“The road to hell is paved with good intentions.”
It’s a common phrase, probably one you’ve heard many times before, and for a good reason.
We’ve all started a course of action that we thought would be beneficial for ourselves
or the people around us, but ended up blowing up in our faces.
Thankfully, for many of us, these actions probably didn’t cause millions of deaths.
The same cannot be said for the five men we’re discussing today – each of which wanted
to do some kind of good for the world, but ended up making it a worse place for everyone
in it.
These men have a collective body count well into the tens of millions, but you might be
surprised to find out how they got there.
First up, we’ve got…
5.
Alfred Nobel – The Father of Dynamite If you feel like that name rings a bell, don’t
worry, we’ll get to that.
Alfred Nobel was a Swedish Chemist whose scientific discovery helped define the nineteenth century
– at least in terms of how they blew stuff up.
Before Nobel came along, gunpowder was the world’s explosive compound of choice, and
had been for several hundred years.
But here’s the problem: Gunpowder was old hat, and while it was a stable chemical compound,
for everything from warfare to industrial applications, the world needed something that
could pack way more of a punch.
That’s where the miracle of nitroglycerin came along – a significantly more powerful
explosive concoction.
Here’s the big problem, though: Unlike gunpowder, nitroglycerin wasn’t stable in the slightest,
and was the frequent cause of deadly, explosive accidents.
Few people knew this better than Alfred Nobel, whose brother Emil was killed in a nitroglycerin
explosion at one of his father’s factories.
This motivated Alfred to direct his intelligence and energies towards a noble goal: Creating
a new compound that could pack the explosive punch of nitroglycerin, but had the stability
of gunpowder, preventing accidents like the one that killed his brother from ever happening
again.
But, from the title of this video, you know this story doesn’t have a happy ending.
In 1867, Alfred happened upon diatomaceous earth, a porous sedimentary rock that had
an extremely interesting property: It could absorb nitroglycerin.
While the resulting compound was still terrifyingly explosive, it was stable, making it the wonder-bomb
that the warmongers and industrialists of the world needed.
Nobel, ecstatic with his new creation, decided to give it the name “dynamite” – derived
from the Greek word dynamis, literally meaning “power.”
But Alfred, being a perfectionist, didn’t stop there.
As the years progressed and dynamite became a household name, he created an even more
powerful and deadly version in 1875 – by mixing nitroglycerin and nitrocellulose.
Dynamite would later become synonymous with cowboys and prospectors, but perhaps its most
iconic usage was in war, where it was used to blow countless people into kingdom come.
Alfred had wanted to create an invention that would prevent unnecessary deaths, like his
brother’s, and had instead created a tool of mass murder.
The man became so synonymous with facilitating violence in his time that, when he was mistakenly
declared dead, the headline of his obituary read “The Merchant of Death Is Dead.”
Okay, we weren’t actually being totally honest with you earlier: This story does kind
of have a happy ending.
Alfred Nobel was deeply affected by his premature obituary, realising that his legacy was violence
and warfare.
This inspired him to use his blood-money to found the Nobel Prize, which intended to reward
the best of humanity rather than commemorating the worst.
Sadly for a lot of people, the next entry on this list wasn’t quite as philanthropic
with his wealth…
4.
Henry Ford – Hitler’s Role Model If ever you’ve been on the open road in
your life, you’ve seen a Ford.
From the Model T to the Mustang, Ford is one of the most iconic automotive brands in American
history.
Statistically, a lot of the car owners watching this video probably own or have owned a Ford
car at some point in their adult life.
They’re just that common.
The Ford Motor Company had a major role in building up the automotive industry in the
United States, massively bolstering the American economy and providing millions of jobs to
hard-working Americans for over a hundred years.
Born to humble beginnings on a farm in 1863, Henry Ford pursued a career in business and
engineering, allowing him to found the Ford Motor Company in 1903.
After five years of research and development, they produced and released the iconic Model
T, which rocked the automotive world and helped bring vehicles like this to the masses – with
standardised parts and assembly line innovations allowing them to be built far cheaper than
other cars on the market, without sacrificing quality.
He was also a magnanimous boss, paying employees $5 a day – which was seen as insanely generous
back in 1914.
So, you’re probably wondering: This is the good side of this iconic American industrialist,
but where does the evil come in?
