Cowbee

The Kronstadt rebels arrested the communists, because false rumors were spread about Communists killing workers and strike leaders. The Bolsheviks were led by Lenin, though Trotsky was in charge of Kronstadt. The rebellion was suppressed as it began, violently, until the rebels turned on the fascists and rejoined the Communists.

You aren't doing any material analysis, just vibes and idealism. You ignore all context.

And I'm suggesting to you that the entire context of the situation gave no chance of that. The rebels had arrested and silenced the Communists in their area, and they were led by a fascist. Again, as I said, had this been at peacetime in a fully solidified USSR, where the Communists held a large enough power difference to enable such a trial or hearing, then that would be a different manner. Referring to Konstadt specifically, of course. Additionally, at Kronstadt, the rebels stepped down and arrested the leaders of the revolt, and were fine.

The fact is, the Anarchists had their own ideals they felt valuable enough to fight Communists to the death over. Either you're defanging and making useless the Anarchists as useless smol beans, or you're misrepresenting them as strong yet entirely in agreement with the Communists, neither of which is true. The reality of the situation was Civil War, where multiple sides fought for their own interests and ideals, the Anarchists were in no way a neutral faction.

Anarchists occupy houses, forests and land to try and live their ways.

Yes, this is what I mean. What you refer to as "building out of the shell of the old," Marxists would see as trying to abolish the state overnight, as though you can directly achieve Anarchism simply by getting more people to agree with it. It isn't literally overnight.

They build parallel structures in the here and now that have the potential to be the thing after the revolution

This is largely the same mechanism Marxists suggest, the entire idea of "Dual Power."

You seem quick to point out what you feel is a strawman against Anarchism, but make no effort to respond to my counter to what I believe to be a strawman against Communists, the "strong leader" idea, or the "ends justify the means" idea. I'd at least appreciate acknowledgement.

Yes and no, Anarchists believe they can do away with the State overnight. Crucially, what Anarchists consider a state and what Marxists consider a state are not the same. Anarchists see states as representations of hierarchy, while Marxists see the state as a tool for class oppression, depending on who is in charge.

The Communist strategy is not to "wait for a leader," it's to build up the productive forces rapidly so that economic democracy can be achieved.

Have you read Marx, Engels, Lenin? Even if you don't plan on agreeing with them, I think it would be useful for you to know what Communists actually believe. I can make a short reading list if you want.

The majority are Marxists on this community, there are other Anarchist communities.

No. Anarchists believe in the unity of ends and means, and Communists believe you can't establish Communism through fiat and have to actually build it.

"Tenth Congress of the Russian Communist Party, in April, 1921, at which Lenin declared open and merciless war not only against Anarchists but against “all petty bourgeois Anarchist and Anarcho-Syndicalist tendencies wherever found. It was then and there that began the systematic, organised, and most ruthless extirmination of Anarchists in Bolshevik-ruled Russia. On the very day of the Lenin speech scores of Anarchists, Anarcho-Syndicalists, and their sympathisers were arrested in Moscow and Petrograd"

Yes, after the previous events had happened. Ie, the millitant Anarchists had been fighting against the Comnunists. It was a Civil War, and Anarchists opposed the Communists. Had the Anarchists won against the Communists, perhaps some Marxists would be making the same argument that you're making, that the Communists were innocent and the big bad Anarchists repressed them, and they would be equally guilty of misframing the context of a civil war. Again, many Anarchists joined the Communists, the ones who didn't stood violently opoosed to them.

All i said is that i wouldn't consider heroic lenin involvement in the Kronstadt rebellion which was suppressed with blood. You praising repressive methods that resemble that of fascists has bigger implications if you ask me.

Is it fascist to be antifascist? You have an uprising led by a fascist in the middle of a Civil War, and you're siding with the fascist? Or do you think the Communists should have let the fascist-led anticommunist rebellion continue in the middle of a civil war?

In all this time, you're specifically quoting Bolsheviks Shooting Anarchists, without any added context or framing. You're suggesting that the Communists were simply evil people killing peaceful anarchists well into the USSR, and not in the context of armed conflict in the middle of a civil war where 14 capitalist nations had invaded them. It's a myopic and idealist, rather than materialist, framing of history.

Some of them were fighting against a government that engaged "anarchists" in this fashion: "the Communist Government attacked, without provocation or warning, the Anarchist Club of Moscow and by the use of machine guns and artillery “liquidated” the whole organisation"

The Communists fought against the Black Guards, a millitant organization that was anti-bolshevik, after the Cheka believed them to be planning a major strike against the Communists. These were not simply random, innocent Anarchists reading theory and making tea, but a millitant organization opposed to the Communists in the middle of a Civil War.

You claim Lenin to be your hero from history so i asked your thoughts on his involvement in the Kronstadt rebellion which was suppressed with blood. It's the first example that came to my mind of one of his shady actions that i personally wouldn't consider heroic.

For clarity, this implies you would have supported the fascist-led rebellion in the middle of a Civil War, while Russia was being invaded by a dozen Capitalist nations. I hope I am misinterpreting your words here.

I answered. The vast amount that Lenin contributed to Marxist Theory and his vital role in creating the first Socialist State, which uplifted hundreds of millions of people and supported numerous anti-colonial and anti-imperialist movements the world over, is absolutely worthy of praise. He managed to contribute meaningfully to Leftist theory and put it to practice.

The subset of Anarchists that decided to fight the world's first Socialist State, rather than join the other Anarchists in supporting it, were certainly not innocent, as proven by high-profile leaders being aligned with the fascist White Army.

I just find it disingenuous that you use Lenin's indirect involvement with suppressing a rebellion led by a fascist against a newborn Socialist state during the Civil War it was still solidifying its existence to be disingenuous. What was your purpose in asking? "Just asking questions?" If I am mistaken, please let me know.

Interesting to hear the Anarchist's perspective, still doesn't change my analysis. The Anarchists weren't simply "true leftists" and the bolsheviks "fake leftists," they disagreed entirely on Marxism vs Anarchism and as such some Anarchists decided to take up arms against the Communists. It's a complicated situation, but it's also important to note that many Anarchists joined the Bolsheviks, it wasn't a case where 100% of Anarchists detested the Marxists.

If I were to be equally as disingenuous, I would ask you your feelings on Stepan Petrichenko, who tried to join the fascists and succeeded in joining the fascists after failing to overthrow the Communists during the Kronstadt Rebellion. I won't, though, because that's pointless. I suggest you read accounts from the Marxists as well as the Anarchists, the Marxists were not guilty of failing to be Anarchists because they never intended to be.

Even if the ideals of the rebellion were founded in good intentions, fighting against the newborn Socialist State played into counter-revolutionary hands and aided the fascist White Army in the middle of a brutal civil war. The Anarchists placed ideals over material reality in this instance. It was also led by Petrichenko, who one year prior tried to join the White Army, and joined the White Army after the rebellion failed and the sailors turned on the rebellion.

Had it been a time of peace with no internal or external pressure and the same measures employed, my feelings would be different on the matter, but the facts are that the stated aims and the methods employed by the rebels were at direct contradiction in the middle of a civil war.

It's not like Lenin hated Anarchists especially, Kropotkin was given a large State funeral and the largest rail station, Kropotkinskaya, was named after him. The Kronstadt Rebellion also factored in the transition between War Communism into the NEP.

Lenin, architect of the first successful Socialist revolution and state.