16. Beneath the Weird, Lurked a Brutal Tyrant
A creepy womanizer, Muammar al Qaddafi often hit on female reporters. He frequently met them for interviews in bathrobes or in his underwear. He became obsessed with former US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, and referred to her as his “darling black African woman“. He showered her during a visit to Tripoli with $212,000 worth of gifts, including a lute and a locket with his picture inside. He also saw himself as a fashion icon, and to that end cultivated an odd collection of ensembles and sartorial choices that made him modern history’s most bizarrely dressed ruler. Changing in and out of silly uniforms multiple times a day, he was the closest real-life depiction of a James Bond villain. The cartoonish villain look was further enhanced by his all-virgin female bodyguard, officially named the “Revolutionary Nuns“, but known more commonly as the Amazonian Guard.
Beneath the buffoonish look and cuckoo philosophy, however, was a brutal dictator. Qaddafi’s regime engaged in massive repression, torture, extermination of individuals, and human rights violations. Among his vices was the habit of ordering women kidnapped off the street – including teenaged girls – and taken to one of his many palaces. At least one of his victims was kept imprisoned in his basement for six years. He forced her to watch pornography while snorting cocaine with him, and repeatedly assaulted her, urinated on her, and subjected her to sundry perversions. He was finally overthrown in a revolt in 2011 and captured by rebels, who tortured and likely explicitly assaulted Qaddafi before executing him.