The 5 Most Shockingly Insane Modern Dictators
#2.
Kim Il Sung -- Eternal President of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea
If you ever wondered how North Korea's Kim Jong Il got so crazy, wonder no more. With a father like Kim Il Sung, it is a wonder that Jong Il is not in a straitjacket and commanding a roomful of troll dolls to be his army.
Via The Kremlin
We blame his friends.
Kim Il Sung was the first president of North Korea after World War II, in 1945. His appointment by the Soviets demonstrated exactly how little they cared about the Koreans, because Kim wasn't very Korean at all (he had only eight years of formal schooling, and all of it in China -- he spoke so little Korean that he had to be coached during his first speech). The Soviets didn't realize he was nuts until he started the Korean War, which accomplished nothing beyond destroying half the country. And then, the man went truly apeshit.
He told his people that during WWII, he had taken part in more than 100,000 battles over 15 years. That computes to roughly 20 battles a day. Oh, and WWII lasted only six years. Do we even need to mention that in reality he hardly saw any combat in WWII? He also said that he could turn sand into rice and cross rivers on leaves, believing himself to be some sort of Korean Jesus.
If Jesus had cannons.
Kim then made 20 different "Kim Il Sung Badges" for people to wear, so that different classes could wear different badges. He had someone write a "Song of General Kim Il Sung." The first two bars were used as intervals in Korean radio and television, and in 2005, the Korean space program blasted that song into space, giving warning to aliens about the terribly contagious stupidity we have on Earth. In other words, he came up with the North Korean tradition of making propaganda a priority above food, education and sanity.
But don't worry, he got what was coming to him ...What happened to him?
Oh, wait. Kim died a fat and happy man in 1994.
Kim circa 1946.
Kim after he died.
A 10-day mourning period ensued, and hundreds of thousands of brainwashed Koreans came from all over the country to cry dramatically at the body. Thousands committed suicide, as obviously, there was no more reason to live.
In 1998, Kim Jong Il posthumously made his father the Eternal President of the Republic. Clearly, he could never fill those shoes.
#1.
Mao Zedong -- Chairman of the Communist Party of China
Mao Zedong became leader of the People's Republic of China when it was founded in 1949. We previously explained how he was responsible for one of the most disastrous policies in world history, the "Great Leap Forward." Basically, it entailed pulling all of his people off of farming to have them try to mill steel in their backyards instead. (Note: You cannot make steel in your back yard.) Millions starved.
That is, unfortunately, the tip of the Mao Zedong crazy iceberg.
We know the people in this image are mostly madmen, but check out that dude with the crazy long goatee. What a straight-up badass.
In the wake of that disaster, Mao's power was considerably shaken, so much so that two of his underlings, Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping, were able to wrest power from him. This, of course, infuriated Mao, who promptly began another disastrous campaign: the Cultural Revolution, which literally was a war against smart people.
Under the pretext that bourgeois elements were permeating a classless society, Mao banished his political opponents, such as Liu and Deng, to the countryside. Soon, however, Mao's definition of political opponents stretched to encompass "anyone who is smart." Universities were closed down, and professors and students were sent to the countryside to be "re-educated" through labor. The word "intellectual" became an insult. The only genius was declared to be Mao himself (people were taught to repeat the phrase, "Chairman Mao is a genius, everything the Chairman says is greatly true; one of the Chairman's words will override the meaning of ten thousand of ours.")
"Also, his image absolutely will not end up littering the floors of vintage shops worldwide."
And then there was Lei Feng. He was a completely unremarkable soldier who died in an unremarkable fashion after getting hit by a telephone pole. But Mao arbitrarily decided to declare him the nation's greatest hero. Various staged photos supposedly depicted him doing good deeds, and stories of his heroics were inserted into textbooks in every school. A diary belonging to him was "found," and it contained nothing but flowery praises for Mao.
Doves and submachine guns. China gets it.
Then Mao recruited high school students to his cause, calling them the Red Guards. Mao tasked these teenagers with correcting the bourgeois elements in society and effectively gave them a legal blank check to do it by whatever means they chose. This went exactly how you'd expect -- they started ransacking people's houses and beating them if they were found to own anything even remotely Western, such as ties.
As he got older, Mao started worrying about his own mortality and subscribing to the Taoist belief that having sex with virgins lengthens one's lifespan. Young girls were brought from all over the country to help him on this monumental task. Mao often had fivesomes or sixsomes and watched nude underwater ballet shows.
Even Enver Hoxha bows to Mao's monumental crazy.
He still died in 1976. We have to be honest, we're kind of surprised that didn't work.
