2012 Wont Happen:

Blablahb:

2012 Wont Happen:
I think Lenin was a hero.
Stalin was overall good.
Khrushchev and Gorbachev fucked everything up.

Reported for being extremely offensive. Go troll somewhere else please.

It is not trolling for me to express my legitimate beliefs, it is freedom of speech.

Personally, I don't think you're trolling. That said, the "freedom of speech" does not apply to private entities such as the Escapist, only governments.

Nuke LaLoosh:

2012 Wont Happen:

Blablahb:
Reported for being extremely offensive. Go troll somewhere else please.

It is not trolling for me to express my legitimate beliefs, it is freedom of speech.

That's true. I for one think your "legitimate beliefs" are horrifyingly misguided, and that communism as practiced in the Soviet Union is a fucking cancer on humanity, but hey, you're entitled to your opinion.

As long as you are not going to attack me personally I won't even bother being angered. It used to be that I would write a damn essay even for people like you who just state disagreement but say I am entitled to believe what I will. Those days ended when I realized that even if I am able to bring absolute doubt upon the other persons sources, essentially showing they are based in nothing but propaganda created by the west at some point in time, and show that the sources I am using to make my points are the most applicable to what we are discussing, they will still believe what they believed before the conversation began.

That's why I didn't rebuke anything but that guy calling me a troll. All the rest of his post was just so much BS that I've heard before and that nobody would bother reading my arguments against anyway.

The Gentleman:

2012 Wont Happen:

Blablahb:
Reported for being extremely offensive. Go troll somewhere else please.

It is not trolling for me to express my legitimate beliefs, it is freedom of speech.

Personally, I don't think you're trolling. That said, the "freedom of speech" does not apply to private entities such as the Escapist, only governments.

There is no rule that limits my freedom of speech to express my opinions in the manner I did. If there is no rule against it made by the private entity, it would stand to reason I maintain the ability to express them.

PrinceOfShapeir:

Karl Marx was a theorist. All he did was talk about it, he didn't inflict it on the world. Lenin laid the groundwork for Mao, Castro, and every other dictatorship based on the lies of communism.

You know what, have it your way. It'd take me a month to even start explaining why you're wrong, and I don't have that kind of time.

...and I'm not even a communism fan...

2012 Wont Happen:
snip

No offense but you just sound like many pro-Nazi's on the internet also claiming oh so many things said about the Nazi's is pure propaganda.

You can always find data proving you to be true. The question is, do you have sufficiently to disprove oh so much data suggesting exactly the opposite? I mean we're not talking about 1 source claiming Stalin of being a murderous prick, we're talking about many , many of them with estimates ranging from 10 tot 70 million of casualties (a website even made an average and came to average estimate of 30 million).
Surely you can understand that when you come up with numbers like 200 000, people go like "O.o"

On top of that i once saw a nice docu based on declassified files about meetings between Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill. Did you know what Stalin said in one of the last ones when victory was imminent? "I want to execute 50 000 German officers and officials once Berlin has fallen" (well i might be a bit off since i've seen that docu years ago) Sounds like a nice man, just execute for the sake of revenge with NO justice involved whatsoever.

And you want to make me believe a man who wants to kill 50 000 people as retribution only killed , what, 200 000 over his entire rule? I'll stick to Churchill's statement "We slaughtered the wrong pig". He was there when Stalin had the balls to make such ludicrous statements in front of him and Roosevelt. He witnessed the beast with his own eyes.

generals3:

And you want to make me believe a man who wants to kill 50 000 people as retribution only killed , what, 200 000 over his entire rule? I'll stick to Churchill's statement "We slaughtered the wrong pig". He was there when Stalin had the balls to make such ludicrous statements in front of him and Roosevelt. He witnessed the beast with his own eyes.

Fact is, the USSR was on the winning side and the Third Reich was on the losing side, and fact is, history is written by the victors. Not by those who were "right". It's written by those who were "on the winning side". Might makes right. That's a constant of human society and it will never change. If you won a big conflict, that makes you right by default. That's why Russia has the veto option in the UN SC and Germany doesn't (Germany not even being a permanent member and all).

That said, I'm quite lucky that the former Yugoslavia broke from Stalinist rule in 1948.

generals3:

2012 Wont Happen:
snip

No offense but you just sound like many pro-Nazi's on the internet also claiming oh so many things said about the Nazi's is pure propaganda.

You can always find data proving you to be true. The question is, do you have sufficiently to disprove oh so much data suggesting exactly the opposite? I mean we're not talking about 1 source claiming Stalin of being a murderous prick, we're talking about many , many of them with estimates ranging from 10 tot 70 million of casualties (a website even made an average and came to average estimate of 30 million).
Surely you can understand that when you come up with numbers like 200 000, people go like "O.o"

On top of that i once saw a nice docu based on declassified files about meetings between Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill. Did you know what Stalin said in one of the last ones when victory was imminent? "I want to execute 50 000 German officers and officials once Berlin has fallen" (well i might be a bit off since i've seen that docu years ago)

And you want to make me believe a man who wants to kill 50 000 people as retribution only killed , what, 200 000 over his entire rule? I'll stick to Churchill's statement "We slaughtered the wrong pig". He was there when Stalin had the balls to make such ludicrous statements in front of him and Roosevelt. He witnessed the beast with his own eyes.

I don't consider the deaths of Germans. That was warfare. I think they should have killed as many officers and officials as they could. It was proper given the circumstances.

200,000 is the highest number that can be proved. I don't believe that number. I have looked at birth and death statistics from the time. I have taken into account deaths estimated from war, famine, disease, and I have found that, unless the only first source statistics are wrong (in which case we have no idea how many died), the most Stalin could have killed, had not one person died of natural causes, could be around five million. What seems most likely is around one million, which is still mass murder. However, without Stalin, Hitler would have won World War 2. Also, without Khrushchev, what Stalin put in place would have created a Soviet Union which could have lasted essentially eternal, which in my mind, while not justifying the deaths, means Stalin can still be considered good overall.

Stalin, strangely enough, is morally similar to Capitalism. Capitalism has caused atrocity. Slavery alone is estimated at 200 million deaths, which, granted, could potentially be off. I don't know, I haven't looked over statistics from the era, just modern text books. Seeing as very few countries exaggerate their own atrocities though, I doubt the USA exaggerates its deaths caused by slavery.

However, Capitalism was not a net loss on history. It industrialized the world. It threw off the chains of Feudalism. It created a world in which Socialism can be viable. It was a net gain for history. Eventually it should be done away with, and in my mind that eventuality should be rather soon, but its historical impact is overall positive.

Stalin certainly shouldn't have stayed in power forever. He was an amazing war time leader, an alright peace time leader, but its good he eventually fell. However, Khrushchev following Stalin with Destalinization would be the equivalent of successful Communist revolutionaries tearing down all Capitalist infrastructure and destroying all Capitalist technology as well as eliminating the bad aspects of Capitalism. Actually, it wouldn't even be that comparable, because Khrushchev kept the worse aspects of Stalin's policies and eliminated the best of them. If you want a monster to vilify, turn to him. If you want somebody who, despite a lack of ethics, had an overall good impact on history, turn to Stalin.

king_katchit:
It still puzzles me that people still try and label other people with these one dimensional titles. Heroes and Villains. This isn't pro-wrestling.

Don't say that, Brian Wilson worked hard on that song. And given the state of his mind he was in at the time...

OT: I think Lenin had some really good intentions, but the way he went about them was clearly insane. I'd say he was more of an Anti-Hero leaning towards Villain, and this is coming from a Communist Hater.

Nuke LaLoosh:
I always thought his later work with the Beatles was terrific; however, I found some of his post-Beatles Yoko Ono stuff to be a tad overwrought and preachy.

At first i was O.o then i was :D.

But back on topic, the tzars were very incompetent leaders; they didn't give a damn about their people. And Lenin tried to help is people (even though he was a little...nuts).

2012 Wont Happen:

I don't consider the deaths of Germans. That was warfare. I think they should have killed as many officers and officials as they could. It was proper given the circumstances.

200,000 is the highest number that can be proved. I don't believe that number. I have looked at birth and death statistics from the time. I have taken into account deaths estimated from war, famine, disease, and I have found that, unless the only first source statistics are wrong (in which case we have no idea how many died), the most Stalin could have killed, had not one person died of natural causes, could be around five million. What seems most likely is around one million, which is still mass murder. However, without Stalin, Hitler would have won World War 2. Also, without Khrushchev, what Stalin put in place would have created a Soviet Union which could have lasted essentially eternal, which in my mind, while not justifying the deaths, means Stalin can still be considered good overall.

Stalin, strangely enough, is morally similar to Capitalism. Capitalism has caused atrocity. Slavery alone is estimated at 200 million deaths, which, granted, could potentially be off. I don't know, I haven't looked over statistics from the era, just modern text books. Seeing as very few countries exaggerate their own atrocities though, I doubt the USA exaggerates its deaths caused by slavery.

However, Capitalism was not a net loss on history. It industrialized the world. It threw off the chains of Feudalism. It created a world in which Socialism can be viable. It was a net gain for history. Eventually it should be done away with, and in my mind that eventuality should be rather soon, but its historical impact is overall positive.

Stalin certainly shouldn't have stayed in power forever. He was an amazing war time leader, an alright peace time leader, but its good he eventually fell. However, Khrushchev following Stalin with Destalinization would be the equivalent of successful Communist revolutionaries tearing down all Capitalist infrastructure and destroying all Capitalist technology as well as eliminating the bad aspects of Capitalism. Actually, it wouldn't even be that comparable, because Khrushchev kept the worse aspects of Stalin's policies and eliminated the best of them. If you want a monster to vilify, turn to him. If you want somebody who, despite a lack of ethics, had an overall good impact on history, turn to Stalin.

1st: no that ain't warfare, that's a war crime. Warfare ends when the enemy surrenders and those executions were planned for after the victory. To satisfy Stalin's sick need of revenge.

2nd: How did capitalism cause slavery? Slavery has existed during almost every era , usually it stems from a sense of superiority of one race, nothing to do with capitalism.

3rd: I still don't understand how he was a great wartime leader :|

4th: You must realize there are not many USSR nostalgics around, it remaining eternally would have been horrible for many, and i believe enforcing something like that on countries is wrong regardless of your ideology. Even a communist should despise the idea of forcing other countries to follow the same set of rules against their will. (which essentially is plain imperialism)

5th: The way i see it is that Hitler prevented the USSR to take over western Europe (based on the hypothetical scenario Stalin would have eventually tried to satisfy his imperialism by invading europe and that Europe, as proven by the Blitzkrieg, was pretty damn weak excluding the nazi army, and thus wouldn't have stood a chance)

JRslinger:
Dictators are always villains. It's that simple.

not really.

as the oft mentioned adage goes perhaps the best form of government is a benevolent dictatorship and while many may assume such things can't or haven't existed that's not really true either.

monarchies have produced some pretty benevolent dictatorships over the years even up until recent times with people like (arguably) King Hussein of Jordan being examples within living memory.

Bassik:
snip

one: So what ? the brits suffered a lot too yet they didn't feel the need to act like that, neither did any european country feel the need "X" of them had to die. We didn't all go to Germany to go rape and murder them. Justice isn't about revenge and retribution. When you ask such a thing to happen as a statesman you know you're doing it wrong. That people who have personally suffered from the war have certain grudges, sure, but Stalin, what did he suffer? That he had to hide in a bunker for a while? doesn't seem to warrant such a desire to murder 50 000 people.

Two: That's not slavery at all. Unless certain states forces these people to work at such conditions to which i'd reply it isn't capitalism anymore. There is a big difference between working in poor conditions and being someone else's possession.

Three: Don't attribute his generals' work to this moron who's stupidity almost cost the soviets the war. The only smart move he made is realizing he was bad at waging war and was better of listening to his army officers.

Four: And who says i'm either american or agreeing with every possible american foreign policy?
And what the hell does mc donalds have to do with it. As far as i know no country is being forced to have them with a gun pointed at their heads. I'm sure if my country were to kick em out the US wouldn't send their bombers at us.

Five: You do realize what you just replied to my quote was basically my point. He tried to attribute the defeat of the Nazi's as something that made Stalin good. One evil defeating an other doesn't make any good, they were both evil, and regardless of the outcome the people remained losers.

generals3:

3rd: I still don't understand how he was a great wartime leader :|

A great wartime leader is not necessarily someone who orders troops around to or on a battlefield successfully. It's a man who does stuff like create unity in his nation against the enemy and energises the population to the utmost effort. Who might be a great inspirational figure, or do a load of background decision-making - economy, foreign affairs, and so on - that give the best chances for the military to get their job done.

