You’re saying that the NATO bombings and the NATO-backed rebels had nothing to do with it…? He was fleeing a NATO air strike.

Yes. Gaddafi was also certainly killed based on French intelligence, and there is substantial evidence that the men who assassinated him were French assets. Part of the reason, apart from the broader geopolitical aim of annihilating a country which wanted to engage in the construction of international monetary and commerical systems outside of the orbit and control of the American petro-dollar, Gaddafi had essentially bribed Sarkozy at a certain point and was holding this over the latter’s head (Sarkozy is infamously corrupt). See:

• https://www.mediapart.fr/journal/international/021012/gaddafi-executed-french-revelations-libyan-agent
• https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/french-secret-service-killed-gaddafi-sarkozys-orders-reports
• https://www.rfi.fr/en/africa/20121001-french-spy-killed-kadhafi-sarkozys-orders-papers-claim
• https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2210759/Gaddafi-killed-French-secret-serviceman-orders-Nicolas-Sarkozy-sources-claim.html
• https://www.euronews.com/2018/03/20/sarkozy-in-libya-case-what-does-it-all-mean-

Hegemon’s have to rule by fear. Read any bloodsoaked page from the history of the Roman Empire. Fear is best instilled through unimaginable atrocity. What do you think the rulers of the rest of Africa and the Middle East thought after they saw how Gaddafi, head of the most prosperous (per-capita, quality of life, standard of living, etc.) state in Africa, ended up?

The general “tankie” position is that the people of Donbas, who mostly do not want to remain part of Ukraine, will not stop suffering attacks without Russia fighting Ukraine off. Russia does not seem interested in siphoning resources from or subjugating the people of Donbas, as they did not the people of Crimea, who merely became Russian citizens. This is very different from US carpetbombing for oil.

Marxists, following Lenin, define imperialism as the monopoly of finance capital. Not as a synonym for ‘conquest’, ‘annexation’, ‘empire’ (not that I’m saying all three necessarily apply to Russia in Ukraine—a conclusion on that isn’t relevant, here).

When US (Anglo-European) finance capital dominates the world through the IMF, World Bank, WTO, and petrodollar, supported by a network of however many hundreds of military bases, all paid for by it’s vassals and enemies due to said dominance, there’s little to no room for anyone else to even consider being imperialist.

We can discuss that if you like. I’ll likely need others to chip in. I’m not proposing that I have all the answers. It’s not something with a clear answer. But we can’t have the debate at all unless we agree on common definitions and frames of reference. Otherwise it feels as though liberals simply do not understand what’s being said. It’s just talking past one another, where one side has a coherent definition and framework and the other side… doesn’t.

I’ll let you decide whether you can honestly say you have a theoretically sound concept of imperialism depending on how much dedicated literature on imperialism you’ve read.

There’s a concept called “critical support”, which most “tankies” are practicing. You have criticism of a side but its the lesser evil so you support it despite your criticism. You won’t hear much of that criticism publicly though because that’s counterproductive.

Like if I want the US to recognize the DPRK as a sovereign state so we can at least begin discussing Korean reunification, why would I bother mentioning my criticism of Juche?

the Russo-Georgian war imperialism

Wait, are you saying Saakashvili has done an imperialism? Because even western/EU reports have confirmed that Georgia started that war, not Russia.

They end up supporting or refusing to criticize regimes that generate similar war crimes.

“From 24 February 2022, which marked the start of the large-scale armed attack by the Russian Federation, to 30 July 2023, OHCHR recorded 26,015 civilian casualties in the country: 9,369 killed and 16,646 injured”

Almost 10 thousand civilians killed is horrible. But compare this to Iraq: it’s less than the first month of the war in Iraq, and no US politicians was tried for war crimes. Maybe you should ponder this factoid.

If you live in a NATO country maybe you should demand Blair and Bush to be tried for their war crimes. If you live in the west you should spend more energy of criticizing the ruling class above you.

“supporting or refusing to criticize” This is a made up leftist. Per definition there is no leftist that uncritically supports a right wing capitalist country.

You’re in a thread with half a dozen comments like “wow libs and tankies are celebrating this?”, followed by a bunch of “tankies” explaining (again) that they do not actually like modern Russia.

Because instead we can spend the energy into the development of social-democracy, which has a better track record.

Social Democracy is objectively the moderate wing of fascism, so no. I don’t accept such imperialist half measures

Do social democracies also ensure better living conditions for the impoverished nations they continue to exploit so they can support their own standards of living?

I don’t see any extreme left or right regime that provided better conditions than social-democracies.

I’m not sure what you define as an “extreme regime” but you can try looking at Cuba, China, or the USSR, for starters.

“Better conditions than social-democracies” is a tall order considering that most (every?) Marxist-Leninist state was formed in impoverished, exploited countries, and have frequently been targeted by sanctions, boycotts, and so on. If you told a Chinese peasant in the 40’s that their country’s life expectancy would someday exceed that of the US, they’d call you a liar. Certainly it wasn’t about to happen under the Nationalists or anybody else.

Not everyone is allowed to have social democracy. For example, Norway’s economy benefits greatly from their oil revenues, but in much of the world, the presence of oil resources is called an “oil curse,” because Western governments destabilize and overthrow governments that bring those profits back to the people. When Iran’s left-leaning (but not communist) government in the 50’s tried to reclaim control of their oil from their British colonial overlords, the CIA did a coup and installed a fascist. There are countless other stories of this happening all around the world.

No country has lifted more people out of poverty and extreme poverty than China. Granting developing countries a second option for investment is an enormous boon for the world, especially since China is much less restrictive over other countries’ domestic economic policies compared to the IMF.

This is why I would argue that, even if you disagree with China’s system, if you want any other system besides capitalism to be available to people in the developing world, then you should recognize that China is furthering that goal. I don’t consider China’s system to be perfect or ideal by any stretch of the imagination, but I’ve read enough history to see more ideal systems get crushed time and again.