The Myth of Late Stage Capitalism - Page 7 - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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#15194417
B0ycey wrote:
Perhaps after Stalin. But what do we make of Afghanistan 79 @ckaihatsu?



Sure, that's fair. I've been looking at the history of it lately, due to recent events regarding Afghanistan.

I think we need to look at what *preceded* the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan:



The Saur Revolution (/saʊər/; Dari: إنقلاب ثور‎ or ۷ ثور (literally 7th Saur); Pashto: د ثور انقلاب‎), also romanized Sowr Revolution,[3] and alternatively called the April Revolution[4] or April Coup,[3] was the process by which the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) overthrew General Mohammed Daoud Khan on 27–28 April 1978, who had himself taken power in the 1973 Afghan coup d'état and established an autocratic one-party system in the country. Daoud Khan and most of his family were killed at the presidential palace by military officers in support of the PDPA.[5]



It was *Daoud*, who took power in a coup in 1973, who reached out to the Soviet Union:



President Daoud was convinced that closer ties and military support from the Soviet Union would allow Afghanistan to take control of Pashtun lands in northwest Pakistan. However, Daoud, who was ostensibly committed to a policy of non-alignment, became uneasy over Soviet attempts to dictate Afghanistan's foreign policy, and relations between the two countries deteriorated.[12]



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saur_Revolution
#15194418
I guess the point was, the US and SU were just on different sides of the same coin. The Warsaw Pact was a defence measure against America the same way NATO was a defence pact against Russia. Russia wanted to control East Europe because America wanted to control Western Europe. Cuba was a response to Turkey, Vietnam, Korea, Afghanistan, Czechoslovakia, whatever, it was all just a pissing contest. The SU was never under attack, so why the excuse? Perhaps because it is known that America was worried about Communism and the SU represented Communism. The SU never was Communist btw. But you have picked your side and need to retain that narrative because of your red flag.
#15194420
B0ycey wrote:
I guess the point was, the US and SU were just on different sides of the same coin. The Warsaw Pact was a defence measure against America the same way NATO was a defence pact against Russia. Russia wanted to control East Europe because America wanted to control Western Europe. Cuba was a response to Turkey, Vietnam, Korea, Afghanistan, Czechoslovakia, whatever, it was all just a pissing contest. The SU was never under attack, so why the excuse? Perhaps because it is known that America was worried about Communism and the SU represented Communism. The SU never was Communist btw. But you have picked your side and need to retain that narrative because of your red flag.



No, I assure you it's not like this -- I'm not being *Stalinist* simply because Stalinism / large-C 'Communism' happened to succeed the invaded and imploded initial proletarian Bolshevik Revolution.

I don't think we can deny that the dual-superpower geopolitical rivalry was *inevitable* as World War II drew to a close, and on-into the subsequent Cold War. As you're noting, the Cold War was a worldwide geopolitical 'taking-of-sides', and I'm under no political obligation to 'take sides' regarding one superpower or the other in general, though I *will* reserve the right to comment on particular geopolitical *incidents* during the Cold War, as I just did regarding Afghanistan.
#15194421
@ckaihatsu, I have no issue with Stalin defending the SU from insurgents. I also have no issue with the SU in a general sense anyway. But if I am critical of America for clear immoral actions, then I should do likewise for every nation don't you think? Stalin is guilty of many things we criticise Mussolini and Hitler of. He acted like a Fascist. And the SU acted as an imperialist nation in every sense of the word. Not everything they did was for defence. Most of what they did was for their self interest.
#15194422
B0ycey wrote:
@ckaihatsu, I have no issue with Stalin defending the SU from insurgents. I also have no issue with the SU in a general sense anyway. But if I am critical of America for clear immoral actions, then I should do likewise for every nation don't you think? Stalin is guilty of many things we criticise Mussolini and Hitler of. He acted like a Fascist. And the SU acted as an imperialist nation in every sense of the word. Not everything they did was for defence. Most of what they did was for their self interest.



No, I certainly don't agree, given the historical record -- again, I would term Stalin / the USSR as being 'geopolitically-left-wing', and *not* comparable to (necessarily right-wing) fascists, significantly due to respective *intentions* / ideologies, which you continue to set-aside for no good reason.

