[cripplecreek]

Communism cannot get started without tyranny.

And useful idiots. However it usually gets the useful idiots killed as soon as their government takes power. The last thing totalitarians need is trouble makers. Castro killed the bearded ones, the Nazis killed the brownshirts, Stalin killed all potential threats to his power.

[gusty]

As you point out, it is not only the useful idiots that are eliminated. Communist tyrants will inevitably end up killing each other. Just ask Leon Trotsky and Hafizullah Amin.

[SWAMPSNIPER]

You can’t have even a little bit of socialism beyond basic charity without some coercion. Beyond the level of charity coercicion must increase with the level of socialism or the whole thing collapses.