7 ms·

Who Is History’s Worst Political Adviser?

23 points by diodorus 6y ago

joelhoffman 6y ago
I was expecting at least an aside for Rasputin, although I'm sure these other clowns were pretty terrible too.
nl 6y ago
"Worst" here seems mostly to mean "horrible" as opposed to giving particularly bad advice. I was looking for mention of the "Darién Scheme" by William Paterson and it was only there in passing. Surely Paul Wolfowitz would have to be a candidate for bad advice in the modern post-Soviet era though?
- thaumasiotes 6y ago
  > "Worst" here seems mostly to mean "horrible" as opposed to giving particularly bad advice. I noticed the same thing. The example of Seianus makes a strong case that he did a bad job. But he was obviously doing a bad job of being king, not a bad job of being an advisor. It's a hard question to investigate, though. History's worst political advisors are unlikely to actually be known to history; their states would have been swallowed by other better states.
BurningFrog 6y ago
Here is one way to think of it: I think of the US invasion of Iraq as probably the biggest strategic mistake in the world since some WW2 decisions. It's arguably the start of the end of the US super power era. Was there a particular adviser we can blame for that? Maybe Cheney? If it was more of a unified team decision, it doesn't fit the question.
- mrslave 6y ago
  The Project for the New American Century[0] think tank is probably the most significant influence here. Naming Cheney alone oversimplifies matters, but he was without a doubt a prominent figure. > It was established as a non-profit educational organization in 1997, and founded by William Kristol and Robert Kagan. > Of the twenty-five people who signed PNAC's founding statement of principles, ten went on to serve in the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush, including Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_Century https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_C...
- yellowstuff 6y ago
  You could make a strong case that the Vietnam War was a more significant error. Including Iraq and Afghanistan, the War On Terror cost about 6 times as much as the Vietnam War, but Vietnam cost more in terms of American lives. I believe the Vietnam War inflicted greater damage to America's reputation and self-conception, and it ended in unconditional retreat after achieving none of its goals. https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-09-09/war-on-terror-could-be-costliest-yet https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-09-09/war-on-terro...
  - rmrfstar 6y ago
    There is no single advisor, but I'd vote for the group of economists who drank so much of their own Kool-Aid they believed that offshoring all of our industrial capacity was a good idea.
    - jointpdf 6y ago
      But think of the utils that you’re leaving on the table by not fully exploiting comparative advantage. /s
      - rmrfstar 6y ago
        Utility is actually a really useful framework, provided you've correctly specified your utility function. [1] "I've shipped my N95 production off-shore and there is a global pandemic" is the kind of thing economists leave out of their models. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Von_Neumann%E2%80%93Morgenstern_utility_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Von_Neumann%E2%80%93Morgenster...
    - JamisonM 6y ago
      The United States of America has a lot of remaining industrial capacity. All of the United States industrial capacity has not been off-shored. The United States of America has about 1/6th of the world's manufacturing output and the majority of the manufacturing output consumed within the United States is in fact produced within the United States.
