this post was submitted on 31 Jan 2025
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Communism and fascism are entirely different, and conflating the two has roots in Double Genocide Theory, a form of Holocaust trivialization and Nazi Apologia. The Nazis industrialized murder and attempted to colonize the world, the Soviets uplifted the Proletariat and supported national liberation movements such as in Cuba, China, Algeria, and Palestine. I recommend reading Blackshirts and Reds.
If you look at the holodomor I think it's hard to continue painting the Soviet Union as having uplifted the proletariat. Soviets starved their people to achieve rapid industrialization - a tradeoff that most of those who died would probably not have agreed with. IIRC most historians say that collectivization was a horrible failure and was not good for the working class.
First hand accounts of life during stalinism make it clear that people had to develop weird mannerisms to avoid making it seem like they were disloyal/anti-party; basically everyone walking on eggshells all the time.
What most historians agree on is that the famine happened, and that collectivization was botched. Kulaks burning their crops and killing their livestock, rather than handing it over, certainly accelerated the issue. However, outside of World War 2, where the Nazis took Ukraine (the USSR's breadbasket), this was the last famine, and as such life expectancy doubled. I am sure that if anyone could go back in time and prevent the famine from happening, they would. The fact that famine went from common and regular to stable food supplies and no more going hungry is an important one.
Moreover, again, this is just one aspect of a country where the working class saw free, high quality education and healthcare, full employment, a dramatic lowering of wealth inequality with a dramatic raising in wealth, doubled life expectancy, lower retirement ages than the US from the State, women participating in the highest rungs of government, and more cannot be erased either.
Taken in total, again, there wasn't a country better for the working class in the 20th century, certainly none that did not owe part of their existance to the support recieved from the Soviets, like Cuba and China. There were many far worse, such as the US Empire and Nazi Germany, and the Soviets opposed both.
*there wasn't a country better for the working class that survived
Imo you can't just ignore all the people who died as a result of the rapid industrialization and collectivization. And how great is your life if you have to change everything about what you say and how you act just to appease party officials?
I don't want to ignore all the great things that happened during the Soviet era. I think you're right about better access to education and many of these other things, but there are so many asterisks.
I argue that the same things could have been achieved without collectivization and without so much political violence. Social support programs are great, but they should be available to everyone, regardless of how much you support the prevailing political party.
And just how sure are you that Stalin would have gone back in time to prevent the Holodomor? I'm unconvinced - it quelled an inconvenient uprising.
I am not ignoring collectivization. I am noting that it ended famine in a country that had regular famines. I believe collectivization could have been done better, but industrialization of farming had to be done to stop famine regardless, be it Capitalist or Socialist.
As for the hundreds of millions that got to live to their 70s vs dying in their 30s thanks to Soviet Policy, I think they were quite happy to not be dying en masse. They didn't have to change everything just to appease party officials.
As for whether or not these huge expansions in worker rights could have been achieved without Socialism, I believe the answer is no. The Soviets were the first to give such sweeping safety nets, and the Capitalist countries that expanded theirs did so in response as revolution became increasingly popular. Now that the USSR has fallen, these safety nets are eroding over time. Read Consessions. And yes, these were given to everyone, even immigrants without citizenship (including the right to vote if they worked there as well).
As for Stalin, here is archival evidence suggesting that he would rather not have had the famines happen. I'm not defending everything Stalin did, of course, but purely calling this point into question:
From: Archive of the President of the Russian Federation. Fond 3, Record Series 40, File 80, Page 58.
Excerpt from the protocol number of the meeting of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist party (Bolsheviks) “Regarding Measures to Prevent Failure to Sow in Ukraine, March 16th, 1932.
Letter to Joseph Stalin from Stanislaw Kosior, 1st secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine regarding the course and the perspectives of the sowing campaign in Ukraine, April 26th, 1932.
Letter from Joseph Stalin to Stanislaw Kosior, 1st secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine, April 26th, 1932.
Basically, the Ukranian Communists appeared to have tried to save face and lied about how bad the situation was, especially Kosior who tried to say the "rumors" of famine were false in the face of Stalin telling him to get his act together and do something, even sending supplies. You could chalk this up to fear of Stalin or whatever, but it seems pretty clear that Stalin was anti-famine.
