Don’t disagree with you on the epistemic point, but for that example, I don’t think anyone in the USSR was under the illusion that they had achieved communism.

Don’t disagree with you on the epistemic point, but for that example, I don’t think anyone in the USSR was under the illusion that they had achieved communism. During the 60s the propaganda (originally for and then also used ironically) was that the USSR was “actually existing socialism”. It was of course run by the communist party, which I think is what people generally mean when they say it was communist. It’s obvious in hindsight, but looking back there are plenty of thinkers that i look up to (e.g. Du Bois) that supported the regime far longer than is comfortable (so i’m hesitant to say i would have been any different at the time).