Fenestella
Banned
Areas historically vulnerable to mongol predation, coincidentally, are vulnerable to communist plague.
Areas geographically vulnerable to mongol predation, coincidentally, are vulnerable to communist plague.
Russia didn't really match Marx's conditions for a country that would go communist (he predicted Germany), which kind of says it all about how meaningfully we can predict this in an ATL.
2. You said China would be communist. Perhaps, but the road to Socialism in China would probably be way different without a USSR. Maybe the Soicalists takes power within Kuomintang in such a scenario.
3. Socialism would itself be way different without the Soviet example.
The Labour movement was strong in Western Europe. Britain, France, Germany and Italy all had strong left wing oriented parites after WW1. However here you again have to take the no Soviet example factor into consideration.
Spain is a good choice, while the left in Spain was much inspired by the USSR, it also had earlier roots in anarchism. But this of course might mean that the Anarchists would be the leading left wing faction in Spain, instead of Socialists (since the Anarchists were a very strong faction OTL also).
Yeah, that's what happens in my TL. Leftist!KMT coalition with CCP against Sun Yatsen and Song Jiaoren.
Would the Labor movement be radicalized or de-radicalized without the USSR?
Ooh, Anarchist!Spain sounds really cool. It's sad how rare anarchist countries are in timelines.
On another thought, which countries could become anarchist with a post-WWI POD?
Russia didn't really match Marx's conditions for a country that would go communist (he predicted Germany), which kind of says it all about how meaningfully we can predict this in an ATL.
Cuba, Albania, Yugoslavia, China, Chile-kinda-sorta-for-a-bit, Vietnam... a lot of those were because of Moscow's sponshorship, but to predict any one of them 'turning' in 1900 would be a shot in the dark.
Would the Labor movement be radicalized or de-radicalized without the USSR?
Ooh, Anarchist!Spain sounds really cool. It's sad how rare anarchist countries are in timelines.
On another thought, which countries could become anarchist with a post-WWI POD?
Sun Yat-Sen could be pretty socialist at times himself.
Without the USSR the labour movement would be DIFFERENTLY radicalised. Its not like Lenin and co invent radical fringes for it, but you would need different ideologies to emerge to channel some of different strands of leftist thought. Also remember that being in a trade union etc doesn't make a worker automatically socialist/communist. You'd need to look as much outside labour movements as inside them for leaders.
Spain is complicated because the CNT is actually anarcho-syndicalist, blending anarchism and socialism. They were never that clearly defined in the 1900s-1920s period - members often cross pollinated and went to other meetings.
As anarchist nations - thats very difficult as even in Republican Spain during the exceptional circumstances of revolution/civil war they were only part of a broad leftist/loyalist spectrum. Likewise with Makhno in the Ukraine during the Russian Civil War - he was never the only power operating in the Ukraine.
It is, as you say, coincidental. It just turned out that way in OTL because Russia became Communist, which enabled the ideology to spread, through influence or (more often) riding the coattails of the Red Army, into the countries bordering it. Remove the USSR and the spread of Communism, if it spreads at all, will follow a completely different pattern.Areas historically vulnerable to mongol predation, coincidentally, are vulnerable to communist plague.
OTL's Bolsheviks were outliers in the broader Socialist movement, with their idea of a "revolutionary vanguard" claiming power in the name of the proletariat. By the early 1900s most mainline Socialist movements based on Marxism (leaving out the non-Marxist ones because it would get even more complicated) hoped to achieve Marx's objectives through democratic or at least incremental means. The far end of the leftist spectrum was occupied by the Anarchists, who engaged in political assassination and other acts of what we'd call terrorism today.Basically all European Communist parties (and world communist parties) in our timeline date from the birth of the Soviet Union. Britain, France, Italy - 1920, USA 1919, Japan 1922, etc.
If Lenin doesn't happen you need to radically rethink how the world will look.