Frankly, George Washington has a deeply mediocre record as a battlefield general, but he was a great war leader. Churchill also repeatedly interfered unhelpfully in military matters to the detriment of the war, and he was also considered a great war leader.

Agema:

generals3:

3rd: I still don't understand how he was a great wartime leader :|

A great wartime leader is not necessarily someone who orders troops around to or on a battlefield successfully. It's a man who does stuff like create unity in his nation against the enemy and energises the population to the utmost effort. Who might be a great inspirational figure, or do a load of background decision-making - economy, foreign affairs, and so on - that give the best chances for the military to get their job done.

Frankly, George Washington has a deeply mediocre record as a battlefield general, but he was a great war leader. Churchill also repeatedly interfered unhelpfully in military matters to the detriment of the war, and he was also considered a great war leader.

Granted Washington wasnt the most skilled general in American history (fellow Virginian Robert E Lee holds that honor arguably) but given what he had to work with against the most powerful army on Earth at the time he did well enough. Plus Washington realized that he just had to keep the British from destroying his army because as long as his army existed as a fighting force the British could not actually claim victory.

Churchill most certainly wasnt a great military mind but he was stubborn, clever, and everything that Britain needed in a leader at the time. In many ways he was the personification of Britain.

Now as for Stalin, he was absolutely not a great military mind (neither was Hitler for that matter), but Stalin knew how to use Russia's strengths, especially its men...all of them...as he said, "quantity has a quality all of its own".

Agema:

generals3:

3rd: I still don't understand how he was a great wartime leader :|

A great wartime leader is not necessarily someone who orders troops around to or on a battlefield successfully. It's a man who does stuff like create unity in his nation against the enemy and energises the population to the utmost effort. Who might be a great inspirational figure, or do a load of background decision-making - economy, foreign affairs, and so on - that give the best chances for the military to get their job done.

Frankly, George Washington has a deeply mediocre record as a battlefield general, but he was a great war leader. Churchill also repeatedly interfered unhelpfully in military matters to the detriment of the war, and he was also considered a great war leader.

Well i guess i'm just too picky. For me not screwing with military decisions negatively is a necessary aspect of being a good war leader. If i had to chose a war leader i'd chose ones like Napoleon over Stalin any day.

He was neither villain or hero, he was a politician with a dream.

I'll explain this by look at ideological bacground. Every one knows about Socialism and often say it is exactly the same as Communism or use those two words for same meaning, now that is somewhat wrong.

Socialism was created by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in socialism the opressed masses rise to power owerthrowng their opressors, this was when industrialism and imperial era were at their peak. The creators and suporters of early Socialism wanted to improwe the living conditions of workers and wanted society to take care of all instead of just few(rich, nobles etc.).

Yes they also did refer to their idea as communism but for claritys sake lets keep them different paths, because Marxism and Leninism has one big difference, acording to Marx the masses would start the revolution and rule themselves after it(like in modern day democrazy) while in Leninism the masses would be led by small group of priviledged ones such as party. Basically lenin wanted socialist utopia described by Marx but led by an elitist goverment slightly different to the one he overthrew.

Now as for that Lenin didn't do much worse than the Tzars, maybe even better but not much just changed the priviliged class to another. When Stalin got in power the things went straight to hell.

But to finish this off there is third path, Social Democrazy created by Eduard Bernstein, in his vision the condition of workers could be improved by peacfull means and more specifically through laws and regulation working together with other political parties. This has actually worked well in comparison.

No dictator is inherently evil(as said several times above), if that'd be the case we'd have to call great majority of monarchs after collapse of roman empire to parlamentary system as evil(and Popes at the peak of Vaticans power too, some of their ways to do things were pretty despotic).

generals3:

Well i guess i'm just too picky. For me not screwing with military decisions negatively is a necessary aspect of being a good war leader. If i had to chose a war leader i'd chose ones like Napoleon over Stalin any day.

