this post was submitted on 29 Oct 2025
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No, the definition of imperialism as a system of international extraction is consistent and is the most widely used. The west is not the world.
Secondly, it's not about absolute proximity, but the terrain and capability of moving troops and materiel through. You keep relying on metrics that don't actually matter nearly as much, you did it earlier too when you thought socialism was a ratio thing.
Im not from the west, you yourself confirmed russia is engaged in extraction and is a capitalist country, and ML definition is not used outside of specialised discourse. You're just going "well akshuly..."
Did you even look at a topo map before spewing this nonsense?
Doing a few hundred km detour to bypass the mighty peaks of 400 m over sea level while requireing many more river passages is something you think any one would consider? Why?
Historically every key invasion from the west (Polish, French, German) rolled pretty much straight on to Moscow. The only notable exception being the Crimean one, coming from the south and closer to the route you seem to be picturing. Unless NATO is quietly assembling a cavalry force in place of it's 5th generation fighter and global reach drone force this might not be a serious concern for anyone since 15th century.
What?
No, the idea that imperialism is about extraction and not about vague "influence" is the dominant understanding in the global south, China, etc. It's dominant because it has clear roots and causes, as well as mechanics. It's an established process rather than a vibe.
Secondly, as I had already stated, the fact that Ukraine was increasingly belligerant and warming up to NATO was why the war kicked off. Location plays a part, as Russia isn't going to go to war with, say, Israel despite Ukraine being similarly used by the US. I don't know why you keep forgetting things we've already covered.
As for the ratio thing, you tried to show GDP ratios and whatnot even though I said what matters in determining if a system is capitalist or socialist is whichever is principle. You just kinda brushed that under the rug and made up your own definition to attack. You've done similar things to it many times here.
Edit: corrected imperialism comment.
Wonder why I'm having trouble understanding your point?
So Ukraine has no right to self determination if Russian influence might wane? And if location plays part, why are the bases on the border with Norway and Finland empty? Why is the south of Ukraine occupied and not the entire border? Why does that align with rousources maps? Why do you look at a historically imperialist country, with hundreds of years of subjecting other nations, and are surprised its neighbors might want to join a millitary aliance against it. Why are you acting like a russian nationalist ignoring the interest of any other etnicity/community/nation of the region? You said yourself its just another capitalist state by now.
Ah, you mean your claim that China is socialist despite its deep commitment to capitalist exploitation of its workforce and majority private control of it's enterprise. But they state their socialism, so that's ok? Im afraid to ask about your take on NSDAP, or did 3rd reich "export capital"? This may surprise you, but just because you state something does not make it reality. You can call exploitation of the working class socialism if you wish, does not make it so.
This is going in circles.
Ukraine is right on Russia's doorstep, is still at active war with Donetsk and Luhansk, and was increasingly belligerant and building up troops in the Donbass while getting closer to NATO. Norway and Finland are not at active war and are not increasingly belligerant towards Russia beyond the usual condemnations. Self-determination, morals, etc are not the driving reasons for why this war is happening. Why not support the rights of Donetsk and Luhansk to self determination? Why are you acting like a Banderite ignoring the interest of any other etnicity/community/nation of the region?
I know Russia is capitalist. I also know that it isn't at war with Kiev to plunder Ukraine.
As for China, I already explained, the large firms and key industries are publicly owned:
Markets are not capitalism, nor are markets incompatible with socialism. China is in the developing phases of socialism, they can't just nationalize all industry overnight without serious problems arising:
I know you aren't a Marxist, so I'm not sure why you're so obsessed with misunderstanding socialism.
The Nazis were imperialist, and went to war specifically to try to create new colonies. This is well-documented.
So is Finland.
Which were occupied by Russia, so you're claiming they can not defend against a foreign invasion of their borders. If you did not notice Putin admitted it was Russian millitary taking them over initially.
So is Finland.
Pretty sure they are very openly arming themselves and Ukraine.
Unless its a defensive war which it is for Ukraine.
Because they are fake, as admitted by Putin, and as practiced before by the "peoples republics" in Georgia, that are now mostly abandoned and forced into merging with Russia proper, as the ukrainian once already were.
Mate banderites sloughtered my people. Thats the level of unity Russia can achive against itself.
You choose to belive so ignoring the material facts.
