The 10 most decadent dictators

A revolving gold statue, pink champagne and a "Pleasure Brigade" of nubile retainers all feature in Times Money's list of history's most decadent dictators. While their people suffered, these men - and sometimes their wives and children - agonised over how best to spend their ill-gotten gains...

1. Kim Jong-il, "Dear Leader" of North Korea since 1994. The son of the communist state's "Great Leader", Kim Jong-il has super-expensive tastes, with 17 palaces and collections of hundreds of cars and about 20,000 video tapes. On one state visit to Russia, he reportedly had live lobsters airlifted daily to his armoured private train. He is believed to spend around $650,000 a year on Hennessy VSOP cognac and maintains an entourage of young lovelies known as the "Pleasure Brigade"

Car-buying spree for Kim Jong Il

2. Ferdinand Marcos, President of the Philippines, 1965 - 1986. The Second World War freedom-fighter turned kleptocrat secreted billions of dollars in overseas accounts. His wife Imelda, however, was the big spender, leaving 888 handbags and 1060 pairs of shoes in the Malacanang presidential palace when the family fled mob justice after Marcos was deposed. Her pricier purchases included the $51 million Crown Building and $61 million Herald Centre in New York and art by Michelangelo and Botticelli

Marcos: a headache that won't go away

3. Nicolae Ceausescu, President of Romania, 1967 - 1989. The "Genius of the Carpathians" was congratulated (by telegram) by Salvador Dali on his excesses, which included his use of a kingly sceptre. Despite an official salary of just $3,000, he found the cash for 15 palaces, a superb car collection, yachts, fine art and bespoke suits. Tens of thousands of homes were demolished to make space for his 1,100-room, 480-chandelier Palace of the Parliament in the capital, Bucharest

And how is your family, Mr Ceausescu?

4. Saparmurat Niyazov, President of Turkmenistan, 1990 - 2006. The President for Life and "Turkmenbashi", or Father of all Turkmen, was at the centre of an awesome cult of personality. His vanity projects included a £6 million revolving gold-plated statue of himself in the country's capital, Ashgabat. He shifted around £3 billion to overseas accounts, renamed the month of January (after himself), banned beards and ordered that his musings be displayed alongside the Koran in mosques 

5. Idi Amin, President of Uganda, 1971 - 1979. The "Lord of All the Beasts of the Earth and Fishes of the Sea", "Emperor of Uganda" and "King of Scotland" awarded himself the VC, or Victorious Cross, and CBE, or Conqueror of the British Empire. He also spent millions on a super-lavish lifestyle - maintaining a reported 30 mistresses as well as five wives and fathering at least 43 children. A typically mad-capped project was the creation of a personal bodyguard of bagpipe-playing 6ft 4in Scotsmen

More on Amin

6. Joseph Stalin, leader of the Soviet Union, 1922 - 1953. The "Gardener of Human Happiness" and "Brilliant Genius of Humanity" was celebrated in his lifetime in thousands of stylised statues and monuments erected across the Soviet Union - many of which were moved or destroyed in later "de-Stalinisation" drives. He also had a taste for palaces, booze and cigars and preferred to travel by armour-plated private train with a Tsarist-style entourage

Obituary: Joseph Stalin

7. Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, Shah of Persia, 1941 - 1979. The "King of Kings" and "Sun of the Aryans" spent a reported $100 million on celebrations for the 2,500th anniversary of the Persian monarchy in 1971, serving breast of peacock on Limoges china to dignitaries in a 160-acre tent city at Persepolis - close to poor villages. His superb collection of sports cars can be seen at the National Car Museum of Iran, alongside custom models by Mercedes-Benz and Porsche for his son, the Crown Prince

Goose step climax to Persepolis parade

8. Saddam Hussein, President of Iraq, 1979 - 2003. The Baathist leader with a fondness for gold-plated bathroom fittings, and Kalashnikovs, rebuilt Babylon on kitsch rather than authentic lines, stamping each brick of the "reconstruction" with his own name in the manner of Nubachadnezzar, the ancient Babylonian king and conqueror of Jerusalem. His playboy eldest son Uday, meanwhile, kept a private zoo with lions and cheetahs at his Baghdad residence and owned a collection of 1,200 luxury cars

