Cowbee [he/they]

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Marxist-Leninist ☭

Interested in Marxism-Leninism, but don’t know where to start? Check out my Marxist-Leninist study guides, both basic and advanced!

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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: December 31st, 2023

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  • That’s not really what they mean by imperialism. When Marxists speak of “imperialism,” we mean the existing system of international extraction helmed by the US and its vassal states. Imperialism in the Marxist sense is economically compelled by late-stage capitalism, and is its necessary evolution, into a highly financialized system of plunder from the global south.

    Russia and Iran are both sovereign countries working against this system, because both stand to gain from a multi-polar world. Ukraine and Israel are so close together because they share a similar geopolitical position, as attack dogs for the US Empire against their adversaries.

    Without an understanding of how capitalism turns to imperialism, under what conditions, and how this can itself be negated, then it’s understandable that it would be difficult to understand the world. I really recommend reading Lenin’s Imperialism, the Current Highest Stage of Capitalism. Imperialism has evolved since his time, namely from competing imperialist powers into a single imperial hegemon and vassalized imperialist powers, but the basis is still correct and necessary for understanding the modern era.







  • You can call millitant expansion imperialism, but Marxists don’t have a problem with the word, but the actual, material process of what we call imperialism. Millitant expansion can be done for progressive reasons, like when the Statesian north liberated the slaves in the Statesian south. The actual economic form of international extraction as a special, necessary part of late-stage capitalism is what Marxists are trying to dismantle, due to it being the biggest obstacle to global socialism.

    As for Ukrainians supporting their government, you’re half-right. Western Ukrainians tend to support their government, while those in the Donbass seceded from it after the Euromaidan coup, and voted to join the Russian Federation.

    Overall, we aren’t arguing about words, but processes. If you insist on calling millitant expansion “imperialism,” then we have to agree to what we call the Marxist understanding of late-stage capitalist imperialism as a special term as well, so that we don’t get mixed up on terms.




  • Ukraine and Israel are used in similar ways by the US Empire, to attack their geopolitical opponents. Russia seeking to annex the Donbass region, a region that had already seceded from Kiev in 2014 after the right-wing coup overthrew the president they supported, isn’t imperialism in the sense that Marxists are talking about.

    When Marxists speak of imperialism, we mean a specific stage of capitalism by which finance capital becomes dominant and international extraction becomes economically necessary for continued existence. Russia is fighting against that system internationally, because the US Empire is keeping them boxed in and wishes to re-imperialize Russia like it was in the 90s, before the nationalists overthrew the liberals.

    Marxists do not have an issue with anything anyone can call imperialism, but with imperialism as it exists as a necessary and scientifically observed phenomena of late-stage capitalism, because this phenomena is the biggest obstacle to global socialism. Russia is helping Iran, Palestine, Cuba, Venezuela, and more in resisting the US Empire, because Russia benefits from the end of a US-dominated world. Western Europe is vassalized by the US Empire, which is why they side with the US Empire. They benefit from this system of plundering the global south, Russia does not.