done consciously, because typically a communist – or even someone who thinks of themselves more as simply an anti-imperialist, as I believe Draitser does – doesn’t have the confidence that they can defend their position point-for-point against a possible surfeit of anti-communism with the limits of their historical knowledge (or just their limits of time and sanity), and so this ambiguous defense is thrown up preemptively. These perceptions aren’t necessarily wrong, especially in the case of Facebook, where there seems to be swarms of liberal “Marxists” that exist solely to come down on anyone posting Marxist-Leninist views in the various groups that exist there. Fortunately, Draitser’s fan base has mostly seemed to have lost all faith in the bourgeois media and are ready to defend Stalin where Draitser isn’t, including with several comments that reference Grover Furr explicitly (one even says that Furr is the only balanced historian of the Stalin period, which I’m actually inclined to agree with at this point even though I don’t see Furr as strictly “balanced,” at least in a liberal sense) and related sources.

I don’t think there’s a single Marxist-Leninist that would be wholly “uncritical” of Stalin – this has always been a straw man. Even arch “Stalinists” Harpal Brar and Grover Furr take this position (though admittedly neither act on it very often). However, and I think this goes back to my above point regarding the DPRK, it must be kept in mind that critique needs the proper context and purpose. The main purpose of being critical of Stalin in Marxist-Leninist strategy should never be to make communism seem more acceptable from a bourgeois perspective. Criticism of Stalin should take place as it is relevant for understanding and furthering the communist project.

Communists should struggle to make the two most frightful Marxist-Leninist hobgoblins, the DPRK and Stalin, acceptable to talk about without immediate demonization from all parties involved, including preemptive demonization that some leftists take part in before trying to put up a modest defense. “Yes, Kim Jong Un is a dictator and North Korea is run by a hereditary monarchy, but…” While active class struggle is necessary for most people to become accepting of revolutionary ideology, preparing the ideological ground for the emergence of a really revolutionary movement through a defense of communist history, based in a scientific approach, is still an important task. Ideological guerrilla bases of anti-revisionism will allow for these ideas to stay alive until the constant crisis that is the capitalist mode of production condenses and makes Marxist revolutionary theory again as necessary as it was in 1917. Stalin and the DPRK will always be used to argue against communism, and these jabs can’t be effectively dodged through a Trotsky-esque concession to today’s fascism. Even if such a thing takes some weight off in the immediate situation, over the long term such vitiation becomes dangerous.

In addition, one concession leads to another. If you can’t defend the Syrian state, what will you say when someone points out the PSUV of Venezuela defends it happily? If you can’t defend the Jamahiriya, what will you do when the imperialists come for Algeria? If you can’t defend the violence of Cuban or Vietnamese revolutionaries, what business do you have shedding tears while watching the Look of Silence? If workers can’t defend their history of revolution in general against the lies of a system that through tortuous starvation kills over 7.5 million people every year, with three million of these being children, what hope does humanity have for a just future? The web of imperialist lies can only be defended against by puncturing through the whole of it.

Conclusion

Bourgeois historical distortion is ubiquitous and gross. They say communism caused 100 million deaths. This statistic is calculated by anti-communists on anti-communist assumptions, but if you applied similar statistical methods to how many lives were gained or lengthened by socialist states, this “death toll” would be balanced FAR in the positive direction. But even going purely by a negative based on anti-communist lies, how long does starvation alone under capitalism take to completely overwhelm this accusation of communism’s death toll? Only a couple decades. And these are just abstract calculations of deaths – the unremitting terrorism that capital imposes on workers, especially those in the global South, is a horror without equal.

Communists who feel vulnerable with regard to their defenses of Marxism-Leninism, perhaps thinking that the process of revolution is maybe a bit too messy to advocate for in polite company, should take time to look at past struggles to hearten themselves. Though the current period is a low point for communism, the successes of the workers’ movement, made in the most difficult circumstances, have been beautiful. There is no other word that could describe, for instance, the victory of the Vietnamese revolutionaries over the imperialist United States and its genocidal war machine. Vacillation is unnecessary: the truth is on the side of the working class. These vulnerabilities should lead to study, not capitulation.

https://vngiapaganda.wordpress.com/2016/04/03/defending-communist-history-in-practice/

On Lenin's rehabilitation
colonelcassad
April 19, 14:12

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Levada Center released results https://lenta.ru/news/2016/04/19/ussr/ another survey on attitudes of Russian citizens to the disintegration of the Soviet Union, socialism and Lenin.

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In general, nothing new, anti-Soviet as it was less than those who sympathize with or support socialist ideas, and left. In the March survey by "Levada" on Stalin, the ratio was roughly similar.
What is remarkable - Lenin on the number of positive responses is almost caught up with Stalin, whose activities are for the benefit of the country positively or rather positively estimated 54% of the citizens. The growth in popularity of Lenin of course due to the fact that the socio-economic situation in the country worsened, and Lenin as one of the most brilliant critics vices and defects of the capitalist system becomes more urgent. At the same time the popularity of Stalin also does not decrease for reasons continuation of the conflict between the Russian Federation and the United States, where Stalin among other things serves as one of the symbols of a subject of foreign policy which are trying to associate the current foreign policy or taken as an example, as an example of how this course it should be. Of course. not all who speak positively about Lenin and Stalin are the Communists, but it is clear that, as in the case of Stalin, we see Lenin's historical rehabilitation processes in the public mind, when people without ideological conditioning define his attitude to Lenin and Stalin, by comparing their real . achievements, where positive for an ordinary person outweighs the negative I can only recall that I wrote on this score 5 years ago.

Lenin rehabilitation.

As I wrote at the beginning of the "zero", the rehabilitation of Stalin in public opinion will take place under the scheme - from slander through praise to understanding.

Now we are in the later stages of the "praise", when the background of the whole people the popularity of the leader and teacher of all the nations victorious in all the polls, and the living and the dead, we see the very same notorious "puppy dog enthusiasm" when praising start to become cloyingly -slaschavymi, eroding the real image of Stalin. It is so to say the process costs and they are objectively inevitable.
Most of them will disappear when the start phase of "thinking", where finally the majority will see the real Stalin - not white or black, and different, with all the victories and defeats, advantages and disadvantages. This is bound to happen, albeit not immediately.

