|
|
|
|
|
|
by beerandt
1716 days ago
|
|
|
>Let's not try to whitewash history. That's what you're doing by discounting what was a fairly popular political opinion of the time. >That's just not realistic. The Soviet army relied on its productive capabilities to wage war. None of that matters if you get hit with a Soviet first strike. The main goal wasn't to take out the conventional war machine, but the Soviet Nuclear capabilities. Counter force vs counter value. And this was before "Spheres of Influence" was accepted as a realistic possibility on either side, when the admitted Soviet policy was that communism had to be spread worldwide, even if it came to instigating war. So a first strike wasn't just thought possible, but expected. |
|
|
Yes, the US in the 1950s had a fairly high amount of absolutely insane but fairly popular political opinions. For example numerous generals were advocating massive nuclear strikes on North Korea and the dissemination of radioactive material on the border with China. That doesn't even begin to excuse anyone.
>None of that matters if you get hit with a Soviet first strike.
>The main goal wasn't to take out the conventional war machine, but the Soviet Nuclear capabilities. Counter force vs counter value.
The USSR had no ability to deal a debilitating first strike to the US.
>And this was before "Spheres of Influence" was accepted as a realistic possibility on either side, when the admitted Soviet policy was that communism had to be spread worldwide, even if it came to instigating war. So a first strike wasn't just thought possible, but expected.
This is nothing less than complete historical revisionism. By the 1920's the dogma of "socialism in one country" was official Soviet policy under Stalin. Anyone that disagreed that socialism only had to be realized in the USSR was contradicting the party line and subject to be purged at any moment. To be sure, the USSR still supported communist parties around the world, but it explicitly eschewed the invasion of countries to install communism, instead it would only be done if it was necessary to protect Soviet socialism.
The idea that communism had to be instigated by war around the world was Trotsky and co doctrine of "permanent revolution". Notably, the first was exiled and assassinated. This doctrine while in the early days relatively popular in the Party never came close to being the official position of the party.
See : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism_in_one_country