History’s biggest Badasses
Mustafa Kemal Atatürk
Mustafa Kemal Atatürk was the soldier-statesman who crushed an invasion at Gallipoli and then dismantled a collapsing empire to build a fiercely secular modern Turkey.
Rank - 154
Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim
Finnish marshal who led the defense of Finland during the Winter War and preserved the nation’s independence against overwhelming Soviet force.
Rank - 155
Audie Murphy
At Holtzwihr, Audie Murphy climbed a burning tank destroyer and dared an armored battalion to try and take it back.
Rank - 156
Bayinnaung
Bayinnaung rose from minor nobility to command an empire that dominated Burma, Siam, Lan Na, and Laos.
Rank - 158
Yusuf ibn Tashfin
Yūsuf ibn Tāshfīn carved an empire from the Sahara to al-Andalus with austere discipline, relentless cavalry, and a quiet ruthlessness that outlived every king who underestimated him.
Rank - 162
Moulay Ismail ibn Sharif
Moulay Ismail ruled Morocco like a furnace with a crown, forging unity through terror, the Black Guard, and a fifty-year rei gn where mercy was the only thing he never built.
Rank - 163
Askia Muhmmad I
Askia Muhammad I rose from seasoned commander to empire-shaping monarch, forging the largest realm in West African history through ruthless discipline, political precision, and relentless conquest.
Rank - 164
Stefan Dušan 'the Mighty'
Stefan Dušan rode through the Balkan smoke like a man convinced the world was one good conquest away from making sense, leaving empires, enemies, and common sense trampled under his horse’s hooves.
Rank - 165
Mahāpadma Nanda
He built an empire by removing every man who thought birth alone made him safe, and the silence he left behind still sounds like power sharpening its teeth.
Rank - 166
Vlad III Tepes
Vlad III Țepeș turned a bleeding borderland into a kingdom defended by terror, crafting a legacy where strategy and brutality became the same blade.
Rank - 168
Leonidas I
Leonidas I, the third son who was never meant to be king, died in a narrow pass at Thermopylae turning a doomed delay into a legend sharp enough to outlive the empire that killed him.
Rank - 169
Banda Singh Bahadur
Banda Singh Bahadur was a fearless Sikh revolutionary who rose from ascetic origins to lead a populist uprising that shattered Mughal power and redefined resistance in 18th-century India.
Rank - 170
Abd el-Krim
Abd el-Krim was the Amazigh strategist who united the Rif tribes, shattered Spain at Annual, and became a defining symbol of 20th-century anti-colonial resistance.
Rank - 171
Antonio José de Sucre y Alcalá
At Ayacucho’s smoke-choked ridge, Antonio José de Sucre carved the death warrant of a three-century empire with the calm precision of a man already doomed to die young.
Rank - 172
Bernard Freyberg
A fearless New Zealand–born commander famed for leading from the front in both World Wars.
Rank - 173
Oliver Cromwell
Oliver Cromwell was a 17th-century English general and ruler who reshaped Britain through military victory, regicide, and authoritarian rule.
Rank - 174
Adrian Carton de Wiart
A walking catalogue of injuries, Adrian Carton de Wiart charged through the twentieth century’s worst battles with the attitude of a man personally offended by mortality.
Rank - 175
