It was extremely obvious war was coming with the Germans eventually, as much as the USSR would’ve loved to avoid it to build up their capacity more, I’m sure. Germany was filled with anti-communist propaganda, they arrested and killed a lot of their own communists, a lot of their antisemitic propaganda associated the Jews with communists (the Judeo-Bolshevik conspiracy theory that continues in conservative circles to this day). Germany and Japan literally made an anti-communist pact in 1936 that Italy later joined. They were on opposite sides of the Spanish Civil War, etc.
And let’s not forget that the US does the same thing, but worse, expanding their military bases not for defensive reasons but for imperialist reasons, all around the world.
“Would have loved”… “Expanded their border area”… That sounds so innocent. Inappropriate words for what that regime represented and what they did with the countries they colonized. The terror, genocides, poverty, famine and the sheer gray hopelessness of life for generations. It’s surreal reading people who praise them because they were “not as bad as Nazis”. Firstly - disputable claim. But even if you grant that (which many survivors of WWII would be reluctant to do)… that’s as low a bar as you can set.
I understand that this is mostly posted/read by young Americans, rather privileged and removed from the subject matter. I’m hoping you can reconsider your positions - probably not now, but maybe some time in the future. Try to see this from the perspective of all those “buffer countries” full of non-people born into “zones of influence” where it’s ok to “expand your border area”. It’s extremely soulless.
But at least this Lemmy instance hasn’t banned me (so far) for hating communism :)
I understand that this is mostly posted/read by young Americans, rather privileged and removed from the subject matter.
Guess what, I can still find Poles like @[email protected] and @[email protected] who aren’t anticommunist at all. You want a fucking medal or something? You aren’t anything special.
What genocides? There’s the Holodomor, but historians don’t agree that was a purposeful targeted famine, so much as failed policy and bad luck. That’s like saying the Great Dust Bowl was a famine against the Midwest. They were a new society trying a new form of government and production for the first time after multiple wars. Famine happened all the time during the tsar’s rule, and stopped happening after the World Wars, when the USSR figured it out. Even the CIA at a certain point said that they ate as much in the USSR as they did in the US, just healthier lol.
And sheer grey hopelessness of life? From the society that went to space first, that revitalized numerous liberation movements around the world like Cuba and Vietnam, that helped women gain equality in the fields of science and technology? They weren’t perfect and did plenty of things wrong but weren’t anything close to the Nazis like you seem to be implying.
In fact, most people would have preferred the USSR didn’t dissolve in the countries it was in. And speaking of poverty, the dissolution of the USSR was way worse for those countries.
It was extremely obvious war was coming with the Germans eventually, as much as the USSR would’ve loved to avoid it to build up their capacity more, I’m sure. Germany was filled with anti-communist propaganda, they arrested and killed a lot of their own communists, a lot of their antisemitic propaganda associated the Jews with communists (the Judeo-Bolshevik conspiracy theory that continues in conservative circles to this day). Germany and Japan literally made an anti-communist pact in 1936 that Italy later joined. They were on opposite sides of the Spanish Civil War, etc.
They tried to ally with the West first but weren’t able to because the West didn’t like communism, and preferred to just go with the policy of appeasement to avoid a war without having to ally with the USSR. So they ended up making a non-aggression pact with Germany to protect themselves. It’s the same reason they expanded their border area, to protect themselves and give them the time for the inevitable future conflict they knew was coming with the Nazis. Remember, they were still recovering from World War 1 and various civil wars. At first, they tried to do it through a treaty so their troops could move through Poland voluntarily to help defend against Germany, but they refused.
And let’s not forget that the US does the same thing, but worse, expanding their military bases not for defensive reasons but for imperialist reasons, all around the world.
“Would have loved”… “Expanded their border area”… That sounds so innocent. Inappropriate words for what that regime represented and what they did with the countries they colonized. The terror, genocides, poverty, famine and the sheer gray hopelessness of life for generations. It’s surreal reading people who praise them because they were “not as bad as Nazis”. Firstly - disputable claim. But even if you grant that (which many survivors of WWII would be reluctant to do)… that’s as low a bar as you can set.
I understand that this is mostly posted/read by young Americans, rather privileged and removed from the subject matter. I’m hoping you can reconsider your positions - probably not now, but maybe some time in the future. Try to see this from the perspective of all those “buffer countries” full of non-people born into “zones of influence” where it’s ok to “expand your border area”. It’s extremely soulless.
But at least this Lemmy instance hasn’t banned me (so far) for hating communism :)
I don’t see how a Union that prevented another Polish famine and helped reconstruct Poland was worse than an anticommunist empire that exterminated at least 1.8 million Poles in a settler-colonial project and would have annihilated millions more had the Axis won, but then again, I have nothing against Poles either. Sorry that you have no respect for your own people, I guess.
Guess what, I can still find Poles like @[email protected] and @[email protected] who aren’t anticommunist at all. You want a fucking medal or something? You aren’t anything special.
You get really hung up on borders. Let me ask you something: when did Poland become an independent nation?
What genocides? There’s the Holodomor, but historians don’t agree that was a purposeful targeted famine, so much as failed policy and bad luck. That’s like saying the Great Dust Bowl was a famine against the Midwest. They were a new society trying a new form of government and production for the first time after multiple wars. Famine happened all the time during the tsar’s rule, and stopped happening after the World Wars, when the USSR figured it out. Even the CIA at a certain point said that they ate as much in the USSR as they did in the US, just healthier lol.
And sheer grey hopelessness of life? From the society that went to space first, that revitalized numerous liberation movements around the world like Cuba and Vietnam, that helped women gain equality in the fields of science and technology? They weren’t perfect and did plenty of things wrong but weren’t anything close to the Nazis like you seem to be implying.
In fact, most people would have preferred the USSR didn’t dissolve in the countries it was in. And speaking of poverty, the dissolution of the USSR was way worse for those countries.