This is an awesome analysis and I agree 100%. I’ve thought to myself before, it’s like the Soviets were playing a video game on Expert mode without ever having played the game before. They had to face impossible problem after impossible problem and I think they did well given the challenges they faced. I do take solace in the fact that for the first few centuries of capitalism, there were all sorts of failed revolutions. Changing the world is an incredibly slow process that is faced with both successes and defeats.
While I might be critical of someone like Stalin, I generally don’t find myself judgmental about a lot of the things he gets criticized for (except for the Purges, I think that was an own goal and not helpful and not something I just say in hindsight). There were so many problems they had to face, I know I would have fared a lot worse in those situations.
This is an awesome analysis and I agree 100%. I’ve thought to myself before, it’s like the Soviets were playing a video game on Expert mode without ever having played the game before. They had to face impossible problem after impossible problem and I think they did well given the challenges they faced. I do take solace in the fact that for the first few centuries of capitalism, there were all sorts of failed revolutions. Changing the world is an incredibly slow process that is faced with both successes and defeats.
While I might be critical of someone like Stalin, I generally don’t find myself judgmental about a lot of the things he gets criticized for (except for the Purges, I think that was an own goal and not helpful and not something I just say in hindsight). There were so many problems they had to face, I know I would have fared a lot worse in those situations.