Here's a primer of sorts that I created -- a version of the conventional one-dimensional left-right political spectrum, f.y.i.:


Ideologies & Operations -- Fundamentals

Spoiler: show
Image
#15194425
I never expected you to agree @ckaihatsu. We did after all spend most of yesterday going around in circles on this. But you still haven't addressed why they are different except one is imperial and the other isn't. That however is questionable anyway given the Eastern European land grab, especially Czechoslovakia.
#15194428
B0ycey wrote:
I never expected you to agree @ckaihatsu.



I *don't* agree, as I just said -- you're being *obtuse*.


ckaihatsu wrote:
No, I certainly don't agree, given the historical record



viewtopic.php?p=15194422#p15194422



---


B0ycey wrote:
We did after all spend most of yesterday going around in circles on this. But you still haven't addressed why they are different except one is imperial and the other isn't.



Here's *another* approach to the general topic of left-wing-vs.-right-wing -- the diagram shows that imperialism is *international* and 'traditional', historically, while Stalinism is *national*, and 'revolutionary', in the sense that it had to *defend* its national self-determination against traditional ideologies like that of nationalist 'autarky' and international 'imperialism' -- meaning NATO.

Here's the definition of 'imperialism':



In order for capitalism to generate greater profits than the home market can yield, the merging of banks and industrial cartels produces finance capitalism and the exportation and investment of capital to countries with underdeveloped economies is required. In turn, such financial behaviour leads to the division of the world among monopolist business companies and the great powers. Moreover, in the course of colonizing undeveloped countries, business and government eventually will engage in geopolitical conflict over the economic exploitation of large portions of the geographic world and its populaces. Therefore, imperialism is the highest (advanced) stage of capitalism, requiring monopolies (of labour and natural-resource exploitation) and the exportation of finance capital (rather than goods) to sustain colonialism, which is an integral function of said economic model.[4][5] Furthermore, in the capitalist homeland, the super-profits yielded by the colonial exploitation of a people and their economy permit businessmen to bribe native politicians, labour leaders and the labour aristocracy (upper stratum of the working class) to politically thwart worker revolt (labour strike) and placate the working class.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperiali ... Capitalism



Political Spectrum, Simplified

Spoiler: show
Image



---


B0ycey wrote:
That however is questionable anyway given the Eastern European land grab, especially Czechoslovakia.



In what year did this event take place? If you mean 1968, I don't defend superpower-Stalinism / late-Stalinism by that point, and I'll point to the *Hungarian Revolution* as a good example of counter-Stalinist political organizing and uprisings:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian ... on_of_1956
#15194435
ckaihatsu wrote:
You're jumping all over the historical timeline, late -- I'm talking specifically about *these* events, particularly from the first half of the 20th century:



Russia wasn't playing defense, still isn't.
#15194440
In some places, the USSR acted first.

In others, the USA acted first.

In other places, the USA was the only significant player.

It could also be argued that in some places, the USSR was the only significant player.

------------

As for late stage capitalism, it depends on how you define it, but it should be noted that Marx never used the phrase.
#15194463
late wrote:
Russia wasn't playing defense, still isn't.



Yeeeeeaaaaahhhhh, I'd say it *was*, since its whole trajectory, post-Lenin, was to quickly industrialize and be militarily capable of defending itself -- hence the whole emphasis on *production* goods (means of mass industrial production), over consumer goods, even well after it industrialized. Remember that it not only beat the Nazis in WWII (militarily, etc.) but also got sucked into the Cold War missile-arms race, meaning that its priority was military parity with the U.S. / NATO, all the way to the bitter end (bankruptcy, basically).
#15194507

Capitalism was arguably born on a remote island. A few decades after the Portuguese colonised Madeira in 1420, they developed a system that differed in some respects from anything that had gone before. By felling the forests after which they named the island (madeira is Portuguese for wood), they created, in this uninhabited sphere, a blank slate – a terra nullius – in which a new economy could be built. Financed by bankers in Genoa and Flanders, they transported enslaved people from Africa to plant and process sugar. They developed an economy in which land, labour and money lost their previous social meaning and became tradable commodities.



https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... ora-papers
#15194508
ckaihatsu wrote:
Yeeeeeaaaaahhhhh, I'd say it *was*, since its whole trajectory, post-Lenin, was to quickly industrialize and be militarily capable of defending itself -- hence the whole emphasis on *production* goods (means of mass industrial production), over consumer goods, even well after it industrialized. Remember that it not only beat the Nazis in WWII (militarily, etc.) but also got sucked into the Cold War missile-arms race, meaning that its priority was military parity with the U.S. / NATO, all the way to the bitter end (bankruptcy, basically).



