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Most Evil Modern day (post WW1) Regimes .. Ever

BuilderPlumber

With all this ISIS/ISIL stuff, we all know that this organisation is truly evil. But is it one of the worst regimes to come about in modern times? What would you consider the top most evil regimes of modern times (1918 to date)?

Along with ISIS/ISIL, I have to say the Khmer Rouge, the Nazis, the Taliban and - when in a certain frame of mind - Ceaucescu's Romania, Milosevic's Yugoslavia and North Korea.

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electrobanana

The FCA and their totalitarian regime in the 80s.

BoJack Horseman

PopePalpatine wrote: »

I remember reading an article (I think it was on the BBC) of how the Americans found it easier to bring themselves to nuke the Japanese than the Nazis, because they weren't white.

Or, more likely, that the war in europe was all but over..... while Japan was much further from defeat.

My vote goes to Stalin, with honourable mention for The Congo/Zaire regimes.

Cold War Kid

Oranage2 wrote: »

Roman Catholic church. Cliché answer now, but they did some truly horrific and evil things.

It's utterly dishonest to say they were the most evil, considering the other regimes that were in power. Plus, many within the Catholic Church did very good things.

davmol

speedboatchase wrote: »

Someone's bound to say Israel soon and then this entire thread will be derailed and eventually locked.

Without turning it into an Israel /Palestinian debate,i would have to say Israel/IDF/Netanyahu are definitely one of the most evil modern day regimes.

5rtytry56

El Salvadore regime - 1980's.
Chile - under General Pinochet utter little príck

BuilderPlumber

A lot of interesting ones brought up here ....

When one looks at evil in a regime, it can manifest itself in different ways. For example: most stifling to live under (the warped Islam of Taliban or ISIS or the warped socialism of Pol Pot), the most invasive of other countries (Bush, Netanyahu), the most racist (Nazis, ISIS, Apartheid South Africa), the biggest killers (Stalin, Mao), or the ones who left their countries totally poor/isolated (North Korea especially under the last 2 Kims, Albania under Enver Hoxha).

Other, mostly military, regimes seemed to be ok for some and not for others (esp. suspected communists). Interestingly enough, the Catholic church was up to all kinds of brutalities at a government level in the older eras. While some of their clergy were involved in abuse and it was covered up in recent times, there was no brutal dictatorship akin to the Spanish Inquisition in place in recent times though.

As regards Irish governments and county councils, they certainly are no saints and they act in their own interests. But they hardly have anything on Pol Pot or Kim Jong Un.

Bad music managers like certain reality TV people who also manage boybands have also been mentioned and there is no doubt that these are dictators in their own way. The media do promote certain people and not others. This clearly is kind of like the personality cults of dictators in its own way.

Crystal Swing are not the worst and are hardly dictators! Unless you mean that this is what happened under the new ISIS rulers in Syria, Iraq and Libya when they hung members of the Gadafi, Saddam and Assad governments on crystal chandeliers that is! Otherwise, I would go for the overhype cult of boyfolk music (Mike Denver, etc.) as being another media created dictatorship.

I also would need to add Eritrea to the list too. They are a very brutal regime too. I included the parts of Somalia, Nigeria, and other areas of Africa controlled by the likes of Boko Haram and al Shabaab under the general ISIS/ISIL umbrella. One needs to add Kony and his Lords Resistance Army too. Perhaps, this is the closest to a Catholic terror group we have although they have no support from any Catholic officials whatsoever.

Stojkovic

PopePalpatine wrote: »

I remember reading an article (I think it was on the BBC) of how the Americans found it easier to bring themselves to nuke the Japanese than the Nazis, because they weren't white.

Nothing to do with the 40m Americans of German descent ?

Stojkovic

PopePalpatine wrote: »

I remember reading an article (I think it was on the BBC) of how the Americans found it easier to bring themselves to nuke the Japanese than the Nazis, because they weren't white.

Nothing to do with the 40m Americans of German descent ?

newmug

PopePalpatine wrote: »

I remember reading an article (I think it was on the BBC) of how the Americans found it easier to bring themselves to nuke the Japanese than the Nazis, because they weren't white.

Germany surrendered on 8th May 1945. The first atomic bomb wasnt dropped until 6th August 1945, nearly 3 months after Germany were out.

FloatingVoter

newmug wrote: »

Germany surrendered on 8th May 1945. The first atomic bomb wasnt dropped until 6th August 1945, nearly 3 months after Germany were out.

