That's not the work of Communism, that's the work of a mad dictator using his power to change his government into an authoritarian sovereignty.

If it was actually communism, he would have never had that kind of power.

If I was going to be nitpicky, it was not actually communism, but it was partly the work of some aspects of communist theory, as the idea of state communism was that you had to go through this immense struggle and remake society before you got to the nice fluffy city on the hill.

However the folk who rose to the top realised that if they wanted to stay on top, they had to keep the struggle bit going indefinitely.

Never mind that the nation was a bad starting point from the outset...

That had absolutely nothing to do with communism.

It's about as stupid as saying that every person killed in other wars was killed by capitalism.

Communism was merely a convenient way to distract the masses while the fat cats were making off with the loot.

Anybody can say that ideology kills during periods of intense famine, but on the other hand, that really doesn't seem that related to the ideology itself. I don't know what a better alternative would have been, but I'm not sure that Fukuyama-style liberal democracy would even work in times of desperate famine, let alone allow people to pull themselves out of their own misfortune.

I dunno. Cats are cute and they are murderous bastards.

edit - even Stalin had something of the lovable rogue about him, back when he was a 2-bit gangster and before he commanded the deaths of millions.

Someone could easily do a kawaii cartoon version of the adventures of young Stalin. - http://spartacus-educational.com/RUSstalin1.jpg

http://rainbowstalin.ytmnd.com/ and http://rainbowstalin[2-5].ytmnd.com/

Indeed they are...

http://i1.cpcache.com/product/199796497/follow_chairman_meow...