What, the guy who made the decisions to wage war on almost the whole of Europe just to defeat the UK, march hundred of miles across the Russian Empire with a tenuous supply chain in winter, keep up a vastly costly troop sink in the Iberian peninsula, and ultimately brought his nation to utter defeat? ;)

I think you need to grant Stalin the fact that his faults were early on: he learnt his lesson to not interfere in military operations.

Agema:

generals3:

Well i guess i'm just too picky. For me not screwing with military decisions negatively is a necessary aspect of being a good war leader. If i had to chose a war leader i'd chose ones like Napoleon over Stalin any day.

What, the guy who made the decisions to wage war on almost the whole of Europe just to defeat the UK, march hundred of miles across the Russian Empire with a tenuous supply chain in winter, keep up a vastly costly troop sink in the Iberian peninsula, and ultimately brought his nation to utter defeat? ;)

I think you need to grant Stalin the fact that his faults were early on: he learnt his lesson to not interfere in military operations.

Well he almost did it, however most of the battles he planned and conducted, he won. It were his generals who failed him. Just like in Waterloo when one decided not to show up like planned. (kinda the opposite of stalin where his generals saved the day)

Anyway, that's kinda derailing it. Bottom line , inspiring nationalism and booming the industry is to my opinion not enough to be a great war leader.

Why must he be one of the other?

He's no villain, he certainly appears to have intended to do good.

He's also no hero. Communism, corrupted or not, does not and indeed cannot work on a large scale until and unless humanity gives up a large portion of its free will. Basically, it works perfectly fine for both ants and the Borg (tm), but not for us lazy and greedy human individuals. This is primarily what went wrong with Stalin and the others, they attempted to force the populace to work together for the common goal, to accomplish through fear what they couldn't through coersion.

generals3:

Well he almost did it, however most of the battles he planned and conducted, he won. It were his generals who failed him. Just like in Waterloo when one decided not to show up like planned. (kinda the opposite of stalin where his generals saved the day)

Grouchy was primarily not supposed to show up - he was supposed to prevent the Prussians showing up. But yes, having failed Napoleon by not stopping the Prussians he doubled the error by moving to the fighting at all. But then, Napoleon also failed at that battle. He had generals who had fought Wellington and knew what his tactics were, but Napoleon ignored them and that was part of the defeat.

Napoleon was utterly despised by the non-French ruling elites: the French revolution endangered by example every monarch and aristocrat in Europe. He was a commoner, usurper, despot. Given his poor standing, a wiser head might have been more diplomatic to minimise the potential threat he posed to them.

Instead, he tore through Europe turning the existing order upside down. (Ironically, of course, Napoleon spread concepts of modernisation much of which we'd approve of today.) He antagonised all his adversaries, in some cases unnecessarily humiliated them, and thought to maintain compliance only by force of arms. He inevitably brought all of Europe down on France, and when the French advantage in modern military theory and professionalism evaporated (it was minimal even by 1809), the numbers were all that would matter.

Great general, sure; and perhaps carried the ambitions of the French too. But he could never have beaten every major power in Europe, and it is utterly his dreadful mistake that he thought he could.

Agema:

Grouchy was primarily not supposed to show up - he was supposed to prevent the Prussians showing up. But yes, having failed Napoleon by not stopping the Prussians he doubled the error by moving to the fighting at all. But then, Napoleon also failed at that battle. He had generals who had fought Wellington and knew what his tactics were, but Napoleon ignored them and that was part of the defeat.

Napoleon was utterly despised by the non-French ruling elites: the French revolution endangered by example every monarch and aristocrat in Europe. He was a commoner, usurper, despot. Given his poor standing, a wiser head might have been more diplomatic to minimise the potential threat he posed to them.

Instead, he tore through Europe turning the existing order upside down. (Ironically, of course, Napoleon spread concepts of modernisation much of which we'd approve of today.) He antagonised all his adversaries, in some cases unnecessarily humiliated them, and thought to maintain compliance only by force of arms. He inevitably brought all of Europe down on France, and when the French advantage in modern military theory and professionalism evaporated (it was minimal even by 1809), the numbers were all that would matter.

Great general, sure; and perhaps carried the ambitions of the French too. But he could never have beaten every major power in Europe, and it is utterly his dreadful mistake that he thought he could.

