By Lina Bryce
It is against human nature to be controlled; despite this history has seen many tyrants comes to power. It takes a cult of personality to make this a reality, but we should not be so complacent to believe that murderous dictators remain permanently in history. One individual with charisma and the artful work of media can make this a present reality.
Marxism manifests in many ideological variances. The distinction between what is “communist” and what is “socialist” is muddled. Conventional thought is that socialists are elected and communists are not. But dictators dress themselves in whatever label is politically expedient for their goals. Aside from their Marxist roots, whether they called themselves socialists, communists, or some variance, these totalitarian leaders had one more thing in common:
They were all cold-blooded murderers and oppressors.
10. Kim Jong-il
“I am the object of criticism around the world. But I think that since I am being discussed, then I am on the right track.”
Before his recent death, North Korea’s ‘Supreme Leader,’ Kim Jong-il arrested over 250,000 people during his rule and is directly responsible for the starvation and deaths of million of North Koreans. While they starved, Kim–who had a fear of flying–would have live lobsters air-lifted to the train every day he traveled in.
“He was also the first ruler of an urbanized, literate society to preside over a mass famine in peacetime,”, the LA Times wrote.
The Great North Korean Famine of the 1990s, which erupted shortly after his father’s death, is believed to have killed hundreds of thousands of his subjects– perhaps more. The exact number would be impossible to know, as it remains a secret to outsiders.
It was reported by South Korean media in December 2012, that he had died “in a fit of rage” over construction faults at a crucial power plant project.
9. Vladimir Lenin
“The way to crush the bourgeoisie is to grind them between the millstones of taxation and inflation.”
No one in history has likely received more assassination attempts than Vladimir Lenin. Of course, given the fact that he instituted the “Red Terror”–the systematic elimination of millions of people, including members of his own political party– this should come as no surprise.
8. Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev
“The trouble with free elections is, you never know who is going to win.”
Nearly 100,000 Moldovans were murdered in a purge conducted by then Commissar Leonid Brezhnev, who would later become the communist leader for the Soviet Union. Following in the footsteps of his senselessly violent predecessors, Stalin and Lenin, his reign would be riddled with bloodshed from a massive genocide, not just against the Moldovans, but the Volga Germans, Cossacks, Poles, and Armenians as well.
7. Kim il Sung
“The oppressed peoples can liberate themselves only through struggle. This is a simple and clear truth confirmed by history.”
Kim il Sung of North Korea led a nation using force, aggression, and deception. Eventually, his own people would have such disdain for him, that he resorted to scapegoating the U.S. for their problems, suggesting that the world’s superpower spread the epidemic throughout the countryside. Just to reassure the people that this was the case, he killed 1.6 million of his own people.
Like Stalin, but without trials, he had large-scale purges for those who dared to doubt his claims. During his tenure, prison camps sprung up all over the country to contain the ever growing masses of people against Kim Il Sun.
6. Mengistu Haile Mariam
“In this country, some aristocratic families automatically categorize persons with dark skin, thick lips, and kinky hair as Barias… let it be clear to everybody that I shall soon make these ignoramuses stoop and grind corn!”
Mengistu Haile Mariam is a politician who was in power from 1974-1991 as the President of the People’s Democratic Republic of Ethiopia. It is rumored that he had smothered the previous president, Haile Selassie, in order attain power, however, he has always denied these claims. He is well-known for his role in the Ethiopian Red Terror, which was a campaign of repression led by the Derg (communist militia in Ethiopia). In his introductory speech Mengitsu yelled, “Death to counterrevolutionaries! Death to the EPRP!” Then he took three bottles filled with blood and threw them to the ground.”
His leadership proved to be a murderous rampage, with thousands of people being killed and found dead on the streets in the years which followed. Much of the murdering can be attributed to the friendly neighborhood watch known as “Kebeles.” He would then charge the family a tax, which was entitled “The Wasted Bullet” if they wished the body of their loved ones to be returned to them. Those would be the lucky ones, the unlucky deceased would be left on the street where wild hyenas would fight over their corpses. The campaign has been described as one of the worst mass murders in Africa ever. Mengistu is even known to have his garroted people to death.
Mengistu fled to Zimbabwe in 1991 at the conclusion of the Ethiopian Civil War and remains there despite an Ethiopian court verdict finding him guilty in absentia of genocide. His estimated death toll number for which he is responsible runs anywhere within a range of 500,000 to 2,000,000.
5. Pol Pot
“He who protests is an enemy; he who opposes is a corpse.”
As the Communist leader of Cambodia, Pol Pot had envisioned a country that would be equal in every way and by any means.
