If you're interested in my position I outlined it pretty fully here. After you've read that if there's anything you want to bring up I'm happy to go from there.
But the fact remains you can't call chapo.chat a "left unity" website which censors "sectarianism" then leave up posts that say "something nice" about Trotsky was that he engaged in the mass murder of hundreds of thousands of anarchists, their families, and anyone who ideologically supported them.
If Makhno's bands were murdering communists & wanting to keep the ossified kulak class structure intact, then they definitely weren't leftists at all
Again, we can't just lionize & write hagiographies for Makhno just because we believe rabid anti-communist lies about USSR
Makhno's fighting against Denikin & the Black Hundreds can be commended, but we can't fall over ourselves thinking that anti-communism is leftism, nor that Makhno was a principled leftist just because he represents an idealized imagined world where the Bolsheviks didn't win the Civil War
Yes, I read what you wrote, and outside of you not really referencing any real scholarly information or credible resources, I can't really agree with anything you've written there, especially the last part where you say that Makhno did nothing wrong, I really have to disagree
You reference Arshinov, which really isn't a credible resource at all. Arshinov is just writing an effusive fanfic, not a sober or even-handed treatment of this history. I've rehashed this information plenty of times too, and I can go point-by-point if you want. You haven't really offered any new information, and to be honest, your unwillingness to respond in good faith tells me everything I need to know
"Nestor Makhno certainly perpetrated numerous counter-revolutionary exploits. His secret police tortured and murdered many communists. His Ukrainian peasant followers committed frequent pogroms against Jewish petty shopkeepers and merchants… Ukrainian peasant antagonism to the overwhelmingly Russian and Jewish working class of the Ukrainian cities… . Grigorev had the worst record of murder, rape, torture and other atrocities committed against Jews of all the peasant bandit leaders ravaging the Ukrainian country-side during the Russian Civil War.
This alliance ended badly for Grigorev. Makhno murdered him, and Grigorev’s peasant followers joined Makhno’s rebel army—but continued to commit pogroms.
Makhno himself was not personally anti-Semitic, indeed there were Jews in his “collective.” In a sense, it could be said that Makhno was simply following anarchist principle. If his secret policemen were torturing prisoners, and if his peasant followers were committing pogroms, what right did Makhno, as just one member of the “collective,” have to object?"
Now, about your statement that Makhno's bands did nothing wrong. Does that include the Pogroms or no?
"The National Secretariat of Ukrainian Jews’ stated during the period of the pogroms: “A special place is held for the actions of the Makhno bands which waged complete destruction in the Yekaterinoslav-Pavlograd region.”
The journal `Reshumot’ (1920) refers to: “the well known wild animal Makhno who was known for his cruelty and his army which was drunk with blood.”
`Jewish Agriculturalists in the Steppes of Russia’ (Israel 1965)’ states:" The Jewish colonies in the Yekaterinoslav province were situated in the centre of activity of the anarchist bands, Makhno. Almost all the colonies of Yekaterinoslav suffered from attacks. All the inhabitants of the colonies Trudoliubovka and Nechaevka, who numbered 1000 people - were murdered. The property was looted completely and since then no Jewish foot has entered those colonies."
Even Trotsky points out Makhno’s rhetorical position vs. the reality of his armies’ actions "“Without a doubt, Makhno provided de facto aid to Wrangel, as well as to the Polish gentry, since he fought at the same time as they did against the Red Army” (translated from “Makhno and Wrangel,” 14 October 1920, Kak vooruzhalas’ revolyutsiya [How the Revolution Armed], Vol. 2, Book 2 [1924]). "
Again, touting some alternate history about Makhno just because you believe anti-communist lies about USSR or fetishize the Makhnovists' banditry & destruction isn't leftism in the least
I'm sorry you can't agree with my serious and scholarly conclusion of
Anyway, I realise I’ve written a lot of words. I hope you read and get something out of the as I doubt anyone else will.
In conclusion
BORN TO DIE
CURRENCY IS A FUCK
Kill Em All 1917
I am bandit man
410,757,864,530 RED FASCISTS
Mahknov did nothing wrong.
Thanks for reading 😊
😔
Nevertheless I will stand by by because I think it's funny and I enjoyed typing it.
My actual thesis, was that Trotsky and the Bolshevik's narrow definition of "the working class" and "proletariat" as being exclusively wage labourers and explicitly not including the peasantry who they defined as being "inherently reactionary" and needed to be subjugated by terror to install a dictatorship of the "proletariat" was an unmitigated disaster in regions, such as Ukraine, whose population was over 80% peasants and <5% wage labourers.
