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Remembering the biggest mass murder in the history of the world
Washington Times ^ | August 3, 2016 | Ilya Somin

Posted on 08/03/2016 5:13:35 PM PDT by grundle

Who was the biggest mass murderer in the history of the world? Most people probably assume that the answer is Adolf Hitler, architect of the Holocaust. Others might guess Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, who may indeed have managed to kill even more innocent people than Hitler did, many of them as part of a terror famine that likely took more lives than the Holocaust. But both Hitler and Stalin were outdone by Mao Zedong. From 1958 to 1962, his Great Leap Forward policy led to the deaths of up to 45 million people – easily making it the biggest episode of mass murder ever recorded.

Just recently, the socialist government of Venezuela imposed forced labor on much of its population. Yet most of the media coverage of this injustice fails to note the connection to socialism, or that the policy has parallels in the history of the Soviet Union, China, Cuba, and other similar regimes. One analysis even claims that the real problem is not so much “socialism qua socialism,” but rather Venezuela’s “particular brand of socialism, which fuses bad economic ideas with a distinctive brand of strongman bullying,” and is prone to authoritarianism and “mismanagement.” The author simply ignores the fact that “strongman bullying” and “mismanagement” are typical of socialist states around the world. The Scandinavian nations – sometimes cited as examples of successful socialism- are not actually socialist at all, because they do not feature government ownership of the means of production, and in many ways have freer markets than most other western nations.

(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...


TOPICS: Miscellaneous
KEYWORDS: communism
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To: FreedomPoster

I have seen estimates of the total cost in human lives because of Communism, placed at 200 million.

That may be high but every single one of them was a human being with hopes, fears, love and life. They breathed the same air as the rest of us. For some reason I tend to forget that when we throw around the numbers.


21 posted on 08/03/2016 6:12:11 PM PDT by yarddog (Romans 8:38-39, For I am persuaded.)
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To: MadMax, the Grinning Reaper

Thanks for your post, and your various services to our nation.


22 posted on 08/03/2016 6:14:51 PM PDT by FreedomPoster (Islam delenda est)
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To: grundle
The atrocities continue.

North Korea, ruled for three generations by a family of Communist psychopaths, has probably endured more politically motivated murders per capita than any other country in world history.

And, while were at it, check out the ongoing economic catastrophe in Communist Venezuela.

23 posted on 08/03/2016 6:15:12 PM PDT by zeestephen
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To: grundle
The biggest mass murderers of all time are the USSC "justices" who voted against against the state of Texas in the landmark case of Jane Roe, et al. v. Henry Wade, District Attorney of Dallas County.

The ramifications of that vote caused the deaths of well over 50 million babies to date, in the US alone, and well over 1 billion infants worldwide, as a result of US lead; worse, the number increases daily by the thousands.

This number greatly exceeds even the 290 million slaughtered by followers of Mohammad.

No other man-made instances of the taking of human life even comes close to these two events. And likely none will, until the Almighty unleashes his wrath once again upon this world, and for good reason.

24 posted on 08/03/2016 6:23:54 PM PDT by amorphous
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To: FreedomPoster

And that should have been Rummel. Oops.


25 posted on 08/03/2016 6:26:02 PM PDT by FreedomPoster (Islam delenda est)
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To: yarddog

Rummel puts the numbers for the Communist regimes at around 140 million, if you look at the numbers for the Communist regimes at my link.


26 posted on 08/03/2016 6:27:25 PM PDT by FreedomPoster (Islam delenda est)
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To: TexasTransplant

Making DDT is simpler than making meth. Anyone can do it.


27 posted on 08/03/2016 6:30:02 PM PDT by OldMagazine
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To: FreedomPoster
The website you referenced was authored by (Professor) Rummel - not “Rommel.”

Since General Irwin Rommel died in 1944, I was completely mystified how "Rommel" could have estimated Stalin's and Mao's final death toll.

28 posted on 08/03/2016 6:30:51 PM PDT by zeestephen
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To: OldMagazine

Freepmail me?


