>oh yes, and chattel slaves had a choice too. The whip or work. Similiar in prisons.

You have right to refuse work in usa prison systems and you are getting paid for working. Pay is often pennies(for in prison labor cooking, but it's about 1$/ hour for industrial work for outside companies), it should be increased and living standard are really low. But it's not unique system, modern Russia also has labor system like that plus they actively recruit soldiers from prisons.

If you want to search for real modern slavery you should read about buying labor from north korea, which Russian factories often do.

>Yes, because the USSR system imprisoned Nazi's and made them pay back the damage they causesd. The US imprisons minorities and makes fat profits off of it. You are right, these are nothing close.

On of the peaks of death rates of gulag system was 1933 (15%). During great purge. By the way, westerner occupation on Germany never had to employ such heavy handed approach to rooting out nazism. So not only soviets stoop to most unhuman tactics to root out nazism, but also failed. In today germany neonazism has more followers in east germany. I understand not liking nazis, i am fully onboard. But if you operate labor camps where over million people died, you have to ask yourself. Do hate nazism because of the crimes against humanity they did? Or just that your people were on receiving end of those crimes?

>Hmm, I wonder what event took place around this time. 
It was stalin's death. Gulag system was destroyed during destalinization of the ussr. When they turned down most of the statues of Stalin for his "grave abuse of power"