Last historical figure that could genuinely be considered a Great Man of history (with a capital G)...

heh

He basically achieved what every absolutist monarch in history wished they could achieve. I genuinely can't think of another figure that wielded such unrestricted, unchallenged power for such a long time. It's disturbing but also kind of impressive.

but you should have make your post like this from the fucking start
namedropping Stalin without any context amounts to shitty bait
also be prepared to defend that greentext, there are quite a few tall claims in it many people don't really agree with

>backward civil war damaged country
Does it count if it was his own shitty war?
Do these people look "backward" to you?

One of the most interesting things in history is internal intrigue, though, with a little bit of everything at the very least. That's why The Romance of Three Kingdoms is the most prominent ancient literature, despite all of them having a standstill and doing some skirmishes.

well put

...

Isn't the Romance of the Three Kingdoms like, half literal fantasy and invented shit?

Vladimir Putin.

I give him credit for being the first leader in fucking ages to actually legit annex land, but other than that he doesn't stand out that much when taken out of the context of his European rivals being cucked to hell, setting the standard so low.

>Does it count if it was his own shitty war?
Lenin and Trotsky managed the war. Also, yes it does count since the country was effectively destroyed
>The small ruling class of a country is somehow representative of how the country is not backward
Come on, Imperial Russia was lagging way behind the rest of Europe at the time, its quick defeat in WWI proved it.

>I give him credit for being the first leader in fucking ages to actually legit annex land

Why? Is there supposed to be something impressive about "annexing" land that has no intrinsic value to anyone but you and had already belonged to you in all but name anyway?

It's more that since the UN and the EU and all those cucked organisations so heavily condemn any form of territorial expansion, and Putin just straight up gave zero fucks and did it anyway, it's kind of cool in like a thug life way.

>land that has no intrinsic value to anyone but you
there would be USN ships moored in Sevastopol today if they didn't do it, this doesn't require detective work for fuck's sake...

>loses 28 million men in ww2
>because he wanted the officer corps purged
>exported food during a famine
>in which he's responsible because instead of listening to the 5% top producers of his country on how to improve the other 95%, he killed the 5% best producers and stole their land
>wrote a constitution that allows free expression, but didn't allow it in practice AT ALL
>People under him are committing their own purges
>took 50 years to close the 30 year gap

Against a three continent large Defense bloc committing sanctions, yes.

You don't think that an intelligence agent moving into politics and steering his nation back into a nationalistic political and economic "superpower" through harsh realpolitik isn't proof that an individual can have a massive impact on history?
You don't know what you're talking about when you write the idea of the "Great Man of History."

Putin didn't really make Russia a superpower in any way it hasn't already been one. If he wanted to really have an impact he would have endeavored to remove Russia's dependence on oil money and make an actual stable and working economy. Most of his geopolitical stunts are dickwavings of an impotent man.

>make an actual stable and working economy

Look up their agricultural and military development efforts. Big league stuff right there.

>"Most of his geopolitical stunts are dickwavings of an impotent man." -LGBT faggot angry ebil president won't let people have sex in the street in front of kids

>Putin didn't really make Russia a superpower in any way it hasn't already been one
I'm not sure if it's even worth my time to point out how fucking wrong this statement is.

>shitty bait

Or maybe if you knew anything about history you would know all that already?

that's an extremely egoistic assumption
I can say with a straight face that I know a good deal about Rome and Russia, but I don't know jack shit about China or Pre-columbian America
on top of it Stalin is an extremely controversial figure even back home, let alone globally, surrounded by mountains of embellishment and political slander alike

Then why didn't they know about this:
Stalin is even more baity with context. Reminder that the USSR only reached 57% the GNP of the USA in 1974 at it's height and then slid back down

>Look up their agricultural and military development efforts. Big league stuff right there.
Agriculture and military do not really a strong economy make.

>LGBT faggot angry ebil president won't let people have sex in the street in front of kids
I do think that's kind of shit, but it has nothing to with Russia's geopolitics.

Please do.

>57% the GNP
measured in USD
gg no re

>Please do.
Between 1993 and 2008 Russia has been at its absolute weakest geopolitically since 1700's, it had no clout to speak of and was generally walked right over by US and its pets in Europe and in no way, shape or form warranted the title of superpower. It's been slowly regaining this political clout since mid 2010's, albeit Putin himself said they don't wish to go down the same path as Soviet Union, no matter how good is the economy doing at the moment, and so we probably won't see them blowing 30% of their GDP on the army to dickwave at Americans, like Soviets did, but they absolutely did become something you have to take into consideration when drawing up foreign policy again.

>Agriculture and military do not really a strong economy make.
Um yes they do, when they export. Agriculture has boomed in days it hasn't seen in a long while. Also helps the domestic job economy and lowers food prices.

Excellent post

It's not a bad thing that you don't have single men holding a colossal amount of power anymore. With that said, I would say Stalin fits the bill.

You completely missed my point. I didn't say Russia isn't a superpower. I'm questioning how much of that was Putin's doing.

I'm not saying they're not good. I'm saying you can't base your economy on them.

Had Hitler not committed genocide, he might've been considered a great man akin to Napoleon.

