"Yea. I mean, maybe it did happen, but 9 million is just too big a number."
9 million is also a made-up number. And let's count how many people would have died if the imperialist war (World War I) had continued? How many people would have died in a civil war, after the collapse of the Russian Empire? And it had already actually collapsed under the provisional government. How many people would have died of starvation if grain exports continued, and speculators continued to raise prices? How much more starvation would have continued if collective farms had not been built? How many people would have lived in poverty in the villages? How would people have lived in the cities without industrialization? How many people would have died from German imperialism in the 1940s if the revolution had not won in Russia? How many people would have died from banditry, which was a monstrous problem amid total poverty? How many people would have died from nationalism in Russia? How would the working class be living now if the proletarian revolution had not won in Russia?
The Communists saved Russia and not only Russia. But now the Communists are not trusted. This makes the whole world more and more a shithole and mad every day. On the other hand, as the crisis grew, Marxist circles and the labor movement revived and intensified each year.