Have a head of state die in battle in the industrialized age.

[Whiteshore]

Just that it’s very hard to imagine any modern leader even symbolically participating in actual combat without it being completely staged ( or comical)

And on that note, my mention of Hitler getting oofed in 1943 by the Red Army was an example of that as well (and even came close to happening IOTL).

 

[Lalli]

Could Napoleon I dying in battle count? Or is that too early for "industrialized era"?

I think that it is bit too early.

But Napoleon III could be counted.

 

[Monk78]

Last Mughal king leading a charge against the east India Company forces in the mutiny of 1857

 

[mspence]

Does Mussolini count? (killed by firing squad after being deposed)

 

[Insane Ranter]

Churchill literally almost got blown up by German artillery because he crossed the Rhine River in 1945 when fighting was still going on.

You could have him get killed during the Battle of Britain somehow or even the King.

 

[Insane Ranter]

You could have anyone from one of the countries Germany/Japan/Italy invaded during WW2 die because they couldn't get out of the country and end up in a battle before their capture.

 

[CaptainCalvert]

I'm pretty sure that "killed in battle" in the industrial age should include industrial-age combat. So ship or aircraft attacked in transit and when on land or sea by aerial attack or rocket bombardment counts, as would ship sunk by mine but aircraft crash is less clear.
Perhaps the OP could clarify if Head of State is just that or if the wider "Head of state or government" is within scope

 

[Lalli]

I'm pretty sure that "killed in battle" in the industrial age should include industrial-age combat. So ship or aircraft attacked in transit and when on land or sea by aerial attack or rocket bombardment counts, as would ship sunk by mine but aircraft crash is less clear.
Perhaps the OP could clarify if Head of State is just that or if the wider "Head of state or government" is within scope

Changing that to form "head of state or government" would be clearer since some count Churchill as head of state despite that he wasn't.

 

[Whiteshore]

Changing that to form "head of state or government" would be clearer since some count Churchill as head of state despite that he wasn't.

And the same goes for Stalin as the position of head of state during WW2 was under a puppet President (Mikhail Kalinin) and not Stalin himself.

 

[Lalli]

And the same goes for Stalin as the position of head of state during WW2 was under a puppet President (Mikhail Kalinin) and not Stalin himself.

And with WW2 Italy head of state was king Victor Emmanuel III not Mussolini.

 

[CaptainCalvert]

OK, so the original post says 'someone in a position of government' and adds that it doesn't have to be a king.
I think that safely includes Churchill, George VI, Stalin etc. and I'd argue that Molotov and Eden were probably important enough to get the nod.
I can't check my books right now but either Stalin or (more likely) Molotov was in Berlin during an RAF air raid, so that's another possible.

 

[irispaiva]

I recall a poem dissing the Emperor Meiji for not fighting in the war himself, though I can't remember if it was the Russo-Japanese War or WW1. I supose either Meiji himself or his successors could choose to fight in a war to recitify that.

 

[Janrey]

Fncisco Solano López

 

[Salamander]

He committed suicide in the Presidential Palace, so that technically doesn't count.

'Committing suicide' during a CIA backed coup that installed a military dictatorship. Yeah. Not suspicious at all. It should definitely count as a death in battle.

Could Napoleon I dying in battle count? Or is that too early for "industrialized era"?

Slightly too early, since the only country that could realistically be considered as industrialized during the Napoleonic Wars was the UK, and even then only barely. Different story by 1830 however, as the Industrial Revolution was hitting its strides by then.

As for a Head of State and/or Government dying in battle, then WW2 offers enormous potential, since both aerial and submarine warfare was widespread. Any leader on either side ran the risk of being bombed, shot down in transit, or killed visiting the front on a inspection/morale-boosting trip, especially in the European/Mediterranean theatres. Yamamoto, a former government minister, was shot down over the northern Solomon Islands. FDR was almost killed by one of his own escort ships, the infamous USS William D. Porter, while he was aboard the USS Iowa. So, it wouldn't be too hard to have any of them killed in a combat scenario.

Then there is the Polish-Soviet War, the Spanish Civil War, and China during any of its revolutions, rebellions & civil wars post 1850.

 

[Lalli]

I can't check my books right now but either Stalin or (more likely) Molotov was in Berlin during an RAF air raid, so that's another possible.

During Battle of Berlin in 1945? I highly doubt that Stalin or Molotov were anywhere close of Berlin. Hardly even in Germany. At least Stalin wouldn't go anywhere here he would be in danger. And Molot probably was too pretty careful on his safety.

Zhukov might b epossible anyway.

 

[Resurgam]

I can't check my books right now but either Stalin or (more likely) Molotov was in Berlin during an RAF air raid, so that's another possible.

Molotov. Leading to the famous conversation with Ribbentrop that included “if you’re winning, who’s bombing us and why are we in a shelter?”

 

[Whiteshore]

Molotov. Leading to the famous conversation with Ribbentrop that included “if you’re winning, who’s bombing us and why are we in a shelter?”

When was this?

 

[Resurgam]

When was this?

Before Barbarossa. In fact, Molotov's aggressive questioning during the meetings further committed Hitler to invasion:

Molotov’s last meeting with Ribbentrop took place on the night of November 13, [1940] in the foreign minister’s air raid shelter because of a British air raid on Berlin. As Ribbentrop started on the same subject of Britain’s imminent collapse, Molotov, who usually preferred to listen rather than talk, interrupted him with what his interpreter Berezhkov later called a phrase that related to a dispute rather than diplomatic exchange. “If Britain is defeated, what are we doing sitting in this shelter? Whose bombs are falling so close that we can hear the explosions?” Molotov would later often tell this story as an example of what he saw as diplomatic prowess. Churchill wrote in his memoirs that the British knew about those meetings in Berlin; although they weren’t invited, they didn’t want to stand aside. During the war, meeting with Churchill, Stalin asked jokingly, “Why did you bomb my Viacheslav in Berlin?”

(from https://day.kyiv.ua/en/article/history-and-i/bungled-berlin-mission)

 

[Coulsdon Eagle]

During the run-up to D-Day, Churchill started insisting that he'd go along to watch the landings from one of the warships involved. He was only dissuaded from this when George VI said that if that would be safe enough for the PM to do then it should be safe enough for the monarch as well and he'd accompany Churchill. It's probable that this was a bluff, to get Churchill to back down, but if that had been a serious intention on George's part instead then potentially we could have lost both of them in the same incident.
(N.B. In his younger years, George had served in the Royal Navy: He was at Jutland, as a Midshipman, commanding -- IIRC -- one of the turrets on Jellicoe's flagship.)

Pedantic nit-pick - The future King was aboard HMS Collingwood, and not Jellicoe's flagship (HMS Iron Duke). I don't think he commanded the turret, although that was his action station.

 

[Lalli]

Question: Did kaiser Wilhelm II ever visited on frontlines? He was pretty much military guy so I wouldn'th have big problems imaginate him to be killed by a stray bullet.