To an extent, Singapore was helped by favorable geography but it's no question this guy made it all possible.

>I'm not saying they're not good. I'm saying you can't base your economy on them.

please tell me bait. I mean that's the backbone of America right there

Nope, Nazi Germany was economically unsustainable without going to war with the rest of Europe.

Don't be stupid. Arms industry is about 2% of the US GDP. Agriculture is about 5.5%

But most of the Russian revival post-90s was already going to happen regardless. Russia has HUGE natural wealth and massive nuke stockpiles, it was inevitable. Putin can easily be seen to have weakened it by isolating himself internationally (at least from the west) and actively making an already corrupt country more and more corrupt through crony-ism. His control and understanding of media is impressive though.

>Calling men Great
Stop this mysoginist thread

Russia ISN'T a Super Power. I'm not sure what you're geopolitics professor is taking to tell you that with a straight face. Russia is a regional power (the most powerful one in its region) but to be a super power you must have the ability to project influence and power abroad. You can argue that Russia's limited involvement in Syria is evidence that it has risen to a super power state, but you would be wrong. Regional powers can project influence elsewhere. France, for example, executed its war in Mali with keen and nimble maneuvering and it was a big success. Does that make France a super power? No.

The other poster has the right idea. Russia does not have the economic power to be considered a super power. It does not have the means to project massive influence in every corner of the globe like the former USSR once did. This is like textbook Putin propaganda you are spouting. Not even China can be considered a super power yet, but they are most certainly a lot closer than Russia.

Yes, of course Putin has done a lot to raise the credibility of Russian might. He has reasserted Russia in the global geopolitical scene as a major player. He is a very smart politician and thus has understood that his support is reliant on convincing Russians that their country's standing in the world has risen since the low's of the early 90's. You mentioned something about military R&D in a post above, but what about military R&D has to do with a global super power status? What do fancy tanks and planes even mean if you can't build more than a dozen of them?

Russia has always been something to consider in foreign policy-- at least in American and European policy. This is partially why the Kremlin has had such a grand time pointing out NATO's encroachment during the 90's and thriving in an environment that allows Russia to use military actions outside of its borders while currying favor and support from the domestic population.

>what is the great spurt

>But most of the Russian revival post-90s was already going to happen regardless
Bold claim
Given that Kremlin was ruled by literal mafia subordinated to American and British governments - who in their endless hubris picked an unassuming quiet paper pusher, whose job was to maintain the status quo and suck western dick and whom they didn't consider any threat - as Yeltsin's successor, only to get completely blown the fuck out by him at every level to the point where we fully expect someone to start a "Victims of Putinism Foundation" any day now, I am very skeptical how exactly was Russia supposed to rebound without him, and who exactly would the alternative figure to bring it about be.
>Putin can easily be seen to have weakened it by isolating himself internationally (at least from the west)
Cutting out a tumor that did everything in its power to keep Russia as banana republic good only for cheap raw materials and making it one of top dogs in international politics again while steering the country towards total self-sustenance is the antonym of isolation.

>but to be a super power you must have the ability to project influence and power abroad
>influence
made America a laughing stock of the whole planet in matter of several years, when someone has a problem or there is a dispute they now go to Moscow to solve it
>power
can end any country on earth in 30 minutes
you didn't think this though, did you?

t. RT

I'd say most leaders during WW2 would qualify as "Great Men" simply because of the impact they had on history.
So Churchill would be the last of those to die.
I think we're still too close to judge more recent people but I think Kohl might also qualifiy to a lesser degree.

...

>lived in total paranoia
>his people hated him

...

...

Charles De Gaulle outlived that fat fuck.

>too much democracy and liberalization and pacifism
Why are people on Veeky Forums so badly unread, I though that Weber's tripartite classification of authority was high-school sociology 101 stuff.
Webers' theory is simple, he proposes that through history 3 ideal forms of political domination that guarantee political legitimacy exist:

>traditional authority (patriarchs, patrimonialism, feudalism)
This is the oldest form of authority descended down from the times tribal leaders. Authority isn't derived from any social reality or popular will but from an "Other" - be it tradition, god's will, heavenly mandate, etc. Authority isn't seized by an individual, but given to him by this "Other". This is more or less how western power dynamics worked until the enlightenment.

>charismatic authority (character, heroism, leadership, religious)
Charismatic authority doesn't rest on any "Other" but purely on the leader's capacity to rule and charm the mob to his cause. Most great men of history(tm) ruled through this model. This is also why morons (anglos) thinking that the French revolution was a failure because it went back to a monarchy are completely wrong. Louis XVIII ruled through traditional authority, he was king of France by grace of God, not because he was a particularly powerful figure, Napoleon on the other hand seized power for himself using only his charisma and competence to assure his legitimacy. Such systems of rule are often short lived because they rely entirely on 1 singular figure and fall apart as soon as he dies.