You're totally correct that his ambitions were his doom, just like Hitler for that matter, both tried to eat more than they could digest. (well on top of that Adolf was a bad general as well). I may have been too vague but what i meant is that if i had to chose between a man like Napoleon or Stalin to lead my country through war i'd rather take Napoleon, because he would have carried out that war much better. Now off course if it would be about who could conquer an empire better (which encompasses more than just finishing an existing war) it is doubtful as Stalin's lack of spine works in his advantage in this case (as obviously shown with the pact he wouldn't try to fight more he could handle). But than again, i'd rather live in a napoleonic empire than stalinist.

His ideals where good, but his methods were dubious (Like most revolutionaries)

Blablahb:

2012 Wont Happen:
It is not trolling for me to express my legitimate beliefs, it is freedom of speech.

Oh, and I guess that irrelevant cry makes it alright to act purposely ignorant, rewrite history and say extremely offensive things about stuff that's meant the death of millions and made hundreds of thousands victims, and defend the most horrific dictators of the 20th century?

Read my other posts on the matter if you would like. I am not rewriting my defenses for one as rude as you.

I will give you this to think about though: if you do not support my right to, not even express support for Stalin, but much as I would say about Capitalism say he was overall positive in an historical standpoint, you are being more authoritarian than the dictators you decry.

2012 Wont Happen:
-SNIP-

Stalin was little more than mobster (which he was before the revolution), he essentially ran the Soviet Union as if it was the mafia, brutally murdering anyone who in government who posed the slightest threat to his position, who's incompetent leadership caused millions of deaths, many directly through violent oppression and many more through famine because of his idiotic attempts to seize lands from skilled farmers and give them to communes of people who didn't know the first thing about farming. His mobster style leadership is why Russia nearly lost WW2, his generals were to afraid to speak up against his inept stratergies for they knew the penalty for disagreeing with him.

Stalin also had similar ambitions to Hitler in terms of land and power, the non-aggression pact with Germany was supposed to guarntee him the right to conquer most eastern half of the eastern European and Baltic states. When Germany attacked the USSR, Stalin tried to get Britain to agree to the same terms in the alliance treaty, even when his country was on the ropes he was hell bent on land aquistion.

Stalin was a brutal, twisted dictator who simply regarded communism as mechanism for maintaining his personal power in the USSR Mafia, he was on a par with Hitler in terms of his evil.

The thing that seems to be have been completely overlooked on context of judging Lenin and the Russian revolutions is the fact that even before the first revolution Russia was already on its way to becoming a constitutional monarchy, with increasing power being in the hands of the Duma (Russian parliment/congress), the first revolution simply removed the Tsar from the equation and Russia was set to become a democracy, even socialist (Mensheviks) supported the idea of democracy believing Russia wasn't ready for full revolution.

The problem came when the legalising of many previously illegal parties brought the return of Lenin to the Bolshevik movement, full blown radical Communists. Lenin returned specifically because he saw the oppotunity to achieve full revolution and more importantly, full power for himself under it's guise. Even far left Socialists opposed the idea of full revolution. The second revolution and the following civil war was nothing but a power play by Lenin and his Bolshevik puppets.

Hell, Karl Marx himself would have opposed the second revolution as Russia hadn't gone through the Capitalist phasae deemed necessary by Marx to accumulate wealth, at the time Russia had little wealth to speak of, so a Communist revolution with the purpose of redistributing wealth was a ludicrus notion. Lenin attempted to justify this through some loose claims Russia had "special circumstances" but ultimately it boils down to a power play by Lenin expoiting the mistakes of struggling to find it's feet Duma, the most notable mistake would be the continuation of involvement in WW1. Had the Duma not carried on the war, they would have been able to find their feet and establish a successful democracy in Russia as main cause for Bolshevik support would not have existed (Russia in WW1). This was the only reason for many to support the Bolsheviks, a simple desire to get out of the war and the anger that their supposed first revolution hadn't achieved this, many didn't want Communism, they wanted an end to the war. Lenin played on this masterfully to achieve his own ambitions of power, he was a villain.

Hardcore_gamer:

JRslinger:
Dictators are always villains. It's that simple.

No it isn't.