Ethan Lou is a freelance writer. He blogs at ethanethan.tumblr.com, his Twitter is twitter.com/Ethan_Lou, and you can reach him at ethan.lou@live.com.
For more insight into North Korea, check out 6 Reasons North Korea is the Funniest Evil Dictatorship Ever. Or learn about some fictional leaders worse than these guys in 6 Iconic Movie Leaders (Who Aren't Fit To Lead A Parade).
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Ceausescu's daughter was actually a very hard worker, head of the mathematical institute. In other words, the polar opposite of her brother.
ReplyThey should have put "Emperor" Jean-Bedal Bokassa on this list. He was the president of the Central Afircan Republic, and then the founder of the (thankfully) short-lived Central African Empire, who was supposedly a cannibal. Either way he was a crazy murderous f**k just like all the others on this list.
Replyyup. psychopaths.
Replybold move to tlk about Mao
Replyso many communism in this article
Replyyou is right there is many communism in the article
communism is many leader crazy
My Chinese friend was very young during the Cultural Revolution, and he told me the red guard were going door to door and arresting anyone who didn't own the standard Mao picture. He says his dad had to paint one, what with needing money for food and all. It took him weeks because he was so scared of any imperfections. He's very bitter, but most Chinese you speak to will still tell you Mao was a hero
ReplyIn regard to Kim Il Sung, 15 years is more accurate than 6. WWII lasted 6 years as far as European and American involvement, but Japan was f*****g s**t up starting in the mid-1930's, so for China and Korea it lasted far longer than 6 years
Reply Hide All See All 5 RepliesOh, well in THAT case I can totally see how he took part in 100,000 battles. How foolish we were to have doubted.
However, the Second Sino-Japanese War didn't start until 1937. Which, as you may be aware, is in the mid-1930s. And which only leaves eight years for warring.
In soviet Korea years war you
i thought there was another one around 1930? Although Il Sung is still one crazy idiot
Bryan:
It ain't just about the Japanese, Mao and the communists were fighting the Nationalist, lead by Chiang Kai Sheik since the 1920's.
Shit, why do we (communists I mean) get all the batshit insane leaders? givin us a bad rap man.
Reply Hide All See All 6 RepliesBecause communism is batsh*t insane? Maybe you should take a hint.
From what I understand, communism is based on a noble ideal, but has at least two fatal flaws. It can only truly work in a community composed entirely of idealistic communists - usually hippies or monks.
CarrieVS is right. IT's a grat idea in principle, but it's too easy for one person to completely f**k up the whole system. I would reccomend you read "Animal Farm". It describes the situation perfectly.
well, there were Jean-Bedel Bokassa (Central-African Republic), François Duvalier (Haiti) and Idi Amin (Uganda) to counterbalance those 5.
Communism never "truly works". There isn't a historical example of an actual nation-state surviving for an extended amount of time using a communist system. Moreover, communism as an ideal is absurd. There's no actual motivating force in a true communist society short of impressing your fellow citizens, as allocation of material goods stays the same regardless of bona fide success or innovation.
MVPacMan23: you misunderstand me. I was talking about communities of idealists within a country. I completely agree with you, but plenty of people do follow the communist ideal, and communes can and sometimes do work, although even they are desperately vulnerable to corruption.
Animal Farm does describe it well, but the writer was writing in favor of socialism, which many people don't realize. Fun fact.
Are you aware that Great Britian and France aren't part of the west? West refers to the Western Hemisphere, which includes only North America, South America and part of Antarctica.
Reply Hide All See All 5 Repliesno
No. "West" refers to "Western Civilization," being societies with strong cultural or hereditary ties to major European (primarily Western European) societies, beginning with the Ancient Greeks. Great Britain and France have been two of the major Western powers of the past few centuries. That was a nice try, though.
please tell me that you are purposely being this stupid.
Atually even if you were right, the western hemisphere is everything west of Greenwich(and East of the International Date Line). That includes western Europe: Portugal, ROI, most of the UK and Spain, the edge of France; and western Africa including Morocco, Mauritania, part of Algeria, and a lot of other countries.
What they said
The South Korean name for South Korea roughly translates to "The Great Han People," whereas their name for the Democratic People's Republic of Korea is literally "North Korea." I've always found that kind of funny.
ReplyGook means nation, not person, so Daehanmingook is the Great Han Nation. The North calls themselves Democratic People's Republic of Joseon, and South Korea is referred to up there as South Joseon.
FAP FAP FAP FAPPITY FAP FAP
ReplyMy modern history of China teacher didn't like this so much, but Mao was one crazy bastard! Yes, you cannot create great steal in your own back yard, but the frenzy wasn't so crazy that they saw and gave up there. They dug up coffins and burned the wood from those to bring heat to the fires to make the metal. That's straight from the professor's lips. Frankly, I think they both must be crazy...
