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He would allow candidates who want to distance themselves from Moscow for sure, but I don't think he'd allowed capitalist ones
How would a "realistic" Superman: Red Son play out?
- Thread starter King Washington
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- Discussion What if? Post-1900
He would allow candidates who want to distance themselves from Moscow for sure, but I don't think he'd allowed capitalist ones
Okay. And how does he prevent them from running for office?
Or from deciding to undertake capitalist reforms as soon as they're sufficiently distant from Moscow?
Or heck, in the case of East Germany, cease existing entirely, instead joining as part of a western liberal democracy?
Send in the Tanks? Do it himself?
Neruz
Rogue Spiderbanana
- Location
- The Land of Fire and Poison
This is Superman raised in the USSR during the Great Depression, this Superman does not have any qualms about killing people if necessary. However he is still Superman and thus a 'good person' at heart, so while willing to kill he genuinely believes that it is an absolute last resort, only to be taken when necessary or under specific circumstances, such as times of war.
Because he is Superman and was (IIRC) raised on a kolkhozy (commune farm), he genuinely believes in Communism. And not the reality of Communism, he believes in the idealized true Communism; something not dissimilar to Star Trek's Federation. And also because he is Superman he is incorruptible in this regard; he believes that Communism is The Best Way To Live, and because he's willing to use his superpowers to enforce that (not having the deep love of Truth, Justice and The American Way of FREEDOM!) if necessary, there's very little anyone can do to stop him.
His belief in Communism also means that he actually uses the fortress full of Kryptonian tech instead of hiding it away for unclear reasons, Kryptonian tech plus Superman's capabilities means that the 'ideal Communism' actually becomes possible. Just by controlling access to Kryptonian tech, something that Superman can easily do for at least a few decades thanks to being the only person who actually understands the stuff, Superman should be more than capable of forcing through any and all reforms he needs to in order to achieve his vision.
As for the conquered parts of Europe that the USSR has when Supes comes into power in this scenario, how that goes would depend heavily on exactly how this Superman feels about violence and how smart he is in regards to the long term. A clever Superman might simply allow those territories to secede if that is what they want, gaining whatever diplomatic and material boons he can from doing so, then in ~20 - 30 years time when the USSR and any territories that stuck with it are living in an idyllic scarcity-free society and exploring the depths of space, maybe some of those territories might reconsider.
Yes Superman can just run around punching every problem until the world is conquered, but a clever Superman has all the tools he needs to make the world willingly follow him as long as he leverages his assets correctly.
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1. By telling them not to, and of they refuse, saying it again. Loudly
2. He's superman. "distanced from Moscow" means that they are independent socialist staes in the Warsaw Pact, not that the've ut all diplomatic ties
3. In 53 it would be more likely to see the West join the East under communism then the other way around. Although there was a strong movement for a unified neutral Germany.
4. He likely wouldn't have to, but personally could probably do more then the tanks
Neruz
Rogue Spiderbanana
- Location
- The Land of Fire and Poison
Plus with his super speed he can 'disappear' people without actually killing them; just zoop and you're on an uninhabited tropical island with a nice house, instant exile.
I don't think he actually would, I doubt it would ever reach the point of being necessary without Supes dropping the ball a whole lot, but it's another option he has.
I don't think he actually would, I doubt it would ever reach the point of being necessary without Supes dropping the ball a whole lot, but it's another option he has.
And when they decide to take a chance and vote not to be part of the Russian Empire Mark II, instead? A few of them will go for it, if only to test the waters and see how far this weird flying dude that thinks he's an alien will go. The ones on the periphery might test it first- possibly the Fins. The Poles might do it just because, well, if he reacts by murderizing them in job lots it's nothing they haven't been through before. Not a lot to lose there.
Or just to spite the Russians. There's going to be a lot of that going around, too.
Anyway, stop dancing around the issue. Does Superman use physical force, or order the use of physical force, to continue upholding the disenfranchisement of the people of Eastern Europe? If he does, is he still Superman? If he doesn't, how does he keep the vast majority of people who remember the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, the secret police, the grinding advance of the Red Army, the extrajudicial killings, and all the apparatus that goes with making Stalinism happen, from leaving as soon as he makes it plain he isn't going to murder them if they decide to?