You're just repeating yourself.

If you could counter the points I made, you would. A quarter century after the war ended, the countries Russia conquered still had Russian soldiers in them, they were occupied.

The squeeze that resulted in the Berlin Airlift was not defensive. Neither was the recent invasion of Ukraine.

Your horse is dead, you can stop beating it.
#15194514
late wrote:
Russia wasn't playing defense, still isn't.



ckaihatsu wrote:
Yeeeeeaaaaahhhhh, I'd say it *was*, since its whole trajectory, post-Lenin, was to quickly industrialize and be militarily capable of defending itself -- hence the whole emphasis on *production* goods (means of mass industrial production), over consumer goods, even well after it industrialized. Remember that it not only beat the Nazis in WWII (militarily, etc.) but also got sucked into the Cold War missile-arms race, meaning that its priority was military parity with the U.S. / NATO, all the way to the bitter end (bankruptcy, basically).



late wrote:
You're just repeating yourself.

If you could counter the points I made, you would.



Okay, go ahead and itemize those / any points you have, and I'll pointedly respond in kind.


late wrote:
A quarter century after the war ended, the countries Russia conquered still had Russian soldiers in them, they were occupied.



Like where, exactly -- ? *Germany* -- ?

Maybe that's because it was *Nazi* Germany just a moment earlier, and was basically taken into 'receivership' by the two postwar superpowers, the U.S. and the USSR.

Here's from the historical material I already posted -- the Soviets favored a more *punitive* approach to the formerly Nazi Germany:



The Soviets took a punitive approach, pressing for a delay rather than an acceleration in economic rehabilitation, demanding unconditional fulfillment of all prior reparation claims, and pressing for progress toward nationwide socioeconomic transformation.[43]

After six weeks of negotiations, Molotov rejected all of the American and British proposals.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_ ... gotiations



viewtopic.php?p=15194412#p15194412



So we might ask, today, what *would* have been the most-appropriate measures to exact on the Nazis, and on the collaborationists in the German population, and beyond, by extension.


---


late wrote:
The squeeze that resulted in the Berlin Airlift was not defensive.



I'd say yes-and-no -- by that point, post-WWII, the USSR had become a *superpower*, though still economically and militarily lesser than the U.S. and its NATO allies. The USSR still had to be defensive in the *Cold War*, though it was more of a 'silent partner' with the U.S. regarding postwar Germany.



The Berlin Blockade (24 June 1948 – 12 May 1949) was one of the first major international crises of the Cold War. During the multinational occupation of post–World War II Germany, the Soviet Union blocked the Western Allies' railway, road, and canal access to the sectors of Berlin under Western control. The Soviets offered to drop the blockade if the Western Allies withdrew the newly introduced Deutsche Mark from West Berlin.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berlin_Blockade



---


late wrote:
Neither was the recent invasion of Ukraine.



You mean *Crimea* -- ?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annexatio ... Federation


Why did both Ukraine and the U.S. support *fascists* in Euromaidan?



A telephone call was leaked of US diplomat Victoria Nuland speaking to the US Ambassador to Ukraine, Geoffrey Pyatt about the future of the country, in which she said that Klitschko should not be in the future government, and expressed her preference for Arseniy Yatsenyuk, who became interim Prime Minister. She also casually stated "fuck the EU."[346][347]



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euromaida ... in_Ukraine



---


late wrote:
Your horse is dead, you can stop beating it.



Yes, I'm going to have to repeat myself because you didn't hear me the first time around:


ckaihatsu wrote:
I don't defend superpower-Stalinism / late-Stalinism by that point, and I'll point to the *Hungarian Revolution* as a good example of counter-Stalinist political organizing and uprisings:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian ... on_of_1956



viewtopic.php?p=15194428#p15194428



And, the following is from a web search:



How the Bolsheviks Treated the National Question

ByRob Jones -April 6, 20202778
Rob Jones, Sotsialisticheskaya Alternativa (ISA in Russia)

A century after the October revolution, the approach of the Bolsheviks to resolving the national question remains a shining example of what could be achieved in resolving national conflicts if genuine socialist governments were to come to power across the world.

This is particularly the case when, under capitalist domination, the world in the 21st century has been ravaged by murderous conflicts in Darfur, the Congo, the Middle East. The national question has still not been satisfactorily resolved in Catalonia, Scotland, Ireland, Belgium and elsewhere and has fueled brutal conflicts in the Balkans, Caucasia, Central Asia and Ukraine.

