The term "tankie" was originally used by dissident Marxist–Leninists to describe members of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) who followed the party line of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). Specifically, it was used to distinguish party members who spoke out in defense of the Soviet use of tanks to crush the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 and the 1968 Prague Spring uprising, or who more broadly adhered to pro-Soviet positions.[5][6]
Tankie refers to the when Russia sent tanks in Hungary to stop them from setting up a communist government that didn't follow their particular communist ideology.
A few days ago Hungary's minister of foreign affairs said that if Trump was president the war in Ukraine never would have happened because Putin feared Trump too much. What a fucking joke, can't decide which dick to suck.
It's not much ironic considering how... fascism-leaning Hungary always was, historically. It was a large faction of Hungarian native politicians who invited Soviet intervention in the first place. The Hungarian secret service at the time also shot at protesters, which escalated the protests. Moscow at the time wasn't an entire culprit, that changed with 1968. But internal power struggle is at core of these interventions, to legitimise them Moscow needed collaborationists.
This doesn't stop tankies from being pro-Russia and pro-China. Modern tankies are absolutely happy with oligarchies and gigacorporations running the world, they just hate western society.
In essence, they worship authoritarianism rather than communism itself.
I'd say the difference between a tankie and a socialist is that a socialist wants equality and well-being for everyone and tankies just want people they don't like to die at the hands of an authoritarian regime, regardless of whether it's actually a communist regime.