Today I will continue with my second installment of the Economic Implications of Socialism.  What follows is not verbatim from Dr. Maltsev, but paraphrased via my notes.

Continuing right where I left off; the catastrophic death toll was not the only consequence of Socialism.  The very teachings of Karl Marx were meant to be classified from the public.  The Soviet government took great care picking and choosing which rules to show people, and which ones to keep secret.  More so, many other books were banned.  Reading or possessing such banned books were grounds for 7 years in a Siberia labor camp (most people would die after 3 years if they were lucky).  Part of the brain washing that the Soviet Union employed was the belief that Karl Max and his teachings were true and absolute.  Any books published before Karl Marx were allowed simply because they pitied the writers that didn’t know the truth.  However, any books published after Marx that proclaimed something different were considered a lie and therefore a crime.

As you can see, this infatuation with Karl Marx left little room for religion.  In fact, Religion was considered opulent.  Holidays like Christmas were banned.  During the formation of the Soviet Union, over 900,000 Priests and Clerics were killed or imprisoned; it was something Stalin referred to as “pest control”.  In fact, the strict Soviet controls of religion lead to serious military defection; 25% of Nazi forces attacking on the Eastern front were Soviet defectors.  Considering this problem, the Soviet Government decriminalized religion in 1942.  Still, churches and religion was not free.  Many patriarchs of these churches were secret KGB officers, strategically placed to continue the influence of socialism.