Joseph Stalin 1

I must have seen this list or one like it about a dozen times.

I think I'll go across the grain here.  Stalin was a great administrator and leader, who reformed the Russian army by replacing some of its more hidebound officers and having them re-educated, found them other careers, or abruptly retired them.  His series of five year plans industrialized the country, essentially drawing it quickly out of the nineteenth century.  Of course he did all this for the people he ruled with benign tolerance, and for their protection greatly increased the resources of the various security and police agencies in the country.  People felt secure, that no matter what, a knock on the door in the middle of the night would tell them that the secret police were on the watch.

What a humanitarian....