Letter from Baghdad: Saddam Hussein

9. Mobutu Sese Soku, President of Zaire, 1965 - 1997. Siphoning his country's wealth into Swiss bank accounts was a speciality of the "All-Powerful Warrior", whose personal fortune was estimated at $5 billion in 1984 - then equivalent to Zaire's national debt. Mobutu's extravagances included palaces and pink champagne, yachts and shopping trips to Paris by chartered Concorde. His second wife Bobi Ladawa rivalled Imelda Marcos as a compulsive spender - with a reported 1,000-dress wardrobe

Mobutu-a personal portrait

10. Suharto, President of Indonesia, 1967 - 1998. The former bank clerk embezzled more money than any other leader in history, according to Transparency International. In 1999, Time Asia put his family's wealth at $15 billion. Playboy son "Tommy" was the biggest-profile spender - lavishing money on cars and clothes and buying a majority stake in Lamborghini before a conviction for murder in 2002. Suharto's daughter "Tutut", meanwhile, spent $100,000 on one shopping flight to the US

Investigation pledged in Suharto scandal

List compiled by Mark Bridge

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Comments

[axeman]

Firstly, it is beyond comical that the Shah of Iran is on this for his 'decadence'. God forbid that a member of royalty live in a palace and have luxury cars. By that standard why is Queen Elizabeth not on this list? The woman has a half billion dollar net worth and lives in multiple palaces. Secondly, to highlight the fact that $100 million was spent to celebrate the 2500 year anniversary of an ancient country...wow!! Do you guys get as indignant about the BILLIONS of dollars spent every FOUR years for the f*cking olympics? China spent $43 BILLION on the 2008 olympics. This is a country with millions of dirt poor people. I hardly think $100 million is significant given that it's a once in 2500 years event.

Iranians have a huge chip on their shoulder. They hate to see anyone be richer or more successful than them. They are the most selfish, vindictive, spiteful people on earth and will stab you in the back whenever they get a chance. They have been milking the 'sins' of the shah for the last 30 YEARS. Move the f*ck on already you losers. Why aren't you up in arms about the filthy mollahs and akhoonds who've been raping and pillaging your country for the last 30yrs. Each of these akhoonds sneaks HUNDREDS of MILLIONS of dollars out of Iran every year. They steal money from Iran and send their kids to swiss boarding schools. Some of these scum take up to 700 million dollars out of the country at a time. When are you worthless scum going to open your eyes to the sh*thole that your country has been for the last 30 years? It's the least respected country in the world. Of course, you can never rely on an iranian to be honest. They are ALWAYS making excuses and blaming everyone and everything else for their misery.

[ehsan]

Hey Bravo dudes .
seeing the Shah on this list was amazin`
I don know why people are talking about everythin...
I ask those Iranians who say Iran was free and so and so , have you live a lifetime under that dictatorship ? or you`re just a kid born after the revolution ?!
how you say that ?
prove that nonsense .

[FOD81]

Sorry, I feel the need to comment on what Nima has said. The queen isn't on the list because she isn't a dictator, Reza Pahlavi was. '10 most decadent dictators'. Theres comments from other baffoons here, people asking why gadhaffi isn't on it as he is a tyrant. Its not top 10 worst of all time, its who's spent loads of cash on stupid stuff. Hang on a minute... no Hitler?!?!

[Nima]

Why is Reza Pahlavi on this list? Do you not expect the monarchy of a nation/his son to have a porche? Perhaps you should consider the wealth of the British monarch in that case!

Under Pahlavi Iran was free, happy and prosperous. Compare this with todays Iran. Why is ahmadinejad not in this list? You have obviously made a huge mistake in this article.

[messy]

As to the Shah...That stunt turned a profit. Tourism increased well over 200%. Are all those commercials paid for by the Austrailians and Jamaicans "decadence"?