..and final testing was conducted on 16th July 45. I'd believe that about earlier worries concerning German scientific analysis of a potential dud - the Atom bomb scientists considered themselves in a race against Heisenberg and co. on the Nazi side.

Nazis were the most nihilistic and expansionist of all the regimes. Stalin wins on bodycount and his influence over acolytes like Mao and North Korea.

BuilderPlumber

FloatingVoter wrote: »

..and final testing was conducted on 16th July 45. I'd believe that about earlier worries concerning German scientific analysis of a potential dud - the Atom bomb scientists considered themselves in a race against Heisenberg and co. on the Nazi side.

Nazis were the most nihilistic and expansionist of all the regimes. Stalin wins on bodycount and his influence over acolytes like Mao and North Korea.

North Korea in many ways would be the worst of all. The regime is so paranoid it kills some of its members. There are concentration camps so bad prisoners are forced to work impossible amounts and are not fed unless they complete it. They often get injured and starve to death. Prison guards are often violent and drunk and enjoy watching prisoners die.

Now, reality check! North Korea IS NOT a warzone. Whatever excuses the Middle East's ISIS, al Qaeda, Taliban, etc. have is not here. Or the Nazis or the Khmer Rouge or Stalin or Mao. Yeah, all of these also engaged in brutal behaviour but there was a war going on.

North Korea has not been involved in a war since 1953!!!!!! Yet, its regime remains in a wartime footing, commits wartime-style attrocities, and has not moderated at all. Other previously brutal regimes that emerged during war moderated over the years. But North Korea is the world's worst non-wartime country and this makes it much worse as one cannot blame the chaos of war and out of control Mad Max style marauders for the worst of the excesses. The excesses of this place are controlled and Kim and his cronies are 100% guilty here.

Nodin

Indonesia under Suharto, not that they're all smiles and chuckles these days.

(West) Pakistan in the early 1970's.

Both responsible for two massive but not well known genocides in the 20th century.

RayCon

Anybody involved in the creation of The Big Bang Theory (the TV show ,..... not the actual science thingy)

Nodin

RayCon wrote: »

Anybody involved in the creation of The Big Bang Theory (the TV show ,..... not the actual science thingy)

I watched 20 minutes of the first episode and thought "this is shite" and turned it off. Ye'd think at my age I'd have remembered that quality and success are not a nessecary pairing.

Mother Brain

America hands down.

(Sorry cold war kid!)

Richard Hillman

The likes of ISIS and Boko Haram scare the bejaysis out of me. I miss when Al Qaeda were the bogeyman.

Cold War Kid

Mother Brain wrote: »

America hands down.

(Sorry cold war kid!)

But, while I understand criticism of US foreign policy/its meddling in the internal affairs of other countries, I just can't see how it is the most evil regime since WWI when you look at what you're comparing it to. Obviously America any time would be a preferable place to live by miles too.

Mother Brain

Cold War Kid wrote: »

But, while I understand criticism of US foreign policy/its meddling in the internal affairs of other countries, I just can't see how it is the most evil regime since WWI when you look at what you're comparing it to. Obviously America any time would be a preferable place to live by miles too.

That's 100% true alright (though they still jail their population at an unprecedented rate), but my argument would be that america is directly responsible for a large portion of the other 'worst regimes' that people have mentioned here for example.

If any single one of those regimes is a contender for 'the worst' then shouldn't the country who made all of them happen bear more responsibility than the regime itself? Especially when in many cases these have been democratically elected governments they have overthrown.

Also, other stuff like being the only one to have ever used WMD's on a civilian population. Mass torture and surveillance programs. Many many unilateral (and completely illegal) military actions against sovereign nations. Testing biological weapons on their own populations, and possible deployments against foreign governments in cuba and korea.

It all adds up in my mind.

RDM_83 again

BuilderPlumber wrote: »

Interestingly enough, the Catholic church was up to all kinds of brutalities at a government level in the older eras. While some of their clergy were involved in abuse and it was covered up in recent times, there was no brutal dictatorship akin to the Spanish Inquisition in place in recent times though.

The Spanish Inquisition is interesting (no monty python quotes :mad: ), was it as bad as many think or thought is it more due to the "Black Legend".
Like according to research an inquisition ended in execution only 1-3% of the time, now that obviously bad since it was meant to be enforcing Christian beliefs (the Whole thou Shall't not kill thing and all that forgiving jazz) but compared to the nastiness of life in general at the time

Streetwalker

Has to be the USA when you look at the misery and destruction they have brought down on people worldwide.

