Kim Jong Il: The Eternal General Secretary

Kim Jong Il, the second Supreme Leader of North Korea, succeeded his father upon his death in 1994 in the communist world's only instance of dynastic succession. He would end up ruling the hermit kingdom for the next 17 years through many of the country's greatest crises, including an apocalyptic famine that potentially killed millions in the 1990s, the development of an atomic bomb, and the biggest military clash with the South since the end of the Korean War.