History tells us dictators who build the biggest bunkers have the most fragile minds
As Bashar al-Assad’s hiding place is revealed, Guy Walters examines the hideouts of some of the leaders of the most oppressive regimes in history, from Hitler to Mussolini, and concludes that these lairs serve as prisons to deeply disturbed and paranoid minds
We have seen these scenes before, of course. As soon as the dictator has fled, his properties are stormed, revealing more wealth than his benighted people could have ever expected. The images and video coming out of Damascus over the past few days are therefore unexceptional – there are the requisite rows of incredibly expensive cars, the predictably naff and soulless marble palace, the textbook lurid and ghastly furniture. You can imagine Loyd Grossman taking us through the keyhole to ask “Who would live in a palace like this?”
The wealth of evil men such as Bashar al-Assad is always stolen from the people they claim to protect, but these images of dictator kitsch provide light relief from the other terrible scenes that always accompany a toppling – the horrors of the prisons and torture chambers.
One of the videos that has emerged from the Presidential Palace in Damascus shows thousands of yards of tunnels. Blast-proof doors are opened, revealing yet more rooms stuffed with what looks like furniture from Ikea or MFI from 1983. These rooms are clearly designed to have been refuges, the last lairs of Al-Assad and his family if they hadn’t hopped on that last PJ to Putin.
As well as the revelation of bad taste on an epic scale, what these heinous characters leave behind also tells us something else about the mindset of men like Al-Assad – and, more often than not, their deep, deep paranoia.
The bunker is naturally an essential feature of despotic real estate, something that became very clear when I was researching for my appearance in a new documentary series called Dictators’ Hideouts.
When one thinks of such lairs, Hitler’s notorious Führerbunker in Berlin comes immediately to mind. With concrete roofs some 3 metres thick, the structure was clear evidence that the strongest walls are built by the most fragile minds. Designed for the protection of himself and his inner clique, the bunker may have been Hitler’s most well-known refuge – not least because it was where he ended his life – but the dictator had many other boltholes.
Although many, such as the Wolf’s Lair, are well known, less frequently considered is the vast and mysterious network of tunnels and bunkers that lie below Książ Castle in Lower Silesia in Poland, which were collectively known as Project Riese. Built by an estimated 13,000 prisoners, the tunnels measure some 5 and a half miles, and even today only remain partially explored, with historians divided as to their intended use.
However, there is no doubt that Riese, with its remote location coupled with a castle and a vast underground complex, would have made a far better hideout for Hitler than either his bunker in Berlin or his often-mooted Alpine redoubt.
Hitler’s ally Benito Mussolini had a similar taste in underground lairs, and he manifested that truism of all dictators – the longer they stay in power, the deeper their paranoia, and therefore the bigger the bunker. Mussolini’s first hideout was a relatively modest affair in the heart of Rome which could only house some 15 people.
But as his hold on power weakened, the Italian dictator stepped up the construction of a vast subterranean complex in Monte Soratte, some 30 miles from the capital. Measuring 35,000sqm, the hideout was impervious to any bombing raid and could be made completely airtight and therefore immune from a gas attack. Despite the vast amount of time he spent on the hideout, Mussolini was never to use it, and after the war, it was instead used by Nato.
Although Hitler and Mussolini were undoubtedly paranoid, their hideouts largely reflected a fear of external threats rather than any emanating from their own subjugated populations. It is the dictators of the post-war period – including Al-Assad – who clearly built their refuges fearing an attack coming from within their borders. Naturally, that is never the reason given, and instead subjugated populations are always warned that their country is under threat from other countries.
Take the Romanian dictator, Nicolae Ceausescu, who ordered the construction of the truly megalomaniac Palace of the Parliament in Bucharest in the mid-1980s, for which an entire neighbourhood had to be erased, 40,000 people displaced, and took architects 13 years to build the 365,000sqm structure. Indeed, the building is so large and heavy it sinks some 6mm every year, which will one day surely impact the eight subterranean floors that were designed as an atomic bunker for Ceausescu and his cronies.
No matter how big and deep, as Ceausescu was to find, no bunker can protect you if your people really want your scalp. In late December 1989, he and his wife Elena were captured after fleeing the capital, sentenced to death by a court assembled by a provisional government, and executed on Christmas Day by a unit of soldiers, their deaths ignominiously captured on video.
But of all dictators, the most paranoid bunker-builder of them all must be Enver Hoxha. The Albanian dictator took paranoia to an extreme by creating hideouts for everyone. Under his rule from 1944 to 1985, Albania was transformed into a bunker-studded landscape, with an estimated 175,000 small, dome-shaped shelters scattered across the country. These bunkers, designed to withstand military attacks, were meant to provide every Albanian family with a personal fortress. Of course, many were never used and remain as a bizarre testament to Hoxha’s isolationist policies and obsessive fears.
Naturally, Hoxha himself had far more elaborate hideouts, including a network of underground tunnels connecting key government buildings in Tirana. His personal bunker, complete with a meeting room and living quarters, was a grim, utilitarian space that mirrored his austere, oppressive rule.
In essence, by their hideouts, you shall know these men. There is no doubt that the bigger and deeper the bunker, the greater their instability and fear of their own people. For all their power, men like Al-Assad are ultimately prisoners of their own fears, retreating into hideouts that, rather than offering true safety, serve as monuments to their paranoia.
Guy Walters appears in Dictators’ Hideouts, which starts on Wednesday, at 9pm, on Sky History
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments