Stalin stopped the USSR from going the way of Cambodia. Churchill destroyed his own country rather than accept peace. Mao was a murderous lunatic but his worst crimes were when he had to unleash uncontrollable forces to survive. Reasonable case for Churchill or Mao.
-
This Tweet is unavailable.
-
-
Replying to @CovfefeAnon @a_centrism
"Stalin stopped the USSR from going the way of Cambodia." - you've missed classes on Soviet history.
2 replies 0 retweets 11 likes -
Replying to @Stepan29894060 @a_centrism
Stalin takes nominal power in a situation where everyone is in a deadly competition to outflank everyone else to the left. He asserts control and (murderously) changes the state to a stable bureaucratic one where everyone left with power is a pure cynic. Cambodia was worse.
2 replies 0 retweets 0 likes -
Granting the dubious argument that a ruthless dictatorship was the only way forward, who other than Stalin forced Stalin to implement the collectivisation of agriculture?
2 replies 0 retweets 1 like -
I mean, there were a lot of members of the communist party that were promoting these decisions before they were implemented.
1 reply 0 retweets 1 like -
Granted, but if Anon's argument is that Stalin had to seize power in order to curb the worst conceivable excesses of leftism, it somewhat undermines the argument if Stalin went ahead and... implemented the worst conceivable excesses of leftism.
3 replies 0 retweets 0 likes -
Because he doesn't have unlimited freedom as dictator - he's constrained by consensus. Acts too much against the "pure" left wing position and a coordination point of killing him arises; follow the left wing line and it doesn't and he gradually gains actual control.
1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes -
Again, it's not obvious to me that there was a consensus in favour of killing Lenin and terminating the NEP, even if Stalin maneuvered himself to succeed him. Or that Stalin had particular difficulty disposing of political rivals (such as Trotsky et al.)
1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes -
Replying to @Bioliberalism @CovfefeAnon and
The whole point to the 'iron-fisted dictator' schtick is that, no, actually, you don't have to care about consensus, at least compared with ruling an oligarchy or republic. If Stalin had wanted 40 more years of the NEP and shot the collectivists, I suspect he'd have gotten it.
1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
Every dictator has to care about consensus because he doesn't rule via personal force he rules by having his commands obeyed and having loyal security forces. He's always constrained by his justification for ruling.
Loading seems to be taking a while.
Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.