How do you defend the "blacklisted" villages? I don't detect any remorse in the material you have cited, just concern over making sure his policies are being properly enacted. It seems pretty clear to me that Stalin considered the loss of life in Ukraine to be worth it in order to drive his agenda forward - why else would he have allowed policies that forbid farmers themselves from eating the food from the fields they tended? Why else would he have allowed policies keeping farmers from traveling for any reason? To ensure that they produced food for the rest of the union, which would focus on industrial output. You can argue that he was right - without such rapid industrialization, they almost certainly would have lost to the Nazis imo.
Also, don't conflate socialism with collectivism. I never said that the gains made in terms of education, life expectancy, etc. were possible without socialist policies. You can have socialism without collectivism/without stalinism. I think it's much better that way.
I don't need to defend every Soviet policy, nor do I try to. I can merely explain why they happened and wether it has been fairly judged or not in the west, and overwhelmingly that tends to be "not." My opinion on the Soviets is that they were overall the best, not that they never committed errors or crimes.
Either way, Blacklisting was originally a punishment meant to counteract resistance to collectivization, the Kulaks often intentionally killed their livestock and burnt their crops. The execution of Blacklisting was obviously more hit or miss.
As for Stalin's role, it seems clear to me that when collectivization was met with outright hostility from the semi-Capitalist kulaks, that his goal was to finish collectivization and try to prevent further famine, not intentionally killing people. You said it yourself, if collectivization did not complete after it was started, even more famine would have occured. I am not sure what should have been done, but I don't think Stalin looks like he would have chosen for famine to happen, more that if anything he would have rather had it go off without a hitch.
As for Socialism vs Collectivism, I don't know what you mean. Socialism is a Mode of Production, characterized by Public Ownership and Planning as being the primary force of an economy. It isn't synonymous with Social Safety Nets.
What in the everlasting embrace of god. Soviets, who - I'll admit - simply chose to work people to death painted as the good guys? The same soviets that starved, beaten and let people freeze to death? The same that put people in cattle wagons and rode them out to syberia in nothing more than clothes they had on their backs?
The USSR was perhaps the single most progressive movement in the entire 20th century. It was not free from flaw, of course not, but in total it was a massive leap forward for the Working Class not only within the Soviet Union, but its very existence forced western countries to adopt expanded social safety nets (along with the efforts of leftist organizers within these countries).
From a brutal, impoverished backwater country barely industrialized, to beating the United States into space, in 50 years. Mid 30s life expectancies due to constant starvation, homelessness, and outright murder from the Tsarist Regime, doubled to the 70s very quickly. Literacy rates from the 20s and 30s to 99.9%, more than Western Nations. All of this in a single generation.
Wealth disparity shrank, while productivity growth was one of the highest in the 20th century:
Supported liberation movements in Cuba, Palestine, Algeria, Korea, China, Palestine, and more. Ensured free, and high quality healthcare and education for all. Lower retirement ages than the US, 55 for women and 60 for men. Legalized, free abortion. Full employment, and no recessions outside of World War 2. Defeated the Nazis with 80% of the combat in the entire European theater. Supported armistice treaties that the US continuously denied.
The bad guys won the Cold War, and they did so by forcing the USSR to spend a huge amount of their resources on keeping up millitarily, as the United States had much more resources and could deal with it that way.
I'd have to challenge that "the bad guys won the Cold War" rhetoric. If the USSR was as successful as your argument claims, why did so many Soviet republics seek independence?
The answer is that most didn't seek independence originally. The referendum on the preservation of the USSR, shortly before its dissolution, wanted it to persist. in looking at Soviet Nostalgia, most say they were better off under Socialism than Capitalism and say the dissolution was a bad thing.
Moreover, it directly compares, say, the Soviet treatment of Estonia with the fascist slaver regime over Cuba that the Soviets helped overthrow, or the Israeli treatment of Palestinians via genocide. It equates what can't be equated. Further, that means that the US Confederacy should have been allowed to leave purely on the basis of wanting to. It's not a real point, it's cheap.
If you keep going with Blackshirts and Reds, it gets to the events surrounding its dissolution, such as the botched coup attempt, liberalization in order to try to make up for spending so many resources on the Cold War, and more, though not a full picture. If you genuinely want to know more after you finish Blackshirts, I recommend Parenti's 1986 lecture, which is even more entertaining because Parenti is a fantastic and passionate speaker. I'd throw on Do Publicly Owned, Planned Economies Work? as an additional articls, around 30 minutes to read, going over the merits of the Soviet Economy and why it was dissolved.