It's 1953. Eastern Germany has been brutally invaded, had its industry stripped, had Berlin blockaded, and suffered through eight years of boot-to-the-face occupation. As I said earlier in this thread, if Superman can convince 1950s Germans that the Soviet Union has their best interests at heart, he's so Silver Age that his mind control powers have mind control powers.
Hrm. A unified 'neutral' Germany is a Germany the USSR, Superman aside, would be highly disinclined to let exist. What does he tell his own folks when they, quite freely and democratically and openly via legitimate Soviet Worker's Council elections, want to declare war to the knife on Germany to prevent them from taking a third swing at World Conquest in the 20th century?
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1. Finland wasn't in the Eastern Bloc
2. No, but he would use it to stop them returning to capitalism
3. It hasn't been that long since the Soviets came. He could convincingly make the argument that that was an unfortunate transitionary phase, and simply replace the unpopular EB leaders with popular ones, they did that IRL and it stopped anti Soviet sentiments for quite a long time
4. While places like Poland are pissed at Russia, the Balkans aren't there yet, with many people still being grateful that they saved them from fascism.
5. There was a fairly large West German movement for a unification under the East, at this time the East was doing better economically then the west was, and was stronger in most every way
6. Stalin proposed a unified neutral Germany several times, with his famous "Stalin notes"
Which is why they'll be one of the likely ones to try it out. They have a great deal of incentive to stop being... well, Finlandized, a word that exists precisely because they were not free to pursue their own way on threat of getting Winter War The Seconded (now with Russians that know how to fight in the Winter).
So, he is indeed willing to use violent and coercive force to keep foreign nations from adopting certain economic policies that he disagrees with, despite the popularity of those policies and the fact that they were voted in via free and fair elections, and that he has no legal or official say in what those nations do. That answers that question: he's not Superman at all, he's Stalin in a Kryptonian suit.
The fact that Eastern Europe was a series of independent nations within living memory, that just got Moscow puppets put into place via a brutal occupation of the Red Army (after having handed half of them to the Nazis in an uncompromisingly cynical bargain)
And, of course, there's always the use of force issue. We know precisely what happens when the USSR hesitates to send in the tanks: nations try to get out, and the only way to keep them in is those aforementioned tanks. No tanks, no bloc.
Heh. Your Superman at least has the advantage that he'll only be personally murdering or disappearing the people that actively try to stand up for their rights; fewer innocent bystanders getting smooshed. All you have to do is keep your head down, never complain, do your job, and give up all hope of your nation being free of a self-proclaimed 'alien' that acts a heck of a lot like a Russian Czar, Soviet Premier, or whatever that particular nation is calling their imperialist autocrat these days.
Yugoslavia I'll grant you; but then, Yugoslavia is a separate brutal dictatorship under Tito. But Romania is right in the middle of their "The Americans Are Coming!" phase, and are almost as convinved as the Germans and Poles that they're being repressed by a nationalist Russian regime that's using Communism as a pretext to re-established the Russian Empire's stranglehold on them. Chervenkov might be able to maintain power in Bulgaria without Soviet support... might. He'd have to really break out the stomping boots to do it, though, what with all his neighbors but Tito bouncing out left and right.
Citation very, very, very much needed on every bit of that. There was a reason the wall went up from the Eastern side. I find it unlikely in the extreme that East Germany would be a preferable place to live for Germans; they were 'voting with their feet' quite prominently. The only place I can see them being 'stronger', even on a per capita basis, would be in number of military under arms. (And in political repression, if you count that as 'strength'.)
And people dismissed it and thought he was making a cynical political ploy as top-cover for the establishment of the GDR. Quite rightly, too- after all, this was Stalin.
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Really, all in all, I think this scenario- a Superman that actually believes in Communism as it is theorized (democratic equitable division of resources), rather than in as applied (excuse #354 for totalitarian dictatorship and self-enrichment)- would end with the both the Eastern Bloc and the USSR ceasing to exist outright, very quickly. Both him being Superman and Theoretical Communism's democratic basis would argue against him applying the necessary physical force to keep it together in the face of nationalism, hatred for Russian occupation, and divergent national priorities. Each nation would go their own way, modestly peacefully, leaving the part that actually voted to remain Russia in Superman's administration.
