Right but it evokes the horrors committed by Nazis. Fascism is not just Nazis. It’s not just about killing Jews. It’s about murdering enemies with secret police, centralizing power to a few, etc. All of that existed in Lenin’s Russia. It could never be considered communism because the people never had power. Only Lenin and his cabal held the power to capture and redistribute wealth and power and most of that went to themselves. Fascism is simply a very period specific version of far-right authoritarianism with ultranationalism, strong use of military and secret police, etc. This is exactly what Lenin’s Russia was. Nazi’s weren’t even a blip yet, but fascism existed in several other countries already at the time and that’s the comparison I was using. Not comparing at all to Nazi’s specifically. Nazi’s were just an extreme implementation that ended up widening their enemy list and thus expanding their death camps more than Russia or Italy or the others.
Right but it evokes the horrors committed by Nazis. Fascism is not just Nazis. It’s not just about killing Jews. It’s about murdering enemies with secret police, centralizing power to a few, etc. All of that existed in Lenin’s Russia. It could never be considered communism because the people never had power. Only Lenin and his cabal held the power to capture and redistribute wealth and power and most of that went to themselves. Fascism is simply a very period specific version of far-right authoritarianism with ultranationalism, strong use of military and secret police, etc. This is exactly what Lenin’s Russia was. Nazi’s weren’t even a blip yet, but fascism existed in several other countries already at the time and that’s the comparison I was using. Not comparing at all to Nazi’s specifically. Nazi’s were just an extreme implementation that ended up widening their enemy list and thus expanding their death camps more than Russia or Italy or the others.