In this regard, it is worth noting that even in the middle of the "zero" I said that once washed clean of Stalin, the time comes to take up Lenin. The fact is that during the period of perestroika, blackening Soviet system occurred including by contrasting Lenin Stalin. Stalin was accused of abandoning Lenin and against the background of good Lenin showed us the bad Stalin.
The split with Stalin, the Liberals have taken already by Lenin. The result - since the early 90s, these two characters were in a stage of denigration.
Now, after the actual rehabilitation of Stalin in the public mind, we see him trying on the same lines as oppose to Lenin - they say Stalin is good and bad Lenin. Technologically - it's the same scheme, which is inverted by 180% and prisazhena in the patriotic camp.
Blackening Lenin is necessary to mix the mud key events of our history and the key role of Lenin in them. There are two points that justify Lenin before history in spite of all real or imaginary faults and sins.

1. Lenin had saved Russia as a civilization from extinction. Under his leadership the Bolshevik project is good or bad there, I put forward the concept of building a new state on the background of crumbling into dust of the former Russian Empire building. As a result, instead of a complete collapse, we have over 5 years, received a new state, which is the legal successor and modern Russian Federation. And Lenin's role is paramount here, as with all the merits of Stalin, Lenin was in fact led the ship through the storm Soviet Russian Revolution and Civil War, bringing it into the harbor, called the Soviet Union.

2. Creation of the USSR, the state in which most of us were born - it is the second most important merit of Lenin. Without it, our homeland would not exist. Of course, someone will say, but the building is not the Soviet Union, Lenin and Stalin, and probably will be partly right. But only partly. Lenin is the founding father, who, like the American founding fathers laid the foundation on which the majestic building will determine the fate of the XX century was built.

It is therefore strange to see people who call themselves "Soviet" or "pro-Soviet" and at the same time, in the best of perestroika traditions throws mud at Lenin and opposed Lenin to Stalin.
But it seems as the costs of the process, where the image of the real component of the Communist Stalin blocked out and strengthened the emphasis on great-power patriotic aspects of its activities. Communist leader Stalin, it is difficult to oppose the communist leader Lenin. But the emperor-king is even possible. And on the stage of "praise" of Stalin, this opposition is particularly noticeable. It appears, along with the rehabilitation of Stalin and the Soviet past as a whole, must inevitably begin the process of cleaning of Lenin. They are in fact already under way, just on the background of the victorious Stalin's triumph (like most black figure in the anti-Soviet mythology), it is not so noticeable. In the "Name of Russia" on the background of the war liberals against Stalin's victory was hardly noticeable by the fact that Lenin took 4 or 5 position. Of all the figures of national history. It says a lot - there is considerable potential for growth in popularity, but it is not disclosed. Therefore, I believe in the coming years in relation to Lenin should more actively to the processes that we have seen in relation to Stalin - will be more systematically trashed the anti-Leninist myth about " German spy, "" destroyer of the Russian Empire, "" world backstage agent "," bloody tyrant "and so on.

I believe that as we approach 2017, Lenin's popularity will increase significantly, may not be on the level of Stalin's popularity, but quite decent. for me personally, Lenin generally positive historic figure who brought the history of our more good than bad. But the establishment of the USSR for me redeems all errors.

When I was in the beginning and middle of the "zero" defended Stalin, then it was a non-format - it is now very easy and comfortable to defend Stalin being overwhelmingly.
At the beginning of the "zero", and in the middle for the most part, too - the man defending Stalin looked black sheep. Same way we have to go and against Lenin. This process takes clearly not one year, but under the protection and understanding of the country's history, a normal attitude to Lenin needed, with black myths around it is necessary to put an end, in order to remove from circulation the modern liberals mechanism opposition of some parts of the Soviet history to others and most importantly - the refusal from slander Lenin finally destroy the vulgar liberal myth about the creation of the USSR and the Soviet project is a way not to. For mantras about "the only true high road of civilization", smeared with mud, Lenin is vital, as it symbolizes the futility of the Soviet project created like this "black character".
According to the dialectic, the basis of the Soviet project, it is Lenin. Stalin - a superstructure. And now, when the superstructure actually tipped the liberal mud, we are faced with the task of cleansing the Soviet project of the foundation, which is impossible without rehabilitation and Lenin's thinking.
It is necessary to put an end to the perception of a mosaic of Soviet history. I personally, as in the case of Stalin, will put its modest strength to even slightly accelerate the process. And what you want.

Http://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/506 424.html - zinc

Well, actually today we can already see some results of social activity aimed at rethinking Lenin and its role in the country's history.
What is remarkable, increasing flow " Lenin revelations "as in the case of the" revelations of Stalin "did not help the anti-Soviet (" user base grows "), which since the end turned out to be zero in the assessment of the activities of Lenin and Stalin in the minority. As already observed the seemingly paradoxical fact - the more exposed Stalin, the stronger grew his popularity in the society.
By Lenin apparently this formula also applies.
Let's see how things go.

PS. With convenient opportunity - petition http://burckina-faso.livejournal.com/154 0748.html for refusing to drape the Lenin Mausoleum. Why from the draperies should be abandoned recently painted here http://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/269 4896.html

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Google Translator

The responsibility of the CPSU and the collapse of the USSR

colonelcassad
September 24, 13:09

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Regarding the questions on "comment on Putin's recent statements on the Communist Party and the collapse of the USSR" - they say who is to blame then?

"You know how I feel about the collapse of the Soviet Union. It is not necessary to do so. It was possible to carry out the conversion, including a democratic character, without it. But I want to draw your attention to the fact that the head of our former fatherland, the Soviet Union, was the Communist Party. Not some other, which promoted the ideas of nationalism or other destructive ideas that are destructive for any state »(c) Putin

Here I can only refer to his own article five years ago on this subject, which are set out my views on the collapse of the USSR. Text to those times urgency is not lost, on the contrary, in the light of periodic exacerbations in a discussion on the collapse of the USSR, repeatedly lead him to be very appropriate, especially since many then my journal have not read and can not be aware of my views on this question.

10 theses about the collapse of the Soviet Union.