1/2

>legal authority (modern law and state, bureaucracy)
This is the stage most industrial and post-industrial societies are in. Authority is not derived from tradition or charisma, but from legal-rational authority. An individual or institution exerts power by virtue of the legal office that they hold. It is the authority that demands obedience to the office rather than the officeholder; once they leave office, their rational-legal authority is lost. With the development of a legal-rational system, the political system is likely to be rationalized similarly. Constitutions, written documents, established offices and regular elections are often associated with modern legal-rational political systems. These in the past have tended to develop in opposition to earlier traditional systems such as monarchies, where the set of rules are not well developed. As these systems develop in a rational manner, authority takes on a legal-rational form. Those who govern have the legitimate legal right to do so and those subordinated accept the legality of the rulers.

Finally, note that these 3 modes are only ideal forms and very rarely manifest in their pure incarnations, most political systems through the ages were mixes of the 3.
A good example of that would be the Roman republic. It was a proto-legal system where democartic rule and ideas of terms of office were already imagined in some sort, but these systems were anchored in traditional authority, the republic and it system was thought to be a sacred institution that derived its legitimacy not from its people but from its history and tradition (note that interestingly enough, modern day republicans have a very similar view). This system was smashed up when men such as Sulla and later Caesar stopped relying on this system and instead took up charismatic authority.

Mao the Communist Insurgent sure (even if I hate him and commies). Mao the state leader though... hoo boy. Deng would be more worthy of that even if he never officially held the top position.

Pretty much but even the actual history (Sanguozhi) is still very interesting.

I would choose Hitler over Stalin.

Stalin was just coasting along with what Lenin built and didn't really change history.

Hitler would have had as big of an impact has Napoleon if he had won. But he didnt and he di didn't cement his world view in like Napoleon did during his reign.

both Napoleon and Hitler's governments completely collapsed after they were defeated but Napoleon's legal and civil legacy as well as hsi version of the Revolution lived on after him.

Maybe because Napoleon was not retarded

>Stalin was just coasting along with what Lenin built and didn't really change history.

>Stalin was just coasting along with what Lenin built and didn't really change history
I can't agree with that. Call Lenin a great revolutionary or whatever, he didn't build the Soviet Union. He may have created it, but the Soviet Union was still struggling to recover from the Civil War when Stalin took power, and it was under Stalin that the Soviet Union industrialized and cemented itself as the preeminent military power. That alone doesn't make him a Great Man, but that he did all of that *and* came from a peasant background certainly gives him a pretty big edge over Hitler. Stalin has entered into Russian national mythology almost on the same level as Alexander Nevsky or Peter the Great; Hitler is saved from being a historical footnote by the colossal size of his war.

>It seems too much democracy and liberalization and pacifism leads to less chances for great men to arise, at least to me personally.
Meme tier brainlet detected

>Come on, Imperial Russia was lagging way behind the rest of Europe at the time, its quick defeat in WWI proved it.

No it wasn't, it was one of the greatest powers in the world, Stolypins reforms increased Russian productivity and they were beginning to industrialize and modernize, Tsar Nicholas was far from a bad Tsar, he was just a weak Tsar who thought being liked by the people was a good idea. Stalin sending millions to slaughter in ww2, and millions in slave labor camps and then bragging about "industrialization" is moronic. Russia didn't lose in ww1, the blosheviks withdrew once they acquired power, Russia made great advances under Brusilov and was a major concern for the Central Powers.

Why did you use a photoshopped pic when you have his paintings there?

This is a great post 10/10

>made America a laughing stock of the whole planet in matter of several years, when someone has a problem or there is a dispute they now go to Moscow to solve it

How? The US can invade any country it wants literally without declaring war and nobody can do shit about it, Russia can barely send aid to irregular troops in its own backyard in Ukraine without getting blasted by the world as evil, thats what being a supower power means, everybody hates America and its evil wars for oil, but nobody stops them, everytime they do it countries flock in support regardless of what the population thinks.

Any Great Man that managed to boast like this?

EVERY

the guy named after that declaration?

what do you think this scene was inspired from?
youtube.com/watch?v=ffeOvwBYkf4

Is there anyone from 1900 to today who you feel deserve to be called "the Great?"

Ataturk honestly

hitla

I would say Stalin. He came from basically nothing, and by the time he was finished, he had completed a series of semi-permanent conquests that totaled millions of square kilometers. By the time he was finished, the Soviet Union was perhaps the preeminent military power in the world, and he the most powerful man in the world.

No, I'm not a commie; I hate Stalin and think that the USSR did a lot of damage to Russian society, but the achievements under Stalin certainly can be compared to those of the great men of the past, and I'm not sure there's anyone else in the 20th or 21st Centuries who has had such impressive accomplishments whose accomplishments didn't fade into dust within their lifetimes or almost immediately afterwards (Stalin's remained in place for nearly 40 years after his death; while the height of the Third Reich's power lasted like 2 years).

>its quick defeat in WWI proved it.
>Lasting 3 years instead of 4 years is a quick defeat
Not to mention it was the communist government that surrendered, not the Imperial one.

Literally Napoleon

The only current leaders that can be considered a Great Man of history are Putin and maybe Xi Jinping if his second term goes alright. Rest are all terrible, or mediocre.

>Stalin was just coasting along with what Lenin built and didn't really change history.

Why are turkroaches hard-countered by the French? Do they fear the frog warrior?