Enemies By Design: How The US And USSR Shaped Each Other's Identity

By Emeka Chiaghanam  

December 2, 1804. Notre Dame Cathedral, Paris.

The cathedral’s stained-glass windows throw fractured light over the crowd as Napoleon Bonaparte, the Corsican artillery officer who conquered Europe, stands before Pope Pius VII. The air reeks of candle wax and ambition. The Pope lifts the golden crown, but before it can touch his brow, Napoleon snatches it from the old man’s hands and crowns himself. The gasp of the crowd is swallowed by thunderous applause.

In that moment, the revolution’s hero becomes its emperor. This is how it begins. Not with a coup, not with a massacre, but with a quiet, irrevocable shift in a man’s soul. The moment he decides the rules no longer apply to him. The moment power stops being a tool and becomes an addiction.

From Caesar to Stalin, from Alexander the Great to Hitler, history’s most brilliant leaders have walked this razor’s edge, and most have cut themselves open on it. This is not a story about monsters. This is a story about us.

THE FIRST TEMPTATION: "I AM THE EXCEPTION"

Every tyrant starts as a liberator. Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon to "save Rome from corrupt aristocrats." Robespierre launched the Reign of Terror to "protect the revolution." Even Hitler’s first speeches promised to rescue Germany from humiliation. And at first, they’re right.

Caesar did break the Senate’s stranglehold. Robespierre did overthrow a decadent monarchy. But then comes the fatal thought: "No one else can do what I do." The rot sets in fast.

By 44 BC, Caesar’s statues replace Rome’s gods. By 1794, Robespierre’s Committee of Public Safety executes 16,000 "enemies of the people"—including his closest allies. The pattern never changes:

1.    Emergency powers ("Just until the crisis passes")

2.    Silencing critics ("They’re undermining unity")

3.    Personality cult ("The nation is my body")

Napoleon’s coronation was the ultimate confession: He didn’t believe in the revolution anymore. He believed in himself.

STALIN’S PARANOIA: A MONSTER MADE BY FEAR

Tbilisi, Georgia, 1878. A cobbler’s son named Ioseb Dzhugashvili is born. He’ll grow up to write poetry, study priesthood, and change his name to Stalin; "Man of Steel."

By 1937, that man signs 357 execution lists in a single year. What happened? Power didn’t corrupt Stalin. It unmade him.

After Lenin’s death, Stalin methodically eliminated rivals: Trotsky exiled, Bukharin shot, Zinoviev begging for mercy before the firing squad. But with each purge, his paranoia grew. He installed microphones in his generals’ homes. He had his own doctors tortured. By 1953, dying on the floor of his dacha, his guards were too terrified to check on him for 12 hours.

The lesson? Absolute power doesn’t just isolate you. It haunts you.

HITLER’S MIRROR: HOW MEDIOCRITY TURNS LETHAL

1910.  Vienna. A 21-year-old failed artist sleeps in homeless shelters, selling postcards of his mediocre paintings. No one could imagine this man would one day engineer the Holocaust. But Hitler’s mediocrity was the fuse.

Rejected by art school, humiliated in WWI’s trenches, he nursed a bottomless wound: The world refused to recognize his genius. When power finally came, it wasn’t just about politics, it was revenge.

By 1945, as Berlin burned, he ranted about "weaklings betraying me." Even in suicide, he blamed others. The warning? The most dangerous tyrants aren’t born evil. They’re born insecure.

THE MECHANICS OF TYRANNY: HOW IT HAPPENS

1.    The Slow Poison of Yes-Men
Nero’s advisors applauded his fiddle-playing as Rome burned. Saddam Hussein’s generals swore they were winning, as American tanks rolled into Baghdad.

2.    The Myth of Destiny
Caligula believed he was a god. Mussolini strutted on balconies shouting "I am Italy!" Delusion is power’s shadow.

3.    The Point of No Return
Mao knew the Great Leap Forward was causing famine, but admitting failure meant losing face. So millions starved.

COULD IT HAPPEN TODAY? (LOOK IN THE MIRROR)

We like to think we’re immune. That modern democracies have safeguards. But the ingredients are all here:

• Crisis politics ("Only I can fix this")
• Media demonization ("The press are enemies")
• Institutional erosion ("The courts are against us")

The 21st century’s would-be tyrants don’t wear military uniforms. They wear tailored suits and tweet from golden toilets.

THE ANTIDOTE: HOW TO STOP THE CYCLE

1. Never trade freedom for "stability" (Caesar offered bread and circuses, and buried the Republic)

2. Protect the truth-tellers (A free press is democracy’s immune system)

3.    Remember: No one is indispensable (The moment a leader says "I alone," run)

THE LAST QUESTION

As you scroll past today’s headlines, the strongmen, the cults of personality, the "temporary" emergency powers, ask yourself:

What would I have done in 1933 Berlin? 1793 Paris? 44 BC Rome?

Would you have cheered? Stayed silent? Resisted? Here’s the terrifying truth: Most of them thought they were the good guys. And that’s why it keeps happening.