1. All empires fall apart

you probably often heard false tezu "All empires fall." Since the Soviet Union had a number of signs of the empire, according to the logic of quotes, not, he could not fall apart. If so, then there is nothing surprising in the fact that he has failed.
If you take the world-historical context, the state share is not on the "empire, which break up" and "not-empire, which do not fall."
And share they state, which have already disintegrated and those that have yet to be whatever it is that - it is the Empire or the empire. All of human history - a history of the birth and death of states - all shapes, forms and colors - from slobbering lyuteyshih democracies to authoritarian dictatorships. Therefore, all existing state regardless of the form of government and political system, sooner or later cease to exist, and in their place are formed or that new state, perhaps even under the same names.
Someone will say, so be it, but it is not Does the absence of the modern world empires direct evidence, "not empire" more viable than the Empire. There are two obvious objections.
Firstly, even if that were the case, we consider only the present day, with its projections in the near future and there is no reason to believe that the empire will not occur in the future, starting with at least kakoy- a World Empire Earth nation that once arisen also someday fall apart.
But in fact, much as an important second reason - who do you say that there are no empires now? Now it is possible to observe a number of empires that exist today, starting with the United States or Britain. Someone might say, and they have a democracy and they do not even called an empire. So what? USSR also not called empires, and it was a socialist democracy. Elements of the empire in their devices, policies, behavior on the surface so that the presence / absence of the name "American Empire" does not change anything fundamentally.
There are different forms of empires and that the development of human civilization evolved form of the imperial unit is quite natural. To date, the highest evolution as clearly reached the forms of construction of imperial structures that demonstrate the United States.
Accordingly, if we are in the framework of the thesis "all empires fall" begin to apply it without double standards and to the USSR and the US, it turns out that the US too must dissolve, because they are "the empire." But this does not answer the question - why "the empire of the USSR" broke up in 1991, and the "US empire" has not yet been dissolved.
Accordingly, the thesis that "all empires fall" does not answer the question - why the Soviet Union collapsed. Actually he can not give an answer to this question, as well as does not answer the reasonable examples - for example, why split "not an empire, Czechoslovakia." Actually all because they substitute the correct thesis that "all States to break up" is essentially a truism, and inevitably leads to the next question - why all states break?

2. Soviet Union collapsed because it destroyed the "main reason"

and hereinafter referred to as the most important reason, which has ruined the country - a betrayal of Gorbachev and Yeltsin, conspiracy zhidomassonov and world government, economic collapse, subversive activities of the CIA and so on. And like each of the known reasons alone it deserves attention and study, but when viewed through its prism of the events of the late '80s and early' 90s, the whole picture is not folded, except the obvious bias in the sample relevant facts.
Common sense is It is that any reason can not explain the collapse of the USSR, hence the numerous meaningless disputes between the supporters of the "most important reason" in its different positioning.
in fact, the collapse of the USSR has occurred as a result of complex impact on the structure of external and internal reasons. Not one of some reason, and the bound complex reasons. And when we consider these causes in the complex, it becomes clear that the point of bifurcation, of which the USSR was only the agony and death, has led not only to Gorbachev, Yakovlev, but the actual economic problems. Not only the operations of the CIA and the US State Department, but the loss of ideological reference points Society. And so on.
So disputes about the "main reason" hopeless. The problem lies elsewhere -. In certain circles of the fundamental reasons for the collapse, which together in the end and gave a sad end result
Accordingly, for a better understanding of the collapse of the reasons, it is necessary to translate the discussion on this issue to the consideration of a complex of reasons, because even in palliative form of "main / secondary "to which divided these reasons, the final picture will be a whole - we see and the USSR problems in its interaction with the external environment and its internal difficulties, which together made survival impossible.
Try to take a piece of paper and start to write down important from your point of view causes the death of the Soviet Union in groups - domestic, foreign, ideological, military, social, economic, cultural and so on. If you approach the matter objectively, you will see how even those called reasons that circulate in the information space, you get more than a dozen (in fact, they are certainly more). After this, you already have an incentive to explain everything that happened one "most important reason".

3. USSR collapsed by itself. "

As part of the" most important reason "to justify this formula can be explained nothing ideological slogans in the spirit" of the USSR was the formation of non-viable ". And time is not viable, then it collapsed by itself. For the "most important reason" is decisive, and if so, then prove nothing, and the supporters of the other "most important reason" can be ignored as heretics.
If we in fact we consider the causes of the USSR collapse in the complex, then we can easily see , in addition to its own structural problems, which would seem to indicated defects within the structure of the USSR, there were problems of artificial impact on the system for the purpose of its destruction - from the reborn nomenclature seeks to dismantle the Soviet system holds the country together and finishing with the external activity forces sought to eliminate the geopolitical enemy. That is, we see that the USSR was not "broke himself", and he was helped to die. Therefore, the key question is - what is actually the ratio of actually-existing problems in the structure of the USSR and artificial impact on the system in order to aggravation / multiplication of these problems. How some reliable evidence-based model to date is virtually absent. There are a wide variety of versions, showing the subjective views into pieces a huge mosaic.
However, the lack of well conceived can not say that the Soviet Union collapsed by itself, because the objective facts indicate a force is applied to the approximation of his death.
Therefore, when you see the translation attempt arrows in the direction of "the natural end of the USSR," you know - you willingly or unwillingly trying to withdraw from the understanding of the whole picture and show only one of the fragments.
the same applies to similar in directional version - "the Soviet Union collapsed as a result of the conspiracy," which focused on the issue of Gorbachev's betrayal & Co., actually ignores the objective problems that existed in the USSR and worked on the system simultaneously with the traitors activities.
Therefore, try not to focus on one reason, and Marshall a coherent picture of the disaster, or an extremely high risk to miss something important, that later translates in the famous aphorism "History teaches us that history teaches nothing."

4. USSR died because he was doomed.

This is a classic example of a fitting reply.
Boy Vasya, looking at the control in algebra tutorial at the end finds a ready answer, and if enough chutzpah, enter it in a notebook, showing a teacher. Corrosive teacher will assume that Basil was not lucky, of course, ask, "Young man, how you got the answer?". And then the boy Vasya will have problems - know the answer because it is one thing, but to know the solution - is quite another. That is abstract Vasya quite able to realize the fact that there was the Soviet Union, and that he died in 1991. But Vasya asked not to show the answer - it is obvious, Vasya asked to show him the answer was, that is, to specify the variables in the equation, which gave the desired response - death.
To put it bluntly - USSR / X + Y + Z = collapse of the USSR (where X, Y, Z - internal and external causes of its decay).
Vasya it turns Death USSR = USSR. Objective variables affecting the destiny of the country, remain in the formula unaccounted for, hence, this formula also explains nothing.
Of course, this answer will satisfy except that of Vasya.
In the case of the USSR, as well as with the common man - we know his date of birth and the date of death. The question is - why the Soviet Union died in 1991. And this simple question, this formula does not give an answer. If this explanation is projected to grandfather Wasi, it turns out that just Wasi grandfather died in that year, then, it was doomed. Of course, recited this nonsense, we did not come close to understanding the question, why Vasya died grandfather - as the kinds of mass death - from murder to "death from old age." But my grandfather could die in such a situation - being sick with blood cancer, he was hit by a tram. And what's doom - in cancer or in a tram
if Bob stupid at this point falls into a stupor in front of a teacher, as a logical diagram of a response, he can not build, the more intelligent, begins to fit to answer. He said something had heard about the X and even once read about Y. obtain a formula like USSR / X = Death of the USSR. It turns out the wrong decision with the correct answer. For if, for example, for X we take the subversive activities of the US, the equation does not explain to us what happened to the remaining Y and Z. They just fall out of solution. Accordingly, the thesis about the "doom" does not explain the reasons for the collapse of the Soviet Union. Behind him an exceptional emptiness in the spirit of "people died because he died." With the same success it is possible to say something in the spirit of "The Roman Empire collapsed because it was doomed to die." Explain whether we do anything about the causes of the death of the Roman Empire? Hardly. Thus - a fact confirming death does not explain anything.

