Especially if you want to minimize the suffering of the people?
Please consider with resource constraint.
What if you are an oppressed civilian with no resource?
What if you are a king of a stronger country?
Pay me a very large sum of money in small, unmarked bills and I’ll take care of your tyrant problem for you. No muss, no fuss. You won’t even read about it in the paper.
No, I’m not a member of the Illuminati. You never even heard of The Illuminati, if you know what’s good for you. Geddit?
First, crucial question: if his removal will precipitate either just another tyrant or an even more civilian-unfriendly civil war, what’s the point?
If one is confident that said removal won’t make things worse, then the civilian car-bombs him and the king smart-bombs him, both on the understanding that turnaround is fair play.
Removing Evil Tyrants:
- Treat Evil Tyrant stain with oxydizer pre-wash per directions.
- Put garment in washing machine, load detergent, let water fill to cover garment and STOP the wash cycle, allowing the garment to soak in detergent for 10 minutes, in cold water.
- Re-Start machine, allow wash cycle to finish.
- Lay flat to dry. Evil Tyrant should be gone.
Very good start. But haven’t you just changed to question to: "How do we prevent yet another tyrant or bloody civil war in the removal of the current tyrant?
And please guys. 
Giving the current world events, you would think someone would have seriously thought about this question?
Aside from assassination or external invasion (on a trumped-up premise or otherwise), what other options are there? On the other hand, is an external invasion mor
I think you’re getting flippant answers because your point is in starting this thread is not clear. I’m guessing, but only guessing, that you want to illustrate in some way that the US invasion of Iraq was justified becasue ther was no other way to deal with Saddam. If that’s what you really want to do, please say so, and lay out your premise.
I think there is no easy answer to this question. If the country has never known freedom from Evil Tyrants, you cannot just topple the current Government and hope for the best. If an executive of a Western Democracy went too far in abusing his powers and refused to step down when his term is over, then a coalition of other nations should be able to topple the administration and tyrant and restore the prior working democratic process with a few changes and extra checks and balances.
Could you be more specific?
Are we talking about a country like North Korea or Iran or a fictional USA?
For North Korea the model that worked for East Germany should work fine for North Korea. The two Korea’s reunite under an expanded South Korean government.
For Iran, I don’t think there is an answer that does not take a huge commitment in time and money.
For Fictional Future USA, the UN would have to come in and hopefully not set off a Nuclear War. If they convince enough of the Military that the Dictator needs to be removed, democracy should reassert itself with a little help.
Jim
Sorry for the complete cock-up. Not sure what happened there.
Aside from assassination, external invasion (on a trumped-up premise or otherwise), or (remember them?) United Nations economic sanctions, what other options are there? On the other hand, is an external invasion morally correct if the tyrant’s country is no particular threat to the country doing the invading, and is either course morally correct if the suffering of the people in the tyrant’s country is not substantially reduced after his being deposed?
I think you’re getting flippant answers because your point is in starting this thread is not clear. I’m guessing, but only guessing, that you want to illustrate in some way that the US invasion of Iraq was justified becasue there was no other practical way to deal with Saddam. If that’s what you really want to do, please say so, and lay out your premise. Or, if you like, we could take a different example, such as the ever-popular subject of what to do about Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, and wrestle with that one.
Assassination always works – but it doesn’t always help. “Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.”
No, that’s not my intention to justify war in any way.
I just think that given the collective intelligence of SDMB, we would have known a better way to deal with this?
Or are you telling me that humanity have no hope at all?
For the discussion, let’s take the worst case.
What would you do if you have the time and money? Because if you consider the alternative of war, you could end up spend less money.
The first question, really, is ‘who are you, what do you have, and what is your relationship with said Tyrant?’
Once you’ve settled that, you can choose any number of methods from overkill to passive resistance. The precise implementation thereof will have to wait on the primary details.
For example, if you’re the Tyrant’s heir, you may slay him outright, poison him, or simply create or enforce some legal issue that causes him to step down. Or even devote your life to promoting the idea that people don’t have to listen to him anymore.
As others have pointed out, it is pretty easy to get rid of an evil tyrant. One bullet or cyanide pellet will do the trick, but in most cases it isn’t going to solve the problem because someone else is going to step into the same slot, possibly after a nasty civil war.
