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Oh yes, I am not for it - but notice how big a distraction it is? We have all forgetten convietiently about problems at home with this distraction.
Same as Vietnam.
It's a cockup, just like it, no doubt. Everyone knows a nice easy Victory makes people happy and distracts them for a bit. However, both times, it hasn't been an easy victory. Perhaps they will learn... the best way to keep people distracted and happy, is to do a good job at home first.
Heh, the war on terror... has done nothing but make more terror! I can only hope we don't follow the US on their next adventure.
So its alright to murder millions if we can get some cheap trinkets?
And its a bit dodgy to say without Stalin the USSR would have lost. They might have done even better if Stalin hadn't previously wiped out the High Command and so brutalised the people of the Ukraine that they were garlanding German tanks as liberators when they arrived.
If Hitler hadn't gone on to show many Russians he was just as brutal as Stalin he had a ready made local army who wanted little more than to put Stalin and his NKVD henchmen's heads on poles.
LMFAO!!!!!
It was interesting for the first 1000 times we debated it, except of course its never a debate, its just you saying the same things over and over.
And its not really even that, its the way that virtually every thread turns into a long blurb about how the neo-cons are stealing our souls.
You see... without Stalin, the industry would not have been there. What good are men without weapons? Historians largley accept that Stalin's Industrial expansion was the saviour - Lenin would not have done so. Without mass-produced efficient weapons, like the Il-2, T-34, and PPSH, the war would have been lost. And without the factories, therefore.
No doubt, Stalin was a murdering cunt. But people let them, as ever, blind them of the fact he is one of the Reasons that Hitler lost the war. Yes, the purge of the best Army Officers didn't help (infact it is the reason the Germans had such an easy time)... but undoubtably, he fucked up there, but staged the one of the greatest comebacks in Military History, thanks to his Industrial Expansion.
Winning WW2 is hardly a "trinket". It is one of the reasons we are free today (Although, Stalin would hardly support that, but his succesorts soon ended the USSR, so we are quite free.)
Stalin was kindof, a necessary evil. We would have been worse off without him. Hitler disliked the Russians rather alot, he'd rather have seen them all dead. Stalin had read Main Kampf... so he knew this. (Then again, he killed more than Hitler ever did.) I am just fed up with everyone going on about his Evils... you forget what he acheived.
Yes they did well to defeat Hitler, but that wasn't the result of Stalin or Mao directly, you can't say they wouldn't have fought any less successfully under different, more benign leders.
Yes the leadership in China benefited, precisely the point surely? Also I would debate whether life was any better at all but there you go.
There is no way you can justify the murder of millions of people.
Thta is like saying the Holocaust was good because Jews got the state of Israel as a result........
Well that kind of defeats your argument.
You are 'fed up' with people pointing out that Stalin is one of the greatest mass murderers (if not the greatest) in history to celebrate his 'achievments'............ :no:
Hitler built some good motorways, woop di do.............
:rolleyes: Fine. You'd rather be under a Nazi regeime than have allowed Stalin? Fair enough.
Russia wouldn't be half the country it is today without Stalin. China wouldn't without Mao.
Britain wouldn't if we hadn't slaughtered Millions in our World Conquest. America wouldn't if it wasn't founded upon the genocide of Americans and replacing them with a nation of Immigrants.
As keen on that one?
I accept that these things happened and that some people may have benefitted, but no I don't think that mass murder and genocide is particually good (especially for the Indians)
But yes, stopping the Nazis...Good thing!
From my own personal perspective then yes I obviously benefited from the defeat of the Nazis, but many did not, and that doesn't prevent the fact that Stalins despotism was not necessary to win the war against Hitler.
It is isn't a case of balancing good vs bad, it is a case of seeing if they did the best thing or not.
It is also bollocks to say that China benefited massively from Mao. China is becoming a proseperous country today because many of Mao policies have been put into reverse.........
Yes, I am sure the cultural revolution was of NO benefit... also, since China's "liberalisation" there has been a rahter large increase in crime and, as many know, AIDS has taken hold badly. Without Mao, China would not have the foundations it has built upon to become the nation it is today.
Stalin, was a cunting twat for the murder, paranoia, and purges. He also killed some of the best men the USSR have seen. But for building it up, giving it strength, and making it stand on its own two feet, he was good. HE is the reason it isn't just a bunch of farmers and a few small cities anymore. He made it into a superpower by the end of WW2, from the start of his reign. Come on, that deserves some credit... he acheived alot there.
They are evil, sadistic cunts. But they acheived alot, stop trying to take that away. Hitler acheived alot, he is responsible for half of the Military advancement the world has seen, the technology he had was amazing, his scientists were the best in the world. Without him... Warfare would not be what it is.
Not really. Russia had began to industrialise long before Stalin. Indeed, according to the Marxist philosophy a prerequisite for a proletariat revolution was the existence of an urban working class. This urban working class grew rapidly from the reign of Alexander III largely due to the policies of Witte (Witte’s “great spurt”) that encouraged industrial growth.
It’s absolutely ridiculous to credit Stalin as ‘the’ reason Russia isn’t a ‘bunch of farmers and a few small cities’ since Russia wasn’t those things even before the revolution. Regardless, the things that you say Stalin was ‘good’ for could easily have been achieved by somebody else without the mass-murder and vicious repression that Stalin implemented.
And in threads where the subject is reaised, hardly every thread. If you don't wish to discuss those responsible for such issues, then don't. Noone is forcing you to comment on them if they bore you.
Russian losses in WWII were horrific and are too often understated although it’s odd that they somehow translate into support for Stalinism for some people. I read recently of an Israeli who is an active member of the Stalinist wing of the Communist Party in Israel and when asked how she could be a Stalinist explained that it was because Stalin saved her family from Hitler.
Yes, Russia was beginning to indutrailise before Stalin... but at best was 50 years away from the rest of the world... it was pretty much a peasant nation, that is why it is shocking - Marx said Revolution would happen in an advanced Capitalist Industrial nation - he would not have seen Russia as the prime candidate - indeed, Germany, or Britain, far more likley.
Yes. It could have been done without Stalin. But sadly, candidates were not lining up, opposition was sortof not allowed. As in, you died for it. So, what other options? Lenin survives, he would not have gone thorugh with the mass industrialisation - it was very much Stalin's idea. He saw the possibility of War, and decided he need to rapidly industrialise Russia, as they need to be ready for a war, with guns, tanks, and planes, and be able to produce more. It was possible other ways, yes... but at the time, no. You don't really lone up candidates and vote in the USSR...
And a lot of those losses were due to Stalin's mismanagement of the war, his murder of his generals and his callous disregard for the lives of his troops.
I have a lot of respect for the ordinary 'Ivan', but that doesn't mean we should gloss over the fact that Stalin was a mass-murdering meglomaniac, who was no better than Hitler. A Europe under Stalin would have been a miserable, sadistic state and whilst I'm glad Hitler didn't win I'm equally glad Stalin didn't achieve domination either.
BTW I bet the 2 troops that were killed were in response for UK trying to kill Irans leader last week in bomb attack :chin: (Has anyone here heard of that attack?).
UK troops are in Shia areas in South
Iraqi Shiite Cleric Pledges to Defend Iran
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/23/AR2006012301701.html
Trotsky?
most people here hate bush and what he stands for.
most people here are against the wars in iraq and afghanistan but you don't bother reading before spouting yer big mouth off.
your doing muslims and Iranians a great disservice talking like you do.
Doubtful. There is a reason he fled... Stalin had established his power base far to well.