Is it possible that the gulag was nothing other than the inevitable result of society organized along purely materialistic lines? Soviet style communism was certainly not "rational", but only in retrospect. It seemed perfectly rational, reasonable to people like Henry Wallace and many others, after all. Why is it that only those who believe they are guided by pure reason, and muddle headed utopians of course, fell for it then and are still attracted to such schemes? Is it possible that the rationalist/materialist mind set of social engineers, planners and statists might just be less than perfectly reasonable? In a strictly materialist universe, what stops the objectification of human beings, other than the promise that this time things be different?

I've heard it said, but only by the materialist/rationalitst, that the tragedy of 20th century totalitarianism has had its run and we are somehow immune to its re-occurance. In the light of history such faith seems questionable at the very least.

The whole problem for the left with the gulag was that an admission of failure meant that something had to follow. And what was that something going to be? Resolution, determination, proclamation - not on your life. Very few leftists turned that way, because it required too much. Not only the loss of Shangri-La, but a transfusion of moral courage. That was asking too much.

The people who still cling to the myths about Alger Hiss and yellow rain = bee feces are of the same stripe. Except now they are reduced to defending Saddam Hussein and Robert Mugabe. Pathetic.

Applebaum is dead wrong about one thing: I am happy to admit that we defeated one mass murderer with the help of another. Furthermore, I am grateful that the other mass murderer did most of the heavy lifting.

There were others, now dead, who agreed with me. Churchill, for one.

One reason practical people tended to shrug at the massacres in Russia in the '20s and '30s by the Reds was that they also had before them the massacres of the Whites.

If an American didn't like the company of mass murderers, he pretty much had to become an Isolationist, which, of course, many Americans did.

Tom has neatly -- though not very persuasively -- explained why Reds kill. But Whites killed with equal freedom, and materialism would not explain that. Or would it, Tom?

The anti-bolsheviks and other more sectarian interests never pretended to be ruled by "reason". They valued custom and traditional institutions.They were ethinic, religious or nationalist killers in response to the revolutionary forces. Rationalism/materialism was intended to free humankind from such ignorant violence. Uhh.. Didn't quite work out that way. t As they say, the cure was worse than the disease. I think even Harry can agree regardless of the history of Jesus' Chinese brother. 100 million daed within 80 years is tough to beat.

Churchill was, of course, wrong as he was forced to immediately admit when he got us into the Cold War.

Even today, if one doesn't like the company of mass murderers, a lot of real estate on this planet is suddenly off-limits. But isolationism only works while someone else is being eaten.

I have often wondered where the bomb would have been dropped if Germany had either defeated Russia, or at least kept some sort of stalemate east of Poland.

The bomb was designed to be dropped on Germany, presumably Berlin at first.

In all the documents, I've never seen the question even raised about what to do if the USSR were no longer in the fight. By the time the bomb was known to be doable, the probability that Russia would stop fighting was nil.

Tom, I do not agree at all. You are mesmerized by big numbers, but proportionately they were small.

To take it out of the realm of communism/anticommunism, no battle had more impact on the mind of Britons and the Commonwealth nations than the Somme, where there were 60,000 casualties (20,000 dead) in one day.

But that was only a third of the men in action that day and only a few percent of all the men in the Fifth Army that day.

There were plenty of earlier, smaller battles in which the kill rate was much higher -- up to 100% at Khartoum.

The proportional killing ratio of White terror compares very favorably with that of Red.

Attempting to make a point by comparing death in combat with civilian deaths caused by state-sponsored and ideologically driven famine and slave labor is wacky.

The point is that some people -- you, for example, and people who want to reform campaign spending -- tend to become mesmerized by big numbers in big arenas, without realizing that small numbers in small arenas may actually represent the more intense experience.

White Terror in Hungary was as murderous as Red Terror anywhere. So what's the real diffence?

There is none.

Harry

The difference? About 99.5 million or so, but then I am mesmerized by big numbers.

The purpose of the Terror, obviously. That's why bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki is different than raping Nanking.

Harry-

You're response regarding mesmerization by large numbers and large arenas vs. small numbers and small arenas and experience intensity is, frankly, a load. The unique thing about Maxist/Leninism is the intensity of the mayhem inflicted on civilian populations by their own gov'ts under the rationalist pretense of creating a perfect society. I believe Lenin stated that such a society could be built, minus the profit motive, with an army of bookeepers. The notion that logical, reasonable objections to his plans could possibly exist aside from the class based objections of the evil bourgiosie or kulaks never entered his imagination.

Soldiers dying on the field of battle is a bit different, agreed?

You missed the point, so I dropped it and substituted one that did not involve many soldiers.

Red Terror was not demonstrably more murderous than White.

It did have a bigger arena, but a shorter run.

More people have been murdered in the name of religion than of scientific materialism.

But Red Terror was wrong and White right.