All of that is well and good, but not enough to say that the Soviets were the good side. It's also necessary to truly look at how disgustingly evil the United States is, and for that I recommend the podcast Blowback. If you listen to Blowback, there will be nothing but hatred and disgust of the highest order for the United States, from lying about WMDs to thoroughly destroy Iraq, to dropping more bombs on Korea than in the entire Pacific Front of World War 2, to countless war crimes intentionally done to make populations suffer and no longer support their governments just to make it stop.
Okay, so I've got a couple of issues with your response. First of all, the referendum only polled 9 out of the 15 republics. The other six boycotted it since they were already pushing for independence. Moreover, within months, nearly every republic declared full independence. If they truly didn't want to secede from the USSR, would they have declared independence?
Secondly, I don't think nostalgia is a good gauge of what people want. Individuals have a tendency to romanticize the past especially during hard times. For example, many citizens of African countries revel in reminiscing about the colonial era due to economic hardships faced today. Is that what they truly want? Probably not. It is usually due to poor knowledge of colonial history that they have these sentiments.
Furthermore, I'm well aware that the US is a despicable country, and my increasing knowledge about its history only fuels my hatred of it, but you're bordering on whataboutism if the standard for the most progressive movement of the 20th century is being "not as bad as the US" which is a pretty low bar.
Edit: You can't compare the confederacy - a slave-owning rebellion fighting to preserve human bondage to the soviet republics - nations seeking independence from an authoritarian superstate. If you really want to compare the USSR with the US civil war, it would be better to compare it to the 13 colonies fighting for independence from the British crown.
Besides, you still didn't address the core argument: If Soviet rule was truly beneficial, why did so many nations (at least 5) risk war and economic collapse to escape it?
The small few that were boycotting it each deserve more investigation than a single Lemmy comment thread. The simplest answer is that they had reactionary, sometimes fascist rising nationalist movements. It isn't sufficient to say that they boycotted it, therefore the USSR was evil, it's more accurate to say that it needs investigation. I can't do the intricacies of their nationalist movements any justice in a Lemmy thread other than telling you that they exist.
Secondly, yes, they did vote to leave months later. The mess with the botched coup, the existence of a weird new political position that stood against the Soviet balance of power in a way that messed up the economy (long story as well), and privatization had already been at play and came to a head months later. The USSR didn't collapse so much as it was killed.
As for Soviet Nostalgia, that's just the term. Look at the polling data, the questions specifically ask about economic situations or if it was bad that the Soviet Union fell. These numbers are more positive among older populations that actually lived there, times are harder now for most post-Soviet states. After the fall, an estimated 7 million people died due to the collapse of social safety nets and the destruction of the economy. Capitalism was and is disastrous for these nations, whose metrics are only just now approaching their Soviet Levels, such as life expectancy, while metrics like wealth disparity and poverty are massive.
What chapter are you on in Blackshirts? They get into almost all of this in deeper detail.
As for US bad, I'll ask you to name a more influential country than the US or the USSR during the 20th century. In terms of sheer impact, the USSR was by far the most progressive. The alternative? A genocidal Empire that tried to crush the Soviets at every chance, and ultimately succeeded. It isn't just a "low bar," the United States is perhaps the single most evil country to ever exist outside of Nazi Germany, and the Soviets opposed both.
So now Estonians, Latvians, Lithuanians, Ukrainians, Georgians, Moldovans, and Armenians suddenly became fascists? Idk, i feel this is a very dishonest take, but who knows what justification you have for this stance.
And yet Gorbachev and Yeltsin moved to swiftly reform or completely dismantle the system. Couldn't it be that they thought the system to be outdated? You do realize that the main reason many grew tired of the Soviet way of doing things was because of Deng Xiaoping's capitalist reforms putting pressure on the USSR to dissolve right?
So why haven't they tried to reinstate the USSR?
I'm well into the second chapter
This still has whataboutist undertones. The USSR also crushed uprisings (Hungary, Prague Spring), supported brutal regimes (Afghanistan, East Germany), and committed mass killings (Holodomor and the Great Purge).
This entire comment is you speaking quite confidently about situations you evidently do not know about. My advice is to not speak on subjects you only think you know about regarding US geopolitical enemies.
Again, I cannot give an accurate assessment of each of their nationalist movements in a Lemmy comment chain. I could point you to the heroization of Nazi collaborater Stepan Bandera in Ukraine, as an example, but that itself requires investigation. It isn't a dishonest stance, rather, I am telling you to do genuine research into these.
