many great leaders throughout history used compassion hard work and valuing the individual
as their guiding principles unfortunately many others preyed on the vulnerable
and used fear and incredible violence as tools to seize and maintain power
in no particular order here are nine of the most cruel leaders of all time
queen mary the first of england did not earn her nickname bloody mary from ordering a few too many
drinks at brunch although living under her rule would definitely give you the sunday scaries
mary had a storybook childhood in the sense that she had an evil stepmother anne boleyn who was
so cruel that mary was afraid she was going to have her executed but mary survived long
enough to ascend to the throne in 1553 to become the first woman to rule england in her own right
she earned her nickname because of her attempts to undo recent protestant reforms and push
england's official church fully into the fold of catholicism
at the time the accepted punishment for heresy was burning at the stake and during her five-year
reign mary was a stickler for the rules ordering the immolation of nearly 300 religious dissenters
edie amin was known as the butcher of uganda his reign as leader of uganda was brief but terrible
marked by ruthless cunning and calculated terror his singular goal was to maintain
his power by imposing fear he formed private death squads with the chillingly ironic names
of the state research bureau and public safety unit which terrorized ugandans from anonymous
farmers clerks students and shopkeepers to prominent judges educators and diplomats
the number of people killed under his regime is estimated at 300 000. in 1979 he was exiled
and fled to saudi arabia where he lived the rest of his days in hiding
amir timmer nicknamed tamerlane is remembered as one of the world's greatest
and most brutal military tacticians drawing inspiration from his idol and distant relative
genghis khan from 1370 to 1405 he led military campaigns through modern-day iran iraq
turkey and syria with such ferociousness it would bring a tear to genghis's face
he once repressed an uprising by completely massacring a persian city and building
towers out of the seventy thousand skulls of its citizens another time he had a tower constructed
by stacking live men on top of each other and sealing them together with bricks and mortar
historians estimate that timur was responsible for some 17 million deaths
the leaders on this list litter the history books with their evil deeds but there is only one with
the distinction of being name dropped in the bible in 605 bce nebuchadnezzar ii succeeded his father
and grew to be known as one of the greatest kings of ancient babylon he was respected as a warrior
king leading his armies into battle and he grew the city of babylon into the crown jewel of the
empire as a center for arts and intellectual pursuits and the location of one of the wonders
of the ancient world the hanging gardens but in a rare instance this history was written
by the losers in this case the jewish people the babylonian exile nebuchadnezzar's expulsion of the
jews from the kingdom of judah and the destruction of their sacred temple in jerusalem is chronicled
in detail in the book of daniel this book also describes him as an enemy of god and tells the
story of the time he threw three hebrew men into a furnace when they refused to worship a giant
golden statue of king nebuchadnezzar luckily god saved their lives in the story at least
vlad the impaler didn't just go down in the history books as a brutal ruler he also inspired
a best-selling novel nicknamed dracula or son of dragon vlad the impaler had a reputation for
you guessed it impaling his enemies and dipping his bread in their blood vlad became the ruler of
olachia in present-day romania on three separate occasions clinging to the throne through torture
mutilation and mass murder victims were disemboweled beheaded and skinned or boiled alive
his forces poisoned wells burned crops and paid diseased men to infiltrate the enemy to pass along
their pestilence it's believed he is responsible for the deaths of around 80 thousand people
historians consider pol pot to be one of the most barbaric and murderous leaders in recent history
pole was the secretary of the khmer rouge communist party which incited a civil war
in cambodia in 1968 by the time the war was over and khmer rouge had seized control of the country
half a million cambodian citizens had died but it was only the beginning pot's goal was
to enforce a radical brand of communism aimed at creating a classless society after taking power
pol pot ordered the city of phnom penh's 2.5 million residents to be evacuated civil servants
doctors teachers and other professionals were stripped of their possessions and forced to work
in the fields as part of a so-called re-education process anyone who resisted or broke the rules
were sent to detention camps the s-21 detention center was unimaginably horrible as few as 12
out of the 20 000 people sent there survived during this time the majority of the bodies
were dumped in mass graves called killing fields it is estimated that from 1975 to 1979 under the
leadership of pol pot the government caused the deaths of more than one million people from forced
labor starvation disease torture or execution in what is now called the cambodian genocide
this next figure is recognized with a single name that is synonymous with evil hitler was
a lowly german corporal in world war one but was humiliated and outraged at the penalties
germany faced from the treaty of versailles in response he helped start the german workers party
the precursor to the nazi party soon after being appointed chancellor hitler suspended many civil
liberties including freedom of press freedom of expression and the right to hold public assemblies
and police were authorized to detain citizens without cause he transformed germany into a war
state intent on conquering europe for the benefit of the so-called aryan race his invasion of poland
triggered the start of world war ii during the war nazi military forces rounded up and executed some
17 million victims they considered inferior or undesirable including jews slavs homosexuals and
jehovah's witnesses he told a munich audience in 1922 there are only two possibilities
either victory of the aryan or annihilation of the aryan and the victory of the jew
he maintained power until his death by suicide in april 1945.
joseph stalin was the russian understudy who became the lead actor he participated in the
russian revolution in 1917 and served under vladimir lenin until lennon's death in 1924
at which point stalin seized full dictatorial control of the ussr and held it until his
death in 1953. his actions and policies were truly heartless and he had zero tolerance for opposition
during a period called the great terror he purged the communist party and army of anyone who might
oppose him over half of his central committee members generals and admirals were executed
average citizens were also encouraged to inform on one another 18 million people were accused
of opposing communism or petty crimes and sent to the gulags or siberian labor camps stalin was also
responsible for one of the worst man-made famines in human history by implementing collectivization
grouping of farms to be owned by the state about 5 million people died and land owners
who opposed giving up their land were executed or imprisoned he was cruel on a mass scale all the
way down to the individual in world war ii his son a lieutenant in the red army was captured by the
germans they proposed to free him in a prisoner swap for a field marshal but stalin refused
saying soviet soldiers who allowed themselves to be captured should be considered traitors
in total historians estimate around 20 million people died during his reign genghis khan reigned
over the mongol empire from 1206 to 1227. at its peak it stretched across nine million square miles
roughly the size of north america and the largest contiguous empire in world history genghis was so
ruthless in his plundering that a 13th century european historian described his army as the
detestable nation of satan that poured out like devils but his reign was complex and he also
ushered in some positive changes he forbade the selling and kidnapping of women banned torture and
the enslavement of any mongol ordered the adoption of a writing system and allowed freedom of
religion on the other hand he killed all conquered aristocrats and resisting soldiers and used the
unskilled workers as human shields during his next assault all in all some historians estimate that
40 million people were killed during the mongol conquests history is riddled with examples of evil
figures for whom no injustice is too atrocious when power is the end game we must learn from
what these people did and recognize how they did it in order to prevent it from happening in the
future
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