PrimeWire

Top 3 Dictators by Estimated Number of Murders (in descending order):

1. Mao Zedong (Communist China)
   Estimated deaths: 45–75 million
   Period: 1949–1976
   Cause: Great Leap Forward (famine), Cultural Revolution, purges, labor camps
   Mao’s policies led to one of the deadliest famines in history and widespread political persecution.

2. Joseph Stalin (Communist Soviet Union)
   Estimated deaths: 20–25 million
   Period: 1924–1953
   Cause: Great Purge, forced collectivization (Holodomor), Gulag labor camps, deportations
   Stalin’s regime oversaw mass starvation, executions, and systemic repression.

3. Adolf Hitler (Socialist Nazi Germany)
   Estimated deaths: 17–20 million (excluding battlefield casualties)
   Period: 1933–1945
   Cause: Holocaust (6 million Jews), ethnic cleansing, political purges, war crimes
   One of history’s most infamous regimes, responsible for the Holocaust and World War II atrocities.