As for the Soviet Economy, I have already linked sources on why growth slowed towards the end and that it wasn't outdated. There were contributing factors like planning by hand rather than computerization, and focusing much of the GDP on millitarization, but ultimately the economy was stronger and grew faster than the current Capitalist system. Further, Deng didn't add "Capitalist reforms," he pivoted to a Socialist Market Economy. That in and of itself is a huge topic.
The Russians haven't re-instated Socialism because they are in a Capitalist Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie. Socialism needs to be achieved via Revolution, and that has a lot of requirements, especially considering current NATO encirclement is a constant threat where even if a Revolution occured, the same thing that happened in 1917 would happen, mass invasion by Capitalist countries to stop Socialism in its tracks (14 countries invaded Russia in 1917). Technically Belarus has a Socialist Market Economy still, and is generally doing much better than its neighboring countries that went full on into Capitalism.
As for Blackshirts, the next 3 chapters are perhaps the most important for this conversation. It goes over "left-anticommunism" in the west, the benefits and drawbacks of the Soviet System, and what led to its collapse (in Parenti's eyes). Honestly, if I were you I'd stop talking to people about the Soviets until you have finished the book, and taken the time to digest it, but if you have specific questions I can help.
The last chapters go over the devastation Capitalism brought to the USSR, which is also topical for this convo.
Back to "uprisings." Again, this is why you really shouldn't use topics you aren't aware of as points in your argument. In Hungary and Prague, both "uprisings" were US-Backed, involved mass lynchings of Soviet officials before the Soviets sent in the millitary, and were led by genuine fascists. In Hungary, for example, they even let out hundreds of Nazis from prison to assist with the slaughter of Soviets, and the Peasantry helped the Millitary put it down. As for the "mass killings," it isn't accurate to call a famine a "mass killing" rather than a huge tragedy, and further the Purges were in the vast majority of cases simply expelling from the Party, actual punishment was usually imprisonment. Execution was relatively rare in comparison.
If you genuinely do not know enough about an event, please, just don't speak on it.
Okay, i won't speak on things i don't know too well, i will however call out the blatant lies in your comment.
This is a lie! Deng explicitly introduced market reforms, privatization, and allowed foreign investment. If it wasn’t capitalism, why does China today have billionaires, stock markets, and private enterprise?
Another lie! The Stalinist purges killed millions. Denying this is blatant historical revisionism. Vasily Blokhin the chief executioner of the NKVD and one of the most prolific executioners in world history has more than 7,000 executions to his name. Are you denying this clear evidence? Also, don't get me started on the massive number of graves that were discovered
No, it is not a lie. Socialism is a Mode of Production characterized by Public Ownership and Planning as primary in an economy. Markets are not Capitalism. If you recall from Politzer's work, you can't look at structures as disconnected from the rest of their context and judge them accurately. Economies aren't 30% Socialist, 70% Capitalist, or anything like that. They can be 30% public, 70% private, but these factors are part of the same connected whole. The private interacts with the public at every step.
The United States is Capitalist because it is driven by Capital and the State supports that. The PRC is Socialist because it is driven by Public Ownership and planning, and markets support that. If you want yet another article, Domenico Losurdo's Has China Turned to Capitalism? Reflections on the Transition from Capitalism to Socialism is a good article on the subject. We can go in-depth about the PRC's economy if you want to, and why it's much better to categorize it as Socialist.
As for the Great Purge, I am not lying. My belief, based on archival evidence, is that Western historians often intentionally lie, such as Robert Conquest, that millions of people were killed, and that everyone purged was executed. The real character is that the vast majority were not killed, but simply expelled from the party, and of those sentenced to death, many were sent to the GULAGs for re-education and released later. This is backed up by archival evidence. The KGB's own internal records day 700,000 were condemned to death, and we know that many of those in the Soviet justice system condemned to death were instead rehabilitated in GULAGs. Even if all 700,000 were killed, this isn't millions, yet Robert Conquest reports 12 million killed.
I, very clearly, did not say that nobody was executed. Many were. However, those killed during the era of the Great Purge were often rapists (which was a crime sentenced to death at the time), murderers, and general spies and terrorists. The vast majority of those millions purged were not sentenced to death or executed.
