I'm curious about your "lots of examples of political regimes keeping their countries in the dark ages." The only one I can think of that actually worked was J

I'm curious about your "lots of examples of political regimes keeping their countries in the dark ages." The only one I can think of that actually worked was Japan's repudiation of the gun, and that was broken open from the outside eventually. The Soviets tried to control communications technology, even requiring copy machines to be licensed, but it didn't work very well.