# Questions on Titles of World Leaders **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 11, 2003, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/questions-on-titles-of-world-leaders/167923 "2003-04-11T00:34:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/questions-on-titles-of-world-leaders/167923/21 "2003-04-12T06:22:33Z")
> [@](#): > > Did anybody ever discern a title that Khadafi (apparently you can spell his name any way you feel like and be at least as correct as anybody else) bestowed upon himself as Grand Poobah of Libya? Apparently Khadafi’s official title is “The Revolutionary Leader” which interestingly enough has no official legal definition in the Libyan government. I guess the title means “the job Khadafi has” and the powers of office are “whatever he can get away with”. Khadafi incidentaly is not the official head of state of Libya. That would be Zintani Muhammad az-Zintani, who is the Secretary General of the People’s Congress. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/questions-on-titles-of-world-leaders/167923/22 "2003-04-12T13:52:58Z")
**brianmelendez,** you’re welcome. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/questions-on-titles-of-world-leaders/167923/23 "2003-04-12T17:45:16Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Ringo \* > \*\*Didn’t Liberia have a Sargeant as a head-of-state for a bit? \*\* I think he was a sergeant when he led the coup. However, if it’s the same one I recall in a newspaper article, he soon promoted himself to a 5-star general. Similarly, Sgt. Idi Amin became Field Marshal Dr. Idi Amin upon “winning” Uganda’s presidency. ---
**Author:** ![everton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ecb155/32.png) [@everton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/everton)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/questions-on-titles-of-world-leaders/167923/24 "2003-04-12T18:27:46Z")
The guy who led the 1980 coup in Liberia was Master Sergeant Samuel K. Doe, who promoted himself to General accordingly. As far as self elevation and accumulation of exotic titles is concerned, Idi Amin Dada is an _interesting_ case. As well as raising himself to the rank of Field Marshal he awarded himself military honours such as the Victoria Cross, Distinguished Service Order and Military Cross (all of which you normally get for unusual heroism in battle) and a range of titles including President for Life, Doctor, Lord of All the Beasts of the Earth and Fishes of the Sea, King of the Scots and Conqueror of the British Empire in Africa in General and Uganda in Particular. Dada indeed. ---
**Author:** ![brianmelendez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/65b543/32.png) [@brianmelendez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brianmelendez)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/questions-on-titles-of-world-leaders/167923/25 "2003-04-12T19:12:59Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Little Nemo \* > \*\*If I recall correctly, I think Stalin did (and there’s a role model for any world leader). For several years his title was General Secretary of the Communist Party, ie the head of the government. While he effectively controlled the entire Soviet Union from that office, it wasn’t until after the Germans invaded in 1941 that he officially became the head of state. \*\* That situation is actually a little different. The Communist Party was the undoubted source of political power in the Soviet Union, and its general secretary was usually the most powerful figure in the Soviet nation and its de facto ruler. But the Party was neither the state nor the government, each of which had its own head, so the general secretary was neither the head of state nor the head of government unless he also acquired one of those titles: > [@](#): > > The general secretary possessed many powers. As chairman of the Politburo, the general secretary decided the agenda and timing of its deliberations. . . . Finally, through attendance at summit meetings with world heads of state, the general secretary acquired symbolic legitimation as the Soviet Union’s top ruler. > > Once selected for this position by other members of the Politburo and confirmed by the Central Committee, the general secretary had to proceed to build a base of power and strengthen his authority. Officials considered eligible for the position of general secretary held a great amount of power to begin with; they always occupied seats on the Politburo and Secretariat, and they developed a large number of clients throughout the party and government bureaucracies. The general secretary’s efforts to extend this power base involved placing loyal clients in strategic positions throughout party and government hierarchies. One measure of the success of the general secretary’s efforts in this regard was turnover in the Central Committee at the first party congress following the secretary’s accession to the position (see Central Committee , this ch.). The general secretary used these clients to promote desired policies at all levels of the party and government bureaucracies and to ensure accurate transmission of information about policy problems up the hierarchy . . . . > > To secure his rule and advance his policies, the general secretary also had to increase his authority. . . . One further means to strengthen the legitimacy of the general secretary’s power has been the acquisition of high government offices. Thus in October 1988, Gorbachev became chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, which was the title for head of the Soviet state. He retained his position as head of state when in May 1989 the newly elected Congress of People’s Deputies close a new Supreme Soviet and elected Gorbachev to the just created position of chairman of the Supreme Soviet. In the past, the head of the Soviet state sometimes had been referred to as “president” in Soviet and Western media, although such a position was not identified in the Constitution. From Library of Congress, [“Soviet Union–A Country Study”](http://memory.loc.gov/frd/cs/sutoc.html), ch. 7. The head of government was the chairman of the Presidium of the Council of Ministers and, as **Little Nemo** points out, Stalin occupied that office–as did several other Party general secretaries, until the practice was banned: > [@](#): > > The Constitution placed the chairman of the Council of Ministers at the head of government. As such, the chairman acted as the prime minister and therefore was responsible for enacting party decisions and ensuring that their implementation conformed to the intentions of the party leadership. Three party leaders have served concurrently as the chairman of the Council of Ministers. Lenin chaired the Sovnarkom when he was the de facto head of the party. Stalin, who was the party’s first general secretary, became chairman during World War II and remained in that position until his death in 1953. In March 1958, Nikita S. Khrushchev, who had been first secretary since 1953 (the title changed to first secretary after Stalin’s death and reverted to general secretary in 1966), took over the position of chairman of the Council of Ministers also. After Khrushchev’s ouster in 1964, in order to avoid too much concentration of power, the party established a policy that the positions of chairman of the Council of Ministers and first (general) secretary of the party had to be filled by two different persons. _Id._, ch. 8. I wrote earlier that I couldn’t think of a case where the same person held independent (in the sense of constitutionally distinct) titles as head of state and head of government at the same time. I was overlooking an obvious one: Adolf Hitler, who acquired the Weimar Republic’s presidency after having been appointed as chancellor. As **paperbackwriter** has pointed out, another example is Saddam Hussein. What a great little club. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/questions-on-titles-of-world-leaders/167923/26 "2003-04-13T00:47:26Z")
**Earl Snake-Hips Tucker** , Idi Amin was a Brigadier (just plain Brigadier, British-style, not "General) when he overthrew Milton Obote to take over Uganda (yes, he was a real career soldier). Lt. Col. G/Kh/Qaddafi was promoted to full Colonel the year after his coup, but it so happens part of his revolution was the temporary elimination of the general/Flag ranks. Eventually Lybia reinstated the ranks (only up to LTG), and in the late 70s Muammar was placed on the list for Major General but declined to actually accept the promotion. In the USSR, it was as **brian** quotes until 1977 – with actually a President, a PM, **and** a GS of CPSU – but in 77 Brezhnev went ahead and took the Presidency again. Gorby did the same, only that he had many of the powers he held as GS officially reclassified as being those of the office of the President – a move that was mirrored at the Russian Republic level by Yeltsin, before the collapse. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/questions-on-titles-of-world-leaders/167923.md?page=1)