How Coup d’états REALLY Work 

Hey! We’re back after (probably?) the longest hiatus in the channel’s history. Good news: it was only a publishing delay for scheduling reasons so we’ll be releasing the videos we’ve been working on in rapid succession in the next few weeks. Enjoy and remember to check out Storyblocks if you make videos or do any sort of creative work: www.storyblocks.com/polymatter

Man youtube REALLY does have a tutorial for everything

Step 3: get funding by the US government

"These dictators even look the same as they did in the sixties." That's because style is never out of fashion.

There are also self-coups, when the leader of the nation having come to power legally, illegally increases his power. The penultimate coup here in Sweden took place in 1772, when King Gustav III dissolved Parliament and became dictator for 20 years until he was assassinated. When the mandate of French President Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte ended in 1851, he declared himself Emperor and ruled for 19 years until he tried to follow in the footsteps of his famous uncle and attacked Germany, but was captured.

I've basically used all of these steps in Minecraft nation roleplay with my friends and It always works. It really pays to study history!

Great tutorial video, straight to the point.

A big element you're missing here, especially in the coup belt. Is the frequency of these types of events. Not coups necessarily but power outages, telecommunications failures, government infighting, armed presences etc. All manner of disorienting information losses are not simply an occurrence but a normalized facet of life. A coup under these conditions is substantially easier to pull off. In stable countries we rarely see these kinds of events, in some developing countries they often even have defined schedules.

Me a Thai citizen : "I'm something of an expert myself"

Coup d’Etat: A Practical Handbook by Edward Luttwak is a must-read

True, we are currently resisting military coup in Myanmar taking up arms. One have to note that covid really messed things up and some citizens were afraid of going out and protest during the early days and a week later everyone was like we would rather die than not tell the world we are accepting this coup.

I was in Thailand when the 2006 coup happened and life was normal except for the random tank stationed in my neighborhood

In the case of Myanmar, a majority of the government was always controlled by the military, even during the democratic government. (The military still held important positions, making it a you do what i say or your not doing it deal still.) Then they just decided to take control of the power they already had.

Prigozhin clearly didn't watch this video

Myanmar's Coup was flawless, everything was over by morning. Not a single shot, and no bloodshed. But they didn't anticipate the power of Facebook & Media. A week later protests started, 3 weeks later protests became violent and the soldiers started shooting.

At @<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="768">12:48</a> it says 242 were successful and 244 were failures. But then it shows that 50.2% were successful and 49.8% were failures. Either the percentages or the number of coups should be the opposite. Other than this, great video as always!

I think the better plural of "coup d’état" is "coups d’état", even in English.

Thx for the guide man! Working real good!

Thanks for the tutorial man . Imma get back to you after giving it a try. Wish me luck!

Thanks, polymatter! Now, having watched this video, I'm ready to start my own coup! When i finally become dictator, i will donate a golden mine to you!

South Asia is a really interesting case in this regard since most of the countries got their independence around the same time but the history shows a stark contrast. Coups by country are, Bangladesh: 8 Pakistan: 6 Sri Lanka: 4 Myanmar: 6 Nepal: 2 India despite being the largest, one of the poorest(at the time) and most diverse had zero thanks to the quick reforms to the military. Generals were taken out of decision making of the general council, the head of the army was made powerless by himself as he didn't have direct command of any troops but rather lieutenant Generals who then commanded troops. Also, multiple intelligence agencies that recruited from civil government controlled paramilitary were set up instead of having militaristic spy agencies.

thanks for the step-by step man, looking forward to doing this IRL soon.

This is how you write believable coup in your fiction works. Leave those Star Wars level of villainy political strategy to Star Wars. When you need to add political drama in your world, at least take this video into consideration because Coups are never simple.

At <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="150">2:30</a> the list of “successful” Thai coup is slightly unaccurate as the Palace Revolt of 1912 and 1949, the Boworadet rebellion, the Songsuradet rebellion and the manhattan rebellion all failed still very insightful video

Coup, coup never changes.

