Dictators on Coins

[chrisild]

Then again, Yugoslavia was quite different from the other "Eastern" countries in the years of the Cold War. You may well honor Tito for that ...

As for humor or the lack thereof, well, saying that people who do not share one's own sense of humor do not have any, that I have always found to be somewhat presumptuous. But I agree, authoritarian rulers are by and large not known for appreciating jokes about them.

Interestingly, Belarus (which is probably worse than Russia) does not issue any circulation coins. Hmmmm.

Christian

[ciscoins]

Interestingly, Belarus (which is probably worse than Russia) does not issue any circulation coins. Hmmmm.

Now there's no difference between two countries. But in previous years Belarus had a very high inflation rate, one of the highest in the World, so they couldn't even think about issuing coins because these coins would completely depreciate in 6-7 months.

[<k>]

Here's that beast Stalin, on the Czechoslovak coin we talked about.

[nomadbird]

Here's that beast Stalin, on the Czechoslovak coin we talked about.

Do you have a copy of this ?

[<k>]

A copy? No, I don't own the coin and wouldn't want to. I just found a nice image of it. It's nice to illustrate the subject.

[<k>]

I suppose that anyone who rules undemocratically can be called a dictator. The Arabs and Iran have a big problem in this regard. They have corrupt kings, or else military or party dictators, or religious dictators. The only exceptions are those countries that are Western-occupied "protectorates". These are the only four options that will eventually be open to Libya.

Some examples.
 

[<k>]

Europe had its dictators too, of course. Remember the brutal neo-Stalinist Nicolae Ceausescu, shot on Xmas day 1989, along with his wife?

[chrisild]

Sure, except that is not a coin. Ceauşescu never appeared on one. This could be a pattern or a medal, dunno.

Christian

[<k>]

Sure, except that is not a coin. Ceauşescu never appeared on one. This could be a pattern or a medal, dunno.

Christian

Don't you dictate to me what it is or isn't!

[<k>]

Well, here is a pattern portraying the third most murderous dictator of the 20th century, after Stalin and Mao.

[Figleaf]

And the winner is...

Peter

[<k>]

General Franco of Spain was most definitely a dictator. He prosecuted the Spanish Civil War most brutally. After he took a town or village, captured Republicans were variously thrown off clifftops or rounded up in the local bull-fighting stadium and machine-gunned.

See also: General Franco, "el caudillo", and a Spanish enigma.

[<k>]

Saparmurat Niyazov of Turkmenistan was born in 1940 and died in 2006. He became president of Turkmenistan after the collapse of the USSR, ruling from 1990 until his death. He was a particularly eccentric dictator, and is said to have boiled his political opponents alive, giving the impression that he had watched too many James Bond films and identified with the villains.

From Wikipedia:

Niyazov requested that a "palace of ice", or indoor ice skating rink, be built near the capital, so that those living in the desert country could learn to skate. The palace was built in 2008 and located near the new Turkmen State Medical University.

Gold teeth were outlawed in Turkmenistan after Niyazov suggested that the populace chew on bones to strengthen their teeth and lessen the rate at which they fall out. He said: "I watched young dogs when I was young. They were given bones to gnaw to strengthen their teeth. Those of you whose teeth have fallen out did not chew on bones. This is my advice."




 

[<k>]

Ante Pavelić was Poglavnik ("Leader") of "The Independent State of Croatia" from 1941 to 1945. He was a Nazi collaborator, who would never have come to power in his own right, but he was as brutal as any Nazi. Pavelić set about creating a “purified” Croatia. He hated the Serbs, who formed a significant minority of Croatia’s population, and their Orthodox religion, while idealising the Croats and their Catholicism. His policy, he claimed, was to convert one third of Serbs to Catholicism, expel one third, and kill one third.

The only issued coin that depicted Pavelić was the gold 500 kuna coin, dated 1941. These 500 kuna coins were presented as gifts to foreign rulers and dignitaries.



After the war Pavelić managed to hide in Italy until 1948, when he escaped to Argentina and was protected by the Peron regime. In April 1957 he was shot in the back and seriously wounded, it is presumed by a member of Yugoslav intelligence. At the end of 1957 he flew to Spain, where dictator General Franco granted him asylum. He settled in Madrid and died in December 1959, reportedly from complications due to the bullet still lodged in his spine.

See also:

1] Croatia: Nazi Satellite State, 1941-5.

2] Croatia of the 1930s: Official unrealised designs and a terrorist fantasy.

3] Croatia: Rare wartime patterns from the Nazi satellite state.

[<k>]

Miklós Horthy ruled the Kingdom of Hungary as Regent from 1920 to 1944. He was deposed by the Nazi-backed Arrow Cross Movement after he put out peace feelers to the Allies. It is said that under him, Hungary was a kingdom without a king, ruled by a Admiral without a navy.

He is best described as an authoritarian conservative or reactionary, who was stuck between two large and dangerous neighbours: Nazi Germany and Bolshevik Russia. Circumstances led him to side with the Axis. However, in his post World War 2 memoirs, Horthy cited the Austro-Hungarian empire as his political ideal.



See also: The Three Faces of Admiral Horthy