Vengeance Leader
Some leaders make it their mission to "get even" with anyone who ever crossed them. History has a name for how that ends.
The Sulla Proscription
When a so-called leader announces they intend to get even with everyone who ever "crossed him" or failed to show loyalty, it's worth knowing about the Roman dictator Sulla.
If Sulla greeted someone while walking around, that person was allowed to live. Anyone he didn't greet was killed on the spot by his guard.
Eventually, terrified senators pleaded with him: if people were going to die at random, could he at least publish a list, so they'd know who was safe? Sulla agreed — and made a new list every single day. He also told wealthy Romans he'd spare them if they named him in their wills. He had many of them killed anyway; it just made the estate easier to collect.
Vengeance leaders don't act alone. They need loyal followers, enablers, and accomplices willing to carry out the campaign against the "enemies within" — a category that has a way of expanding to include millions of people.
Molière and the Gullible Crowd
Molière, the famous French playwright, was struck by how easily crowds could be talked into believing an obvious con. His response was Tartuffe — a comedy about a fraud who manipulates a household through false piety. The play gave us the term Tartuffery: performed virtue used as a tool of manipulation.
The Sales Job
Getting into power sometimes just takes a good sales job. Classic sales training pushes a simple rule: if you didn't close the deal, you didn't use the right words — try again with better ones. One common technique is the "Wouldn't It Be Nice" method: paint a picture so appealing that the customer stops asking how it actually gets delivered.
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"Wouldn't it be nice to cut fuel prices by 50% or more?"
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"Wouldn't it be nice to make food much cheaper, starting right away?"
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"Wouldn't it be nice to be rid of the enemies — foreign and domestic — causing all our troubles?"
None of these promises make it into anything resembling a written contract. That's not an accident — it's the whole method. See also: sleazy sales techniques, and the recurring question of why this kind of appeal keeps working.
Creating the Drama
Vengeance leaders often manufacture a crisis to justify extreme measures against the "enemies within" — a page taken straight from Hitler's Enabling Act, which used a manufactured emergency to legally dissolve the checks on his power.
When a vengeance leader faces losing power, some resort to violence to keep it. In the worst historical case, that meant a "scorched earth" policy — Hitler's actual plan to punish and destroy Germany itself as a consequence of its failure to win.
The Malignant Narcissist
Psychoanalyst Erich Fromm coined the term "malignant narcissism" in 1964, calling it "the most severe pathology and the root of the most vicious destructiveness and inhumanity." Psychiatrist Otto Kernberg later gave the concept its clinical shape, describing it as a specific combination of four things layered on top of one another, rather than any single trait acting alone.
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Narcissism: grandiosity, a constant need for admiration, and a genuine lack of empathy for others' experience.
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Antisocial traits: a willingness to exploit, deceive, or break rules that apply to everyone else.
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Paranoia: chronic suspicion, a worldview organized around enemies and betrayal.
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Ego-syntonic sadism: the clinical term for cruelty that feels justified rather than guilty — the person doesn't experience their own aggression as a problem to be hidden.
Fromm himself used this exact framework as a chapter-length case study in his 1973 book The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness, applying it directly to Hitler. Read against the earlier sections of this page, the pattern lines up cleanly: the enemies list, the manufactured crisis, the scorched-earth impulse when losing — all four components of the clinical concept, playing out as a historical case study.
Who Helped Bring Hitler to Power
One of the most stubborn myths about Hitler's rise is that he seized power outright. He didn't. Historian Alan Bullock's assessment is blunter and more accurate: Hitler came to power "as part of a shoddy political deal with the 'Old Gang'... Hitler did not seize power; he was jobbed into office by a backstairs intrigue." A vengeance leader rarely climbs alone — he's carried, at least at the start, by people who think they're the ones in control.
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Franz von Papen — the former Chancellor who personally talked President Hindenburg into appointing Hitler, convinced the Nazis could be managed from inside a coalition cabinet. When a colleague warned him he was placing himself in Hitler's hands, Papen's actual reply was: "You are mistaken. We've hired him." Papen was sidelined and placed under house arrest within eighteen months, while several of his own close associates were murdered in the Night of the Long Knives.
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Paul von Hindenburg — the sitting President who personally disliked Hitler and had refused to appoint him chancellor twice before, but signed off on January 30, 1933 after being persuaded by his own inner circle, including his son Oskar von Hindenburg and state secretary Otto Meissner.
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Industrialists — a group including steel magnate Fritz Thyssen had already petitioned Hindenburg in November 1932 to make Hitler chancellor; a further secret meeting on February 20, 1933 saw major industrialists agree to bankroll the Nazi Party's election campaign directly.
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The Reichstag Fire, February 1933 — used to convince Hindenburg to sign the Reichstag Fire Decree, suspending press freedom and habeas corpus just five days before the election, and providing the pretext to arrest Communist Party deputies outright.
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Ludwig Kaas and the Centre Party — the final votes Hitler actually needed. The Enabling Act of March 23, 1933 required a two-thirds majority; with Communist deputies already arrested or banned, Kaas — a Catholic priest leading the Centre Party — negotiated a set of promises from Hitler protecting the Church's rights, then delivered his party's votes. The final tally: 444 in favor, 94 against — every single "no" vote came from the Social Democrats, the only party that didn't cut a deal. Hitler did not keep his promises to Kaas's party afterward.
Vengeance Leader prevention can save many lives.
Recognizing the pattern early is the whole point. Could you help?