He'll let them go; after all, International Communism will arrive whatever the map borders say. He's got a lot on his plate, after all, in running Russia alone. Not only does he have to make all these stupid, slow, greedy humans work with an ideology that never quite got around to explaining how the 'New Soviet Man' could be manufactured, he's got to work through the fact that 99% of his own inherited government and administration are outright criminals by the very laws they put into place and claim to uphold. (One did not advance far in Stalinist Russia without being willing to get more than a bit dirty, if only in self-defense.) Then there's all the innocent folks in the Gulag to free and provide jobs for, the fact that everybody is determined to put his "I'm invincible!" claim to the test and not caring about how many people get caught in the crossfire, the demobilization of a huge, proud, highly nationalist, and highly influential army that he no longer needs, keeping local apparatchiks from fixing the vote like they've been doing for the last thirty years, the growth of 'Communist' parties and movements that proclaim their Communism is better and vote for me I'll make it all better, etc. etc. Endless work, running a country and giving a hoot about what happens to the people in it- even when you're not trying to completely upend its established system on the fly without letting another famine slip in the door. (Might have to make like the USSR did historically and buy some grain from Iowa for a few years or decades. Odd thing about those Nasty Capitalists: despite all their economic repression, they keep making more and better stuff. Might want to look into that, figure out how they do it.)
So, the end result is, after all the reorgs and increasingly esoteric assassination attempts and the institution of an actual democratic society and several decades of work on the economy and the implementation of Kryptonian technology (if he has it; he doesn't always), a Russia that looks pretty much like Star Trek. It's going to be a long road to get there, though, and he's going to have to work with the fact that the ideology he really, truly believes in takes his active intervention to make work on these stupid apes that keep trying for larger slices of the pie than the Grand Economic Plan allows for.
One just hopes he can grow the pie fast enough to not get voted out of office by the democratic system he sets up. Another thing stupid humans are notable for is a profound lack of gratitude for dismantling a people's hegemonic empire and refusing to put the boot into their historic enemies.
(Meanwhile, over on the other side of the Iron Curtain, the Western Powers are delighted with the implosion of their strategic rival and the institution of actual free rights and fair elections across huge swaths of the earth. US policymakers promptly laud George F Kennan on his prescient policy position, and go about turning down the military spending and making money hand over fist. Without a strategic counterbalance to worry about, and with Moscow-line Communist movements across the world being pushed towards nonviolence by their patron, the arguments in propping up right-wing dictatorships to keep left-wing dictatorships from forming have much less play, and decolonization is much less violent. Probably slower, though, as is US desegregation: having a major superpower openly decrying those blights (no matter how imperialist and racist the Soviet hypocrites were) helped push fence-sitters towards liberal stances, to prove ourselves better than them. Still, progress apace- and, all in all, getting such a huge chunk of the world under liberal democratic regimes makes Superman's intervention here a massive historically positive thing.)
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I see know that your argument is entirely based around anti-communism, and not the actual facts of the day. So lets go through point by point
1. Finland wouldn't need to try anything out, they were completely separate from the Soviet Sphere
2. "I will stop you from exploiting people, by force if necessary " is not the same as "literally Stalin", whatever that means
3. Your imposing mid and late war attitudes in teh Eastern Bloc onto to early war, at this point the Communist governments in Eastern Europe (with a few notable exceptions such as Poland) were not super unpopular, and still had the support of large sections of the population
4. see 3
5. see 3, and your assuming that communism and rights are incompatible, which is false
6. I said at teh beginning that most of the EB leadership would likely be replaced once Superman took over, and the leaders would be much more friendly
7. The wall hadn't gone up yet (it wouldn't for 8 years if this starts in 53), and for good reason, at this point East Germany was richer, better defended, and had better social programs. It wasn't until later that the west outpaced them. There wasn't a mass exodus yet, nor was their secret police any more violent then their western counterparts at the time. Again, see 3
8. It was a legitimate plan. He proposed it to the Western Bloc, and when they said no, he attempted to propose it to the German people themselves.
that's the rebuttals done, now for your complete misunderstanding of communist doctrine
1. I see no reason why they entire EB and teh rest of the Soviet Union itself would vote to leave, the EB I've already gone over, but your claim that the Union would disband is even more ridicules. Morale in the Union was at an all time high, and a massive wave of Soviet Patriotism, which hit the country during WW2, had yet to subside. The Soviet poeple were, for the most part, united, and would not leave the Union.