5. The Soviet Union was not competitive.

In other words, in competition with the West as part of the Cold War has come to light the fact that the socio-political and economic system built in the Soviet Union was obviously worse than Western, and why the Soviet Union was doomed. No chance of survival in the Soviet Union as a defective system was not - The message is the following - it was destroyed, then so times in the USSR were obviously unavoidable defects that determined its lack of competitiveness in 1991.
Here we see a classic example posleznaniya where the key are not real or perceived defects occurred in the Soviet design, but the fact posleznaniya - just died, so the defect persists, although this formula does not imply any analysis of the real or imaginary defects, as well as the extent of their influence on the ultimate fact of death.
Does not explained as the Soviet Union until 1991, when "fatally uncompetitive," he countered half the world and achieved those or other success. Where the criterion of competitiveness for these conditions? what to compare? Show us for these conditions more konkurentnosobnuyu system. An example of the West's not working because that the Soviet Union was the antagonist of the West. You can certainly nominate tezu that edinstvennokonkurentnosposobnoy system it is the Anglo-Saxon capitalist system, the underlying matrix of the Western world. And, therefore, based on the example of the Soviet Union - all antagonists of the West are doomed. In fact, this view is held by those who have the Euro-Atlantic world centering. Its basic tenet - once the Soviet Union lost the Western system, the only true. And others too lose - because the system only-true. The key factor - not her real or imaginary virtues, but the fact of the death of the antagonist. But in this formula, we can see only posleznanie, as it itself does not tell us why the Soviet Union was "structurally doomed."
At the same time we do not see any indication of what kind of "fatal flaws" leading to lack of competitiveness. In the best case we can see an attempt to justify all the "most important reason" which was mentioned earlier. In fact the same objective data showing that the Soviet Union was doomed initially - does not exist. As an illustrative example, consider a single "most important cause," which is trying to justify the initial defect of the USSR, which led to death.

6. Lenin and Stalin, instead of the one and indivisible Russia "created a national of the Republic with the right to self-determination, which ultimately separated and destroyed the USSR. And if the Soviet Union in 1991, was killed, and the republic seceded - the Soviet Union was doomed. "

The emphasis here is on the fact that the national policy of the Bolsheviks was wrong, and she laid a Soviet bomb. After all, in the end - also collapsed.
Of course, the fact of the collapse, as has already been indicated were above - tells us nothing about the fact that it occurred due to a single cause. After all, it is reasonable to raise questions - why is it not collapsed before. There may be an answer - well, so this, this and this factor has triggered the bomb. But then again we come to the need for a comprehensive analysis of all the factors, which immediately kills the thesis of "the main reason."
History has shown that the system of national relationships in the USSR was quite a functioning both in peace and in war conditions. And, nevertheless, it collapsed.
The fact that the Soviet nationalities policy was not a spherical horse in a vacuum, and was part of the Soviet social and political system. If we consider the work of Lenin and Stalin (and first of all it is necessary to consider it is their - who else to ask, they do not have the architects of the system) on the national question, it is easy to notice that the entire set of national relations in its Bolshevik interpretation has been entered in the project constructing a unified system. Classics clearly pointed out that the Soviet / proletarian state, society and the dominant factor of the worker-peasant, will separate themselves, will not. On the contrary, the republic where power belongs to the workers and peasants - will seek a union of socialist republics. The main enemy of this unity called the bourgeoisie, which is using the nationalist and separatist slogans would seek to separate the republic from the Union. Accordingly - the viability of the system is primarily determined by how dynamic system remained Soviet. This was the basis on which rested a national concept of Lenin and Stalin.
In the context of degeneration of the party nomenklatura, system becoming less Soviet (ie, there is a departure from the basis - thereby floated superstructure), on the basis of the CPSU were formed proto-bourgeois elites interested it is what Stalin warned -. to the department of the republics of the Soviet Union and the dismantling of the gains of the revolution
is already here we see that scrapping the system of national relationships in the USSR there was not because he was very defective, but because of very different processes. In this connection, it is possible to see how trying to put the cart before the horse when the cause of the collapse of the attempt to declare a major defect of the national policy of the USSR - written in the Constitution, "the right to withdraw." In fact, the "right to secede from the USSR" was not the cause but the consequence. First of all, it was one of the instruments providing information dismantling of the USSR
dismantling of the USSR carried out by whom? Who is this slogan and this article use? Here it is necessary to understand, that the hand holding the knife and the knife itself, is not the same thing. The decisive here is the intent of those who used the "right to withdraw" for the dismantling of the country. But here we are faced with the obvious question.
If this "right to withdraw" missing, then perhaps it would have canceled all the other objective and subjective reasons that led to the deaths of the USSR? From which it follows that the Soviet Union collapsed only because "the reasons for this?" And what comes first - the idea of the use of "knife" or hit "knife" in the victim's back.
Here we come again to the previously mentioned issues, and a comprehensive analysis of the causes of false theses, "the most important reason." Trying to easily explain complex phenomena does not work. It turns out that once the Soviet Union collapsed because the republics created by the Bolsheviks had the right to secede from the USSR, it turns out that "people died because he came back the knife." As the knife appeared there - we do not report. First of all, because it confused cause and effect. No. No. No.

