“n5667�, It is a common mistake to look at the former Soviet Union, Cuba, etc. and see their real and perceived abuses as proof that their systems are the same as capitalist imperialism.

When you say that the Soviet Union subjugated “quite a bit of Asia� I presume you are referring to Soviet Asia. Yet it is a funny kind of subjugation that voluntarily joined the Soviet Union and had a large improvement in their standard of living due to the USSR’s centrally planned economy. In this centrally planned economy a priority was made of advancing the economies of the poorer regions. This is the opposite of imperialism under capitalism, and cannot be perceived as the same thing.

On every level the standard of living improved including in medical care, literacy, women’s rights, and material well being. Likewise, by all of these same standards the, the well being of the people in these regions has gotten much worse since Yeltsin’s capitalist counter-revolution.

“n5667� You state, “The USSR subjugated Eastern Europe�. I say yes and no.

The Soviet Union was brought into World War 2 due to Hitler’s attacks on the Soviet Union. These attacks came after Stalin’s unprincipled peace agreement with Hitler, an agreement that had divided the strategic control Poland between Nazi Germany and the USSR.

In response to Hitler’s invasion of the USSR the people of the Soviet Union fought heroically and the entire socialist economy was geared up for the victory against fascism. Many who fought Hitler’s invasion did not like Stalin, this included the Left Opposition to Stalin, yet they fought to defend the substantial gains of the October Revolution. As a result of this heroic fight, the fascist menace was physically repelled from the Soviet Union thus defending the gains of October.

The Soviet Union brought progress to Eastern Europe by smashing the Nazi system in Germany, establishing a deformed socialist system in East Germany, and eliminating the Nazi occupations of Poland, Czechoslovakia, Romania, Bulgaria, Albania, and Hungary. Yugoslavia also had its own socialist revolution against the Nazi occupation. Greece was also liberated to a large degree by its own internal socialist opposition to Hitler’s occupation, but Stalin made an unprincipled pact with U.S. imperialism that led to U.S. imposed capitalist dictatorship in Greece the subsequently carried out mass murder against the revolutionary opposition that had fought against the Nazi occupation.

Thus the role of the Soviet Union in Eastern Europe was contradictory from the beginning, yet it was also a roll imposed on the Soviet Union by Hitler’s invasion.

Not only was fascism smashed primarily by the sacrifices of the Soviet Union. The socialist block as it was set up helped play a progressive role in world politics. These countries, especially East Germany (the most powerful former capitalist country among them), were no longer part of the world capitalist system and no longer profited off of the subjugation of Africa and other “third world� capitalist regions. In addition they lent aid to national liberation struggles from Vietnam to Cuba, helping those countries throw off the yoke of U.S. and French imperialism.

Yet there were important contradictions. The Soviet Government was very fearful of the example that could emerge if any type of democratic communist government emerged in Eastern Europe. They knew this could become an example for political revolution in the Soviet Union itself. Thus the Soviet Union intervened directly against movements for democratic communism in Poland and Hungary in the 1950s and in Czechoslovakia in the 1960s. These interventions were criminal acts.

While there were no supportable justifications for these interventions, this was not the economic driven imperialism of capitalism. The Soviet Union actually did much to help underdeveloped countries like Cuba economically. This is opposite the role of capitalist imperialism, a role that under-develops countries and regions for cheap resources and cheap labor.

I advocate democratic communism, but this does not mean I will draw equal signs between systems that are very different for the convenience of people who need over simplified black and white versions of reality.