Replysteel**.
Yup, Mao was a crazy moron. And they didn't even mention the time he made every citizen of China stand outside and bang on pots and pans for a day!
ReplyAKA, to chase away the sparrows! You'd think they got better things to do than banging on pots and pans for a whole day but that's what they did. I know since my parents, as kids, did it!
For some reason I read "could turn sand into rice" into "could turn into sand and rice".
Replywhich is actually way funnier
"Taoist belief that having sex with virgins lengthens one's lifespan"
Reply Hide All See All 6 RepliesCan we like not slander Taoism on the side for like no reason? Even though it's a religion that probably no one cares about (other than me).
I'm sure if it said something like "Jesus sucked c**ks" it'd be alright, though.
That's not slamming Taoism. It's true. But! You have to hold in your sperm so you wouldn't lose your life force.
It only lengthens life span if they come and you don't, allowing you to steal their jing (sexual life energy). Cos, you know, Tao isn't batshit and is entirely logical and scientific. And shit.
Oh, like a zombie jew granting wishes is more plausible.
This is Taoist mystic stuff which most sane taoists don't practice.(Although they do belive in mediums and spirit possesion fortune telling) Taoism is China's native religion.
it's an insane idea, but come on, guys, virgins! Sex! Assuming they are of legal age.
Albania only has three million people? Man, if they all moved to New York we wouldn't even notice
ReplyThey kinda have- things were so bad in the 90s that when the borders opened up people left like crazy (and by crazy I mean overfull boats crossing the Ionian sea to Italy with people falling off . . . ) so now more Albanians live outside Albania than live in it. There are lots of Albanians in New York, Michigan and Worcester, Mass. Also, one more fun fact about Enver- he made students "volunteer" on vacations and weekends for work duty building roads and railroads and stuff- one thing that they had to do every year is move huge white rocks on hill sides spelling out his name. You can still see 30 ft tall "Enver" on sides of hills all over the country.
At least Washington wasn't that crazy, would've taken twice as long to write his name in stones....
Im really quite surprised that Stalin didn't make the list.. that guy was kinda nuts, and still loved by his country after killing 20 thousand of his own people. They were run by fear afterall
Reply Hide All See All 5 RepliesDid he not kill a helluva lot more than 20k?
Actually, Stalin killed literally millions of people, more than -gasp!- Hitler himself. He still has statues though.
Stalin was (by comparison) quite normal.
I don't know if Stalin was "funny" crazy so much as "shoot you and make your family pay for the bullet" crazy
He may have personally killed 20,000 people, but the real death toll of his personal brand of crazy was well north of 20 million.
Not even counting the cannon fodder he made of his countrymen, fed to German troop advance in the "great patriotic war."
He also apparently held parties in the Kremlin where people had to keep up with his very Russian pace of drinking, and people pissed themselves in full dress uniform lest they offend the boss and stand up to go for a piss before given permission.
anyone else surprised that Kim Jong Il didn't make the list?
Reply Hide All See All 4 RepliesSince it's pretty much common knowledge that Kim Jong Il is bats**t insane i figure alot of people would've just scrolled past that section anyway
He's already been on like two other lists dude.
This is the followup to another list in which he was no.1.
He's mentined as being less insane than Il Sung. I think there's no reason to put them both on.
Fun stuff! One important detail about the Kim Il-Sung bit:
Reply Hide All See All 3 RepliesWWII lasted 6 years for Britain, etc. For a lot of Asia (ie China and Korea), the war lasted well over a decade. So yes, 20 battles a day for 15 years is technically possible. And yes, it's still insane.
And what's with communist dictators getting mummified. amirite?
No. He invented time machine, and used it often.
and what's up with all these communist dictators being f**king mental?
Thing aboot NK, they have a thing against not only the "US Imperialism" but also j*panese, mostly because the j*panese were a legit full on killing machine throughout the 1930's, as well as the 40's. and while today they make reliable cars and ultra-creepy sex dolls there was a time where Imperial j*pan was a threat to Asia; see the 'Rape of Nanking' and basicly all of Manchuria circa late 30's as evidence. that explains the jon Illin'ism psycho-extrapolation of a 15 year 2nd world war.
This article, if it can be dignified with such a name, should be called 'Five Left Wing Dictators Crapped Claims to be "Shockingly Insane".'
Reply Hide All See All 4 RepliesAre you attempting to communicate? I see words, but beyond that....
Indeed.
Are you Kim Jong Il, by any chance?
You didn't see the crazy in this article at all?