[peter]

Mao murdered 70 million. That is one person every 11 seconds during his 25 year reign as king of china

[Jewel Mathias]

It would be interesting to know whether those in our present Administration profited personally from the Afghanastan and Iraq Wars.

[Melek]

This list is pathetic ... why stop at 10! ... How about our neighbor, the despot, Fidel Castro? Decadence is an inherent trait of dictators.

"The evil of the world is made possible by nothing but the sanction you give it." ~ A. Rand

[GADDAFI OF LIBYA IS AMONG WORST]

Gaddafi of Libya is one of the longest ruling dictators to date. He has destroyed Libya and its once modernizing and educated society, he's responsible for killings of thousands of Libyans who spoke against his repression and regime, and responsible for terrorist attacks of BErlin, Lockerbie's PanAm bombing, and assasinating Libyans in the diaspora. Gaddafi should be at least among the top 3, yet to exclude him from the list is insulting to the Libyan people. Please revise this list.

[Patrick C.]

Adding George W. Bush to this list is as absurd as those who are recommending it. Bush has kept America free of more terror attacks since 9/11. He deposed Saddam Hussein and saw that the dictator was hung for his crimes against humanity. Bush and the Republican Congress presided over one of the most robust economic expansions in American history. (It was only after January 2007, following the Democrat takeover of Congress, that the US economy began to decline precipitously.)

Now that Obama is threatening a marxist takeover of our ecomony, the Stock Market has declined by 30% and the US is rapidly slipping into a deep recession. The clowns who have complained about Bush are going to have lots more to whine about when their messiah Obama takes over. Then we'll have four years of double digit unemployment, double digit inflation, double digit interest rates and unprecedented economic misery thanks to Obama and his bogus economic policies.

[KR]

Mao, Stalin, Hitler.
MVP's of the major leages.

All others' pale. I am sure that many others, Pol Pot, etc, would have done more if they had more resources.

[Evocatus]

Amazing are the many interpretations of the word "decadent"

Quite some commenters should buy a number of dictionaries and copy the definitions a thousand times each.

I quite agree with many posters commenting on the choice of Ceausescu.

Furthermore I am amazed about the positive thoughts some Iranians harbour about the Shah. This puppet of the USA does *not* deserve their appreciation.
Ave, Evocatus

[Glenn Greenslade]

No mention of Tony Blair or Gordon Brown??

[Frank Beaton]

What about Museveni of Uganda?

This guy is probably the most decadent leader in Africa at this time.
He rules a bankrupt failed state with no roads, lights or running water, while he travels in a private jet at least twice a week on useless junkets all over the world.

He is a pupil of Suharto and he and his family owns nearly every business in the country.
His family are flown to Europe for non-urgent medical treatment.

Guess what?

He is strongly supported by Bush of the US, and Blair and Brown of UK .

[Greg Lorriman]

Garzon:"And what about Pinochet?"

He wasn't decadent, and with his careful management he made Chile rich. Even Chileans are divided on this subject. He also did the inconceivable: he voluntarily gave up power. He wasn't a real dictator: he was simply anti-communist as any sensible person should be.

Consider, for a dictator how very few people died; even more extraordinary for a latin country, who usually don't have many qualms about torture and death, and quite incredible considering that military rule is unavoidably brutal.

Both Pinochet and Franco were the good guys. Western, leftie sentiment has dressed them up as nasty, but they were not. They were simply military: and military guys are rough.

[Tim Williams]

Nice to see you've embraced the spirit of debate and discussion, Peter. "Don't talk about things you don't understand?" What, exactly, don't I understand? Or will you just tell me that there's no point in explaining what I don't understand, because, well....I won't understand.

[Peter]

Thank you, auther, you made my day, giving me something so hilarious to read.

PS, You are so blind that you make me sad...

And to Mr TIM WILLIAMS, don't talk about what you don't understand.