The current wave of sympathy for the Soviet Union, as expressed in the idealization of the Brezhnev era, or the glorification of Stalin, is a danger to the pro-Western course, first of all, that of the past, which is to be sealed, in our daily penetrate ideals, our ideological reality incompatible. There is a conflict with the current ideals seemingly destroyed by Soviet, carriers which starts to get young people, that in the future creates a threat. And, of course, some would like to see young people really believed that the reasons for the collapse of the Soviet Union are not important. The dominant point of view should be emotionally colored evaluation "of the USSR = evil". Therefore, with such characters meaningful discussion is not possible, in principle, as corny people doing their jobs. Intuitively, these characters can be seen, for example, in the program "The historical process", where the position "of the USSR absolute evil" is very easy to understand disclosed in the statements of Svanidze and company.
But what particularly pleases, the percentage of young people is growing every year, which seeks to understand the causes of the death of the Soviet Union . They grew up after the country and its interest in the death - it is their own reflection, young people are not involved, either directly or indirectly, to the ruin of the country.
Their interest is not attributed to dubolomny Soviet agitprop, my entire adult life they listened just the opposite - about criminal past, the bloody Stalin's repression, gulags, inefficient economy, stupid scoops, etc., and especially they hammered that "the USSR is evil." But as practice shows, this thesis are fewer and fewer young people meet, which in the past, albeit often idealized, looking for answers and ways on which to build the future. After all, who does not like young people to think about how and where to move the country - they live in it. Finding answers in the bleak present, they are looking for them in the recent past.
While interest in society and especially among young people in the country's development paths will be maintained, huge sympathy for the Soviet experience is objectively inevitable, as in the recent past - the Soviet Union is the closest and a clear example of how to make the country better, but taking into account the sad experience of the collapse of the country, in order not to repeat the mistakes made during the Soviet era. Therefore, attempts to divert the public discourse on a complex analysis of the causes leading to the death of the Soviet Union will inevitably fail. For a description of this process is best suited Lincoln quote.
You can deceive some of the people all the time, and all the people - for some time, but you can not fool all the people all the time.
The times when it was possible to fool all the people all the time is gradually running out. And so a comprehensive study of the causes of death of the Soviet Union is extremely important. In the first place for our future.

Conclusion

Despite the fact that since the death of the country's been 20 years, the total reflection does not come in the society. The heads swarming all sorts mythology of both Soviet and anti-Soviet, detailed analysis of the complex causes of death of the Soviet Union has not yet been produced, and therefore in society still lacks a clear understanding of how and why the Soviet Union lost. This lack of understanding is a threat, as the technologies that were used for its destruction, it is applicable to modern Russia. Moreover, they are already used against her. Therefore, the main point in the permanent debate about the causes of the death of the Soviet Union is to seek understanding of how to prevent a recurrence of the destruction of our state otherwise in a certain number of years, our descendants will argue why split the Russian Federation and who is to blame.

Http: // colonelcassad. livejournal.com/477 206.html - zinc (plus recommend the article "Deformation of socialism" http://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/103 3682.html on the causes of the crisis of socialist ideas)

PS. In general, if you come back to the question of responsibility, deny the "contribution" of the CPSU in the deal collapse silly, but just as silly to reduce everything only to the question of rebirth partocracy or passivnmu neprotivoeniya party members (membership card of which he said Mr. Putin put on the table and that under the same logic as a member of the party and the KGB, as well divides this responsibility) and the people.

http://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/2973778.html

Google Translator

Placed here kinda arbitrarily cause VNGIAPAGANDA's work deserves visibility.

Exposing Robert Conquest - Lies about Socialism, #Stalin and the USSR


http://youtu.be/_vcHuTskBz4

This Is the Percentage of Millennials Who Believe George W. Bush Killed More People Than Stalin
Jamie Gregora / October 17, 2016 /

One-third of millennials believe that more people were killed under George W. Bush than under Joseph Stalin.
http://dailysignal.com/wp-content/uploads/dpaphotostwo565281-1250x650.jpg
(Photo: Martin H. Simon/dpa/picture-alliance/Newscom)

The Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation released its first “Annual Report on U.S. Attitudes Towards Socialism” Monday. The survey showed a distinct generation gap regarding beliefs about socialism and communism between older and younger Americans.

For example, 80 percent of baby boomers and 91 percent of elderly Americans believe that communism was and still is a problem in the world today, while just 55 percent of millennials say the same.

Just 37 percent of millennials had a “very unfavorable” view of communism, compared to 57 percent of Americans overall. Close to half (45 percent) of Americans aged 16 to 20 said they would vote for a socialist, and 21 percent would vote for a communist.

When asked their opinion of capitalism, 64 percent of Americans over the age of 65 said they viewed it favorably, compared to just 42 percent of millennials.

The survey also revealed a general lack of historical knowledge, especially among young adults. According to the report, one-third (32 percent) of millennials believed that more people were killed under George W. Bush than under Joseph Stalin.

When millennial respondents were asked about their familiarity with various historical communist figures, 42 percent were unfamiliar with Mao Zedong, 40 percent with Che Guevara, and 33 percent with Vladimir Lenin—three notorious figures in communist regimes. Among millennials familiar with Lenin, 25 percent viewed him favorably.

“It is because of such widespread ignorance about communism that we formed the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, which is dedicated to telling the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth,” said Lee Edwards, a distinguished fellow in conservative thought at The Heritage Foundation and co-founder of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, an organization that seeks to “memorialize, educate, and document the grim history of communism around the world.”

“Ronald Reagan said that ‘freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction,’” he added. “It is the solemn obligation of this generation to educate the rising generation about the manifold victims and crimes of the deadliest ism of the last 100 years—communism.”

The survey was conducted among 2,300 people, with a margin of error of 2.8 percent and a 95 percent level of confidence.

http://dailysignal.com/2016/10/17/this-is-the-percentage-of-millennials-who-believe-george-w-bush-killed-more-people-than-stalin/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=tds-tw

Kids......

Do I have to get a cell phone now?

“Ronald Reagan said that ‘freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction,’” he added. “It is the solemn obligation of this generation to educate the rising generation about the manifold victims and crimes of the deadliest ism of the last 100 years—communism."

Ronald Reagan also supported South Africa's apartheid regime and funded terrorists in Afghanistan and Central America. And he called the murderous Contras "freedom fighters." But I would expect nothing less from a scab who enthusiastically sold out his Hollywood friends (or people who thought he was their friend) to HUAC - that epitome of "freedom."

Shit son, Communism's got nothin' on capitalist America and its cronies when it comes to "manifold victims and crimes." And the victims of Western imperialism, of course, are the very people who are in position to defend themselves...