2. At no point in any major communist doctrine, much less Marxism-Leninism, does it say "If they don't want you to do communism, just leave, the'll come around eventually". The International Revolution must be completed as fast as possible, both so that imperialist powers could not destroy it, and to free the workers still under the capitalist system. No principled communist would simply let territory go back to capitalism without a fight. You give the "communism won't work because human nature" argument, which is complete nonsense, make a fair point about assassination attempts (just think of the crazy things the CIA might try), while teh army would be downsized, I dont think it needs to be disbanded completely. And its highest ranking members were fairly apolitical, supporting communism, but without much focus on specific ways to do it, and the political power of the army had been broken years before with the Great Purge. The only one who could be considered a major political figure was Zhukov, who was happy to along with most anything as longs it didn't escalate the autocracy like Beria. Somehow predict another famine, despite it being even less likely then IRL, and finish the chapter with a fairly silly idea that because the Soviets needed to buy grain, communism has been proven false. (as for why the West made so much stuff, google imperialism)
3. This paragraph is just teh human nature argument
4. Why would anyone vote Superman out? Not only is he an insanely powerful superhero, but he was hand picked by Stalin himself, who was at the time, and still is, immensely popular among the people of Russia.
5. They wouldn't applaud the collapse of the Union because it wouldn't happen, but even if it did do you really think they would become perfect democracies? South Kore and South Vietnam were both military dictatorships, and for quite a long time. I see no reason why Superman would push Moscow Line governments too nonviolence, he's still a communist, and while he doesn't want to just people, its kinda necessary for the revolution. Without Soviet influence decolonization would be so slow as to be comedic, and the civil rights movement would be pushed back decades. And again, if you think any of these former Soviet nation will become liberal democracies, I've got some neat triangles in Egypt to sell you.
What would likely actually happen would be an Eastern Bloc that is quickly pacified into the Warsaw Pact, with leaders bieng replaced with more popular, less autocratic ones (a tactic which successfully stopped dissent across the Eastern Bloc multiple times), with Superman ruling with a lighter hand you wouldn't see a Hungary happen either. With a literal superhuman alien being leading the USSR you will see a massive moral boost among communist forces across the world, and likely many more successful revolutions, especially since superman can pop in for 15 minutes to help them out. The Soviet economy, able to massively cut down on its military budget would not face the economic crisis that hurt it IRL, while with more successful revolutions the capitalists would face a much greater economic crash. Slowly, more and more countries would go red, either from successful violent uprisings, or peaceful ones (unlikely, but it's still possible), where the government knows they have no chance and surrender to save themselves. Eventually all that would be left under the capitalist powers would be an impoverished, much farther right USA, and its small number of allies, likely including Britain, Canada, and maybe one or two small nations. With teh rest of the world falling under global communism. On that much we agree I guess, Superman would be a massively positive thing for the world.
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Didn't at least one Superman story said that Superman's power is not just super strength, but also a super insight and nobility?
I think Superman's USSR will be a pretty fine place - not perfect, of course, since almost all people there are still regular humans with flaws, and Superman is not flawless either, but much closer to Socialistic ideal than the OTL USSR.
I think Superman's USSR will be a pretty fine place - not perfect, of course, since almost all people there are still regular humans with flaws, and Superman is not flawless either, but much closer to Socialistic ideal than the OTL USSR.
Um. My argument is based on the history of Europe, 1919-1989. The one where Russia forcibly lost, then forcibly gained, then peacefully lost a series of satellite states that they maintained dominance over via naked force. It's pretty plain in any history book what happens in Eastern Europe the moment the Russians aren't occupying it: it ceases to follow Moscow's line and desperately seeks outside alliances.
The fact that their nation is the very word for "overawed by immediately local superpower" somewhat belies that statement. Care to argue that Finlandization was a pure chimera despite it being common parlance, and the presence of the Red Army did not influence the Russo-Finnish Treaty of 1948? The one where Finland signed a mutual defense pact with the USSR and removed itself from alliances with the West?
"I will impose my chosen economic system upon you by force, despite you having chosen against it via free and fair elections" is the argument here. Basically, removing the Democractic part of the communist ideal, and replacing it with communism as practiced in Eastern Europe between 1945 and 1989- a thinly-veiled excuse for Russia to push out its security cordon and continue Russian Imperial dominance in the region.