[Tim Williams]

What about Mao Zedong? He ruled over the most populous nation on Earth for a quarter of a century, constructed palaces across the length and breadth of China, amassed a personal fortune which made him the PRCs only billionaire, hoarded food and treasures which led to the physical and cultural decline of his people, caused mass starvation in order to expand his sphere of influence amongst his Communist allies, built a one million strong army of young women whose sole purpose was to service his libido...

Surely he deserves to be at the top of the list, if only for the scale of his perverse indulgence.

[John W Meadows]

It is rather pathetic that so many of the responses to this article were from illiterate people who do not understand the meaning of the word decadent.
To those who used this article as an opportunity to politically bash some public figure you happen to disagree with all I can say is "try and get a life"

[AK]

Some of you seem to be commenting without first reading.
1. The BLOG is titled '10 Most decadent Dictators' not 10 most evil, 10 richest etc. Bush/Blair/Brown etc AREN'T decadent- no fleets of cars palaces etc. Ditto the Queen- its all state owned not private.
2. This is a Times online BLOG and not an article so all comments along the lines of "I cant believe the times would print..." are redundant.
3. As with all lists, blogs etc this is opinion and has not been presented as fact.

So please stop your whining!

[王京亮]

我认为贵报总结的很好！

[G Hunt]

Sir
A sensible selection, although perhaps should be titled 'of the last century'. Surely the pharoahs, tsars and even our own beloved royal families of Europe looking back a few centuries would give the likes of Kim 'ronery' Jong-il a run for their money.
Re. Bush and Blair; unpopular maybe, but decadent dictators? Stop whingeing and try and live in N Korea to see how our democracy is a relative success.

[Duude]

I'll tell you who is really missing on this list is Yassir Arafat. The scale should take into consideration both the extravagance of the head of state despite the desperate poverty of the people. The Palestinian government received untold hundreds of millions in charitable contributions mainly from the U.S. and Europe, and funds for weapons from Arab states. These funds are largely unaccounted for except for the palaces Arafat built in the middle of the desert. He was a despicable rodent.

[Bob Dobbs]

Add any Pope. 1 billion dupes oppressed by His Divine Infallibility, ruler of a city state, with priceless treasures bought from a cult that preaches abstinence and poverty.

[Geo]

Joke or not, putting Blair, Obama and Cowell in the leagues of mass murderers ain't funny. Posted by: Tony | 8 Sep 2008 00:33:52

Tony Blair is directly responsible for running down our armed forces then plunging them into 5, THATS FIVE wars they were not equipped for. The deaths of those service men and women is not funny.

[Ed]

What a piece of garbage, the SHAH of Iran did more for his country than any other leader in the history of the middle east. He brought respect, class, and pride to Iran ( which has since been lacking) there were mistakes along the, but none more than the mullahs that are there today. AS far as I am concerned Iran died on January 16, 1979 the day the SHAH left. P.S. What has the queen done in her lifetime? (Leaning towards not much!)

[Paul Williams]

Some posters seem very confused. The reason Hitler is not on the list is because he was not personally decadent. At one point Eva Braun naively asked if they could transport a fountain she admired to their home after he retired. Hitler admonished her, saying that would be impossible for two reasons: firstly the fountain was public property and not for sale; and secondly that even if it was for sale he could not possibly be able to afford it on his pension! Bad he was, corrupt he was not....

[DB Dublin, CA]

George Bush? Tony Blair? You who say they belong on the list are as insane as Idi Amin.

[Mohamed]

Why no Mohamed 6 ???

[D.McGregor]

Shameful- since there are so many posing as democrats in west who deserve to be on this list too.

[Rudy Lakewood, ca USA]

can you post the list from the iraqui point of view? I am sure who is going to be in the first place, what do you think?

[Hamid]

very interesting comments

[Francine Sidler-Sicard]

I have been reading all the comments with delight and I can help it but to smile because it reminds me of some articles in the past from the British and foreign press who at the time qualified Charles de Gaulle as a tyrant! And I agree with some of the readers, where are Mobutu of Zimbabwe and Pinochet of Chile on this list? Just to name 2 of the missings.

