Who Would Weep for a Statue? "Great Leaders" Who Killed Themselves

 

This post is not a wish; it is a worry. Hearing Donald Trump’s ghost author for The Art of the Deal predict that the president will follow his past behavior—resign and declare victory-- I was struck by his account of Trump’s psyche. In sum, Trump doubles down and eventually loses; doubles down on his losses, and loses more and more and more. Eventually, his partners abandon him, and he quits while declaring victory.

That is unusual behavior but not so unique. Many of us have an Uncle Joe who follows a similar course, without making so many billions and so many enemies.

But filtering this analysis through two more lenses.

First, Uncle Joe does not perpetually attack people; but our president cannot go more than 36 hours without using Twitter to viciously attack someone. His attacks are indiscriminate, and increasingly target his allies. That is alarming.

The second piece is the president’s elegy for statues. Politics aside, how can a man mourn a statue and not have real feelings for people, other than disdain, mistrust, and vengeance?

Here are three “great leaders” who took their own lives. I hope my comparison is wrong. But my gut says it’s possible. As for me, I see parallels in these cases— personalities with grandiosity and delusion, a lust for power, abandonment, and betrayal,  followed by “closing in” from political enemies, ending in self-martyrdom.

Adolf Hitler

Hitler realized by late 1944 that he could lose the war. By the next April he concluded Germany’s military failures meant it had forfeited its right to survive as a nation. He ordered the destruction of all German industrial infrastructure before it could fall into Allied hands. His minister, Albert Speer, secretly disobeyed the order.

According to U.S. Armed Forces newspaper, Stars and Stripes, Hitler met with his inner circle for the last time on April 22^nd. He launched into a tirade against the treachery and incompetence of his commanders, culminating in his declaration—for the first time—that “everything was lost.” Several days later, Hitler was informed that Mussolini was captured and hung. Within hours, Hitler shot and killed himself.

Marcus Junius Brutus the Younger (Brutus)

Julius Caesar acquired dictatorial powers, enraging Roman senators who plotted to kill him. Brutus was recruited to the conspiracy. On the Ides of March, Brutus led an all-out assault that killed Caesar in the hallowed halls of the Senate. 

The Senate granted the assassins amnesty, but ordinary Romans were outraged. Brutus fled to Crete. Two years later, his world was a fast-closing circle, with his protecting legions fleeing from his consul. Knowing his army had been defeated and that he would be captured, Brutus committed suicide by running into his own sword being held by two of his own men.

Hannibal

This iconic Carthaginian general battled a much bigger and stronger Rome. But over time, the Roman strategy of attrition was too much for Hannibal’s strategic prowess. Roman generals avoided direct battle with Hannibal— instead, they fought guerilla wars that slowly dissipated Hannibal’s power. Facing defeat, Hannibal drank poison that he carried in a ring. Before dying, he left behind a letter declaring, "Let us relieve the Romans from the anxiety they have so long experienced, since they think it tries their patience too much to wait for an old man’s death.”

That sounds like uncomfortably like President Trump-- trying to turn the psychological tables on an enemy in the context of a tragic and lost battle.