Ronald Reagan also supported South Africa's apartheid regime and funded terrorists in Afghanistan and Central America. And he called the murderous Contras "freedom fighters." But I would expect nothing less from a scab who enthusiastically sold out his Hollywood friends (or people who thought he was their friend) to HUAC - that epitome of "freedom."

Shit son, Communism's got nothin' on capitalist America and its cronies when it comes to "manifold victims and crimes." And the victims of Western imperialism, of course, are the very people who are in position to defend themselves...

So Allen, you're a 'Millennial', yes? Does this paranoia spasm from the Heritage Foundation have any legs? Would the people you know agree with those heretical opinions giving those fascists the shits?

So Allen, you're a 'Millennial', yes? Does this paranoia spasm from the Heritage Foundation have any legs? Would the people you know agree with those heretical opinions giving those fascists the shits?

Well, seeing as I live in the SF Bay Area, my peers (at least, those who are remotely political - at least, those of whom I know are political) are a rather diverse lot. ;) They range from generic liberals and "progressives" who supported Sanders (these are by far the most common types) to Libertarians or Libertarian-style Republicans (these are, to a person, white guys from affluent middle-class families - shocker...) to a handful of evangelical Protestants (these are surprisingly diverse politically - though the younger evangelicals are more less white, male, and economically secure than older generations, so not really a surprise I guess...) to feminists, anti-racists, and LGBT rights people. And though a lot of us are at the very least, deeply ambivalent about capitalism, I can't really think of one other person I know who is actually a Marxist.

There are, however, some interesting patterns. Young women and (especially) young blacks - specifically those who are university-educated in the humanities, sociology, and so on - and other "persons of color" are, in my experience, the most critical (at least, theoretically critical) of capitalism, racism, sexism, and imperialism. On the other hand, those who come from poor/working-class families (men and women, whites and non-whites alike) are more suspicious of - if not outright hostile to - liberalism and "social justice" tropes and are more likely - if they attend college at all - to choose college majors that have a higher probability of landing a decent job (i.e. so-called "STEM" jobs - especially men, as opposed to women who tend to pursue health, education, therapy, etc.); yet at the same time, these are also much more likely to recognize on a day-to-day basis the sheer cruelty and rigged nature of America's economic and political system.

That's the gist of it. Oh, almost forgot: the young white men - of all class backgrounds and political stripes, and even the otherwise apolitical ones - are unfortunately, often quite reactionary regarding women and minority groups. But of course, those from rich backgrounds - including (perhaps especially) the self-described "liberal" ones - are in a position to actually influence society and culture - whether they become university intellectuals, corporate executives, or lawyers. So I'm not too worried about the disgruntled "blue-collar" (or much more often, petit-bourgeois) white guys who voice racist and misogynistic sentiments - even including the one "Millennial" I know who is a Trump supporter (ha!).

So to answer your question: the outright fascism is almost universally rejected by my peers, but we still don't have the language or the knowledge for genuine anti-capitalist (and thus, Marxist) criticism. Though I'll grant that we seem to be considerably better than the Cold War generation at not buying into the bullshit about the benevolent wisdom of the Free Market (TM). Honestly though, most of us are just trying to get by in this degenerate neoliberal economy - which leaves little time for politics...

Well, seeing as I live in the SF Bay Area, my peers (at least, those who are remotely political - at least, those of whom I know are political) are a rather diverse lot. ;) They range from generic liberals and "progressives" who supported Sanders (these are by far the most common types) to Libertarians or Libertarian-style Republicans (these are, to a person, white guys from affluent middle-class families - shocker...) to a handful of evangelical Protestants (these are surprisingly diverse politically - though the younger evangelicals are more less white, male, and economically secure than older generations, so not really a surprise I guess...) to feminists, anti-racists, and LGBT rights people. And though a lot of us are at the very least, deeply ambivalent about capitalism, I can't really think of one other person I know who is actually a Marxist.

There are, however, some interesting patterns. Young women and (especially) young blacks - specifically those who are university-educated in the humanities, sociology, and so on - and other "persons of color" are, in my experience, the most critical (at least, theoretically critical) of capitalism, racism, sexism, and imperialism. On the other hand, those who come from poor/working-class families (men and women, whites and non-whites alike) are more suspicious of - if not outright hostile to - liberalism and "social justice" tropes and are more likely - if they attend college at all - to choose college majors that have a higher probability of landing a decent job (i.e. so-called "STEM" jobs - especially men, as opposed to women who tend to pursue health, education, therapy, etc.); yet at the same time, these are also much more likely to recognize on a day-to-day basis the sheer cruelty and rigged nature of America's economic and political system.

That's the gist of it. Oh, almost forgot: the young white men - of all class backgrounds and political stripes, and even the otherwise apolitical ones - are unfortunately, often quite reactionary regarding women and minority groups. But of course, those from rich backgrounds - including (perhaps especially) the self-described "liberal" ones - are in a position to actually influence society and culture - whether they become university intellectuals, corporate executives, or lawyers. So I'm not too worried about the disgruntled "blue-collar" (or much more often, petit-bourgeois) white guys who voice racist and misogynistic sentiments - even including the one "Millennial" I know who is a Trump supporter (ha!).

So to answer your question: the outright fascism is almost universally rejected by my peers, but we still don't have the language or the knowledge for genuine anti-capitalist (and thus, Marxist) criticism. Though I'll grant that we seem to be considerably better than the Cold War generation at not buying into the bullshit about the benevolent wisdom of the Free Market (TM). Honestly though, most of us are just trying to get by in this degenerate neoliberal economy - which leaves little time for politics...

Rather what I expected, sometimes ya wish the paranoid ravings of the Right were true. 'Deeply ambivalent' is a start though, and as things overall are not going to get better we should expect ambivalence to increase. At which point ruthless criticism needs to make itself felt by every means possible. The time is coming when 'politics' will become a more feasible possibility than 'getting by', which will become mostly impossible by middle class standards.

Communists vow to fight ‘falsification of history’ as anniversary of Bolshevik Revolution approaches

https://www.rt.com/politics/363885-communists-pledge-resistance-to-falsification/

Published time: 24 Oct, 2016 11:02

https://img.rt.com/files/2016.10/original/580dd577c46188373f8b45d7.jpg
Supporters of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation at Moscow’s Kaluzhskaya Square on the International Workers’ Day. © Vladimir Vyatkin / Reuters

The Russian Communist party has passed a resolution urging its members to step up efforts to propagate leftist ideas and resist all attempts that might be made to falsify history in the run up to the 100th anniversary of the October Revolution of 1917.
The resolution was approved at a recent joint plenary session of the Communist Party’s Central Committee and its Central Control Commission, which is tasked with preparing for the centenary of the October Revolution.

