Before you start searching new destinations for traveling on the internet, has it ever occurred to you to check if some of those countries could be among the most evil countries of all time?
In many countries, there are monuments, ruined buildings as memorials that show many atrocities which happened in many wars. Nevertheless, some of the countries have reshaped their cities with modern architecture, and as a result, they have masked their evil history. Moreover, when we look at today’s political scene, all we can hear is America’s involvement in other countries’ issues, which makes us think it could be one of the most evil countries of all time. Maybe if we do a proper research we could find Most Evil Companies in the US, but in our list, America, believe it or not, cannot be found.
To create this list of most evil countries in the world, we have to define evil as a concept first. When we say evil country, what exactly do we have in mind? It makes us think about human rights violations, such as no freedom of speech, no freedom of media or presence of different types of political oppression. Moreover, committing of genocide though history is one of the major factors as well.
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According to Global Peace Index (product of the Institute for Economics and Peace), there are many indicators if one country is peaceful or not such as, the number of deaths from internal conflicts, political terror or military expenditure, to name few. Nevertheless, as our list requires the countries of all time, we decided to take as the main parameter for this research death toll that is directly or indirectly caused by genocide, which is a consequence of dictatorships or imperialistic wars. In order to understand genocide as another concept, we took definition from The United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (CPPCG) : “genocide are acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group such as killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”
For the sake of our research we used many sources in order to get the best ranking such as Infogalaktik’s list of genocides by the number of death tolls and Necrometrics‘ list of death tolls across history. The ranking in our list will go from least number of death toll to the top one.
16. Sudan
Death toll: over 400, 000 people
One of the most recent countries in the world that caused lots of casualties is Sudan, according to recent dates. From 2003 until 2010 there was a war between rebel groups and government in Sudan. As a consequence, there was a major ethnic cleansing of civilians (approximately 480, 000), and indictment of Sudan’s President Omar al-Bashir by International Criminal Court for genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
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15. Ethiopia
So-called Red Terror, violent political campaign in Ethiopia, took around 500, 000 lives. Mengistu Haile Mariam, leader of Ethiopia back then, was convicted for his part in Red Terror, but until today he is hiding under the protection of Zimbabwe.
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14. Rwanda
Death toll: between 800 000 and 1 million people
One of the most brutal genocides of the 20th century happened in Rwanda in 1994. The conflict occurred between Hutu and Tutsi population, in which Hutu slaughtered around 1 million Tutsi using mostly machetes. Rwanda is just one of the many countries involved in genocide today and last 100 years, as you will see through the article.
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13. The Ottoman Empire
Death toll: 1.5 million people
Ottoman Empire has lasted over six centuries and was one of the most evil empires in history. It lasted from 1301 until 1922, and towards the end of its existence, it committed several atrocities. In 1876, they massacred Batak population in Bulgaria by burning alive and beheading more than 5,000 people. Later, between 1915 and 1918, Ottoman government slaughtered 1.5 million Armenians in Turkey, which is known as one of the most brutal genocides in the world. Turkey still denies that this happened and doesn’t recognize it as genocide.
12. Cambodia
One of the evilest countries in the history of Asia is Cambodia. From 1975 for four years Khmer Rouge, the communist party in Cambodia, has killed around 2 million people. The genocide ended by the Vietnamese invasion.
11. Nigeria
Three ethnic groups in Nigeria called Hausa, Yoruba and Igbo, have been fighting over control of the country since its independence in 1960. When Igbos started prevailing in political power, from 1967 until 1970 other two groups slaughtered them. It is estimated that in that period around 3 million Igbos died.
10. The Portuguese Empire
Portuguese Empire lasted from 1415 until 1999. They spread Catholicism through South America, Africa, and Asia, and more than 5 million people died in that process. The most evil thing they did was boiling alive Indian slaves during “Goa Inquisition”.
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9. The Spanish Empire
Around 5 million people died during expansion of Spanish Empire (1492-1892) into South America’s territory. Besides slaughtering, many people died as a cause of epidemic diseases Spanish brought. One of the most brutal methods they used were so-called ‘head crushers’, a metal cap that compressed the head using a screw.
8. Nazi Germany
Most known and talked about genocide is led by Hitler’s Germany against Jews from 1933 until 1945. It is estimated that more than 6 million Jews have died in gas chambers, buried alive or as a consequence of hunger and forced labor. There were over 20, 000 concentration camps, out of which Auschwitz is most widely known.
7. Japan
Death toll: between 6 and 10 million people
The Japanese military regime murdered between 6 and 10 million people from 1937 until 1945, in order to fulfill their mission and become the biggest power in Asia. In China, they slaughtered 300, 000 civilians out of 600, 000 in then-capital Nanking, in 1937. Victims were soaked in gasoline and burned alive, while women were sexually assaulted and then brutally killed with bayonets so that after they cannot testify.
6. The French Empire
Believe it or not, French Empire (1534-1980) has caused the deaths of 10 million people on the territories of Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas. French Empire was one of the most evil countries of all time during Napoleon, when he invaded Haiti. He forced slaves to collect sugar and in order to stop them from eating sugar canes he ordered to put muzzles on them. Napoleon also used to let dogs ripped slaves in order to terrify the slaves in revolt.
5. Belgium
King of Belgium Leopold II, known as one of the most evil rulers, has bought Congo and enslaved its people. In 50 years an estimated 10 million people died under his rule. Leopold exploited villagers and made them work to death; those who failed to succeed in collecting estimated quota on the fields were shot or had their limb cut off. King Leopold II ruled from 1865 up to his death in 1909.
4. The Soviet Union
From 1922 until 1989, Stalinist regime has led to over 20 million of people deaths. USSR instigated a regime of terror across territories of Russia and Eastern Europe. Their intention was to eliminate all non-communists, and obviously, make themselves one of the most evil countries on earth. They were sending prisoners to overcrowded Gulags – camps in which people were condemned to starvation, forced labor, and execution. One of the most evil techniques to get confessions was ‘the rat torture’. They would put rats in cages on prisoners’ abdomens and then they would heat the bars, which made rats escaping through human bodies.
3. China
Around 40 million people were killed from 1949 to 1975, under Mao Zedong regime. He was a Chinese communist and founding father of the People’s Republic of China, which he governed from 1949 until his death in 1976. He was influenced by Marxist–Leninist theories, whereas his military strategies and political policies are known as Maoism or, in the other name Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.
2. The Mongols
From 1206 to 1368 the Mongols slaughtered over 11% of the world’s population, which is around 40 million people. Their goal was to conquer others and build the biggest empire world has ever seen under their leader Genghis Khan. In that process, a lot of innocent civilians, including pregnant women died. Their worst method of killing was catapulting corpses over city walls in order to infect entire populations.
1. The British Empire
Death toll: 150 million people
Finally, in the first place of most evil countries of all time is The British Empire (1783-1997). British caused over 150 million deaths by conquering Asia, Europe, and Africa. Throughout history, they are mostly known for the number of their colonies. Most of the British atrocities were felt in India, where around 29 million people died out of starvation. Increased harvest taxation caused Indian civilians to eat grass and human flesh in order to survive. However, one of the most ruthless conquests was in 1800 when they annihilated Tasmania’s indigenous people. British forced aborigine wives to carry the heads of their dead husbands.
