In the present stage of history, yes. No country other than Japan or the western ones have managed to rise to the status of being imperialist powers. The reason is simple. The powers which became imperialist first delayed the development of the rest of the world by literal centuries, preventing any other people from becoming imperialist. Japan happened to escape this fate by geographical luck and developed early, allowing it to join the ranks of the imperialists.

There is a reason why the most dominant/advanced capitalist countries today are still the same ones that were advanced over a 100 years ago.

otherwise it’s just sparkling being an asshole to your neighbors

This has literally nothing to do with imperialism, which is the system by which a handful of the most advanced capitalist countries have consumed unparalleled sums of human labor from the whole of humanity for centuries on end.

[–] davel@lemmy.ml 4 points 3 days ago (1 children)

It’s not exclusive to the West. Japan did it for sixty years, until it was made a vassal of the US, which it still is today[1][2].

[–] Ciderpunk@lemmy.world 1 points 3 days ago (2 children)

I’m not sure what the point of this considering that I am specifically calling you out for refusing to admit Russia is doing an imperialism and your deflection is to say that Japan did an imperialism. Is that supposed to make Russia all clear to do an imperialism?

[–] Sodium_nitride@lemmygrad.ml 6 points 3 days ago

admit Russia is doing an imperialism

The very fact that you treat imperialism like an action and not a system shows that you don't have even the minimum possible of understanding of what it is.

[–] davel@lemmy.ml 6 points 3 days ago (1 children)

It seems you didn’t read what I linked to, so I’ll copypasta:

<octopus_ink> Honest question from a non-communist, based on your reply here. Does one need to support Putin to be a Marxist?

<davel> In a word, no. In a few more words, support for Russia (not Putin, as historical materialists don’t subscribe to great man theory) is only a partial, temporary, tactical one, in the context of imperialist liberation. Russia is still a capitalist state, though, so it’s a two stage strategy: first liberate colonized bourgeois states from colonizer states, and second revolution within those liberated bourgeois states.

Russia is an interesting case: it has already liberated itself from the post-Soviet “shock therapy” neocolonizers. This occurred during Putin’s administration, which is why he is especially hated by the US. So now the support for Russia is in the context of keeping the colonizers from recolonizing it, and supporting Russia to the extent that it helps other states liberate themselves. But Russia isn’t trying to “liberate” Ukraine, at least not all of Ukraine. It’s trying to resolve the genocidal attacks on the people of the Donbas, and it’s trying to resolve the imperialist military expansion at its border.

Robert Parry, 2015: The Mess that Nuland Made

Jeffery Sachs, 2023: The War in Ukraine Was Provoked—and Why That Matters to Achieve Peace

[–] Ciderpunk@lemmy.world -5 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Still hinging literally everything on Donbas not being externally caused I see. As long as you cover up interference in other countries, it’s fine to use that as pretext to invade and do whatever you want.

[–] Grapho@lemmy.ml 7 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

So Donbas was externally caused because... we should trust you that it was?

But Ukraine's 2014 coup wasn't externally caused because... it was different from all the other times the US deposed a government, since this time they put congresspeople like John McCain on the ground? Even US, anti-Russian sources recognize it as fact.

At this point you have to be deliberately dodging the evidence to not recognize what's going on.

[–] Grapho@lemmy.ml -2 points 3 days ago (1 children)

It's imperialism if it has the characteristics of imperialism, wishing it really hard because that's a word that would be an amazing gotcha isn't enough. Imperialism is, to really overly simplify it: the extraction of surplus value, often in the form of labor through financial instruments from one country to another. Russia's position in the world is not that of imperialist extraction (except in the participation prior to the sanctions in the western financial sector) since capital was still consolidating its power over the working class in Russia, given that its capitalist system (another western imposition) wasn't developed enough to do so, and it was still mostly an export economy.

Now, I eagerly await for the flat-earth level analysis of "but I see it and I think it is imperialist".

[–] Ciderpunk@lemmy.world 6 points 3 days ago

I mean, we agree, Russia intends to exploit Ukraine’s natural gas reserves in the regions they are occupying, which definitely meets the definition you set out so…

Unless you’re insisting that Russia is going to just give that territory up after all this, despite them claiming they have a hereditary right to it all, because they just really wouldn’t want to accidentally profit off taking over their neighbors territory in which case, it sounds like the “flat earth level analysis” is coming from inside the house.