“On the eve of the 100th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution, regional and municipal committees of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation must step up their efforts in propaganda and education. They should also strongly resist any attempts to falsify history,” the document reads.

https://img.rt.com/files/2016.05/thumbnail/573c2d57c36188df3a8b456c.jpg

Communist leaders also agreed to launch a year-long “jubilee membership drive” in 2017, which will use the approaching anniversary to boost the party’s numbers.

In the report delivered at the plenary meeting, the Central Committee’s deputy chairman, Dmitry Novikov, told his comrades that the September parliamentary elections demonstrated that Russian society still highly values Communist ideas.
“The authorities and bourgeois parties cannot resist us in the field of ideas. They conducted the fight using political tactics rather than ideological concepts, but they could not disprove our ideas, because ours are the ideas of the majority of the people,” he said, adding that the fact that other parties had adopted the rhetoric of social justice was further proof that the concept is still very popular.

The Communist Party of the Russian Federation is the only official heir to the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, and is still one of Russia’s major political parties. With the second largest caucus in parliament, Communists make heavy use of Soviet ideas and images in their campaign materials, which target the older sector of the population that is still nostalgic for bygone times. In recent years, they have also attempted to capitalize on the image of Joseph Stalin, presenting him as the man who led the Soviet Union to victory in WWII.

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In early 2016, the Communists decided to use Stalin’s image to boost its popularity ahead of last month’s parliamentary elections. Subsequent campaign stunts included naming paragraphs in the party’s elections program after Stalin, erecting monuments to the Soviet dictator, and putting forth a proposal to denounce the decision of the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) in 1956 that condemned Stalin’s cult of personality.

Stalin’s name and image are popular weapons in the Communists’ arsenal, as they rarely fail to attract media attention or provoke rows with more libertarian sections of Russian society. For example, in February of 2015, Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov appealed to President Vladimir Putin to return the name of the city of Volgograd to “Stalingrad,” and also to name a square in Moscow after Stalin and put a monument of him in its center.

The initiative gained some momentum in the city of Volgograd, as the local authorities agreed to rename the city during the celebrations marking the anniversary of the battle of Stalingrad, but only in some internal documents for a short, limited time.

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Truth and Lies about Socialism: On the 60th anniversary of the counterrevolutionary events in Hungary 1956
https://communismgr.blogspot.com/2016/10/truth-and-lies-about-socialism-on-60th.html

On the 60th anniversary of the
counterrevolutionary events in Hungary 1956.
Below you can find extracts from the publication of the CC of KNE “Truth and Lies about Socialism” (Synchroni Epohi 2012) in relation to the counterrevolutionary events that took place in Hungary in 1956.

THE COUNTERREVOLUTIONARY EVENTS IN EASTERN EUROPEAN COUNTRIES.
“In autumn 1956, Hungary announced its withdrawal from the Warsaw Pact, but Soviet troops invaded the country and suppressed the uprising.”
“In 1968 the Czechoslovak attempt to distance itself from Moscow was met with an invasion of the country by the member states of the Warsaw Pact.”
(History book, 3rd grade of High School) 70
The historical experience of socialist construction in the Soviet Union and the People’s Democracies of Europe confirmed that class struggle continues during socialist construction, which means that a counterrevolution is possible. The attempts to overthrow t workers’ power in a number of European countries (counterrevolutionary attempted coup in the GDR in 1953, attempted counterrevolutions in Hungary in 1956, Czechoslovakia in 1968 and Poland in 1980-81) was nothing other than efforts of the defeated bourgeois classes of these countries to retake power. These efforts, as we shall see below, were strongly supported by international imperialism in a multifaceted way.
Of course, a catalytic role was played by the domination of the opportunist forces in the party and state organs in relation to the appearance of the above counterrevolutionary actions. These leaderships not only weakened the vigilance towards the activity of imperialism and underestimated the sharpening of the class struggle but in the process the same parties became vehicles of the counterrevolution, even leading popular forces to counterrevolution and supporting counterrevolutionary actions (e.g. Nagy in Hungary, Dubcek in Czechoslovakia).

All these counterrevolutionary actions are presented by the imperialist propaganda as uprisings for “democracy” and against “repression”, while their treatment by the Soviet Union and other socialist countries is presented as an “invasion”.
What is written in the school textbooks is characteristic and corresponding references flood the bourgeois press when we have the “anniversaries” of the events. The interpretation that is given by the imperialist propaganda to the events is also accepted by opportunism.
But what really happened? We should examine how the counterrevolutionary events developed and were organized in Hungary and Czechoslovakia.
The counterrevolutionaries organized a large-scale manhunt that was directed mainly against the members and the cadres of the Hungarian Working People’s Party. On 30 October 1956 for example, according to the Associated Press, 130 people in the Party offices were seized and were hanged upside down or beaten to death.

