The word
tankie is a pejorative or self-descriptive term which can have several meanings. First used within sections of the
Cold War left to decry support for
Soviet interventions in
Warsaw Pact countries, the term was later resurrected by
internet leftists and broadened in scope to include
historical revisionists concerned with any
socialist state. Because of their opposition to liberal historical narratives and longtime association with the
Soviet Union,
Marxist–Leninists were often labelled
tankies; the persistent use of the term in this sense has given rise to neutral or even positive connotations, and modern leftists may use the two interchangeably.
Starting in the 2010s (or possibly earlier), left-adjacent
liberals such as
progressives and
radlibs, either by deliberate innovation or as the result of a misconception (e.g., that only a tankie could hold such positions), began to use the term against critics of Western narratives concerning the
Syrian Civil War,
North Korea, and the
2014 Ukraine conflict, among other topics. This usage is unequivocally negative and has achieved widespread currency online, even among
centrists and
rightists. The term is now a favorite of establishment media figures (including "blue-checks"), who have in recent years taken to several mainstream outlets to criticize specific ideas or figures which they believe are part of a rising tide of tankie influence. The use of the word almost always implies support for
authoritarianism.