A better understanding of the personality disorders and socio-political factors that create dictators may help democratic forces to proactively identify and prevent dictatorial leadership.
VIRAL GENOCIDE: Misguided bioweapon research in a lab disastrously misplaced in the crowded city of Wuhan and the mishandling of the inevitable leaks have left 7 million dead globally. The intermediate host for the spread of this virus from bats to humans is none other than the Chinese dragon. There is no information about the Uyghurs in Xinjiang internment camps or the Tibetans in mass labour camps. The massive surge in Covid cases in China with a severe shortage of drugs and medical facilities is leading to the genocide of the incarcerated, and pogrom of the vulnerable and elderly, thus achieving ethnic cleansing. This provides convenient deniability, unlike resorting to gas chambers, chemicals, or mass shootings. This may also explain why security forces were vaccinated first in China ahead of all others.
NARCISSISTIC POWER-HUNGRY AUTOCRATS: Autocrats often have a troubled childhood leading to failed emotional development and critical reasoning. They have an exaggerated sense of themselves and difficulty empathizing with their subjects and humanity elsewhere. They take all decisions with little or no inputs from subordinates. They are brutally vindictive in response to any perceived criticism. Only extremely submissive aides survive in the echo chamber around an autocrat afflicted with the hubris syndrome, shielding him from any criticism or sane advice. Hence no course correction is possible. The Nazi Goebbels kind of propaganda is used to arouse hyper-nationalist fervour about the historical superiority of the Han Chinese, wronged by 100 years of humiliation. Xi Jinping expects citizens to hero-worship him and not revolt. Democratic revolutions are contagious; hence key leaders are tortured or killed to demoralize the rest to become apathetic, as in Hong Kong. When the sustained Zero Covid policy led to untold misery and violent protests, all pandemic restrictions were suddenly withdrawn. The Covid surge that followed devastated all domestic protests and changed the population profile.
INSECURE PARANOID AUTOCRATS: “Live by the sword, die by the sword” has many examples in history. Of the three main leaders of the French Revolution, Jean-Paul Marat was stabbed, while Georges-Jacques Danton and Maximilien Robespierre were guillotined. Autocrat Nicolae Ceausescu, despot Muammar Gaddafi, dictator Saddam Hussein, fascist Benito Mussolini, and tyrant Adolf Hitler also came to violent ends. Mao Zedong survived assassination attempts. Paranoid Saddam Hussein had multiple meals prepared for him across Iraq daily, to prevent being located or poisoned. Burmese dictator Than Shwe moved the capital to a remote location in the jungle. Xi has eliminated dissent, just like a military junta does. In the guise of reform, rooting out corruption and traitors, all able, ambitious competitors and threats have been purged, eliminated, or subjugated and the Chinese economy is being ruined. Xi fears a repeat of the USSR breakup and a violent end like riding a tiger, not knowing how to get off without being eaten. Desperate to stay in power, regimes like the ISI, and Taliban, accept economic collapse, isolation, and mass poverty in a failed state. Allocating aid to corrupt autocratic nations helps the regime, not the citizens.
EXPANSIONIST AUTOCRATS: Autocrats serve their own interests and those of their cronies and security forces. Amassing a formidable armed force and financial war chest to threaten annihilation has often been used in history to subjugate nations. A feeling of hopelessness leads to a collapse of the administrative and security framework of the nation and surrender. The gain of territory, assets, and resources is then at a minimal cost. Imitating the East India Company that created the British Empire, Chinese mercantilism is weakening us and the rest of the world. Unscrupulous neo-colonist China has corrupted multilateral bodies and many national governments with inducements; bullied those who resisted, with threats and coercion; and used debt traps, soft power, and disinformation to con, persuade, and co-opt other nations to submit. China has been sabotaging India internally with cyberattacks; psychological warfare; financial, diplomatic, and covert support to forces inimical to India. Autocrats break not only the laws of their own country but also international laws regarding territorial integrity, international waters, air traffic, homicide of dissenters abroad, terror financing, and support.