Two brutal wars in Chechnya and the treatment of national minorities demonstrate that the ruling elite in modern capitalist Russia has nothing in common with the Bolsheviks. The recent attack in Surgut, the Siberian oil town, when a young Muslim run amok with a knife in a shopping centre is clearly the result of racist state policies and the actions of far-right extremists. Only recently riot police invaded a café in the town and forced young men there to shave their beards, claiming they could be Wahhabis. The Bolsheviks however, led by Lenin bent over backwards to support the rights of national and ethnic minorities. Way ahead of his time, Lenin even criticized the use in everyday language of national stereotypes such as the use of the word “Khokhol” to describe Ukrainians. Not only is this word still in widespread use, it was added to recently by official Russian propaganda which presented the Ukraine as a fascist state.

The language question

The Bolsheviks were very sensitive to the language question, taking conscious steps to support the use of minority languages. Lenin spoke against the recognition of specific languages as “state languages”, particularly when that meant that significant language minorities were discriminated against. Yet in complete contrast to this approach, the attempts by the new capitalist governments to restrict the use of the Russian language led to serious ethnic conflict in Moldova in the 1990s and serious tensions in the Baltic states. In President Nazarbayev’s Kazakhstan, whenever social conflict has arisen, in particular during the Zhenaozen oil workers’ strike, he has leant on the so-called “National-patriots” and “National-democrats” (right-wing nationalists) to call for restrictions on the Russian language. Even the threat of restricting the use of Russian in Ukraine was enough to heighten the tensions that led to the conflict in East Ukraine. Hypocritically, the Putin government, which used the attack on the rights of Russian speakers in Ukraine to intervene in East Ukraine has now announced that finance for the teaching of Russia’s many minority languages will cease. This is already causing discontent in republics such as Tatarstan.

Declaration on the Rights of the peoples of Russia*

Most of all, the Bolsheviks were principled proponents of the right of nations to self-determination. Within days of the October revolution, the Declaration on the Rights of the peoples of Russia was published. In contrast to the approach of modern diplomacy, in which different sides maneuver and disguise their real intent from the population, this revolutionary declaration stated in a clear, transparent and concise way that because the peoples of Russia have suffered such repression and misrule, freedom from pogroms, slavery and attacks should be immediately granted, decisively and irreversibly. There should be, it declared, the equality and sovereignty of the Russian nationalities, the right of the Russian peoples to self-determination up to and including the right to form their own states, the abolition of all and any national and religious privileges and restrictions supported by the free development of national minorities and ethnic groups populating Russian territory.



https://www.socialistalternative.org/20 ... -question/
#15194533
ckaihatsu wrote:


Like where, exactly -- ? *Germany* -- ?

Maybe that's because it was *Nazi* Germany just a moment earlier, and was basically taken into 'receivership' by the two postwar superpowers, the U.S. and the USSR.





So we might ask, today, what *would* have been the most-appropriate measures to exact on the Nazis, and on the collaborationists in the German population, and beyond, by extension.

You mean *Crimea* -- ?






The place I actually visited was Hungary, I talked with the people there. As you should have guessed, walking by Russian soldiers every day wasn't what they wanted, neither were the prying eyes of the KGB.

Now compare what the Soviet part of Germany was like when the Iron Wall fell. And what it cost free Germany to partly bring them up to Euro standards...

The "most appropriate plan" was the Marshall Plan.

No, I mean Ukraine, a country that Putin is saying he wants to finish off...

And about your horse:

For the house fell on it's head and the coroner pronounced her dead
And thru the town the joyous news was spread
Ding-dong, the horse is dead! Which old horse? The wicked horse
Ding-dong, the wicked horse is dead
Wake up, you sleepy head, rub your eyes, get out of bed
Wake up, the wicked horse is dead!
#15194646
Late Stage Capitalism is like late stage Alzheimer's.

In the late stages of Alzheimer’s, the person with the disease loses the ability to respond appropriately and is unable to converse with others.

The defenders of capitalism have turned into shrieking toddlers when confronted with any restriction or sacrifice brought on by COVID-19 or climate change.
#15194683
ckaihatsu wrote:
And what about *politically* -- what do you think of the Nuremberg Trials?



First, that's a dodge.

Second, what about Nuremburg? While it lacked grounding in actual law, it was a sight better than the slaughter that occurred elsewhere.
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