Hey Lara! I really liked this post on the anti-alcohol campaign. It really goes to show the harm in punitive operations to try and re-tailor society, when in fact society and its broader people will just go ahead and do things anyway, abortion, alcohol production, etc, which makes sense why they should all be legalized so people have easy access and safe revenues to it. Definitely not Gorbachev’s best idea while in power.
Author: ajmal1917
Comment on Why Afghanistan? by ajmal1917
I definitely agree that Afghanistan represented a potential source for economic turn around and power for the USSR, but not in a way that would function the same as western imperialism in the past, or today. One thing I’d also caution against is the insertion of Babrak Karmal as party leader akin to America creating sovereign leaders to prop up authoritarian neoliberal governments (look to Chile’s Pinochet), but because the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan was a rotten factional nightmare that the Soviets were trying to stabilize.
Initially, the PDPA led the Saur revolution, a bloodless one with a mass, democratic mandate from workers and peasants throughout Afghanistan, but as factionalism developed due to an underdeveloped party taking power in a stage that could hardly even be called embryonic is what led to their disarray. Just like the RSDWP, the PDPA had two main factions, except they were draw on the lines of industrial proletariat (parcham) and rural peasantry (Khalq) intead of their interpretations fo Social Democracy. With the often destructive Khalq faction undermining what was won in revolution, it made sense why the USSR did what they did. Unfortunately, the Saur revolution wasn’t led by Lenins, Trotskys, Sverdlovs, etc. Their revolution was led by brash academics with a poor understanding of Marxism, unequipped with the knowledge needed to fight strategically within the party, and outside of it too. As Goethe once said, in order to possess something, you must not just initially win it, but win it over and over again- what the Bolsheviks had done with their base to regain support and trust, even through some of their failures, the PDPA ignored as soon as Saur happened.
Comment on Death and Dissolution by ajmal1917
It really is, especially thinking about what could’ve been.I think what’s been glossed over in history, especially for us in America, is how there would be no mujahideen, the progenitor for the Taliban, without American funding and CIA backed operations. Religious extremism was only born from providing arms and weapons to reactionaries, using Islam as a weapon for right-wing beliefs and ideologies. On top of providing weapons, providing political education and propaganda to them was also a powerful tool in changing the discourse and mindsets within Afghanistan. The Mujahideen are often seen as this resistance from below, when in actuality, were an American proxy for regime change per usual.
Comment on Death and Dissolution by ajmal1917
Hi Lily!
I definitely agree with the parallels shown through this war and the Vietnam war for many Americans. I also agree with hindsight being 20/20, and I think that for many people in the Soviet Union, it might’ve appeared as somewhat of their continuity into a new decade, but as time went on and prevailing moods took place, I’m sure that many Soviets knew that something had to change, but just not sure what that would be.
Comment on Death and Dissolution by ajmal1917
Thanks, Austin! It definitely has been a sort of centerpiece for capture by other countries, and while one can marvel at how it’s impressive or what have you about it’s usual inability to be captured, it’s a true shame and highlights the darkest of humanity expounded through colonialism, imperialism, and the two as functions within capitalism’s history.
Comment on Life After Lenin by ajmal1917
Hey, Lily!
I definitely agree on the leadership part. I think that the quality and temperance of the leadership is often what makes or breaks the success of revolutions, even if initially successful, like the October revolution and Russian Civil War. As great as the Bolsheviks were as strategists and organizers, especially in prevailing in the hardest of times, it was unfortunate that their winning streak lasted so long before the degeneration that we saw with Stalin consolidating party power. As Trotsky once quoted Goethe in polemic- “In order to truly possess something, you must win it, over, and over again.”
Comment on The First Five Year Plan, Collectivization, and the Kazakh Famine by ajmal1917
Hey Mark! I think one of the most tragic things that occurred was the rapid collectivization, and especially in kazakhstan that we went over for class. A shame that Stalin chose to ignore people’s warnings not to collectivize some of these places, and especially at a rate that bukharin warned against even though he also advocated for socialism in one country.
Comment on Saying Yep to the NEP by ajmal1917
Hey Joey! I think you did well in highlighting the contradictions of the NEPmen and NEP itself, but the conditions that forces the new soviet government to have to relinquish not yet fully nationalized industry. An unfortunate scenario, but an understandable consequence of not entering socialism from an already established capitalist economy