That also doesn't mean everyone punished was guilty either. I am not defending the excesses of the Great Purge, but explaining that the idea of the Great Purge that exists in your head is likely far and away different from the reality of the situation. I think you did me a disservice by misinterpreting my claims. Moreover, a lot of the Purges from the party were entirely necessary, as the somewhat small but notable Trotskyists and Bukharinists were directly working to sabotage the Socialist system with assassinations, factory espionage, and more. I can't think of any situation where the correct answer would be to let that continue.
For the same reasons California or Texas keep entertaining independence ballot initiatives every 4 years; internal politics.
The USSR’s republics didn’t just debate independence, they actually left. If it was just “internal politics,” why did every non-Russian republic take the first opportunity to break away?
The Texas/California comparison is a weak false equivalence. The USSR suppressed nationalist movements (read on the Hungarian Revolution), while the U.S. allows open political discourse.
It's the only equivalency there can be between the two countries; unlike the Soviet Union, the United States was not formed by colonial absorbtion of neighboring nations. The closest thing there is, is the Mexican land grab in the 19th century and Europe has a long history of nationalist movements being suppressed, so the Soviet Union is not unique in that regard.
And, just like the USSR, the US has a track record of not allowing political discourse that threatens its hegemony; the Black Panthers, Pinochet, and Cuba are probably the most glaring examples.
You're deflecting. If the USSR was truly a voluntary workers' paradise, why did nearly all of its republics leave at the first opportunity? You’re avoiding that question by pointing to U.S. wrongdoing, but the reality is that Soviet republics didn’t just ‘entertain’ secession like Texas, they actively fought for it and succeeded.
Comparing minor secessionist sentiments in Texas to the complete collapse of a superstate is absurd.
Did they support liberation movements in Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Poland etc etc?
Bit of a cheap pivot, isn't that? Not all nationalist movements are good, many are highly reactionary, even fascist in nature. On the whole, Soviet foreign policy was cleary in the interests of the working class, from helping Cuban workers liberate themselves from the fascist Batista regime, to helping Algeria throw off the colonizing French, to helping Palestinians resisting genocide, to assisting China with throwing off the Nationalists and Imperialist Japan.
Moreover, it directly compares, say, the Soviet treatment of Estonia with the fascist slaver regime over Cuba that the Soviets helped overthrow, or the Israeli treatment of Palestinians via genocide. It equates what can't be equated. Further, that means that the US Confederacy should have been allowed to leave purely on the basis of wanting to. It's not a real point, it's cheap.
Really? Cheap pivot?
USSR walked into Poland to "save" it, shot it in the back, started massive executions of polish people, cooperated with Nazi Germany, stole most of resources, glorified brutalizing people, forced glorification of Lenin, made everyone stand for hours in lines to get basic products like flour or meat, made everyone distrust everyone because, their armies seen civilians as playthings with a little better approach to farm families...
I do not claim USSR had only bad influence. But there is no way in hell anybody who knows history can call them good guys. They had their own agenda.
And yeah, they marched against Nazi's and won, but when was that? Ah, yes, only after Nazis betrayed them and failed. From this point onward, it was great way to make other countries back off from USSR whille making sure Nazis - already weakened by failed invastion of USSR and constant war with UK, USA and rebels - won't be able to reorganize and strike again.
There's a lot of historical inaccuracy here.
Harry Truman had this to say:
Poland. The Nazis invaded Poland, and then the Soviets waited and tried to get the Western Powers involved. They did not, so weeks later the Soviets went in to prevent the Nazis from taking all of Poland. Of course, the Polish people saw the Soviets as aggressors, but at the time the Polish government had already collapsed, there remained nothing more than to be overtaken by the Nazis.
Social services. I think it's very silly to complain about feeding those who need it. There were stores, and there were farms as well, and to fill in the gap there were social services. The US has also had Bread Lines, this isn't an especially evil thing to do. Moreover, the Soviet Economy had stable and unceasing growth until its dissolution, outside of World War 2, despite having 50% of dwellings destroyed by the genocidal Nazis.
No idea what you mean by "made everyone distrust everyone."
Again, the Soviets and Nazis hated each other from day 1. Read Blackshirts and Reds, you only need the first couple of chapters in an already short read.
Checked with my friend and checked few other sources on this. Friend, who studied history, knew about these - other articles also mention that such tries were held, and the Nazi hate towards communists is known to me, however the reason why it failed is different for each point of reference I have so I am unsure what to make out of it. Still, learned something new. Thanks.