- deeg 6y ago
  If you're limiting this to just the U.S., maybe, but I'd say the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was a bigger blunder.
- pnako 6y ago
  An even bigger mistake than starting the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is the mistake of keeping those wars going forever. And that mistake is still ongoing. Of course, I'm assuming it's a mistake and not a deliberate strategy. But the people advocating for keeping troops there should make explicit again their reason for doing so.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 6y ago
I think whoever advised the shah of Khwarazm to execute the envoy of Genghis Khan has to go down as the worst political adviser in history. Genghis and the Mongol Army practically wiped out the entire country in retaliation. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongol_conquest_of_Khwarezmia https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongol_conquest_of_Khwarezmi...
- thaumasiotes 6y ago
  > the Mongol Army practically wiped out the entire country in retaliation. He can't have been the worst, then; worse things have happened to countries than just being "practically wiped out". Compare Nongqawuse, who did not hold an official advisory position, but who nevertheless "successfully" advised the Xhosa that the solution to the stress they were under through contact with the British was to destroy all their crops and slaughter all their cattle. Unsurprisingly, they mostly starved to death afterwards.
- satvikpendem 6y ago
  This marked the beginning of the end of the Islamic Golden Age, and Baghdad still hasn't recovered. That is one of the most interesting facts to me, that over 600 years later the Middle East is still in disarray.
- throwawaysea 6y ago
  That would be Inalchuq (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inalchuq https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inalchuq), the governor who killed Genghis Khan’s envoys who were there to make a trade deal and open relations. He suggested that the trade caravan were spies (which may have been correct) and got permission from the shah to kill them and take their goods. The shah repeated the same offense to the khan a second time when Genghis sent a second set of diplomats demanding that Inalchuq be punished or handed over.
DonHopkins 6y ago
Roy Cohen. We have him to thank for Trump.
andrewstuart 6y ago
Grima Wormtongue.
- scollet 6y ago
  This is a matter of perspective.
- Doctor_Fegg 6y ago
  Since reincarnated as Dominic Cummings.
n_t 6y ago
> a high-flyer who had enjoyed several brushes with scandal in the past, mainly for rubbing people up the wrong way. Nevertheless, he had his admirers (snip) who thought he was ‘generous and very clever’, ‘an extremely reasonable man’ – just what the stuffy civil service needed at a time of change and rising pressure from Byzantium’s neighbours. Few others saw it that way. Many bristled at Nikephoros’ tactless and aggressive behaviour, at the way he locked others out of important decisions and limited access to the ruler. He was accused, too, of giving his friends a leg up and showing them favours they had not earned and did not deserve. He was arrogant, clumsy and scorned those who criticised him. Oh man! I was unsure if I was reading about long gone Roman advisor or one of our contemporary ;)
alex_young 6y ago
Shouldn't this belong to Anatoly Chernyaev? "One can confidently say that every bold foreign policy initiative advanced by Gorbachev in the years 1985-1991 bears Chernyaev's mark on it."[0] [0] https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB192/ https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB192/