[Emperor Bush II]

Add Kim's father Kim Il Sung and my name too, Mao, Hitler, Genghis etc... American emperors as chief sponsors like me should be reserved the top of the list. All hail the Queen. The Shah obviously should not be there. Saddam was sponsored by my predecessors yet I invaded Iraq by a big dirty lie. I am sorry for being indirectly responsible for his death. Blatantly irresponsible journalism...

[Gazza]

Hilarious...

Delete all of these entries, and insert the top 10 ruling members of the House of Saud.

[Tim]

Garzon has no idea what he is talking about. Were you in Chile when Salvador Allende was trying to run the country???????

[Tim Sharp]

The story goes that the Crown Prince of the Netherlands, as part of his education, was handed over to bargee to spend some time living a simple life on a barge. He had his ears boxed by the bargee for putting both butter and cheese on the same piece of bread. That's the way all rulers should be educated.

[FR]

Shah of Iran decadent? Listen to yourself: "reported" $100M ?? (fact check?) It was a silly party at Persepolis, granted, but it cost nowhere near $100M. $100M is the cost of a weekend's worth of Morgan Stanley's consultation fee to the Federal Gov in its $85B (not $85M)rescue/takeover of AIG. Along with a few automobiles i.e. custom Mercedes and Porsche, the party at Persepolis (and breast of peacock -- oh my word!!) is the only item establishing the Shah as one of the ten most decedent rulers! Saville Row haberdashers spend more liberally. What a pile of facile, uninformed nonsense.

[Hank]

Where is Adolf Hitler?

[Armando Gascón Lozano]

Franco.
His wife used to go the jewelers and just take what she fancied. They had to raise up an insurance fund against her depredations. He had a palace (Paço de Meiras) "given" to him -paid out of compulsive contributions from public workers. Had doubles of him to carry out boring state meetings, while he went hunting and fishing. He was propped up by Ike and Britain, after being put in power by Hitler and Mussolini.
The fortune of Franco's family is still a state secret in Spain.

[Bill in NJ]

You have faulty research.
You forgot, or didn't evaluate in accordance with your own criteria (decandence): Mao: who like to pop young virgins; King Farouk (Egypt) who had the largest collection of pornography up to that time.

[Joeyjoejoe]

Funny thing is most of those dictators for much of their life were backed and financed heavily by western powers, notably the US and UK.

Saddam... check
Suharto... check
Pahlavi.... check

And there are many others not on that list who were fully supported in their opulent lifestyles. As long as the oil, gas, timber, iron ore or whatever riches of their nations flowed to the west, then all is well.

A man is not a dictator unless designated so by the mighty emperor who sits in Washington.

[Andreas]

Wait...Where is Queen Elizabeth or the rest of the English monarchy? Because they surely do and did tax you without anything in return!

[Exilio]

Fidel Castro and his family own an Island in the Carrebean with 10 million slaves.

Not good enough for you silly commies?

[SHall]

The Windsor House should be on the list also!

[nena]

what are u talking ??? are u crazy ! ha ? yes , sure

[Jack Thursby]

I hope to be head of this list someday!

[EC]

Why do you think all comments posted re Iran is from one person??!! The Shah was not an angel or God nor was he the demon depicted by the West. What came after him in iran has in the eyes of mainstream Iranians exonerated him totally. At least he did have the best interest of his country at heart and did not sell his country to Russia or fund international terrorism.
I am so sick of this spiel of poverty versus extravagance why do you not apply the same rule to the UK where people have to go on waiting list for lifesaving cancer therapy and the wasted unemployed youth knife each other to death in the streets whilst the heir to the throne and his unemployed girlfriend down £10K cocktails in nightclubs? I can think of many worse dictators than the Shah of Iran, really shame on the times for such politically correct and safe journalism. Feeding the ignorance of the massess rather than telling the truth as it is.

[GK]

George W. Bush?!

Sadly, you people have missed the point of the exercise. Remedial classes start tomorrow.

[Anonymous]

What about the Bush Family?