On the pogroms stuff, again,as you said, institutionally, the Mahknovist Black Army was not Anti-semitic. They frequently condemned the whites on the basis of their anti-semitism, citing it as a reason they could never make common cause, and had a lot of jews in their command structure. Were individual Mahknovists anti-semitic? Yeah, almost certainly, it was 1917. Was that reflected by targetting jews disproportionately when they purged the bourgoisie and aristocrats in the cities they took? In some cases, yeah, almost certainly. But the Black Army didn't engage in Pogroms any more than the Bolsheviks did and it's disingenous to pretend they did. Like, come on, the thing you quoted even specifies that it was jewish "merchants and shopkeepers". Is there perhaps another word for that? One maybe starting with a B?
But all of that is kind of besides the point. The fucked up shit Trotsky and the Red army did wasn't fighting the Black Army. It was the mass forced conscriptions and the mass executions of the friends and families of anyone who resisted or "deserted". That, alongside the Bolsheviks blunt refusal to allow the peasants to redistribute land and negotiate the sale of their produce on a collective basis (y'know, seize their means of production and own the fruits of their labour) and insistence instead, that they keep working their old lords fields and give the grain to the Bolsheviks, and again, policy of executing not only anyone who resisted this but also their families and supporters that kept the peasant revolutions going.
The USSR accomplished some wonderful things, but they shouldn't have done what they did to the Mahknovists.
I don't agree with most of what you've written about Makhno. And it's a shame that you stand by it even knowing that Makhnovists were murderers & anti-leftist pogromists
The peasantry were included in the poor & working classes supporting the Reds, literally the sickle represents the peasantry, and the bourgeois fancy lad Menshevik Trotsky isn't reflective of who actually identified with the Reds.
Actually the Red Army didn't engage more in pogroms than did the Black Army, and the Red Army conscripted specifically among Jewish communities far more than any of these other groups did
" A delegation from Novozlatopol once went to Machno [sic] to discuss his raids against the Jews. Machno’s reply was “What can I do ? They’re just a bunch of ignorant peasants”, referring to his own men.”
Is that your idea of Makhno "condemning" the anti-Jewish murders among his ranks?
Black Army isn't to be lionized. Makhno is beatified in a way comporting with Western anti-communism, not in a historically or functionally accurate manner
If Makhno had maintained his obligations and continued the fight against imperialism where and when he was needed, I think that the situation would've been far different
I've had this argument before too many times.
If you're interested in my position I outlined it pretty fully here. After you've read that if there's anything you want to bring up I'm happy to go from there.
But the fact remains you can't call chapo.chat a "left unity" website which censors "sectarianism" then leave up posts that say "something nice" about Trotsky was that he engaged in the mass murder of hundreds of thousands of anarchists, their families, and anyone who ideologically supported them.
If Makhno's bands were murdering communists & wanting to keep the ossified kulak class structure intact, then they definitely weren't leftists at all
Again, we can't just lionize & write hagiographies for Makhno just because we believe rabid anti-communist lies about USSR
Makhno's fighting against Denikin & the Black Hundreds can be commended, but we can't fall over ourselves thinking that anti-communism is leftism, nor that Makhno was a principled leftist just because he represents an idealized imagined world where the Bolsheviks didn't win the Civil War
Again, I wrote 2000+ words on this in the post I linked.
If you want to have this discussion with me please read that first to see where I'm coming from.
If there's something in there you want to respond to I'm happy to go from there but I'm not down to rehash a whole lot of shit.
Yes, I read what you wrote, and outside of you not really referencing any real scholarly information or credible resources, I can't really agree with anything you've written there, especially the last part where you say that Makhno did nothing wrong, I really have to disagree
You reference Arshinov, which really isn't a credible resource at all. Arshinov is just writing an effusive fanfic, not a sober or even-handed treatment of this history. I've rehashed this information plenty of times too, and I can go point-by-point if you want. You haven't really offered any new information, and to be honest, your unwillingness to respond in good faith tells me everything I need to know
"Nestor Makhno certainly perpetrated numerous counter-revolutionary exploits. His secret police tortured and murdered many communists. His Ukrainian peasant followers committed frequent pogroms against Jewish petty shopkeepers and merchants… Ukrainian peasant antagonism to the overwhelmingly Russian and Jewish working class of the Ukrainian cities… . Grigorev had the worst record of murder, rape, torture and other atrocities committed against Jews of all the peasant bandit leaders ravaging the Ukrainian country-side during the Russian Civil War.
This alliance ended badly for Grigorev. Makhno murdered him, and Grigorev’s peasant followers joined Makhno’s rebel army—but continued to commit pogroms.