The first revolts against Russian dominance in the region predated World War 2 and lasted for decades afterwards. There were active revolts in countries other than Poland in 1953, 1956, 1968, and a constant stream of defectors throughout the cold war. The Romanian "Americans are Coming" movement was from the 40's and 50's. All of the above were supressed, either with naked force or through the use of secret police by Russian puppet governments.
Your portrayal of the Eastern Bloc governments as any more popular with their people in the early war as the late war has no historical basis. Indeed, there were fewer revolts or attempts at reform later on- simply because everyone knew what would happen: Red Army tanks would roll in and remove anyone who dared. Then, the very moment Gorbachev said "no tanks", poof. Every single communist regime in Eastern Europe collapsed in a matter of months.
You are correct in theory, but no self-proclaimed communist nation has ever maintained individual liberties, an open government, or free and fair elections.
Not one.
I don't have to assume anything. History has made quite clear how it works in practice.
Who knows, maybe Superman can fix that.
I'm reasonably certain that we'll end up with something more like a very large Sweden, though: democratic socialist.
And still Russian puppets. Why does a Russian- heck, just one Russian- get to decide who governs Poland? Do the Poles not get a say? That alone is reason for them to try to leave the sphere of the new czar as soon as possible.
Hrm. Of course, if Supes puts a Pole that the Polish like in charge of Poland... and then says "no tanks"... that Pole is likely to simply take his nation elsewhere forthwidth. Repeat for every nation but Yugoslavia and maybe Bulgaria.
Berlin blockade was '48-49. That's a pretty big hint for what's happening, and who's caring about what.
For people leaving, immigration was well under way, wherever possible.
And, as before, Citation Needed on the rest. Especially the "secret police not any more violent" part; the West German state was up and running by this point, if barely. Even then they had a serious leaning against that sort of thing.
Who rightly rejected everything that came out of the man's mouth. This is Joseph Stalin, remember? One of the three most universally reviled and evil people of the 20th century? Silver or Bronze in the Mass-Murder Olympics, depending on how you count?
Well, except for the Ukrainians- still fighting a resistance war in the early 50's. Or the Baltic states, they'd vote to leave in a heartbeat. Maybe they can keep Belarus on-side? I mean, there's some serious ethnic differences, but at least there's not an active insurgency going on at the moment Superman takes office. Maybe the 'stans, too? Not sure how much they actually bought in to the whole Soviet deal; they certainly didn't a couple of generations later.
"Soviet Patriotism" is nice and all, but when it's mostly for Russians, by Russians, the non-Russians get a little put out. This was part of the problem of the Soviet Union in the first place: it was a host of ethnic groups, most of which would rather have their own nation, held together by force from Moscow. Hundreds of years of Russian Imperial domination and decades of Soviet rule simply couldn't weld them together, so the moment the force was off the table, they bounced.
Because he's dismantled their empire and their army, let the Germans rejoin the west and re-arm, let Eastern Europe go their own ways, etc. That's a really rather horrible stump speech when you're up for re-election, especially to a bunch of Russians amped on up "Soviet Patriotism".
Well, that, or he's tossed democracy (and with it, the very Soviet Constitution he wishes to uphold) by the wayside entirely and kept all of the above from happening, so there's no elections to vote him out anyway.
That's a key point, BTW: by the Soviet constitution and laws, and those of the nations in the eastern bloc, there's supposed to be free and fair elections. If not between non-communist parties, at least between varieties of communism. Does he follow the law like a good communist is supposed to, and allow this? Or does he do what actual communist regimes did, and deploy the usual combo of secret police, open ballots, and single candidates to get his way despite what people think?
("Immensely popular"? Did you somehow miss the entire Secret Speech? Everyone was terrified for their lives. Don't mix up "unwilling to oppose" with "popular".)
So, basically, the plot of "Red Son", only without the little moral lesson at the end about human freedom being important.
I think we've come to an impass. I have the history of what actually happened to present, you have the assertion that Supes can handwave all the brutality and vicious repression he is heir to and get people to follow him anyway, as well as convince all these silly, shortsighted, nationalistic, violent, greedy humans to vote for the things he wants for them as opposed to the things they want (or toss his idealism by the wayside and just rig the elections like his predecessor- much easier! Not very New Soviet Man of him, though).
Anyway, I think anything beyond this would be getting too deep into W&P debate territory. Call it here?