I for one thing democracy is a piece of shit. The only reason for why I haven't already decided that I just want to dump it for some other system that doesn't put all of the power into the hands of stupid monkeys is that the risk of a dictator becoming drunk with his power is too big for it to be desirable to get rid of democracy just yet. Even in spite of that however the "all dictators are evil" nonsense is just propaganda created by some Western countires like the USA. Not to mention that countries like the USA are barely even democracies in the first place with the handful few rich owning and controlling basically everything.

It was much better before the 17th amendment (the direct elections of senators). Before that, States had a LOT more power, and made sure atleast some smart people made it into Congress regardless of what the people thought of them. After the 17, though, it allowed power to become far more centralized and put more power in the hands of the few. The Federal Reserve Act of 1913 (which allows private bankers to make interest on the printing of our own money, which the prevention of that was the life goal of several presidents to bring down including Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson) could only of passed with weaker states.

Vegosiux:

PrinceOfShapeir:

Kinda is, Communism fucked up the world right proper. See also Great Leap Forward.

What does Lenin have to do with that?

Oh yes, that's right...NOTHING AT ALL.

Actually, if you want to go for the "original sin", I have no idea why you're bringing Lenin up? That bearded German gentleman is feeling abandoned as we speak! You know who I'm talking about, right?

Right?

The gulags were started by Lenin. Not Stalin, Lenin. Everything that came after was seeded through Lenin's actions. And anyone who brings up Trotsky is a frelling smeghead. Trotskys ONLY objection to Stalin's actions was that it was some of his own followers getting the ax. Hell, Trotsky thought that Stalin's farm collectivization, which on it's own caused over 5 million dead, was too tame. He wanted the program advanced faster.

Oh, and Trotsky virulently hated the Nazi's. So no MR pact. But everything else about the USSR would have stayed the same or been worse.

Leon Trotsky was the best of that age of Marxists, sadly even at the early stage of Lenins death Stalin was already scheming to take power. Eventually exiling Trotsky and having him assassinated.

They both killed a lot of people, Stalin just killed more.

That's the difference between the two as I see it.

Lenin was more reasonable, and far less paranoid and mean than Stalin, but he was a cold, driven man who was not adverse to getting his hands bloody. He once said that he'd rather kill 99 innocent people if it meant he could kill one guilty man rather than letting that one guilty man go free, because he was of the mind that a single anti-communist could undermine the revolution.

Lenin was pragmatic. Before his death, he introduced several reforms that would have made the Soviet Union a better place. He started to allow private individuals to own businesses and was experimenting with a market-socialist economy, much like what China has now. He didn't do it out of the goodness of his heart - he did it because it was practical. The Soviet Economy wasn't doing too well, so he sought to modify it to make it more competitive. But shortly after he introduced these reforms, he up and died and Stalin promptly reversed every single one of them.

Lenin was a visionary. Ultimately, he had good goals, but he was vicious and cold and absolutely violent. His opponents, the Tsarist regime, were also violent and cruel and he felt that he had to act in that way to survive. Lenin made the mistake a LOT of revolutionaries make: He felt SO passionately about communism and revolution that he became absolutely determined to ensure its survival - to the extent that he started becoming like his enemies. You see this time and time again with communist leaders: They have this gnawing fear that their brilliant vision for the future might be defeated, and it scares them so much that they decide to become ABSOLUTELY RUTHLESS in "safeguarding" the revolution. At the back of their minds they know they are doing bad things, but they always justify it by saying "I'm fighting for the future! Sure, I might have to be evil now, but in the FUTURE, communism will be better!". Lenin fell into that trap: He became so dedicated to communism that he felt any atrocity was justified in order to save the revolution.

Stalin on the other hand, was a paranoid monster.

But both were cruel. Both had cold, cold hearts. Both had no problem with torture, killing, assassinations and imprisoning people who had opposing views. Lenin was a far less paranoid leader - so he didn't kill as many people, because he didn't perceive as many enemies. But had he been as paranoid as Stalin, I'm sure he would have killed just as many.

ravenshrike:
The gulags were started by Lenin. Not Stalin, Lenin.

No.

The principle was much older - Tsarist Russia also sent criminals to work in forced labour camps in Siberia. For an obvious cultural example, it occurs to one of the Karamazov brothers in the Dostoyevsky novel from the 19th century. Lenin did not change the system much at all as far as I know. It was however several years after Lenin's death that what we now think of as the gulag system really developed and people were carted there en masse.