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In 1921, Lenin had his soldiers steal nearly all the grain produced on peasant farms, then distributed it amongst his soldiers and cronies while five million pe

In 1921, Lenin had his soldiers steal nearly all the grain produced on peasant farms, then distributed it amongst his soldiers and cronies while five million people died of starvation: https://www.google.com/search?q=soviet+famine+of+1921&source=lnms&tbm=isch https://www.google.com/search?q=soviet+famine+of+1921&source... When America donated enough grain to relieve the famine, Lenin deliberately prevented it from reaching the starving rural peasants. Lenin, by the way, purchased no fewer than nine Rolls-Royce cars during his brief reign. I'll give you that he was genuine. So was Hitler.

themartorana 12y ago
all wealth including land, industry and business was confiscated Right. No one rich, well off, or even well fed except him. Sounds genuinely like all absolute dictators ever. Leaders around the world respect a glorified, scrubbed version of an idealistic man, not the real Lenin. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Lenin http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Lenin
- themartorana 12y ago
  Downvoted. Gonna take that as a compliment.
ommunist 12y ago
So was Sir Winston Churchill, by whose policy 10 mln Bengali people died from starvation. I see no difference between one greedy self-important politician and another. Its a pity we are defenseless in front of them.
- Aloha 12y ago
  There is good information that the true scope of the famine didn't really reach London until after the 1943 harvest came in, and by then the famine was easing.
- mc32 12y ago
  There is a difference when one is intentional and the other is due to unreliable information. Yes, the results are the same (starvation), but it matters how it happened. It's also interesting that in soviet Russia it was the urban disaffected population who supported the revolution, while the farmers and peasants did not. Lenin at first tried to get them to cooperate (volunteer) in the collectivization programme, but farmers wanted none of that, they preferred selling their grain and produce on the market to urbanites. Finally, desperate, Lenin gave orders, contradicting his advisors who told him it would result in poor production and starvation, went ahead and forced collectivization. This resulted in famine, as farmers forced to hand over their production, didn't have an incentive to produce.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
    - deleted 12y ago
      [deleted]
- mr_luc 12y ago
  It seems as though this was a murky situation that administrators/provincial governments did not understand was happening at the time (much less a central government back in London!) Which would make it very different from the other famines being mentioned here. (Also, according to Wikipedia the figures you cite seem to be a multiple of current estimates).
  - anigbrowl 12y ago
    It's not like the British Empire didn't have any experience of dealing with famine in the colonies, though. In the previous century a quarter of the Irish population died in a famine and another quarter or so fled to the US. It's not that I have anything against Churchill, but it's easy to come up with excuses for politicians or historical figures one would like to support while assuming both omniscience and ill-will of the others.
    - SixSigma 12y ago
      And 25m Indians in the late 19th C. The British had turned most Indian arable land over to cotton. The British food producing arable land had been turned over to wool. The market for Indian cotton collapsed when the superior American production recovered from the Civil War. The El Nino drought wiped out the remaining food production and what grain was produced was being exported back to the UK. They guarded from starving Indians with soldiers. The same weather system flooded China, flood defenses had been neglected while the Chinese were fighting off European colonists. Another 25m starved.
  - GFK_of_xmaspast 12y ago
    "Churchill's only response to a telegram from the government in Delhi about people perishing in the famine was to ask why Gandhi hadn't died yet. " http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2031992,00.html http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2031992...
  - ommunist 12y ago
    Oh yeah, and killing every second male in Ireland by Lord-Protector Cromwell is also grossly exaggerated.
Aloha 12y ago
You imply that Lenin caused the famine, that's a stretch, a fatal one. I'll accept fully that war communism made an existing food situation worse, but no man controls the weather. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_famine_of_1921 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_famine_of_1921
- mc32 12y ago
  I think they are referring to the famine the soviets caused in Ukraine[1]. [1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor
  - mercurial 12y ago
    Except Lenin was long dead by then.
- restalis 12y ago
  "no man controls the weather" Men in power control the resource allocation and the extent at which actions in their political program would consume the known resources. Famine was not only the result of the weather alone.
mercurial 12y ago
> I'll give you that he was genuine. So was Hitler. I would say Lenin was more comparable to Robespierre than Hitler. There is no doubt they were all ruthless mass murderers, but for different reasons.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
marincounty 12y ago
I think they confirmed Lenin bought one Rolls-Royce? There was an embargo in effect, and no Industrialized nation would sell to the Communist. Britian caved, and let Rolls-Royce sell Lenin air plane engines. They Sweetened the deal by selling him a Rolls at a 15% discount. Maybe he had more? It was a horrid time. I have found conflicting information on Lenin. I don't think there were too many historians(especially American) who weren't writting a narrative condemning anything remotely related to communism? I know communism has not worked, but sometime's I wonder, "Do I need three automobiles, or more water/food than my family needs?" Do I have a right to more inorganic and organometallic compounds, or carbon atoms just because our current system says I can--if I obtained them legally? I just don't know. Would I be a willing participant in order to find out--no. What I'm trying to say is I just don't feel the ideas of communism are evil. I still can't even talk about it because of the McCarthy era.(No, I'm not that old. The fear of anything different than Capitalism was just drilled into me as a kid.)
- tim333 12y ago
  Autoevolution has some info and pictures on the Rolls, including one he had converted into a sort of snowmobile: http://www.autoevolution.com/news/dictators-favorite-rides-10538.html http://www.autoevolution.com/news/dictators-favorite-rides-1...

