Because he did not care about his country, Lenin was prepared to promise everybody whatever they wanted without giving much thought to the future. Th… - Richard Pipes

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Because he did not care about his country, Lenin was prepared to promise everybody whatever they wanted without giving much thought to the future. The peasants wanted private land for their communes? Let them take it: eventually all the land will be confiscated and collectivized anyway. Until then, ‘looting the loot’ will win over, or at least neutralize, the peasantry. The workers demand to run the factories? Even though ‘workers’ control is a detestable syndico-anarchist slogan, there is no harm in granting their desires—for the time being. Once industries have been nationalized and subjected to general economic plan of production, ‘workers’ control’ will vanish of itself.

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About Richard Pipes

Richard Edgar Pipes (July 11, 1923 - May 17, 2018) was a Polish-American academic who specialized in Russian history, particularly with respect to the Soviet Union, who espoused a strong anti-communist point of view throughout his career. In 1976 he headed Team B, a team of analysts organized by the Central Intelligence Agency who analyzed the strategic capacities and goals of the Soviet military and political leadership. Pipes was the father of American historian and expert on American foreign policy and the Middle East, Daniel Pipes.

Also Known As

Native Name: Ryszard Pipes
Alternative Names: Richard Edgar Pipes Richard E. Pipes

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Stoicism’s contribution to the shaping of the Western intellectual tradition is probably second only to that of Jewish monotheism. If monotheism advanced the revolutionary concept of an all-powerful and all-pervasive but non-material God ruling the universe, the theory of Natural Law posited that God’s universe was rational and capable of being grasped by human intelligence.

The collapse of the Soviet Union, a state which appeared as solidly entrenched to us as the tsarist Empire did in its day, was not triggered by social unrest: there were no strike waves, no massive demonstrations, no widespread violence. The USSR disintegrated because of political decisions made at the top.

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In 1925, Mussolini adopted the term [totalitarian] and assigned it a positive meaning. He defined Fascism as ‘totalitarian’ in the sense that it politicized everything ‘human’ as well as ‘spiritual’: ‘Everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state.’

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