Lee Kuan Yew

Was he the best statesman of the 20th century? The results surely suggest so

that's not Saddam

that's not Mugabe.

That's not Deng

That's not Merkel

That's not Pinochet.

It's easy to make a decent country out of Asians, it's harder with mestizos.

Churchill was better.

Eh...probably not. There's a quote from Deng Xiaoping about he was quite impressed by Singapore and the prospect for harnessing capitalism to advance Chinese civilization. He said something like "Lee would have made a good Mayor for a city like Shanghai". Inexact and perhaps apocryphal but the assessment has merit.

That's not Reagan.

City-states are not a real state.

That depends on his leftist kill count
Bonus points for free helicopter rides

If you seriously think this, you are retarded.

OP asked for the best statesman, not the most overrated

Hm?

The challenges faced by a city-state are hardly comparable to those faced by a world hegemon. While Yew's work in Singapore is almost beyond reproach I don't think he can rightly be compared to a Roosevelt or even a Stalin

He had an easier job.

Always the same excuse.
Not only is there no argument, even from a purely empirical view it doesn't hold. There are many small countries less populated than Singapore that are complete shitholes.

>hurr hurr why cant world leaders of massive countries be as good as a glorified mayor
>mommy i make poopy pls wipy bum bum!

Still no argument in sight.
Were Pericles and Paulus Aemilius glorified mayors too? The second being a glorified half mayor apparently.
England for most of history was less populated than Singapore under Lee. Mere surface area was perhaps a valid excuse at the time of Alexander, but a non argument in an era of fast transportation and communication.

>i compare modern rulers with ancient ones look at me
>wah wah why isnt my chicky nuggies dino shapedd i want dinos now!!!

Wouldn't count Göring as statesman

>wah wah i refuse to use historical record because it cant sustain my horrendously stupid political views

Ataturk was playing on the hardest difficulty level.

I mean, him and Kagame.

Population density lends to more centralized political authority. It's easier to manage 10k people in the area of a city than 5k people in the breadth of a state.

Are you memeing?

Gaddafi was impressive

>most overrated
>not FDR

Singaporean here, and I would absolutely say yes.

"The challenges faced by a city-state are hardly comparable to those faced by a world hegemon."

A city-state has less insurance compared to other full on countries, there is less of a margin for error, so it's definitely harder. Not to mention the situation in Singapore wasn't easy either. To the north and south were two Islamic nations that expressed interest in annexing Singapore. Communist uprisings also spread from those regions into Singapore.

"Population density lends to more centralized political authority. It's easier to manage 10k people in the area of a city than 5k people in the breadth of a state."

It's not always a straight 'win' situation. In the case where you're forced to have a high population density because your island is about 740 km^2. it also means that you have no natural water, no natural resources and other commodities that most other nations with large land expanses have. For many nations, they would rather have a large land expanse than the 'benefit' of high population density (which comes with other drawbacks like needing good sanitation, transportation, etc.)