themartorana 12y ago

all wealth including land, industry and business was confiscated Right. No one rich, well off, or even well fed except him. Sounds genuinely like all absolute dictators ever. Leaders around the world respect a glorified, scrubbed version of an idealistic man, not the real Lenin. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Lenin http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Lenin

themartorana 12y ago
Downvoted. Gonna take that as a compliment.

ommunist 12y ago

So was Sir Winston Churchill, by whose policy 10 mln Bengali people died from starvation. I see no difference between one greedy self-important politician and another. Its a pity we are defenseless in front of them.

Aloha 12y ago
There is good information that the true scope of the famine didn't really reach London until after the 1943 harvest came in, and by then the famine was easing.
mc32 12y ago
There is a difference when one is intentional and the other is due to unreliable information. Yes, the results are the same (starvation), but it matters how it happened. It's also interesting that in soviet Russia it was the urban disaffected population who supported the revolution, while the farmers and peasants did not. Lenin at first tried to get them to cooperate (volunteer) in the collectivization programme, but farmers wanted none of that, they preferred selling their grain and produce on the market to urbanites. Finally, desperate, Lenin gave orders, contradicting his advisors who told him it would result in poor production and starvation, went ahead and forced collectivization. This resulted in famine, as farmers forced to hand over their production, didn't have an incentive to produce.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
mr_luc 12y ago
It seems as though this was a murky situation that administrators/provincial governments did not understand was happening at the time (much less a central government back in London!) Which would make it very different from the other famines being mentioned here. (Also, according to Wikipedia the figures you cite seem to be a multiple of current estimates).
- anigbrowl 12y ago
  It's not like the British Empire didn't have any experience of dealing with famine in the colonies, though. In the previous century a quarter of the Irish population died in a famine and another quarter or so fled to the US. It's not that I have anything against Churchill, but it's easy to come up with excuses for politicians or historical figures one would like to support while assuming both omniscience and ill-will of the others.
  - SixSigma 12y ago
    And 25m Indians in the late 19th C. The British had turned most Indian arable land over to cotton. The British food producing arable land had been turned over to wool. The market for Indian cotton collapsed when the superior American production recovered from the Civil War. The El Nino drought wiped out the remaining food production and what grain was produced was being exported back to the UK. They guarded from starving Indians with soldiers. The same weather system flooded China, flood defenses had been neglected while the Chinese were fighting off European colonists. Another 25m starved.
- GFK_of_xmaspast 12y ago
  "Churchill's only response to a telegram from the government in Delhi about people perishing in the famine was to ask why Gandhi hadn't died yet. " http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2031992,00.html http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2031992...
- ommunist 12y ago
  Oh yeah, and killing every second male in Ireland by Lord-Protector Cromwell is also grossly exaggerated.

Aloha 12y ago

You imply that Lenin caused the famine, that's a stretch, a fatal one. I'll accept fully that war communism made an existing food situation worse, but no man controls the weather. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_famine_of_1921 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_famine_of_1921

mc32 12y ago
I think they are referring to the famine the soviets caused in Ukraine[1]. [1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor
- mercurial 12y ago
  Except Lenin was long dead by then.
restalis 12y ago
"no man controls the weather" Men in power control the resource allocation and the extent at which actions in their political program would consume the known resources. Famine was not only the result of the weather alone.

mercurial 12y ago

> I'll give you that he was genuine. So was Hitler. I would say Lenin was more comparable to Robespierre than Hitler. There is no doubt they were all ruthless mass murderers, but for different reasons.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

marincounty 12y ago

I think they confirmed Lenin bought one Rolls-Royce? There was an embargo in effect, and no Industrialized nation would sell to the Communist. Britian caved, and let Rolls-Royce sell Lenin air plane engines. They Sweetened the deal by selling him a Rolls at a 15% discount. Maybe he had more? It was a horrid time. I have found conflicting information on Lenin. I don't think there were too many historians(especially American) who weren't writting a narrative condemning anything remotely related to communism? I know communism has not worked, but sometime's I wonder, "Do I need three automobiles, or more water/food than my family needs?" Do I have a right to more inorganic and organometallic compounds, or carbon atoms just because our current system says I can--if I obtained them legally? I just don't know. Would I be a willing participant in order to find out--no. What I'm trying to say is I just don't feel the ideas of communism are evil. I still can't even talk about it because of the McCarthy era.(No, I'm not that old. The fear of anything different than Capitalism was just drilled into me as a kid.)

tim333 12y ago
Autoevolution has some info and pictures on the Rolls, including one he had converted into a sort of snowmobile: http://www.autoevolution.com/news/dictators-favorite-rides-10538.html http://www.autoevolution.com/news/dictators-favorite-rides-1...