CamaradeBoina [comrade/them, any]

lmao sorry I missed it, the full version is way better

“nerves kicking in?” bouhahahaha

I think it might be this https://twitter.com/heelvsbabyface/status/1698457945711739062

Guy is an immense fucking baby

No worries at all, it’s really my pleasure. As you said, establishing nonemclature within its theoretical and academic context really goes a long way, otherwise it’s super easy to find oneself in a “dialogue amongst deafs`” (idk if it makes sense, it’s a saying in my first language), and everyone speaks past each other while assuming the worst from one another.

Really happy to hear that other hexbear users were patient too, and I hope you get to brush up on your Marx notes (and include the Lenin texts I linked you, being serious they are very important, Marx only ever alluded to what Lenin ended up theorizing about !)

I am referring to the Marxist-Leninist definition of the term, see these two texts: https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/ and https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1915/s-w/index.htm

To be clear its not some cooky ideologically driven fantasy, the marxist analysis of imperialism and subsequent impacts on geopolitical and international political analysis is a well recognized analytical and theoretical model in IR theory.

From that perspective “imperialism” does not predate capitalism. It does not refer to “empires” in the vague sense of “Roman Empire, French empire, etc”. The mechanics are vastly different. Aggressive expansion of feudal states in europe and their colonial expansion around the world (funnily enough that second one directly fueling feudalism’s demise, serving as the “primitive accumulation of capital” that allowed the emergent bourgeois class to gain gradual economic hegemony, and eventual state hegemony) is not the same as the form of imperialism that emerges out of the most “advanced” expression of capitalism). It’s understood as the monopoly stage of capital wherein bank and industrial capital merge, forming large scale monopolies, seeking new markets, and leading the state to engage in imperial plunder of less economically advanced states, and direct confrontation with other imperialist entities.

Furthermore, capitalism is positively not an “invention” nor is it dated to the 18th century ! Capitalism emerged organically from class struggle in the feudal period, with capitalistic elements emerging from within feudal society as early as the 15th century. It established itself as a dominant mode of production well into the 17th century in various areas of the world, but yes only fully superseded the feudal state structure and took control of the state as a whole in the 18th century. If anything was invented, it was the “word” for it, referring to what is an objectively observable scientific fact of human development (again, from the POV of marxist analysis, and its thesis of historical-materialism).

Yes it would be. A very strong argument can be made that Russia fits to a T the 5 conditions to be imperialist as set by Lenin. To note also that imperialism is NOT a policy decision, it’s an objective stage of capitalist development, any advanced or semi advanced state with its material base being capitalist will express variations of imperialist tendencies.

I would argue that while the thesis “the war in Ukraine is a provoked (by the west) interimperialist confrontation”, holds a lot of merit, it does fail to account sufficiently for the extent this war was provoked, for the remaining fact the western imperialist alliances and particularly the US, remain hegemonic af, and for the more minute analysis of the Russian economy. That being said, if Russia isn’t an imperialist state, it is at the very least an aspiring-imperialist one (and in certain regions very much already acts as one).

Regardless these two variations of analysis are FAR more accurate than those which aim to posit Russia as ANTI imperialist somehow, that one is just caricatural campist nonsense that isn’t rooten in an honest materialist analysis, and which echo a lot the (erroneous) thesis of “super-imperialism” that Kautsky put forward.

In all the above this doesn’t change the role of communists in the west tho: revolutionary defeatism, fight our own imperialists. It does raise question about those who go further and give concrete support towards Russia (an IMO very damaging position that harms anti-imperialist organizing here), and it does change the attitude for say, Russian and Ukrainian communists ought to have with regards to the war ( attitude being a choice between revolutionary defeatism or critical support).

Umm okay?

What tankie tears are you referring to? This entire post is everyone joking around and generally not giving a FUCK that a PMC far right oligarch got got.

Also you ARE aware that the vast majority of communist parties are not pro-Russia whatsoever right? That the “critical support to Russia” people are ultra minoritarian in the world communist movement, whereas the majority condemns BOTH NATO’s role since 2014 (and prior) in precipating the situation leading to the Russian invasion, AND Russia for well, invading? Some even saying this war is one of inter-imperialist competition or close to one? That there is no good side but that of seeking peace asap for the sake of the working class, given the possibility of turning this bourgeois war into a revolutionary class war in both Ukraine, Russia, and the west is impossible atm?