29 posted on 08/03/2016 6:32:17 PM PDT by Ghost of SVR4 (So many are so hopelessly dependent on the government that they will fight to protect it.)
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To: grundle

Mao. Hands down.


30 posted on 08/03/2016 7:19:17 PM PDT by mfish13 (Elections have Consequences.)
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To: grundle

Mao. Hands down.


31 posted on 08/03/2016 7:19:21 PM PDT by mfish13 (Elections have Consequences.)
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To: grundle

45 million? Expendable.

What’s 45 million in a country of over a billion?

Besides, getting rid of the 45 million, was for the greater good of those left behind.

Anyhow, I’m pretty sure that the massive 45 million of Mao, are small potatoes compared to the number of people who have died as a result of all the chaos and mayhem and wars and terror acts, that have been caused in the last 1400 years, by that religion of peace, Islam.


32 posted on 08/03/2016 7:49:46 PM PDT by adorno (w)
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To: zeestephen

I corrected myself in post #19, 9 before yours.

Yes, I know who Rommel was.


33 posted on 08/03/2016 8:50:36 PM PDT by FreedomPoster (Islam delenda est)
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To: MadMax, the Grinning Reaper

Wow. I second the thanks for your service. Impressive!


34 posted on 08/03/2016 8:52:09 PM PDT by T-Bone Texan (Don't be a lone wolf. Form up small leaderlesss cells ASAP !)
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To: grundle

Cain slew one quarter of the population of the world.

Percentage wise he killed the most.


35 posted on 08/03/2016 8:56:47 PM PDT by Graybeard58 (Bill and Hillary Clinton are the penicillin-resistant syphilis of our political system.)
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To: yarddog; grundle; SunkenCiv; All

Here is a site with a lot of information on masses of killing. Below that is a list of worst killing events or periods. Given that Genghis Kahn lived in a century with a much smaller population than Mao’s century I rate him the worst.

http://necrometrics.com/pre1700a.htm

Rank Death Toll Cause Centuries
1 66 million Second World War 20C
2 40 million Mao Zedong (mostly famine) 20C
40 million Genghis Khan 13C
4 27 million British India (mostly famine) 19C
5 25 million Fall of the Ming Dynasty 17C
6 20 million Taiping Rebellion 19C
20 million Joseph Stalin 20C
8 18½ million Mideast Slave Trade 7C-19C
9 17 million Timur Lenk 14C-15C
10 16 million Atlantic Slave Trade 15C-19C
11 15 million First World War 20C
15 million Conquest of the Americas 15C-19C
13 13 million An Lushan Revolt 8C
14 10 million Xin Dynasty 1C
10 million Congo Free State 19C-20C
16 9 million Russian Civil War 20C
17 7½ million Thirty Years War 17C
7½ million Fall of the Yuan Dynasty 14C
19 7 million Fall of Rome 5C
7 million Chinese Civil Wars 20C


36 posted on 08/03/2016 11:38:05 PM PDT by gleeaikin
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To: FreedomPoster

Thanks for the interesting link.

I responded to Post #19, which said “Rommel.”

I spent about 10 minutes on your page link trying to find the “Rommel” quote, which, of course, was not there.

You corrected yourself in Post #25, which wasn’t up when I read #19.


37 posted on 08/04/2016 12:14:29 AM PDT by zeestephen
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To: zeestephen

Rommel was one of the millions of Hitler’s victims.


38 posted on 08/04/2016 12:34:16 AM PDT by dfwgator
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To: gleeaikin

I’m not sure I understand why famine in India would be blamed on British colonialism.

What is unmentioned here is that about 100 million Indians perished from various plagues between 1850 and 1950.

The British trained and equipped thousands of Indian public health workers and Indian engineers in an effort to control those plagues, which had been present for centuries before the British arrived.


39 posted on 08/04/2016 12:42:58 AM PDT by zeestephen
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To: dfwgator

Re: “Rommel was one of the millions of Hitler’s victims.”

Yes, but not before Rommel added thousands of British and American soldiers to Hitler’s head count.


40 posted on 08/04/2016 1:06:05 AM PDT by zeestephen
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