| Career Highlights: Born in 1924 in Uganda, then under English rule, Idi Amin was a career soldier who rose through the ranks of first the colonial and then national armies to become Chief of the Army and Air Force in 1966 4 years after independence. 1970: Amin is relieved of his command position by his former patron, and then President for Life Milton Obote, following the murder of his only significant rival among senior army officers. 1971: Having been removed from his military command, and fearing arrest by Obote, Amin stages a coup declaring himself President and Commander of the Armed Forces. 1971-1978: Amin declares himself Field Marshall and eventually President for Life while turning Uganda into a charnel house of inter-tribal genocide. State sponsored killings during this period have been estimated at between 100,000 and 500,000 with 300,000 offered as the typical split-the-difference estimate. Additional accusations against Amin during this period include rape, child rape, torture as well as allegations of canabalism (probably spurious but fun to repeat). 1978-1979: Having wrecked the Ugandan economy and civil infrastructure, Amin engages in an ill advised invasion of neighboring Tanzania. Used to killing unarmed civillians, his demoralized troops are swept from the field by the Tanzanians who seize the Ugandan capital of Entebe in April of 1979. 1979-Present: Having converted to Islam (and having previously sponsored the failed PLO operation at Entebe), Amin fled to Lybia and eventually Jeddah, Saudi Arabia where -- despite an aborted effort to return to Uganda in 1989 -- he continues to live on a government stipend."; | 