Slava Ukraini! Slava NATO!

Deeply embarassing behavior. It’s a war dude, not a sport match.

Brotherly peoples after all

One general dude got dismissed too today, it’s a belated consolidation of power IMO.

Let things chill from the “march on moscow”, get people complacent, wack hard.

What’s for sure is that Wagner is absolutely not going to open a “new front” from Belarus as things stand.

Let the speculation commence, one hypothesis is that said cleaning house is necessary for the preliminary steps to negotiations? After all, key NATO elements and some major western news have been hinted that the conflict can only end by negotiation. A key element to make that happen from the Russian POV is to get rid of their “rabbid dogs” like Wagner. They also cracked down last months on pro-insane escalation elements like ppl who were key to stage of conflict starting 2014, like Strelkov (who’s now jailed).

As far as I know no, it refers to a telegram channel operated by an ex-Wagner soldier. Unofficial Wagner news basically from what I gather. The Grey Zone aren’t connected.

From the reports its the entire high command that got merked on that plane sooooo…maybe nobody and Wagner get fully absored in the Russian armed forces, who is to say

The Kfls word should never be spoken

You are so lucky.

A comrade and I seriously considered getting a job at the local alcohol gov monopoly company to staff their depot and liberate some Russian Standard bottles that have been pulled off the shelf since the beginning of the war. It sadly didn’t materialize :(

There are many spots to get yankee cuisine tho! Burgers, fries, some (shudders) Quebecers even showed a hotel cuisine staff how to make poutine. Lots of that at the glorious water park, with beer in big ass glasses.

I hope our comrade defector however opens himself to the delights of Korean and North East Chinese cuisine, maybe have himself also some Russian off brand doshirak.

I’m pretty sure the Talibans (not to defend them, mind you), were already cracking down on poppy farming before 9/11 and the subsequent decade long war.

So how were they benefitting? Or do you mean to say the US and allied forces allowed mass poppy crop farming that was then utilized by the Taliban to fund itself? You know there is an alternative hypothesis: the US and other occupation allied forces tolerated poppy farming to pacify and win over tribal chiefs and keep corrupt Afghan officials squarely on their side. Maybe both were happening, who is to say.

Well I mean barring your personal dislike of the source, it does report an objective fact: opium cash crop farming exploded under the US / Joint alliance occupation and decade+long anti insurgency war, and died out once they left.

And this objective fact DOES raise important questions: what in the hell was the US doing all this time? They had infinitely more resources than the Talibans do now to subsidize non opium crops for farmers, to encourage diversification and development, etc. Did they turn a blind eye to the mass scale poppy farming? If so, why? It generated huge sums, was it a strategic use of and encouragement of corruption of local Afghan administrators and tribal elite to “make the occupation easier”? Did some money return to western elements? What was the impact on world trafficking?

Like you can dislike mintpress news but IMO it’s important to, now that the US/West occupation of Afghanistan is over, not swipe it all under the rug and investigate.

If you are in an IMCWP party or youth organization, and if your organisation hasn’t yet made direct (through formal statements) or more indirect (articles for mass party press organs for ex) statements, push for that.

I won’t necessarily say in what way certain parties give concrete help to the PCV due to the fact in many cases it involves “illegally” bypassing sanctions.

At a non organized level, keep yourself informed and don’t allow the likes of say, Ben Norton, in sapping international solidarity by him spreading absolute shameful lies on the situation.

It’s the PCV.

We can balance critical support for the PSUV against imperialist pressures while condemnig obvious and blatant ill founded anti-communist attacks by it in a context of more than questionable economic moves done in the past few years, putting as stake in the process several key elements of the bolivarian revolution.