I still remember when every Thai TV channel broadcasted ONLY patriotic songs all day all night lol.

What is crucial for Coups is a lack of trust. When you can't trust your fellow soldier or your officers to do the right thing, self-preservation takes priority. And in these political climates, self-preservation tells the soldier - don't do anything. Watch and see who is the "winner" and back them. You might want to do the right thing but you have no faith that enough people will agree, so you could be committing a form of suicide by opposing a coup. If no one knows who is on board, and no one knows where loyalties lie, then no one will act. This is why it is critical to keep people, soldier and civilians, engaged in politics and aware of what processes should occur and when. It is also why precedent and political norms are so vital to democracy - a lot of democracy is built on norms and the people accepting new leaders if they conform to those norms. Democracy is only possible when people care enough about it and are informed enough about checks and balances. Democracy is, sadly, always a few generations away from failing, no matter how strong it seems today. Continuous education and civil participation is extremely important. Be aware - be VERY aware - of those who seek to undermine participation, restrict or discourage voting, or encourage apathy.

Another reason why coups beget more coups is because other groups see the instability from another coup attempt as the opportunity to launch their own before power is consolidated by the group that beat them to the punch

You forgot the part about having a girl do a dance workout while your vehicles parade in the background up the street and into the capital.

I once heard it said that to pull off a successful coup- 1. You must be fast 2. You must be ready to employ violence 3. You must be willing to break the law

Ghana had it's last coup d'etat in 1981... 31 years ago!!! Since 1992 there has been 8 successful democratic elections every 4 years without delay (1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020) with peaceful transition power between the 2 main political parties. The way you presented it sounds like as if the country is a failed state, even using stock footage of the current military leadership as if they had any agenda to do another coup. Ghana, by no means is perfect and has a long road ahead in terms of economic prosperity, but it is an undisputed beacon of peace and democracy in the world based on it's democratic trackrecord! I really love your channel, your videos are super informative and I will keep watching them even on Nebula but this is quite misleading about the state of my country!

considering what happens in most places, im shocked there arent more coups

"jan 6 was coup" pffff

great video! slight correction: during the early segment on coups in Africa you showed a video of the South African Union Buildings - South Africa is far from the Sahel region and has never experienced a coup

The algorithm knows things

I found this quite an informative look into coups and how they are performed! For instance, I've heard of how coup participants may take control of radio or television stations, but I didn't know _why_ until <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="528">8:48</a>! Thanks for the video!

Africa does have a means to stop them by using the African Union as a solidarity measure to assemble all available armies and remove or intervene in the Coup d'etat, but it will depend on the African Union's willingness to be engaged in such. The people have very little sympathy for their government as they more identify with their tribe, so they don't really care and until African governments tackle this issue, they won't be able to change the people to prevent a coup d'etat. So you have to be proactive rather than preactive with this isssue.

I always thought you could make a really good strategy game based on a coups

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="377">6:17</a> "if there are multiple candidates for a given role we pick the less qualified one" I think this sums up the majority of politics lmao

Thanks for the tutorial, will definitely try this

“As seem on Jan 6” *closes tab*

Pedantry corner: it's "coups d'état"

Fallen in love with this channel . Everything is explained so systematically

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="705">11:45</a> - the coup televised address cliche gave me a chuckle.

Man, I've live in Thailand and witness 2 fooking coup in my life time already, it's suck so much my father went out protest during 2010 and government just open fire then armed protesters strike back by launching grenade at command tent blowing that commander leg off, later one of the protestor key member got assassination. I've never afriad for my dad life more then that event for my entire life.

Ah yes! A step-by-step guide to starting a coup 👀

Shouldn't the plural be "Coups d’état" instead of "Coup d’états"?