The combined acts of executions, abusive work conditions, malnutrition and poor medical care claimed the death of approximately 25 percent of the Cambodian population. In total, it is estimated that anywhere from 1 to 3 million people died as a consequence of Pot’s policies during his four-year dictatorship.
In mandating equality for all, he sent city people to the farms while farm people were to go to the city. As one might expect, he did not get the results he intended.
Eventually, he would resort to punishing people by depriving them of their right to education, medication, and nutrition. If people didn’t follow these expectations, he would kill them.
4. Fidel Castro
“Capitalism has neither the capacity, nor the morality, nor the ethics to solve the problems of poverty.”
Fidel Casto who shared ideological views of the USSR, establishing relations with several Marxist-Leninist states, ruled Cuba for nearly half a century. Like so man other dictators of the world with blood on their hands, he could have his own Top Ten List of horrid acts. During his rule, Castro shot down of American civilian aircraft killing four people, including three American citizens.
With his own people he was just as unforgiving, detaining Cuban political prisoners, instituting forced labor camps, and separating loved ones from their families, if necessary. Castro had his own firing squads and sank the 13 de Marzo tugboat killing Cuban women and children. He restricted the mobility of the Cuban people and was also a religious oppressor.
The estimates of Cubans killed range from 35,000 to 141,000. His biggest death toll that he is credited for is for the ‘Balseros’ (rafters in Spanish), refugees fleeing by boat who had perished.
3. Josef Stalin
“Death is the solution to all problems–no man, no problem.”
Josef Stalin became the leader of Soviet Union after Lenin died in 1924, and launched government programs that would make the country more progressive. His attempt to move to the new economy, however, led to the starvation of nearly 10 million people. With many intellectuals and activists not in favor of his leadership, Stalin also launched the “Great Purge,” killing every person who opposed him and his ideas.
Stalin imposed a deliberate famine on Ukraine and killed millions of the wealthier peasants (‘kulaks’) while forcing them off their land. He purged his own party as a result, shooting thousands and sending millions to work camps to only in the Gulag.
While the death count at his hands is widely agreed to be in millions, it is also noted that if famine were included, the death count of around 10 million deaths—6 million from famine and 4 million from other causes—can also be attributable to the regime. Recent historians suggest it to be a likely total of around 20 million, citing much higher death tolls from executions, Gulag camps, deportations and other causes.
2. Adolf Hitler
“I do not see why man should not be just as cruel as nature.“
Before becoming the leader of the Nazis (the National Socialist German Workers’ Party), Hitler’s murderous legacy would begin on November 8, 1923, in a failed coup that ended up killing sixteen NSDAP members and four police officers; landing him in jail.
Hitler was appointed chancellor in 1933 and began his Third Reich. Between 1939 and 1945, the Schutzstaffel (SS), assisted by collaborationist governments and recruits from occupied countries, was responsible for the deaths of at least eleven million people, including 5.5 to 6 million Jews (representing two-thirds of the Jewish population of Europe, and between 200,000 and 1,500,000 Romani people). Early on, Hitler had authorised a euthanasia program for adults with serious mental and physical disabilities called Action Brandt. He approved killing squads (Einsatzgruppen) that followed the German army through Poland, the Baltic, and the Soviet Union—and he was well informed about their activities.
By summer 1942, Auschwitz concentration camp was rapidly expanded to accommodate large numbers of deportees for killing or enslavement. His death is said to be nearly 17 million.
1. Mao Zedong
“Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.”
Mao is famous for being the leader who brought communism to the Republic of China. In his first five years, he killed about 4 to 6 million people, indiscriminately sentencing them to death. His social programs such as the “Great Leap Forward” are said to have resulted in the starvation of nearly 20 million alone. He would also execute countless enemies of the State.
Before taking power, he worked on a Socialist movement to indoctrinate children through education so that they would eventually fight to take over the current regime. This was part of the “four cleanups movement”–cleansing politics, economics, ideas, and organization of “reactionaries.” Eventually leading to the formation of the “Red Guards,” who were organized to punish intellectuals and take out Mao’s political adversaries. He encouraged his followers to destroy buildings, sacred objects. They were told to stand up to their elders, punish them, and even kill them if they did not agree.
By 1968, Mao’s agenda showed success, which enabled him to implement his policy called the “Down to the Countryside Movement”–forcing young intellectuals to move out to the country to become farmers. These people who were pushed out to the countryside were mostly people from the Red Guards who helped him gain power.
Mao is responsible for the deaths of anywhere from 7- 40,000 million with some estimates holding his policies and political purges from 1949 to 1976 responsible the deaths of 49 to 78 million people.