Makhno himself was not personally anti-Semitic, indeed there were Jews in his “collective.” In a sense, it could be said that Makhno was simply following anarchist principle. If his secret policemen were torturing prisoners, and if his peasant followers were committing pogroms, what right did Makhno, as just one member of the “collective,” have to object?"
Now, about your statement that Makhno's bands did nothing wrong. Does that include the Pogroms or no?
"The National Secretariat of Ukrainian Jews’ stated during the period of the pogroms: “A special place is held for the actions of the Makhno bands which waged complete destruction in the Yekaterinoslav-Pavlograd region.”
The journal `Reshumot’ (1920) refers to: “the well known wild animal Makhno who was known for his cruelty and his army which was drunk with blood.”
`Jewish Agriculturalists in the Steppes of Russia’ (Israel 1965)’ states:" The Jewish colonies in the Yekaterinoslav province were situated in the centre of activity of the anarchist bands, Makhno. Almost all the colonies of Yekaterinoslav suffered from attacks. All the inhabitants of the colonies Trudoliubovka and Nechaevka, who numbered 1000 people - were murdered. The property was looted completely and since then no Jewish foot has entered those colonies."
Even Trotsky points out Makhno’s rhetorical position vs. the reality of his armies’ actions "“Without a doubt, Makhno provided de facto aid to Wrangel, as well as to the Polish gentry, since he fought at the same time as they did against the Red Army” (translated from “Makhno and Wrangel,” 14 October 1920, Kak vooruzhalas’ revolyutsiya [How the Revolution Armed], Vol. 2, Book 2 [1924]). "
Again, touting some alternate history about Makhno just because you believe anti-communist lies about USSR or fetishize the Makhnovists' banditry & destruction isn't leftism in the least
I'm sorry you can't agree with my serious and scholarly conclusion of
😔
Nevertheless I will stand by by because I think it's funny and I enjoyed typing it.
My actual thesis, was that Trotsky and the Bolshevik's narrow definition of "the working class" and "proletariat" as being exclusively wage labourers and explicitly not including the peasantry who they defined as being "inherently reactionary" and needed to be subjugated by terror to install a dictatorship of the "proletariat" was an unmitigated disaster in regions, such as Ukraine, whose population was over 80% peasants and <5% wage labourers.
On the pogroms stuff, again,as you said, institutionally, the Mahknovist Black Army was not Anti-semitic. They frequently condemned the whites on the basis of their anti-semitism, citing it as a reason they could never make common cause, and had a lot of jews in their command structure. Were individual Mahknovists anti-semitic? Yeah, almost certainly, it was 1917. Was that reflected by targetting jews disproportionately when they purged the bourgoisie and aristocrats in the cities they took? In some cases, yeah, almost certainly. But the Black Army didn't engage in Pogroms any more than the Bolsheviks did and it's disingenous to pretend they did. Like, come on, the thing you quoted even specifies that it was jewish "merchants and shopkeepers". Is there perhaps another word for that? One maybe starting with a B?
But all of that is kind of besides the point. The fucked up shit Trotsky and the Red army did wasn't fighting the Black Army. It was the mass forced conscriptions and the mass executions of the friends and families of anyone who resisted or "deserted". That, alongside the Bolsheviks blunt refusal to allow the peasants to redistribute land and negotiate the sale of their produce on a collective basis (y'know, seize their means of production and own the fruits of their labour) and insistence instead, that they keep working their old lords fields and give the grain to the Bolsheviks, and again, policy of executing not only anyone who resisted this but also their families and supporters that kept the peasant revolutions going.
The USSR accomplished some wonderful things, but they shouldn't have done what they did to the Mahknovists.
I don't agree with most of what you've written about Makhno. And it's a shame that you stand by it even knowing that Makhnovists were murderers & anti-leftist pogromists
The peasantry were included in the poor & working classes supporting the Reds, literally the sickle represents the peasantry, and the bourgeois fancy lad Menshevik Trotsky isn't reflective of who actually identified with the Reds.
Actually the Red Army didn't engage more in pogroms than did the Black Army, and the Red Army conscripted specifically among Jewish communities far more than any of these other groups did
" A delegation from Novozlatopol once went to Machno [sic] to discuss his raids against the Jews. Machno’s reply was “What can I do ? They’re just a bunch of ignorant peasants”, referring to his own men.”
Is that your idea of Makhno "condemning" the anti-Jewish murders among his ranks?
Black Army isn't to be lionized. Makhno is beatified in a way comporting with Western anti-communism, not in a historically or functionally accurate manner
If Makhno had maintained his obligations and continued the fight against imperialism where and when he was needed, I think that the situation would've been far different
:PIGPOOPBALLS:
:pigpoop: