Among the pearls of wisdom in this video we have:
“Russia is imperialist because it has state capitalist monopolies” Yes, you heard it right, having certain economic sectors under exclusive state ownership is imperialism. Guess Putin should privatize Gazprom like Yeltsin did, that way he wont be imperialist right Paul?
“Russia is imperialist because it has a big state owned bank called Sberbank” Yes, having big state owned banks is imperialism
“Russia is imperialist because it invests and isnt indebted” He uses the Net International Investment Position (NIIP) as “proof” that Russia is imperialist. That index takes foreign assets held by residents of a country and subtracts it the total debt, both public and private, of a country. Thus, if the NIIP is positive, the country is a creditor/invester, and if its negative, its a debtor. Russia has a positive value, but what does that prove? That Russia isnt indebted, thats all it proves. He says this proves “Russia is a major exporter of capital”, which it doesnt, the index doesnt account for Russias biggest export, commodities, which makes it NOT imperialist. The NIIP only accounts for investment/credit and debt. Also this index has many flaws, since all you have to do to count in is be a resident of the country. Tax heavens thus have insane positive values, but that doesnt mean they are imperialist. I mean just look at the NIIP values online. France and the US are negative, yet Argentina and Botswana are positive! I guess Botswana is imperializing the US, you are right Paul.
“Russia is part of international monopolist organizations. Russia is a permanent member of the UN Security Council and a BRICS member” yes, he fkin said this i swear. Does this guy know the USSR was a permanent member of the UN Security Council? Im sure he would say they were dirty revisionists. Also apparently BRICS, an alliance formed by Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, with no western countries in it, is imperialist. He does specify tho, that of BRICS only Russia and China are imperialist. Thanks Paul!
“Russia sending its military into Donbass, despite the people of Donbass wanting it, is imperialism” Wow, guess the Soviet presence in Afghanistan was imperialism. Nevermind hes a maoist, he probably thinks that.
“Russia helping Syria against the US is imperialism” I dont even know what to say, besides that he should go to Syria and tell the people there that Russia should leave them alone against US aggression, see what happens. Fkin idiot.
“Supporting Russia, China, Iran, Syria, etc is lesser evilism, they are all imperialist” 🤦♂️
“We must support the oppressed nations such as Cuba or Venezuela” Does this anglo idiot know that Cuba and Venezuela support Russia? The doublethink is insane.
“Russia is not an oppressed nation” Does this idiot know what happened in Russia in the 90s?
“Only anticapitalist countries can be antiimperialist” Oh, so i guess Venezuela (whom he supported just 2 seconds ago), Nicaragua, Allendes Chile, Bolivia, etc are not antiimperialist. Nice one Paul!
Then he finishes with an “inspiring” “no war but class war, long live communism” speech. Yeah yeah great words, says the stupid brit from his privileged house in the imperial core. Hes the true marxist, not the people of the third world who overwhelmingly support Russia and China, whom he calls “capitalist imperialist”. Fkin idiot
Edit: I want to add that Marxist Paul has good videos regarding theory and criticism of the west, but when he steps out of that, especially regarding China and Russia, he says the dumbest shit. Considering hes a maoist who loves Gonzalo and the Shining Path, i guess that was to be expected.
This discussion was had earlier on another GZD post, but I’ll post my previous comment. to spice up a bit of the discourse about it.
Something I don’t seem people talking about is Russian Imperialism. And I mean like for real. (I’m not sure if this is touched on the video, I probably will agree with Paul’s conclusion, but I haven’t watched it yet.) Russia has finance capital in other countries. (Pretty important for imperialism lol.) In places like Belarus, Kazakhstan, Moldova, Pridnestrovia (weird right?) and also until recently Ukraine. I feel very firmly Ukraine is thoroughly fascist, and perhaps being in a critical position of Russia, removed their finance capital. Still though the invasion (special operation, whatever you call it) is a Imperialist action in my view. I also do not like Putin playing off the ethnic conflicts and fascism in the area. I support full succession of the Donbass region (Maybe not as the Donestsk and Lugansk republics still though.) As well as Crimea. if not a Tatar republic or independent oblast in the Soviet Union, (as we know all the states in the conflict are illegal and should be part of the USSR.) as part of Russia. (Brezhnev Gave it to Ukraine for some god damned reason.) The fascism is serious and using for a Imperial war is fucked. Still either way Ukraine should be de-nazified. Feel free to debate though, I’m open to new ideas.
Also in my view Syria is anti-imperialist, I don’t know enough about Iran, and Venezuela is as well anti-imperial.
Simply having finance isnt imperialism. According to that logic almost all countries are imperialist, even the poorest one have some foreign investment, mainly by their rich elites. An imperialist country is a country whose main export is capital, and whose economy is dominated by finance, vs just industry. Is that the case with the US? Yes, its economy is dominated by Wall Street moguls, finance capital, the richest industries, Google, Amazon, etc, dont produce anything, they only profit from advertisement and so on, and they only care about their stocks going up, finance capital. The US economy is based on the value of its currency through the petrodollar, and its main export is capital, theres no country you cant find US brands in. And whenever that is threatened, US military and CIA intervene.
Meanwhile Russia, is not imperialist. Its economy isnt based around finance, but around industry. Russias biggest export and what sustains their economy is their state owned export of gas and oil. Imperialist countries, such as the west, import products, produced at cheap prices, they dont export it for the most part. Russia exports products mostly, it doesnt import. Russia is almost self sufficient, as we are seeing now with the sanctions, which is literally the opposite of imperialism, imperialist states depend on their neocolonies to survive. Russia is almost 100% economically independent. Russia doesnt intervene for economic reasons. When Orange Color Revolution of 2004 happened in Ukraine and Ukraine reduced economic ties with Russia, did they intervene? No. Did they intervene in Euromaidan 2014? No, they only got Crimea (which has always been russian territory btw) because of the Sevastopol Naval Base which was a national security threat. Russia only intervened after Ukraine was planning to invade Donbass, where they had been killing people for 8 years. You say you support Donbass? Well you should be happy that Russia is intervening, because otherwise they would be all slaughtered.
There is no “russian imperialism”, who controls the world finance institutions, the IMF and the World Bank? The west. Who controls the global trade currency, the USD? The US. Literally noone used the ruble in international trade until the 2022 Ukraine crisis, how is this “russian imperialism”? Why are world assets all held in western banks and not russian ones, if Russia is imperialist? Because Russia IS NOT imperialist, this is just westerners trying to reconcile their subconscious “Putin bad” bias western media indoctrinated them with, with leftism.
Also it was Khrushchev who gave Crimea to Ukraine, not Brezhnev. And he did just because he was ukrainian, it was a personal petty decision. Crimea is part of Russia, it is inhabited by russians mostly.
Yeah sorry, it wasn’t Brezhnev, and yeah I know that’s why I support it going to russia.
Oh sorry, i thought you were saying Crimea should go to Ukraine. My bad sorry