Human deaths

[Dom Tuk]

If you discount the Hiroshima Nagasaki bombs which man made event resulted in the most human civilian casualties in the shortest time. Note military casualties do not count.

[linseli]

Not the same as dropping a bomb but during the Great Leap Forward in China (1959-61) an estimated 30 million people died from starvation. 

 

This was not down to war or natural disasters but was the result of a manmade policy to take farmers away from the land so they were making steel instead of growing food. It's very difficult to get anywhere like an accurate figure (some estimates put it as 'little' as 4 million and as high as 40 million deaths in two years) but it's recognised as the biggest peacetime death toll from famine.

 

It even beats Stalin's best efforts.

http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/warstat 1.htm

 

The link gives civilian casualties as well as military ones for some of the most brutal events of the 20th century.

[linseli]

Sorry can't get the link to work but  if you search for "twentieth century atlas - death tolls" you should find it. The author specialises in statistics about manmade 'megadeaths'!