"I think that what we are witnessing is a return to a feudalistic, warlord-run society in which it depends on who calls the shots in any particular area."
I've been reading about the Red Terror in Russia (1918-1923, brought to you courtesy of the Bolsheviks), and what you said has a terrible parallel from that devastating time.
"I think that what we are witnessing is a return to a feudalistic, warlord-run society in which it depends on who calls the shots in any particular area."
I've been reading about the Red Terror in Russia (1918-1923, brought to you courtesy of the Bolsheviks), and what you said has a terrible parallel from that devastating time.
The Bolsheviks set up "Chekas" - English speakers usually call them the secret police, but the term is actually a Russian abbreviation for "Extraordinary Commissions." These got started in large cities like Moscow and Petrograd, but eventually extended out into every last village of the country.
The Chekas would regularly carry out executions without trials. Often, these executions were in retaliation for attacks on the Bolshevik leadership. The rule of thumb was to take out numerous "counter-revolutionaries" for every Bolshevik killed. But there was this trend whereby, the further away from the main centers of power you went, the more blood that had to be spilt. Sergey Melgounov, the author of "The Red Terror in Russia," explains:
'... be it observed how, the further we go from the centre, the more bloodthirsty becomes the local unit, until [retaliatory killings] “by the hundred” has swelled to “by the ten thousand.” The cause of this is that catch phrases uttered by, in the first instance (to judge from official reports), employees of the Central Che-Ka underwent repetition until they became stereo-typed arguments, and, thus robed in hackneyed, outré [startling] terms, spread to one locality after another in proportion as the Bolshevists wrested further territory from their opponents."'
"I think that what we are witnessing is a return to a feudalistic, warlord-run society in which it depends on who calls the shots in any particular area."
I've been reading about the Red Terror in Russia (1918-1923, brought to you courtesy of the Bolsheviks), and what you said has a terrible parallel from that devastating time.
The Bolsheviks set up "Chekas" - English speakers usually call them the secret police, but the term is actually a Russian abbreviation for "Extraordinary Commissions." These got started in large cities like Moscow and Petrograd, but eventually extended out into every last village of the country.
The Chekas would regularly carry out executions without trials. Often, these executions were in retaliation for attacks on the Bolshevik leadership. The rule of thumb was to take out numerous "counter-revolutionaries" for every Bolshevik killed. But there was this trend whereby, the further away from the main centers of power you went, the more blood that had to be spilt. Sergey Melgounov, the author of "The Red Terror in Russia," explains:
'... be it observed how, the further we go from the centre, the more bloodthirsty becomes the local unit, until [retaliatory killings] “by the hundred” has swelled to “by the ten thousand.” The cause of this is that catch phrases uttered by, in the first instance (to judge from official reports), employees of the Central Che-Ka underwent repetition until they became stereo-typed arguments, and, thus robed in hackneyed, outré [startling] terms, spread to one locality after another in proportion as the Bolshevists wrested further territory from their opponents."'