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The attempted counterrevolution in Hungary
From 13 to 16 of June 1953, the leadership of the in the Party offices led by Mathias Rakosi, Secretary General of the CC and Prime Minister, visited the USSR at the invitation of the Soviet leadership. After this visit, the Political Bureau of the Party decided to include in its composition the cadre of the Party, Imre Nagy. On July 2, Nagy, who supported the bourgeois multi-party system, was appointed prime minister.
These developments sharpened the internal party struggle. In 1955 Nagy was removed from the party and state posts and later expelled from the Party. In December of ’55 the anti-communist writers’ club “Petofi” was created. M. Rakosi, Secretary General of the CC of the Hungarian Working People’s Party, in plenary session of the CC in May 1956 characterized the position of Stalin regarding the sharpening of the class struggle in conditions of the workers’ power as “mistaken and harmful.” Two months later, Rakosi was dismissed from his duties. On 13 October 1956, Nagy was restored and reintegrated into the party’s ranks. From the above, it is clear that an intense struggle was being waged in the leadership of the party, and that there was confusion and wavering as regards the revolutionary line. It also seems that there were different trends of opportunism within the Party, the more open led by Nagy and the centrist by Rakosi. The Party not only showed weakness in dealing with the counterrevolution, but the emergence of opportunism in its ranks assisted this process.
The counterrevolutionary events began on 23 October 1956 with the organization of a large counterrevolutionary demonstration with misleading slogans like “socialism with Hungarian colors”, and demanding the promotion of Nagy to the leadership of the government.
At the same time, a huge wave of terrorism and murders against communists was unleashed, particularly in Budapest. The leadership of the Party confronted the situation by declaring a state of emergency in the country, calling for the assistance of Soviet troops and agreed that Nagy should take over as a President of the cabinet.
When Nagy took over, he opened the borders with Austria and allowed the infiltration into the country of thousands of counterrevolutionaries and agents, fascist and reactionary elements who had left the country. The equipping and supplying of counterrevolutionaries was carried out by airlifts from Vienna- to Budapest, mainly by American planes.
The attack against the workers’ power escalates.
On the morning of 25th October, the public order institutions together with the assistance of military forces of the province that had not been corroded by the counterrevolution, declared a strict curfew in Budapest in order to facilitate the suppression of the armed counterrevolutionary groups. This measure was suspended by Nagy who proceeded with negotiations with the counterrevolutionaries. At the same time, he was threatening the Ministry of Defense that if they attacked the “Korvin” Arcade , where the most important counterrevolutionary forces were gathered, he would resign.
At the same time, the government of Nagy was promising arms to the revolutionary workers’ guards that were established in various companies and in party offices, but delivered them to the counterrevolutionaries. Nagy could not come out openly as enemy of socialism. As it is noted in the publication of the Hungarian State Information Service: “… Imre Nagy in his radio announcement on the 25th October noted that the ” intervention “of the Soviet troops in the fighting was demanded by the vital interests of our socialist regime. (…) Even Imre Nagy could not present himself at this point as being anything other than a steadfast supporter of the socialist people’s power, as a friend of the Soviet Union, as an irreconcilable enemy of the counterrevolutionary attackers. (…) If Imre Nagy on October 23 had a taken an open position against the Warsaw Pact and in favor of “neutrality according to the model of Austria”, there could have been no discussion of his appointment to the Presidency of the Cabinet. » 71
The subversive activity of imperialism.
The declassification of secret documents from the archives of the imperialist powers allows us to have a “picture” of the subversive activity that the secret services of international imperialism carried out in various ways. Indicative of this activity are the following directions given in the report of the National Security Council “The US policy toward the Soviet “satellites” in Eastern Europe” that was approved by the US President D. Eisenhower, in July ’56:
“In order to encourage the establishment of governments that have been elected freely in the “satellites” as a means of disorganization, and not as an end in itself, you should be ready in any case, covertly and under the appropriate guidance to help the nationalists in every way in which independence from the Soviet domination is possible and where the consistency of the US and the “free world” will not be endangered by it. »
(See. National Security Council Report NSC 5608/1,” US Policy towards the Soviet Satellites in Eastern Europe “, July 18, 1956 ).
On the 30th of October, the Soviet troops withdrew from the country at the request of Nagy. Then the counterrevolutionary forces continued even more savage offensive. “The counterrevolutionary terrorism was dominant in the streets of Budapest-the, Communists and progressive people were being murdered. Thousands of Party militants, presidents of farmers’ associations, presidents of councils, supporters of socialism were imprisoned throughout the country and their slaughter was being prepared. In the political arena capitalists, landlords, bankers, princes and counts had reappeared, led by Midsenti. They appeared in Parliament and in only two days founded 28 counterrevolutionary parties” 72.
Fascists and supporters of the Nazis were openly involved in the counterrevolutionary events. The correspondent of the East German newspaper Veli Autsontag wrote about one of the counterrevolutionaries: “The first thing I saw on him was the medal of the German Iron Cross 73”, while the French newspaper France-Soir wrote that “the most reactionary and fascist elements” had a leading role in the events 74.
The Nagy government’s announcement about withdrawal from the Warsaw Pact and the “neutrality” of the country on the 1st of November lent such momentum to the counterrevolutionaries that it even led the Reuters correspondent to write: “Since yesterday there is a manhunt in the streets of Budapest” , people ” are being hunted and slaughtered like dogs, hung from lampposts and balconies. Across the country there are scenes that remind us of the return of the “whites” to Hungary in 1919.” 75.

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The role of international imperialism.
The involvement of the imperialist powers in the “Hungarian uprising” is evidenced by what a British official stated 40 years later, without revealing his identity: “In 1954, we were taking agents from the Hungarian borders, which we drove to the British-controlled area of Austria. We took them to the mountains and we gave them military training… Then, after we had trained them in explosives and arms, I took them back … We trained them for the uprising. 76 “.
The Pravda also wrote in an article: “The western bourgeois newspapers write with enough sincerity that reaction was preparing the Hungarian events a long time ago and with diligence, both internally, and from abroad, that from the beginning one could see in everything the experienced hand of the conspirators. The leader of the American spies, Allen Dulles, openly stated that “we knew” what would happen in Hungary. 77″
The imperialists also throughout the duration of the counterrevolution through the radio station Free Europe, which was funded and guided by the US government, were calling on the Hungarians to “rise up”. With its broadcasts, they called on them to carry out sabotage, to support with food and supplies the counterrevolutionaries, and to support their actions. It broadcast that the US would send military aid. The radio station, according to what Henry Kissinger wrote, appealed to the Hungarians to “stay committed to their revolution and not to accept any compromise (…) Fighters for Freedom, don’t hang your guns on the wall!78”
The US plans are also revealed by the recommendation of J. Dulles at the meeting of the National Security Council on 31 October 1956, regarding US policy in Hungary and Poland, while the counterrevolution was under way. He said of Hungary: “(…) 22. Immediate humanitarian aid for the Hungarian people. (…) 23. If a government comes to power at least as independent in Poland as well: a. To be prepared to provide (…) economic and technical assistance in reasonable quantities, enough to give the Hungarians an alternative solution to total dependence on Moscow. (…) d. To take appropriate steps to reorient Hungarian trade to the West. 79 “
The defeat of the counterrevolution by the Hungarian working class and the Red Army.
As was mentioned, coherent communists, workers and peasants had formed revolutionary guards and tried to confront the counterrevolutionary groups. But, only in some areas did they manage to arm themselves and to defeat the terror. Finally, on November 3rd, a Revolutionary Workers’ and Peasants Government was formed by cadres of the Party in Szolnok city and invited the Soviet Union to help suppress the counterrevolution. The USSR responded to the request, fulfilling its internationalist duty, and on November 4th, the Hungarian communists and leading workers with the help of the Red Army prevailed over the counterrevolutionary forces.”

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