History is truly fascinating. Did you know that the remains of only five world leaders are still permanently preserved today? Behind this are more complex technical challenges than you might imagine, intertwined with political judgments unique to each era.

Lenin was the start of it all. When he died in 1924, he was originally scheduled to be buried normally, but the public’s mourning was so intense that emergency freezing was carried out to prevent his body from deteriorating. Although it was initially planned to be stopped after one month, Soviet scientists developed a special embalming solution and established a technique to replace the body’s water content and suppress bacterial growth. This is what became the foundation of modern permanent body-preservation technology.

Lenin’s tomb is equipped with a constant-temperature cooling system, and experts in the laboratory constantly oversee it. There are restoration procedures every week, and regular full-scale maintenance is also carried out. In some cases, even minor transplant surgeries are required. With such strict processes, his body has been kept in virtually perfect condition for nearly 100 years.

However, Stalin is different. He was also a Soviet leader and was buried in Lenin’s tomb in 1953, but in 1961, his body was changed from freezing to cremation. This was because the mainstream values had changed. The combination of Stalin frozen and preserved symbolizes that when historical evaluations change, even the fate of a body can change.

Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam is also interesting. Although he himself wanted to be cremated, his successors decided to preserve his body. During the Vietnam War, his remains were secretly stored in a mountain cave for 5 years, and Soviet experts completed the embalming treatment underground while avoiding bombings. It was the same level of Soviet technical capability used during the Stalin era, applied in another country as well.

In Angola, Nétu required even more technical ingenuity. A color preservation technique was specially developed for pigments for Black skin, solving the problem of pigment leakage. Today, his body is only publicly displayed on his birthday.

But not everyone succeeded. For Gottwald, the embalming technology was insufficient, so in 1962 the body decayed and was cremated. Dimitrov was preserved for more than 40 years, but after Eastern European democratization, his body was changed to cremation and buried in a public cemetery.

Ultimately, the permanent preservation of bodies is the result of both technology and history. Even with technical support, when the values of the era change, those decisions can be overturned. The bodies in crystal coffins are not only proof of science, but also a mirror of history.