23 points by diodorus 6y ago

I was expecting at least an aside for Rasputin, although I'm sure these other clowns were pretty terrible too.

nl 6y ago

"Worst" here seems mostly to mean "horrible" as opposed to giving particularly bad advice. I was looking for mention of the "Darién Scheme" by William Paterson and it was only there in passing. Surely Paul Wolfowitz would have to be a candidate for bad advice in the modern post-Soviet era though?

thaumasiotes 6y ago
> "Worst" here seems mostly to mean "horrible" as opposed to giving particularly bad advice. I noticed the same thing. The example of Seianus makes a strong case that he did a bad job. But he was obviously doing a bad job of being king, not a bad job of being an advisor. It's a hard question to investigate, though. History's worst political advisors are unlikely to actually be known to history; their states would have been swallowed by other better states.

BurningFrog 6y ago

Here is one way to think of it: I think of the US invasion of Iraq as probably the biggest strategic mistake in the world since some WW2 decisions. It's arguably the start of the end of the US super power era. Was there a particular adviser we can blame for that? Maybe Cheney? If it was more of a unified team decision, it doesn't fit the question.

mrslave 6y ago
The Project for the New American Century[0] think tank is probably the most significant influence here. Naming Cheney alone oversimplifies matters, but he was without a doubt a prominent figure. > It was established as a non-profit educational organization in 1997, and founded by William Kristol and Robert Kagan. > Of the twenty-five people who signed PNAC's founding statement of principles, ten went on to serve in the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush, including Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_Century https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_C...
yellowstuff 6y ago
You could make a strong case that the Vietnam War was a more significant error. Including Iraq and Afghanistan, the War On Terror cost about 6 times as much as the Vietnam War, but Vietnam cost more in terms of American lives. I believe the Vietnam War inflicted greater damage to America's reputation and self-conception, and it ended in unconditional retreat after achieving none of its goals. https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-09-09/war-on-terror-could-be-costliest-yet https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-09-09/war-on-terro...
- rmrfstar 6y ago
  There is no single advisor, but I'd vote for the group of economists who drank so much of their own Kool-Aid they believed that offshoring all of our industrial capacity was a good idea.
  - jointpdf 6y ago
    But think of the utils that you’re leaving on the table by not fully exploiting comparative advantage. /s
    - rmrfstar 6y ago
      Utility is actually a really useful framework, provided you've correctly specified your utility function. [1] "I've shipped my N95 production off-shore and there is a global pandemic" is the kind of thing economists leave out of their models. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Von_Neumann%E2%80%93Morgenstern_utility_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Von_Neumann%E2%80%93Morgenster...
  - JamisonM 6y ago
    The United States of America has a lot of remaining industrial capacity. All of the United States industrial capacity has not been off-shored. The United States of America has about 1/6th of the world's manufacturing output and the majority of the manufacturing output consumed within the United States is in fact produced within the United States.
deeg 6y ago
If you're limiting this to just the U.S., maybe, but I'd say the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was a bigger blunder.
pnako 6y ago
An even bigger mistake than starting the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is the mistake of keeping those wars going forever. And that mistake is still ongoing. Of course, I'm assuming it's a mistake and not a deliberate strategy. But the people advocating for keeping troops there should make explicit again their reason for doing so.

RcouF1uZ4gsC 6y ago

I think whoever advised the shah of Khwarazm to execute the envoy of Genghis Khan has to go down as the worst political adviser in history. Genghis and the Mongol Army practically wiped out the entire country in retaliation. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongol_conquest_of_Khwarezmia https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongol_conquest_of_Khwarezmi...

thaumasiotes 6y ago
> the Mongol Army practically wiped out the entire country in retaliation. He can't have been the worst, then; worse things have happened to countries than just being "practically wiped out". Compare Nongqawuse, who did not hold an official advisory position, but who nevertheless "successfully" advised the Xhosa that the solution to the stress they were under through contact with the British was to destroy all their crops and slaughter all their cattle. Unsurprisingly, they mostly starved to death afterwards.
satvikpendem 6y ago
This marked the beginning of the end of the Islamic Golden Age, and Baghdad still hasn't recovered. That is one of the most interesting facts to me, that over 600 years later the Middle East is still in disarray.
throwawaysea 6y ago
That would be Inalchuq (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inalchuq https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inalchuq), the governor who killed Genghis Khan’s envoys who were there to make a trade deal and open relations. He suggested that the trade caravan were spies (which may have been correct) and got permission from the shah to kill them and take their goods. The shah repeated the same offense to the khan a second time when Genghis sent a second set of diplomats demanding that Inalchuq be punished or handed over.

DonHopkins 6y ago

Roy Cohen. We have him to thank for Trump.

andrewstuart 6y ago

Grima Wormtongue.

scollet 6y ago
This is a matter of perspective.
Doctor_Fegg 6y ago
Since reincarnated as Dominic Cummings.

n_t 6y ago

> a high-flyer who had enjoyed several brushes with scandal in the past, mainly for rubbing people up the wrong way. Nevertheless, he had his admirers (snip) who thought he was ‘generous and very clever’, ‘an extremely reasonable man’ – just what the stuffy civil service needed at a time of change and rising pressure from Byzantium’s neighbours. Few others saw it that way. Many bristled at Nikephoros’ tactless and aggressive behaviour, at the way he locked others out of important decisions and limited access to the ruler. He was accused, too, of giving his friends a leg up and showing them favours they had not earned and did not deserve. He was arrogant, clumsy and scorned those who criticised him. Oh man! I was unsure if I was reading about long gone Roman advisor or one of our contemporary ;)

alex_young 6y ago

Shouldn't this belong to Anatoly Chernyaev? "One can confidently say that every bold foreign policy initiative advanced by Gorbachev in the years 1985-1991 bears Chernyaev's mark on it."[0] [0] https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB192/ https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB192/