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> how can you possibly judge actions in the 50s by what surprised everyone in the 80s

The thing is, your ends don't justify your means. It was Stalin's dogma and boy was he wrong. You can't justify crimes with "or what would have happened". The fall of communism just makes that apparent.

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That's a worthless platitude. Your values mean nothing if you lose. Our ideals of democracy and human rights wouldn't be worth the paper they're written on if the Nazis or Communists achieved world domination.

But they didn't and they couldn't.

However, what do your ideals of democracy worth when you overthrew democratic regimes?

One ties oneself in knots if one promotes "democracy" above all. What's valuable is freedom. Democracy is just one means of encouraging that, and it doesn't always work.

>But they didn't and they couldn't.

They most certainly could have.

I don't think so. With their half-life they'll never be able to overrun much of the world. And thing is, we'll never know now. It's your opinion vs my opinion.

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