Cold War Kid

Mother Brain wrote: »

That's 100% true alright (though they still jail their population at an unprecedented rate), but my argument would be that america is directly responsible for a large portion of the other 'worst regimes' that people have mentioned here for example.

If any single one of those regimes is a contender for 'the worst' then shouldn't the country who made all of them happen bear more responsibility than the regime itself? Especially when in many cases these have been democratically elected governments they have overthrown.

Also, other stuff like being the only one to have ever used WMD's on a civilian population. Mass torture and surveillance programs. Many many unilateral (and completely illegal) military actions against sovereign nations. Testing biological weapons on their own populations, and possible deployments against foreign governments in cuba and korea.

It all adds up in my mind.

Worse than even, say, the Soviet Union during the era of purges and gulags?

BuilderPlumber

I think that neither the US or USSR were ever the most evil regime ever. Now, both in their formative years were pretty brutal (Native Americans, African Americans, royalist Russians and Ukrainians would agree). But their real legacy was inspiring much more brutal regimes directly and indirectly during and after the cold war.

The_Valeyard

Post WW1??

Think they have all been mentioned,

But id also include Francos Spain, in the 30s-40s.

Mother Brain

Cold War Kid wrote: »

Worse than even, say, the Soviet Union during the era of purges and gulags?

I guess that qualitatively, there are worse regimes in terms of the specific instances of brutality they tend to inflict. But quantitatively I would argue that they US is worse if you get me.

It depends how you want to measure it really. Say what you will about the soviet union as well but their policy was 'socialism in one country'. Now obviously to a large degree that's a lie as well since they exerted their influence on the entire soviet bloc. But when you think a little more closely about it. The territory had all basically been agreed at the end of the war. They were a devastated country, 20 million dead roughly. No interest in world domination as america made out in their propaganda.

It was the US taking action across the globe to secure their economic and idealogical interests in the third world and founding all of these other brutal regimes.

Mother Brain

Cold War Kid wrote: »

Worse than even, say, the Soviet Union during the era of purges and gulags?

I mean you had citizen uprisings against corrupt oligarchies around the world (the american story basically playing out again), who held free elections and installed democratic governments who basically ran socialist / marxist policies. Including in many cases, pusuing a policy of nationalisation of natural resources.

America could not allow the so called 'good example' of socialism / marxism to take route in any of them, as it threatened the access of american corporate interests, and could lead to a 'domino effect . So they basically just overthrew them and re-established the old corrupt oligarchies! The reinstated regimes would play ball with the corporations and everyone gets rich. Freedom wins! Or free markets at least..

The fact that these brutal dictators then had to brutally repress their people again has its logical and causal foundation 100% in american foreign policy, Sure they had been overthrown in the first place for being terrible anyway! I don't know. It just strikes me as worse on so many more levels or something!

shugy

BuilderPlumber wrote: »

With all this ISIS/ISIL stuff, we all know that this organisation is truly evil. But is it one of the worst regimes to come about in modern times? What would you consider the top most evil regimes of modern times (1918 to date)?

Along with ISIS/ISIL, I have to say the Khmer Rouge, the Nazis, the Taliban and - when in a certain frame of mind - Ceaucescu's Romania, Milosevic's Yugoslavia and North Korea.

all the same if you ask me

Teflon Ron

In Europe, (we'll take the Nazi's as a given) Ceaușescu's Romanian rule turned out to be a poison chalice. Pretty brutal.

iDave

Northern Ireland up to GFA. One religious group completely prioritised over another.

Capt'n Midnight

BuilderPlumber wrote: »

A lot of interesting ones brought up here ....

When one looks at evil in a regime, it can manifest itself in different ways. For example: most stifling to live under (the warped Islam of Taliban or ISIS or the warped socialism of Pol Pot),

If you look at from our point of view it's Pol Pot. Just living in a city was going to drastically reduci

Most of us would have been executed out of hand for , wearing glasses, having a post primary education , speaking a bit of French, having soft uncalloused hands.

They rolled Cambodia back to Year Zero, abolished money - let that one sink in for a while , emptied the cities into the countryside and if you were a hospital patient you ended up taking your drip , if you were lucky.

Kermit.de.frog

Streetwalker wrote: »

Has to be the USA when you look at the misery and destruction they have brought down on people worldwide.

Don't agree there Ted. You should ask yourself would you prefer China or Russia to be the dominant power and then you might know what destruction and misery would actually be like.

At least the US is a democracy.