How to Become a Tyrant

1. 1
   

   Seize Power

   31m

   Interested in becoming a tyrant? There are rules, and the playbook for a rise to dictatorship starts with one of history's most brutal: Adolf Hitler.

2. 2
   

   Crush Your Rivals

   27m

   You've secured your place at the top, but maintaining power means watching your back. Nobody did that better or more ruthlessly than Saddam Hussein.

3. 3
   

   Reign Through Terror

   28m

   When keeping your population under control, is it better to be loved or feared? Idi Amin certainly thought he knew the right answer to that question.

4. 4
   

   Control the Truth

   27m

   Through public relations spin, revisionist history and censorship. Soviet autocrat Joseph Stalin found a certain flexibility with the truth useful.

5. 5
   

   Create a New Society

   26m

   Free speech? Right to assembly? Rebel-turned-dictator Muammar Gaddafi realized that civil liberties had to go when reshaping society. But he got soft.

6. 6
   

   Rule Forever

   30m

   Seizing power is hard, but keeping it is harder. In North Korea, the Kim dynasty unlocked the secret to ruling forever: They declared themselves gods.

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