Basic government functions like the military aren’t communist.

Communism however is when the government does everything. Thus there’s a threshold where more government control is more Communist.

40% of US corn is turned into ethanol not because the free market thinks it’s a good idea but because the government does. That’s Communism in action inside the US, it’s inefficient central planning that fits right into the kind of stupid economic decisions you’d see in the USSR. https://afdc.energy.gov/data/widgets/10339