Western Powers did, in fact, take offense. But it was too little, and Poland fell quicker than anticipated. Also, Polish goverment didn't collapse so wtf are you talking about - it went into hiding but was still very much active. And it's kinda hard not to see Soviets as aggressors when they also attacked and massacred Polish side and were comfy enough to, after "freeing" land on their way to Warsaw, just sit outside it and wait for Nazis to do their cleanses. -.-
Feeding those who need it? That's why people died of hunger under USSR? Yeah, in Russia they took care about theirs. Every country other than Russia was, however, at best ignored, at worst plundered. And yeah, there were stores - famously empty stores. I heard about them from my family members, about the lines, waiting whole day, about exchanging goods for favors among people. Also, I am not from US and trust me, I am not seeing them as paragon of virtue either.
People were incentivised to basically snitch on each other for any and all hints of not following what the "glorious" USSR wanted. So it was common that people used them to go higher in standing or get what they wanted. Especially folk who liked the newfound power that USSR granted them over their neighbours.
I know they hated each other and never said otherwise. But they cooperated to fuck everyone else. Only after Nazis attacked USSR, did USSR move against Nazis.
I encourage you to dig deeper, western countries had business ties with the Nazis and did not want to ruin that.
I need to know more about what you mean by "slaughtering Polish people." Seriously, the way the Soviets and the Nazis treated the Polish was night and day different. The Polish government had abandoned the Polish people, that counts as a collapse just like Assad fleeing Syria counts as a collapse.
Mass Starvation ended in the USSR outside of World War 2, following collectivization. There was common famine in the Tsarist Russia, and this continued until collectivization. Here's CIA intelligence saying as much. Again, I am not going to dock the Soviets any points for feeding its people, rather than letting them starve like they do in the US.
Without concrete examples of what you are talking about, I don't really know what to say. It's a fact that Western countries tried numerous times to infiltrate and destabilize the USSR, which has just as much responsibility for said Paranoia.
No, they did not cooperate. They signed a Non-Aggression pact to bide time until the inevitable war between them. The Nazis killed their allies in Germany immediately, fascism and Communism are immortal bitter enemies. Read Blackshirts and Reds.
I admit I had to learn more about USSR during our convo. And however much I hate admitting this, it would me insincere of me to not admit USSR had more sensible politics internally than I thought when it comes to food. They were, however, still insanely brutal and sadistic regime while dealing with anything comparable to opposition to their goals. So yeah, thanks for broadening my horizons, but please never state USSR was in any way or form good guys. They massacred, murdered, invigilated and abused, not unlike Nazis, at least in Poland.
Katyn is debated, actually. There were Nazi bullet casings that predated any chance for the Soviets to come accross them, children were included in the victims (something the Nazis did regularly and was practically unheard of for the Red Army), and the bodies were stacked in a manner the Nazis were known to do. As for the Polish government, I wouldn't say it "tried its hardest." The results were clear the second the Nazis set foot on Poland, either all of it would go to Nazi Germany or some would go to the Soviets if they got involved.
1946 was a direct result of World War II, surely the year can tell you that alone, right? The Nazis scorched and burned everything they could, 50% of housing was destroyed by their genocidal invasion. Food stabilized as they built back.
Fair enough.
As for your closing paragraph, I recommend you read Blackshirts and Reds. The Nazis and the Communists are in no way comparable, and doing so originates with Double Genocide Theory, a form of Nazi Apologia and Holocaust Trivialization. Out of all the major world powers, the Soviets were by far the best and most progressive, and it isn't close. From Nazi Germany inventing industrialized murder and trying to colonize the world, to Britain intentionally starving 4 million Bengalis, to French colonialism of Algeria, Vietnam, and more, to US colonization of Cuba, genocide against Palestinians, Koreans, Iraqis, Vietnamese, and working directly with the Nazis before and after World War 2, and more, the Soviets were consistently the most progressive and most correct.
Soviets also played a big role in helping India achieve independence which is one major reason why relations between India and Russia are so good to this day. https://actofdefiance.wordpress.com/2022/09/05/soviet-support-for-indian-independence/
I don't think it's a cheap pivot at all. If you want to say "look at all these places where the people there wanted freedom!" While completely ignoring that they were violently surpressing those same scenarios within their own annexed territories? That's just willful blindness.
How familiar are you with, for example, Estonian nationalism? How familiar are you with its treatment within the USSR? These were not at all the same conditions as, say, Algeria.
My grandmother died in a Siberian labour camp for being an academic.