I think the question you meant to ask was how do you get rid of tyranny. Much harder. Also I don’t think it is likely that if you are a king you are going to be interested in getting rid of tyranny next door when you are likely engaging in it yourself.
If however you are an elected government of a stronger country and you wish to intervene on behalf of an oppressed population, first and most importantly get yourself agents into this country and get a lot of intel. Do not go leaping in without knowing a great deal about the cultures, factions, issues and groups involved. Once you have this information you will be able to pick groups of resistance leaders in that country who will work to overthrow their government without becoming terrorists in the process or tyrants if they win. Support these people with money and publicity, put pressure on the government of the tyrant and especially on multinational corporations who support them, usually so they can have cheap oil, gold, diamonds, labor, whatever. Arming these groups should be a last resort.
If you are an oppressed citizen with no resources? You only have to have one resource: Courage. Freedom from tyranny requires that enough people be willing to die to gain it. An outside force can offer assistance and resources, but trying to accomplish it via military might is only replacing one tyranny with another(though hopefully milder one).
- You have to approach regime change in Iran as a UN coalition.
- You have to somehow get Russia in the Coalition
- At least one major Muslim Power should be on board, hopefully Egypt or Saudi
- Long term economic sanction don’t work so you need to use pin point military strikes and Assassination, but minimize Infrastructure destruction.
- Before you launch the strikes have the Occupation forces ready with a lot of interpreters.
- You are still left with the problem of a large part of the population are devout Muslims that are anti-west. I don’t know how you get past this to avoid civil conflicts.
Jim {best I can do, hopefully someone else will tear it apart and fine tune it}
Assassination, preferably by someone farily high up in the tyrant’s hiarachy(sp?). That is if the person is really a tyrant not simply the head of a repressive regime. A tyrant being the focus point, and the magor contributer to the repression of his/her country.
Set up trade with a neighbor or neighbors. Offer low tarrifs, great trade packages, allow immigration and free exchange of labor. Make the evil tyrant insainly jealous. When ET invades the other country, offer support, move in troops, and convince your allies that they should conquer and hold the ET’s territory. Allow the neighbor to do the work, take over the country and give the ex-ET’s land to the new country. They get to deal with the insurgents and the problems of holding hostile territory. You on the other hand, cement your relationship with your ally, they get richer, which means you get richer, and you lose a minimal amount of lives, and have less of a negative image to the world.
So we should start expanding trade with Pakistan and Iraq quickly so they can divide up Iran? I don’t know if your plan would really work in the Middle-East. It sounds much more feasible for Africa or South America.
Jim
Yeah, it is more of a general Machivellian scenario. I agree about the Middle East though. It seems it would take more drastic measures there, which means less subtlety.
There’s a hint of truth there.
I think we would all agree that the best, long-term method for retiring a tyrant is to have him removed by the citizenry and replaced by some form of non-oppressive government.
To that end I would postulate that one of the most important factors is the growth of an established and reliable middle class. People who begin to command economic power and acheive it in such a way that those under it can aspire to join it.
In other words, give the people something to lose and see how well they work at keeping it (and expanding it).
You flatter us, really. I seriously doubt anyone here is going to come up with a plan that no one else has ever thought of. Again, three practical means of removing a tyrant are a) assassination b) external invasion c) the slow drip of economic sanctions imposed by a body representing other countries opposed to said tyrant. Oh, here’s a fourth: providing covert support to members of the tyrant’s inner circle who might be disposed to getting rid of him. Of course, should they be successful they are more likely than not to turn out to be tyrants themselves.
The relative success of any of the above, as we can see from recent history, depends on whether ther are enough democratic institutions in place to replace the tyrant with a more representative regime. If not, no net gain.
All of the above also assumes a single strong person at the head of the tyrannical government, which is not always the case. If not, the quick ‘n’ dirty assassination option is most likely out.
You asked about the options open to citizens of the tyrant’s country with limited resources. I actually knew a citizen of a small West African country many years ago who, while a bit drunk one night, claimed to have worked out a coup d’etat plan involving a radio-controlled model plane and some explosives, but the whole thing sounded completely hare-brained to me and I didn’t take it seriously.