A hardline Stalinist. A tankie is a member of a communist group or a "fellow traveller" (sympathiser) who believes fully in the political system of the Soviet Union and defends/defended the actions of the Soviet Union and other accredited states (China, Serbia, etc.) to the hilt, even in cases where other communists criticise their policies or actions. For instance, such a person favours overseas interventions by Soviet-style states, defends these regimes when they engage in human rights violations, and wishes to establish a similar system in other countries such as Britain and America.

The term is used to distinguish the rare individuals with these kinds of beliefs from communists more broadly (including Communist Party members), whose adherence to Soviet doctrine and attachment to existing "socialist" states is somewhat weaker.

It is always more-or-less abusive in the sense that those termed tankies do not use the term themselves, but it doesn't have any particular bite (unlike, say, Trot).

The term derives from the fact that the divisions within the communist movement first arose when the Soviet Union sent tanks into communist Hungary in 1956, to crush an attempt to establish an alternative version of communism which was not embraced by the Russians. Most communists outside the eastern bloc opposed this action and criticised the Soviet Union. The "tankies" were those who said "send the tanks in".

The epithet has stuck because tankies also supported "sending the tanks in" in cases such as Czechoslovakia 1968, Afghanistan 1979, Bosnia and Kosovo/a (in the case of the Serbian state), and so on (whereas the rest of the communist movement has gravitated towards anti-militarism).

A very authoritarian socialist/ communist.

Slang for someone who supports militant communism, as opposed to the subversive, political, or economic warfare variants of communism. Generally, though not always, a Stalinist.

1 Communists who are anti-american imperialism to the extent that they defend cartoonishly bad people/countries as long as they claim to be socialist and challenged the interests of the U.S. or some other western nation. They can be found defending Joseph Stalin, Bashar al-Assad, and North Korea.

It began as an insult to members of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), who supported the Soviet Union's response to the Hungarian Revolution (1956) and the Prague Spring in Czechoslovakia (1968)

2 People who fetishize the aesthetics of 20th century socialist states and treat communism like a social group rather than a political ideology; not everyone who calls themself communist on Twitter is a tankie.

An apologist for dictatorial regimes with atrocious records on human rights, so long as those countries are not the US. A person who thinks that because the US is flawed, and has done bad things, that that means that countries that are or have traditionally been our adversaries (generally communist countries) are actually perfectly fine places to live, and everything bad that you hear about them is a Western lie. Someone who goes beyond just being a communist or socialist, into defending some truly awful regimes, a tankie throws out the baby with the bathwater.

Apologists for some of humanity's most brutal regimes, including (but not limited to) the Soviet Union, China, and North Korea.

Most Tankies are hardcore Stalinists who want a totalitarian Stalinist regime established in their home country.

Tankies claim be to be left-wing politically and are (rightfully) shunned by other left-wing groups (Progressives, Socialists, Social Democrats, Anarchists, etc) due to their love of dictators.

Authoritarian 'communist' often class reductionist likes to larp as a revolutionary and adamantly plays defense for the USSR, CCP and North Korea.
Often Marxist-Leninist (not all MLs though) however sometimes outright Stalinist. often call others rad-libs if they disagree about existing 'socialism' (CCP/USSR)

A type of communist who generally supports the Soviet Union and Stalin. Often includes support for North Korea and Maoist China as well.

In 1956, Hungary tried to leave the Soviet orbit to start its own fully independent communist state. The Marxist world was split on whether Stalin should allow this to happen, or whether he should "send in the tanks." Those who supported the latter were dubbed Tankies.

Tankies are contrasted with the modern descendants of Eurocommunism, which rejects Leninism/Stalinism in favor of a more soft-handed, humanitarian, pluralistic approach.

A Thomas The Tank Engine fandom member