This entire comment is just erasing Donetsk and Luhansk, and the right of their self-determination. Documentation of the war in Donbass has been going on for over a decade. Finland is not nearly as armed as Ukraine, nor was it in active war with ethnic Russians. This is going in circles, you deny material facts then dance around points I bring up, or drop the subject entirely when you're disproven without acknowledging.
How many casualties of this war were there before Russian troops moved in to occupy the supposedly self-determinating regions? Your argument is that of a bully asking why is Ukraine punching itself in the face. Yes, this has been going for over a decade, you can stop repeating this mantra, as this is one of the few things we do agree on.
Oh yeah, after 10+ years of war against Russia Ukraine is likely better armed than a number of times smaller country. Still, wouldn't be that sure when it came to per capita expense/militarization, particularly before the Russian invasion, but that's not important. What is that Russia is in fact not concerned with NATO being a stone throw away from it's second largest city, or surrounding it's key military installations in the north. It's only concerned with resources rich regions of the south Ukraine. Go figure.
Which material fact did I deny? In particular?
Dude, at least have the decency to look critically at your own arguments, most of them are not even beyond "because I say so". Is Chinas economy controlled by private capital, and majority work for private enterprise? Yes. But it says "socialism" on the box, so EOT. Is Russia exploiting occupied land? Yes, but "not exporting capital" as if that means something when it's only the ruling cast accumulation capital and the rest of the nation living worse off then they did 40 years ago. Is Russia establishing control over global south countries in exchange for explicit control of resources like gold mines? Yes, but somehow it's not colonialism, Each time somehow it's ok, because Russia can. Russia has the right to establish whatever it wishes on any other countries, but said countries have no rights over their own territory or politics as anything not pro-Russian is western imperialism. And the thing is - for us it's not a support of either, it's an existential struggle not to be crushed by either. Our countries have endured Nazi occupation as well as Russian and Soviet ones. The amount of threats of invasion against the Baltic states for example is just absurd, we had a weekly threat of a nuclear war from Russia towards most of CEE. But somehow you will claim their security, the one of a 140 million strong nuclear empire stretching two continents, depends on a "a land bridge" in southern Ukraine, despite historical precedence, how wars have been conducted in the last 50 years and ignoring the very material, obvious resources capture and extraction.
You have yet to prove that the war is about extraction, your only point is that Russia hasn't invaded Finland despite being entirely different situations.
Secondly, in China the large firms and key industries are overwhelmingly publicly owned and planned, and the working class is in control. Socialism is not the absence of private property, no matter how much you point at China having markets you still won't have a point.
Russia has an absolutely tiny amount of the world's largest companies, it's an industrialized economy that has no colonies. Doing production overseas is not itself colonialism nor imperialism. There is both a massive quantitative difference and a qualitative difference as a result of that massive gap.
You have yet to prove anything you've asserted, you just keep re-asserting.
No, my main point is this; https://www.arcgis.com/apps/mapviewer/index.html?webmap=9f04944a2fe84edab9da31750c2b15eb&extent=36.6605%2C47.7199%2C36.6815%2C47.7363 and secondary, that your "NATO to close" argument is ostensibly irrelevant anywhere else. Your "disproving" of this point was what? Saying "no it's not"?
Didnt take you for a social democrat. I was pretty sure we actually share fondness for actual workers control, my bad.
True, yet a very disproportionate amount of the worlds richest people. Just as if their was some wild exploitation going on there.
The ones recently "couped" in Africa aside.
And that means they can invade key resource rich regions of other countries, exploit these and other resources benefiting their own economy and it's ok?
I aware of your point about Finland's proximity. I've already explained that Ukraine is different because it's more millitarized, was actively at war, and was cozying up to NATO. I don't think you repeating that they're the same and me repeating that they're different is going to solve anything.
Secondly, as for socialism not being the absence of private property, I'm a communist, not an anarchist. Once a socialist state is established, production and distribution is gradually collectivized as it develops. This is increasing over time in China, after a correction from the ultraleft Gang of Four period. Socialism is the transition from capitalism to communism, it has elements of the former as they are gradually phased out. Again, here's Cheng Enfu's diagram illustrating it:
As for Russia being wildly unequal, you're correct! It's a nationalist capitalist country, I've never stated otherwise. Secondly, I am not interested in "justifying" Russia, I'm telling you that it's important to understand actual root causes rather than invent ones. The idea that Russia is trying to conquer all of Europe or something isn't accurate.
Sorry, edited my reply before noticing this.