Ben Norton is completely, absolutely, painfully wrong in these two tweets and is reaching serious anti-communist slanderous levels. There has been discussions on the issue for the past couple days, see my posts, and that of thelastaxolotl here: https://hexbear.net/comment/3719428

And there: https://hexbear.net/comment/3718791

The first tweet falsly accuses the PCV for “moving to the right” without instantiating it whatsoever. If anything PCV has moved TO THE LEFT as the PSUV moved to the right, especially starting 2018 when the ARP was created as a loyal left opposition against the objective neoliberal reforms done by the PSUV and the attacks it did on its once most steadfast left allies. Things soured even faster after that, especially once PSUV started openly collaborating with the right opposition and doing huge concessions to imperialism while attacking victories of the Bolivarian revolution. All that being said, defense of the PCV must go hand in hand with a steadfast opposition to ANY imperialist pressures on Venezuela. The allegations repeated by Norton without base about PCV being defacto pro imperialist are disgusting. Edit: One of his claim in the first tweet is also straight up manipulative. He says the “leadership was changed” and leaves it at that. What happened is the following: the PSUV went and made a group of non party members and long ex-party members to make a politically motivated judicial attack through the national electoral council to be given the leadership of the party. That means seizing the party logo, legal status, legal face, etc. A hijacking, directly helped by HIGH ranking members of the PSUV like Diosdado. The PCV like any communist party is governed via dem-cent, with the CC and the leadership elected by the membership at a central convention that happens every so years (3,4,5 are the usual years through communist parties the world over, as a rule of thumb). The convention also democratically decides the party lines and positions. The current leadership is abiding by what the mass membership wants, it so happens what the mass membership wants is to stick to Chavez, Bolivarianism, anti-imperialism, and the socialist reinforcement of the Bolivarian revolution. And the PSUV is not a fan TM, especially as it rolled down labour rights recently leading to working class protests.

The second tweet is IMO even MORE shameful: there Norton attacks the KKE, the PCM, and by extention the overwhelming majority of the IMCWP, and blatantly misrepresents their positions, the nuance in said positions, and their actions. To depict the KKE for example as pro Ukraine is single handedly enough insult to get beat up senseless in Athenes. The KKE in terms of opposition to NATO and the war did more than Norton could even dream of. When he is capable of mobilizing thousands to block (physically, via blockading trains) NATO arms shipments to Ukraine, mobilizing union workers to disrupt supply, maybe he can start flapping his glorified blogger’s mouth. He went full anti-communist in defense of…a social democratic government rapidly betraying the bolivarian process and attacking communists.

Ben here is flirting with Larouchites and various patsoc/right opportunist parties currently trying to hyjack the world communist movement through the ill named “World Anti-Imperialist Platform”. At the very least he shares their same pseeudo anti-imperialism that swings to support to bourgeois forces and opposes communist ones. It’s sus as all hell too. It’s also absolutely not Leninist.

And I say all that as someone who appreciates his work generally speaking. But those two tweets? Shameful, disgusting, gulag worthy big ass pack of lies. For much balanced news on this situation I would encourage checking out what has been said through the IMCWP, venezuelaanalysis, and Arropea (if u speak spanish).

Edit: if I can add, you can see for yourself the countless tweets responding to him pointing out how wrong his take is on this one, if not down right libelous. With sources and documents. It’s odd to repost his tweets as authoritative several days after him getting absolutely dogpiled by various communists from various parties, and as the PCV is receiving messages of support from the entire world communist movement as we speak. I don’t want to insinuate anything but as always, more investigation is better than a cursory one.

That is not true tho.

The PCV was one of the earliest and staunchest ally of Chavez. Things soured under Maduro when the PCV along several parties to the left of the PSUV made the ARP (a left alliance of revolutionary parties), which prompted faced repeated legal attacks by the Venezuelan state. Several parties in the ARP (like the Tupamaros/MRT) faced similar attacks by the PSUV but it never dared go after the PCV. Now that the situation is a bit eased on the domestic front, the right wing being largely defeated, and now that some sanctions are being lifted, and as the PSUV is making reforms that revert the Bolivarian revolutionary advances, it feels threatened on its left and is now trying to coopt/take over / illegalize the PCV.

It’s far more serious than previous disagreements IMO, the fact that the PCV is being called trot (lol) or right wing plants by key PSUV members is telling, its gotten real ugly this time.