first, there is no democracy in the west.

parliamentary governments depend on money to buy votes, and aristotle would call most of them "plutocracy".

america was explicitly created to empower 'men of property' and does so today. her policies, foreign and domestic, have always reflected the interests of wealth, most obviously in the caribbean, where visits by the usmc on behalf of corporations was habitual.

in short, democracy was not subverted, although plenty of legitimate governments were overthrown and individuals assassinated in support of american policy.

communism threatened america's wealthy in two ways: taking away markets was unwelcome, but the notion that great wealth was a crime was anathema. it could have caught on among america's poor.

so the response of the american government to the leninist coup was absurdly violent, by any practical measure. russia was never a threat to america, until america made war on russia, out of genuinely religious motivation: america's masters worship wealth.

the attack on russia after ww1 was abortive, for lack of preparation. but it was inspired by religious revulsion in america's upper class, and class revulsion in the british aristocracy- they saw the lowers killing the uppers in russia, and wanted to discourage this idea before it caught on in britain.

afterwards, peace between the masters of the soviet union and the masters of western nations was impossible. both sides used whatever means came to hand in a struggle for survival.

neither side has any claim to virtue, but the west struck the first blow. thereafter, stalin could truthfully claim that whatever he did was necessary to survival. since this was true in part, apologists for soviet policy were on strong ground. the fact that stalin was a mass murderer was inconsequential for many, since dispatching an army to a foreign country is a more obvious variety of mass murder,and happened first.

DEMOS,

I appreciate you drawing our attention to the fact that the Soviet Union was attacked at the end of the First World War by large number of capitalist countries including the UK, America, France, Japan and Germany.

However, what you wrote is contradictory.

Whilst you are critical of the Soviet system, but still offer what are, in effect, excuses for Stalin's brutal rule.

As an example, you write, "stalin could truthfully claim that whatever he did was necessary to survival."

The overwhelming evidence is to the contrary. Stalin's policies needlessly undermined the security of the Soviet Union (although they possibly ensured that his own personal rule endured).

These include:

* The purging of the officer corps in 1937

* appeasement of Hitler to the point of failing to act on numerous intelligence warnings that that a German invasion was imminent lest any preparations against invasion be interpreted as 'provocation'.

* disastrous meddling in the affairs of Communist Parties in other countries, which probably led to defeats of socialist movements in Britain (1926), China (1927), Spain(1936-1949) and also to Hitler's triumph in Germany.

* his betrayal of post-war socialist movements in the west as described above.

Arguably, some of his other policies (e.g. the rapid relocation of the industrial base of the Soviet Union to the east of the Urals) did make it possible for the Soviet Union to resist the invasion that he, himself, largely brought about, but at a terrible (and, in my view, needlessly high) cost. On the whole, what you write, gives far more credit to Stalin than he deserves.

---

My essential point is that crimes committed by the rulers of the Soviet Union, both domestically and internationally, intentionally harmed, rather than helped the cause of socialism that they claimed to espouse.

The fact that those in the west, who have stood for a better political system than what we have, have quite often, themselves, been the victims of Stalin and his heirs hasn't prevented Cold War propagandists from dishonestly holding them morally responsible for those crimes.

Dagget,

I notice your going even further off topic. My purpose in this debate has been to demonstrate the farce that you suggested ie "The Soviet Union was not ever expansionist".

That you have steadfastly refused to stick to that debate shows me that you are incapable of making much of a case.

I can no longer waste my time discussing things with you if you cannot stick with the subject. I really don't expect much from someone who honestly believes that economic liberalism is a conspiracy cooked up by the likes of Hayek and Friedman to protect the rich and screw the poor.

My views are fairly standard. You can read views like them in the Australian (this countries most respected newspaper) every day. So this all encompassing conspiracy has sucked in virtually everyone except you and a select few shut ins who still believe in fairy tales. I feel sorry for you.

So when or if you feel up to continuing the debate on the subject you set, i'll reply, otherwise not.

Paul.L,

I ask again:

"Why did Stalin have any more right to entrust the fate of the people of Greece, Yugoslavia, Italy, etc. to Churchill than did Churchill have to entrust the fate of the people of Eastern Europe to Stalin?"

Paul.L wrote, "I can no longer waste my time discussing things with you if you cannot stick with the subject."

Why is the above question, as an example, not relevant to the subject? It a direct response to your statements which I quoted immediately before that question.

It seems to me that you are running away with your tail between you legs, because you have put your foot in your mouth and because I have shown that the case you are arguing is not supported by the evidence.

Paul.L wrote, "My views are fairly standard. You can read views like them in the Australian (this countries most respected newspaper) every day."

Yeh, right. Like support for privatisation of NSW's electricty assets which enjoys such widespread support from the NSW public.

Dagget,

Just the fact that you can't tell when you are going off on a tangent is illuminating.

Whether Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill had a right to carve up half the world is irrelevant to our central question which is " Was the Soviet Union ever expansionist.

If you can, I'd like to see just how exactly you think your question is relevant to that debate?

You say >> " I have shown that the case you are arguing is not supported by the evidence.

You have three times now ignored the evidence that I have brought forward regarding Brezhnev and Kruschev because they don't fit your position. Just blanked it. In fact you refuse to even discuss that topic and instead you have seen fit to bring up issues like Rumsfeld and the lightwater reactors, Who did the most violence in Korea, And whether I support the actions of the US during the cold war. The fact is none of these things are relevant to the debate, yet you cannot help throwing them in.

I think what happened is you didn't really think this all the way through, and you'd much rather talk about the excesses of the West.

Well just as soon as you acknowledege that the Soviet Union was expansionist during some of its existence we can move on to other things.

As you clearly don't read the Australian I can tell you that their editorial team do support the privatisation of electricity in NSW. Have a look.

They've been scathing of not just the labor idiots, but of the spinelss opposition as well. And before you trot out your figures again let me just say that this IS a debate which was shaped by the unions and by the opposition and the poor handling of the gov't. If it had been done properly there would not have been 70% opposition.

Paul.L,

I thought that the central question was:

"Was the subversion of democracy in the 'free world' necessary to fight the 'evil' of 'communism'?"

It is not:

"Was the Soviet Union ever expansionist?"

... or, for that, matter:

"Was the United Kingdom ever expansionist?"

... or:

"Was the United States ever expansionist?"

... or:

"Was Germany ever expansionist?"

... or:

"Was Japan ever expansionist?"

etc.

I ask again the question that you continue to dodge:

"Why did Stalin have any more right to entrust the fate of the people of Greece, Yugoslavia, Italy, etc. to Churchill than did Churchill have to entrust the fate of the people of Eastern Europe to Stalin?"

I asked this question because you have shown an astonishing disdain for the principle of self-determination. In your moral Universe, but not mine, a crime against self-determination by one of the two (or three) contending camps in the world justifies a crime by another.

Hence, in your moral universe, Stalin's crimes inside the Soviet Union and his treatment of Eastern Europe somehow gives a moral blank cheque to Western governments to commit whatever crime they deem necessary against any popular political movement in their "spheres of influence" - Greece, Yugoslavia, Chile, Vietnam, Iraq, Guatemala, Iran, etc.

If you had read my posts you would see that I don't reciprocate and don't attempt to excuse the crimes of Stalin, Kruschev, Brezhnev etc, by raising the crimes of Hitler or various other Western capitalist countries.