The fact that his map used the ancient roman forum as the government perimeter

I just overthrew my student council.

how many have we orchestrated in "rebel" countries whose government dont listen to us

"Infiltrate the dealer. Find the supplier."

Was really looking for this tutorial. Thanks! Seems very useful.

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="652">10:52</a> "Power resides where men believe it resides" -Varys from that one dragon show

I am sudanese and I can say that sadly this is really so accurate and it is exactly what has happened in my country , most people have lost hope and they don't really care that much , young graduates are leaving the country in droves , economy is falling and we all are paying the cost for the benefit of a group of corrupt military elites

I don't know if I love you more for the tutorial (I promise to be a benevolent dictator!) or the awesome animations. Cheers anyhow!

Great work 🥳 Thank you 💜

Interesting, found a lot of the steps similar to the coup seen in the movie Valkyrie. Especially the part about giving the appearance of holding power.

Very useful will be using

The Coup D'etats, not to be confused with the more famous Coup deVille.

Hey PolyMatter! I recommend you to make a video about the structure of the Communist Party of China. Who gets chosen how? Who's next? Balance of power? Etc. I think it would be a good video.

Everyone who knows Legends of the Galactic Heroes knows that Admiral Yang Wenli descibes it perfectly: The military has to be controlled by the civillians. It never has to assume/strive/seizes power, nor does it has to interfere with government or politics. The best military is a military which just collects pay checks and works untill the days dismissal. The anime Imo shows perfectly how it is done/prevented.

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="189">3:09</a> if they had a numerical advantage it would probably be called a revolution and not a coup

Thanks for the information. It's gonna be very useful for me soon.

Nice Guide, Thx. Best Tutorial I could find on YT.

Gonna try this tutorial IRL. I'll keep you posted on how it goes!

As a channel that have made so many videos on coups, I find this video so much interesting and very accurate, especially as you explained how to get allies. I have made videos on all the coups that happened in Nigeria and gradually getting to coups in Africa. Thank you for this great job. By the way, I hv just discovered this channel now!

Great video! One of the most interesting videos I have watched in recent times. Need to plan one 😅

Awesome piece of art!

Reminder: the only person shot and killed on January 6th was an unarmed female Air Force veteran. Calling it a “coup” is remarkably ignorant.

Thanks for the tutorial, I'll let you know how it goes.

Gorgeous visuals!!!

Thank you for the tutorial, Will definitely use this!

This video should be part of the school curriculum in every democratic country to fight the "my vote doesn't matter" attitude and the growing disregard for the "rule of law". Every vote no matter how silly the topic or hopeless the policy is active political engagement and thus a vote against coups and autocracies.

Great theme, been wondering about this for a long time!

It will be really helpful, thanks

Thanks for the tutorial bro!

Amazing tutorial! I've been waiting for a tutorial on dictatorship for so long!

"Zimbabwe is not in the midst of a coup!" - Zimbabwe's head general, on Zimbabwean television, in the midst of a coup

Thank you. This will come in handy in the future

thanks for the tutorial! 👍

There is a small mistake at <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="790">13:10</a> (the percentages are flipped). Apart from that, this really was an excellent tutorial on how to stage a coup.

You forgot the part about seeking CIA assistance in destroying democracy

Thanks this will be really useful

Great video!

For more detail, see CGP Grey video "rules for rulers"

Fun fact, given that coup d'etat is french loan expression its plural it actually be "coups d'État"

Thanks for the tutorial

Thanks for the advice

Now can you make a video on USA style :"Regime Change" ?

Jan. 6 was a Coup d’État?

I have taken notes now be on the lookout for when I take over Timbak tu.

We need this now

Excellent content as usual 👍

The correct plural of “coup d’état” is “coups d’état,” not “coup d’états.”

You make the best videos thanks

Thanks for the advise!

Thanks for the tutorial! They won't see this one coming.

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="223">3:43</a> “it is very unlikely that all 4 will” i thought there were 5

You make great videos

Thanks! I’m gonna try it