Totally mistyped when I said the "influence" idea was dominant in the global south, China, etc. In the global south, China, etc, understanding imperialism as a form of international extraction is the dominant understanding. I corrected the comment.
OK, no problem. But then is it extraction or "capital export"? If it were extraction we'd arrive at the very point that started this discussion, where I stated this is exactly what is happening.
Extraction happens via export of capital. Think outsourcing, where factories are built overseas to take advantage of cheap labor, and millitant force is used to keep wages low.
You do know, that Slavic (and so also Muscovian) history is mostly based on self exploitation; literally slave trade with own people, holding serfs/peasantry as slaves tied to land and so on?
Why would a country bother exporting factories, when it has unlimited land, and impoverished and underdeveloped "republics" with freely exploitable ethnic minorities? Would say Chechnya (their Luhansk/Donetsk style right to self-determination aside) be a place of expensive labour and lack of militant force to keep it in check? But then again, it's not like the USA owns factories in China, the same factories that produce for the west produce for Russia.
China has soveriegnty over their own factories, China's large firms and key industries are publicly owned and the working class is in control, rather than a comprador regime selling out the people.
Ultimately, the problem is that you're trying to have an in-depth conversation about a subject you haven't studied and have already made up your mind about.
Yeah, we both did made up our minds about this clearly. I did watching how stuff is produced in Chinese factories as a hired translator for a small time capitalist making deals there, you did from ideological texts. And yet you are the one defending private ownership and market economy, while my problem is that it's been nearly a hundred years and they have less public ownership then they had say 40 years ago. Also this is not an issue I'm trying to have an in depth conversation about, this is only a side note.
China had a larger portion of public ownership under the Gang of Four, and they were poor. They tried to collectivize production before the level of development actually suited publiv ownership, at the expense of growth and prosperity. The market reforms were a return to Marxist understandings of economics, and stableized growth. I read Marxist-Leninist theory, and I study China's growth and metrics over time. Being a translator while remaining entirely disengaged from Marxist theory and Chinese economics doesn't give you a leg up, I can find people that believe Trump is a communist unironically.
In the People's Republic of China, under Mao and later the Gang of Four, growth was overall positive but was unstable. The centrally planned economy had brought great benefits in many areas, but because the productive forces themselves were underdeveloped, economic growth wasn't steady. There began to be discussion and division in the party, until Deng Xiapoing's faction pushing for Reform and Opening Up won out, and growth was stabilized:
Deng's plan was to introduce market reforms, localized around Special Economic Zones, while maintaining full control over the principle aspects of the economy. Limited private capital would be introduced, especially by luring in foreign investors, such as the US, pivoting from more isolationist positions into one fully immersed in the global marketplace. As the small and medium firms grow into large firms, the state exerts more control and subsumes them more into the public sector. This was a gamble, but unlike what happened to the USSR, this was done in a controlled manner that ended up not undermining the socialist system overall.
China's rapidly improving productive forces and cheap labor ended up being an irresistable match for US financial capital, even though the CPC maintained full sovereignty. This is in stark contrast to how the global north traditionally acts imperialistically, because it relies on financial and millitant dominance of the global south. This is why there is a "love/hate" relationship between the US Empire and PRC, the US wants more freedom for capital movement while the CPC is maintaining dominance.
Fast-forward to today, and the benefits of the CPC's gamble are paying off. The US Empire is de-industrializing, while China is a productive super-power. The CPC has managed to maintain full control, and while there are neoliberals in China pushing for more liberalization now, the path to exerting more socialization is also open, and the economy is still socialist. It is the job of the CPC to continue building up the productive forces, while gradually winning back more of the benefits the working class enjoyed under the previous era, developing to higher and higher stages of socialism.
Yeah and its not like these firms grow on extracting the value added of the workers, because its socialism and its totally different. They just get horrible job conditions for a pay allowing at best sustaining themselves, but its their country because the irreplacable goverment says so.
As for the rest I could actually agree in most points, China clearly played USA, it did manage to pull a lot of people from extream poverty. That being said it is not communist in everyday life of normal people it could be hardly considered socialist. What I've seen is just another totalitarian capitalist state on it neverending path toward better times and I just don't belive there's socialism comming out of that. It already developed a new sort of owners class, same as other socialist republics you join the party to conduct your buisnesses, not much different from a american country club or scientologists. Never ending ideological BS and in the end its always the workers paying with their loves.
Id say only time will tell who's right, but then your cheerleading for a clearly corrupt capitalist state of Russia so no point in arguing on that further.