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Eh, sure, our arguments are based on inherently opposing philosophies, with opposing premises, so we're mostly arguing past each other. I don't think we have to end the thread though, if we make Superman's appearance and takeover earlier, say, when Germany invaded the Soviets, and his takeover soon after that (maybe Beria, seeing Superman's influence, assassinates Stalin soon after Superman crushes Germany) we can avoid the IRL Eastern European relations with the Union, as Superman would likely have far more lenient initial policies, putting the communist movements from those nations incharge, instead of purging them and replacing them with Moscow Puppets, and making them equal partners with the Soviets, instead of puppet states.
It might also make interesting things with Japan and the USA, Japan had made a non aggression pact with the Soviets by that point, but Superman might go in to help out Mao anyway, and without joining into the war the USA might not get out of its isolationism, and it's recovery from the depression might be a lot slower
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Romania literally had no native communist movement and that still means establishing hiper unpopular regimes that if forced to run free and fair elections will lose immediately.
Also this scenario will still require the USSR to lose the Baltics because superman will immediately recognize the pact with the nazis as real and disgusting.
Relations from here are hard to see how they would develop but i could see Superman pursuing actual internationalism and honestly help the global left wing movement and helping to make the UN a just institution against Americans and British intentions.
The USSR will still have to be rebuild and that will take time and effort regardless of his skill and tech base.
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Common theme I see is people assuming that Superman would be fine with places returning to capitalism, I really don't think he would be, he'd give them more autonomy sure, have elections, and make the EB members equal to the Soviets instead of puppets, but it would very much be a "democracy as long as you don't do this one thing", with that thing being capitalism
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He will have to be literally Stalin to do that.(Exception in Czechoslovakia maybe)
You literally can't have democracy in the east and have the east be pro-soviet unless you go back to Lenin and if you do that the scenario changes from Superman dealing with Stalin's legacy of Tyranny to building Socialism from scratch.
I would love to see you define "capitalism" in a way that can be consistently enforced via violence upon another state, without including huge chunks of things Soviet Union (and every other nation on the planet) did itself in the list. Heck, even the USSR was all about being "a socialist state in the process of transition to true communism". There were still stores and money and buying and selling, and quite a lot of buy-low-sell-high trade with foreign nations for all sorts of resources.
I mean, how would you even start? Do nations with state owned steel factories get the nod, but not those with (say) nationally-owned merchant marines? Or vice-versa? Does it count if a nation owns all the land but leases it out to large-scale farm corporations or collectives, or do all the farms have to be communally run as well? What would modern China count as, being a nominally communist nation with a huge, vibrant, and growing free market? Is completely publically owned infrastructure a must or a nice to have? (What even counts as 'infrastructure', anyway? The train tracks sure, but the trains themselves? Roads yes... but must all be cars hire-cars owned by the state?) Even down to 'are people issued their toasters, or do they have to save up their sheckles to buy them' is a choice of fine degrees between levels of socialist and capitalist economic planning, and that's just a petty matter of heating up one's bread for a sandwitch.
Of course, it's simple enough to go the other way. There being no pure-capitalist nations- every single nation on earth and in history having at least some level of socialist redistribution or government ownership- then superman can easily claim there are no capitalist nations out there to destroy, and that a nation voting for slightly less socialism (like, let's buy some foreign toasters and sell them to our citizens) is hardly worth muderizing their legislatures. Nice rhetorical dodge, allows Superman to not spend all his time putting down people annoyed that he just murderized their legislatures because they did a petty 'capitalist' thing.
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Easy definition, are the means of productions owned by the workers, or private individuals, if its teh former, its socialism, if its teh latter, its capitalism.
Superman would certainly allow democratic elections in the Soviet Sphere, but he would not allow for candidates promising a return to capitalism to run, and if one ;red about what they would do in office and returned to capitalism anyway, he would replace them, with force if neccecery.
But he wouldn't use force to keep them as Soviet puppet states, which I would argue was the greater cause of discontent then the economic system
Superman would certainly allow democratic elections in the Soviet Sphere, but he would not allow for candidates promising a return to capitalism to run, and if one ;red about what they would do in office and returned to capitalism anyway, he would replace them, with force if neccecery.
But he wouldn't use force to keep them as Soviet puppet states, which I would argue was the greater cause of discontent then the economic system
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Those 2 things happen to be exactly the same one.
The soviet communists are literally like Stalin and native communists would lose to anyone(in my case(Romania) even the fascist would be more popular),do you not understand that there is no way to have democracy and somehow gets communists in power.
Social democrats and populists friendly to welfare maybe but not communist.
Edit:You also didn't address the other problems like the baltics,eastern poland,The Gulags,Mass rapes and piliging of the red army and the USSR still being garbage fire economically and socially in this case(You can't just replace Stalin like that)
Edit2:In actuality i would go as far as to say that in the eyes of all eastern european peoples the Soviets where equal to the Nazis in how hated they where.
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"Easy"? Like heck it is. Not even big-C 'Communist' thinkers agree on what is and is not part of the "means of production", and things just get more complex when you work in the shtonking huge body of work of socialist writers and luminaries in general. And who precisely constitutes a "worker"? Is that a legislative definition, a philosophical one, what? And of course, there's 'ownership'. Is nominal ownership, a share of the proverbial pie, enough? Or do you need to exercise some form of control in order to be an owner? (Huh... by some particularly careful definitions, the US is a communist country thanks to mass ownership of stocks and mutal funds, giving the bulk of the population an owning stake in the economic power of the nation as a whole. Interesting thought, that.)
And what if some parts are owned by the "workers" (presumably via the government? Or just communes?) and some parts owned by individuals? Like the economic system of every nation in the history of the world, the USSR included?
Your insistence on some magical dividing line between "communism" and "capitalism" is really rather silly, given we know that's not how actual nation-states work by simple observation: they all have a blend of government and private ownership. No 'communist' county, from the USSR to China to North Korea, lacks the latter; no 'capitalist' country, from the USA to Sweden to France, lacks the former.
If you can't answer all these questions about economics, that's okay; you don't have to, it's a big subject with all sorts of finicky bits. But... I would hesitate to continue proclaiming that Superman will of course do X or Y thing without at least a good idea of what you're saying he's actually doing and why, at least beyond a one-liner definition. This shit ain't easy, there's a reason it's one of the three biggest and bloodiest conflict points in human history, along with race and religion. If nothing else, allow that Superman default on the side of not doing violence upon foreign people for voting the way they choose, and for their leaders to follow up and do what they've been put in office to do.
Besides, like I said, he doesn't need to mandate other nations do anything to advance (his idea of) Communism. Just build it where he has people already following him: Russia. (Well, the parts of Russia that aren't massively pissed at him going all Idealist on their Nomenklatura power-brokering and money-grubbing, or allowing their Empire to fall apart again.)
"I mandate that every aspect of your national economic policy and law meets my definition of correct. If you violate this, I will kill or remove your leaders by force until you choose ones that meet my personal standards. But no, you're not a puppet state."
I don't think that's going to be a very convincing argument. I know I'm not convinced, and this is purely intellectual for me (and with me knowing Superman is a Good Guy). I'm not a 1950s Eastern European working from a starting point of Stalin's own use of economic ideology as a paper-thin excuse for Russian imperialism; I'd imagine they'd be even more skeptical.
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1. Just only let communists run in the elections, there's many different kinds
2. none of the SSRs would leave the Union on either start date, if Supes comes in during WW2 they would have just seen teh Soviets instantly wreck Nazi Germany, without getting hurt much, and if he comes in in 53 then they will have just been under Nazi rule, and have been liberated by the Soviets. Gulags are literally just jails, mass rapes is a Nazi myth, there was a pillaging of sorts, with the Nazis going total war and boring shit down, and after the war the Soviets moving industry from Germany to the Union.
3. The Union was actually doing pretty well economically by this point, and socially was flatly unified, because they had to pull themselves together to fight the Nazis.
4. Nazis in these countries might think that way, but probably no-one else
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I like this plan
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Are you thick i just explained why thats stupid.
Do you want 1 party on the ballot?
The baltics have literally just being conquered as well as eastern Poland are you suggesting molotov ribbentrop pact is something superman would stand for?
Are you a Tanky seriously?
You just had the autocrat eliminated what do you think will happen?
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They do though, what constitutes the MOP is not something people disagree with, its been universally accepted since Marx.
And he wouldn't force them to have his specific preferred type of communism, just a type of communism, wether that be Soviet planned economies, Titoist Market Socialism, or something else entirely.
And can we please move on from what will happen to the Eastern Bloc? Were never going to agree. I agree that nations would drift out of Soviet direct control, but I don't think they would become capitalist, or that the USSR would somehow dissolve.