Napoleon, Stalin, Hitler

[Louis VI the Fat]

Napoleon was from Corsica, Stalin from Georgia, Hitler from Austria.

Coincidence? Or does this have explanatory relevance for the behaviour of these three?
Any links or thoughts?

[cegorach]

It is quite obvious that beeing more French/Russian/German than the 'natives' was one of driving factors in their behaviour, but it is not uncommon I guess there are many people like these who are famous or threated as national heroes in countries where they were not born. I can find several examples in Polish history right now if someone asks me.

[matteus the inbred]

in Napoleon's case he was actually quite a committed Corsican patriot before he decided France would be a better stage for his ambitions. in all cases it was probably a desire to achieve greatness for their respective adopted countries, personified by themselves. all three were from relatively poor backgrounds and had uncertain relations with their fathers, but where Hitler was a poor student, for example, Napoleon was extremely bright and hardworking.

Corsica was a fairly unregarded backwater, Austria an important country in its own right, Georgia somewhere in between...

i think someone once said about Napoleon 'he finds it so easy to shed French blood because he does not have a drop of it his own veins'.

Someone researching British Prime Ministers found that something like 25% of them had lost one or both parents before they were adults, a much higher proportion than normal for the population as a whole.
make of that what you will.

[hellenes]

It is quite obvious that beeing more French/Russian/German than the 'natives' was one of driving factors in their behaviour, but it is not uncommon I guess there are many people like these who are famous or threated as national heroes in countries where they were not born. I can find several examples in Polish history right now if someone asks me.

BTW
Stalin was as much Russian as Hitler was Korean...
He was Gergean...

Hellenes

[Rodion Romanovich]

Napoleon was from Corsica, Stalin from Georgia, Hitler from Austria.

Coincidence? Or does this have explanatory relevance for the behaviour of these three?
Any links or thoughts?

It would explain their eagerness to be nationalistic, but whether it has any connection to them so carelessly causing the deaths of so many is however difficult to say. Moving to another place can cause rootlessness, insecurity and fear, but I doubt it would have any crucial impact because there are so many other factors that can cause fear and uncontrolled unjustified hatred. And fear and determination doesn't necessarily lead to violence if you have firm moral principles and use your determination for something good. (Edit: we have the situation of a factor A not causing B always, and factor B also being possible to be caused by other factors than factor A). It's a complex matter, and it's probably impossible to find out the entire truth about those persons. Common recurring themes are poverty, insecurity, rootlessness, alienation, pushing people out of society and bad relations between parents and children, all of which may or may not have importance.

[Kralizec]

Hitler & Austria are a bit different, Hitler viewed Austrians as Germans and that was also the feeling of most Austrians at the time.

[ShadesPanther]

Hitler was ethnically German in a way. Napoleon and Stalin really weren't. IIRC Corsica was bought from Genoa not long before so really he could be considered in the same boat as Stalin. Georgia is a really nationalist area who aren't Russian at all so it is quite surprising that someone of his background could become the most powerful person in the world.

[Kralizec]

Hitler was ethnically German in a way. Napoleon and Stalin really weren't.

Indeed

[econ21]

I think in some sense, all three were fundamentally "rebels" in their character and it was partly this that drove them to capture powerful states so that they could rule them as they wished. Being something of outsiders in terms of origin[1] probably helped stirr up feelings of being outside the mainstream, encouraging rebelliousness and spurring them to the extremes of personal commitment needed to fulfill their ambitions.

[1]I suspect they were also "outsiders" in terms of social class - they were not born into the classes that typically ruled their countries.

[ShadesPanther]

Indeed

not that they were German. That they werent ethnically the same as the people they controlled

[Avicenna]

Trotsky wasn't a Russian either.

He was probably a better leader than Stalin, but he was murdered by one of Stalin's agents.

[nokhor]

i believe something along the lines of what simon appleton said. 'great' leaders are by definition freaks and abnormal, otherwise they wouldn't be 'great' leaders. 'great' being someone that impacts the world significantly, not necessarily in a beneficial manner. so you will always find some differences in their biography from a normal leader. richard the lionhearted was french, joan of arc was female etc. their alieness is not the defining charachteristic of what makes them 'great' but is usually there.

there are also interesting subsets of 'great' leaders other than national origins. caesar and genghis khan both came from upper crust families who had fallen on hard times. alexander, hannibal, and frederick all inherited military machines that had been created by their fathers.

[Louis VI the Fat]

Now that you mention it, we could expand our list.

More outsiders, from semi-peripheral areas, who took control of the main country and pushed it to great military successes, with insatiable expansionist policies:

Joan of Arc was from Lorraine - peripheral to French culture in her times.
Alexander the Great was from Macedonia.

With our trio of Napoleon, Stalin, Hitler they do share Simon's 'extremes of personal commitment needed to fulfill their ambitions'.

Do any of you know any others?

[Brutus]

Now that you mention it, we could expand our list.

More outsiders, from semi-peripheral areas, who took control of the main country and pushed it to great military successes, with insatiable expansionist policies:

Joan of Arc was from Lorraine - peripheral to French culture in her times.
Alexander the Great was from Macedonia.

With our trio of Napoleon, Stalin, Hitler they do share Simon's 'extremes of personal commitment needed to fulfill their ambitions'.

Do any of you know any others?

I don't think Joan of Arc and Alexander the Great fit the description;

Joan of Arc may have come from a marginal region of France and may have been from the 'politically marginal sex', but she never ruled anything, and was most likely used as a pawn by Charles VII and his advisors.

I also fail to see how Macedonia, after the conquests of Philip II, can be percieved as 'marginal'. Maybe it was culturally marginal to Greece and Persia, but it seems to me that Alexander's situation isn't comparable to those of Napoleon, Stalin and Hitler.

Maybe Byzantine emperor Basil I (who started life as a Macedonian peasant) and a Chinese emperor (can't remember his name) who also started as a peasant would fit into the category?

I think in going on with comparisons like this you will eventually find that most really famous and important 'rulers' in history didn't come from the established elite in some way or another. Probably because of this they had a reason to want to change things (in contrast to those who already occupied the highest echelons of society, and thus usually didn't have this drive).

[Kralizec]

Or emperor Justininian...
Conquered the bulk of the old empire, ordered the codification of Roman law, built the Hagia Sophia and started a golden age of architecture...
and to think he was the son of a slavonic peasant.

[matteus the inbred]

Maybe Byzantine emperor Basil I (who started life as a Macedonian peasant) and a Chinese emperor (can't remember his name) who also started as a peasant would fit into the category?

I think you're referring to Chu Yuan Chang, who, following the death of his parents from plague, became the leader of the Red Turbans cult and led a largely proletarian movement to remove the last members of the Yuan dynasty and found the Ming dynasty as Emperor Hung Wu in 1368.
He's a very good example actually, as his rule was autocratic, harsh and brutal, with periodic but inconsistent crackdowns on corruption and treason, which cost the lives of probably 40,000 people. He also put great emphasis on his humble origins and identified closely with 'the people' as opposed to the elites. He was militarily aggressive and his initial career and moral beliefs were influenced and helped by a less well known predecessor.

[Upxl]

Trotsky wasn't a Russian either.

He was probably a better leader than Stalin, but he was murdered by one of Stalin's agents.

Who wasn’t?

[BelgradeWar]

Let's add that apart from being Georgian (Dzugasvili was his surname, clearly non-Slavic) he studied theology before he embarked on communism...

[Shaka_Khan]

What's ironic is that Corsica and Georgia never made large territorial expansions.