FALL OF AUTOCRACIES: Autocrats never groom a successor, leading to instability later on. Deng had inserted a series of checks and balances to prevent a Mao-style disastrous Cultural Revolution and Great Leap Forward. With his claim of “Enlightened” absolutism, Xi has seized absolute power in an already totalitarian CCP China and has groomed no successor. “How Autocracies Fall” by Andrea Kendall-Taylor and Erica Frantz is a unique study of what happens when autocracies fall. Autocrats’ ouster by public revolt as after the post-Soviet era “colour revolutions” and more recent “Arab Spring” has a 45% chance of leading to democracy. When an autocrat loses power via resignations or term limits, the regime persists in 58% of cases as seen in China. An autocrat’s death leads to the dynasty’s continuity as seen in North Korea. The violent fall of a regime in a coup or civil war is least likely to be followed by democracy and more likely to be followed by a worse leader and regime or chaos.
DETERRENCE NOT DIPLOMACY, NEGOTIATION, ARBITRATION, LITIGATION: For China, negotiations are a means of gaining time and lulling the enemy into complacency, as seen in the Himalayas. Only deterrence can stop Chinese expansionism. In July 2016, the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) of the International Tribunal of Law of the Sea (ITLOS), ruled that the Spratly Islands illegally occupied by China, fall within the Philippine EEZ. China has disregarded this ruling. The three superpowers—the United States, Russia, and China, aren’t part of the International Criminal Court (ICC). China acts with impunity against international laws with its financial and veto powers, while simultaneously exploiting multilateral organizations like ITO, WHO, etc., and liberal laws of democracies to its advantage. Hence negotiations, arbitration, or litigation is a waste of time in dealing with China. The Daedalus Trust states, “Once in power, a leader with an Antisocial Personality Disorder thrives on continuing conflict and never seeks peace.”
CONTAINMENT STRATEGY: In his famous “The Long Telegram,” on 22 February 1946, US diplomat George Kennan proposed the use of “containment” rather than talks or use of force against the communist Soviet Union. He suggested if denied opportunities for expansion by the adroit and vigilant application of counter-force at a series of constantly shifting geographical and political points, the Soviet party rule would ultimately collapse due to inherent contradictions. In efforts to contain the USSR, the US helped communist China become a super-threat to the world economy, health and peace. Ideally, the world should unite against repeated threats of Covid-19 emanating from China, treat China like a containment zone, and block all travel and trade. India needs to set an example by completely delinking from China and providing alternative supply chains, trade, and financial opportunities to the world.
OPEN SOCIETIES NEED TO BREAK UP THE AUTOCRATS’ CLUB: Autocrats befriend other autocrats to circumvent sanctions, and corrupt or destroy democracies by supporting and protecting criminals, drug syndicates, money laundering, and terror financing. If autocrats are denied illegal resources, their network will break due to greed and envy like in the 1939 Hitler-Stalin Non-Aggression Pact. We are not facing a limited warfare at our borders but a total warfare internally to our security, economy, and democratic institutions, and externally, via financial and terrorist safe havens, media, cyberspace, and outer space. Instead of letting our enemies exhaust us, we need to take the fight to them, out-think, out-manoeuvre and disintegrate them. Open-source intelligence (OSINT) communities are using software like Git at GitHub and services like proxy servers to bypass Chinese internet censorship for information exchange and to support dissidents among the public, security forces, and CCP. Democratic forces need to disrupt the financial and organizational integrity of autocratic perpetrators of war by any means. Open societies are best served by supporting democratic Taiwan and isolating autocratic China.
A new equitable multilateral global order is needed to isolate and hold accountable evil forces. Democratic nations need visionary leadership that can deliver on all fronts as public frustration and despair are fertile grounds for autocrats. A better understanding of the personality disorders and socio-political factors that create dictators may help democratic forces to proactively identify and prevent dictatorial leadership.
Dr P.S. Venkatesh Rao is Consultant Endocrine, Breast & Laparoscopic Surgeon, in Bengaluru.