Well, a famous slogan for the Model T was that you could have it in any colour you like,
as long as it’s black.
Henry Ford didn’t extend this same attitude towards people, though, as he was an avowed
racist and Anti-Semite.
That’s right – even for the early 20th century’s standards, Henry Ford was considered
a massive bigot.
There wasn’t an antisemitic conspiracy theory he didn’t buy into, and he was a vocal proponent
of the American Eugenics Movement that was picking up steam at the time.
Holding these views would be problematic in its own right, but it strays into deadly territory
when you meet Ford’s biggest fan: Adolf Hitler.
Hitler found Ford’s insane levels of bigotry inspirational, to the point where he quoted
them in his infamous book, Mein Kampf.
Having this powerful, beloved American icon on his side helped offer the budding genocidal
dictator a sense of international legitimacy, and some sources report that Hitler was interested
in helping Ford to become, in his own words, “the leader of the growing Fascist movement
in America.”
Ford’s wilful spreading of antisemitic propaganda helped lay the groundwork for the Nazi atrocities
that were to follow.
3.
Winston Churchill – Scourge of India From Nazis, to one of the world’s most famous
and cherished Nazi-fighters: The bulldog-faced, cigar-chomping, iron-willed Winston Churchill
– England’s legendary prime minister during World War II, and one of the most well-known
faces of the allied forces.
When people think of Churchill, they think of his inspirational radio addresses – like
his famous “We will fight them on the beaches” speech – and his razor-sharp wit.
Churchill was infinitely quotable, with nuggets of wisdom like "To improve is to change, so
to be perfect is to change often” and “Courage is rightly esteemed the first of human qualities
because it has been said, it is the quality which guarantees all others.”
Churchill saved England from the terrifying Nazis forces in its darkest hour, while the
country was being bombed and the Third Reich began to claim more and more of Europe on
its rampage to rule the Western World.
His part in orchestrating the legendary invasion of Normandy by Allied Forces, and liberating
France from their brutal Nazi occupiers, has earned him a permanent legacy as a hero to
many.
While he fell out of favour after the end of World War II, it’s hard to find somebody
who’ll tell you that Winston Churchill didn’t help pull Great Britain – and perhaps even
Western Europe – from one of their most dire struggles in modern history.
Unless, of course, you’re in India.
While Churchill’s goal of defeating the Nazis was undeniably a noble one, some of
his methods for securing that win helped facilitate the horrible ends of millions of innocent
lives.
To be more specific, the Bengal Famine of 1943 was a national tragedy that left over
three million Indians dead from starvation.
There were a number of factors believed to be involved in causing this famine: Drought,
crop infection, and Burma – which was a major source of rice imports for the Indian
people – falling into the hands of the Japanese.
However, more recent evidence shows that Winston Churchill likely had a hand in causing this
tragedy.
Indian journalist Madhushree Mukerjee found compelling evidence that there would have
still been enough supplies to feed the Bengal region, were it not for the decisions of Winston
Churchill’s wartime cabinet.
Because India was still under British colonial rule during the 1940s, they were still controlled
by the British government – and, as a result, the British government had full control over
all their resources.
Churchill diverted so many of these resources to the allied war effort that he left over
three million Indians to starve.
And to add insult to injury, he blamed this mass starvation on the Indian people, attributing
the lack of resources in India to the fact that the Indian people – in his own words
– bred like rabbits.
Yikes.
2.
Albert Einstein – Uncle of the Atomic Bomb This is a man who is practically synonymous
with the very concept of science, and is up there with Isaac Newton, Nikola Tesla, and
Bill Nye on the list of “scientists who became household names.”
He made gravity waves with his general theory of relativity, his answer to the mystery of
the photoelectric effect, and his evidence for atomic theory.
His contributions to science were so great that he won the Nobel Prize for Physics in
1921, and has inspired multiple generations of children to pursue knowledge for the betterment
of mankind.
Not too shabby for a bored former patent officer.
He did, however, make one terrible mistake that went on to cause hundreds of thousands
of deaths, and cause an ongoing threat to the continuation of modern civilisation even
today.
As World War II was reaching a fever pitch in 1939, Albert Einstein was signing his name
to one of the most dangerous letters in human history.
Despite being a pacifist, Einstein was one of the many experts who feared that Nazi Germany
was on course to develop the first atomic bomb.
As an exiled German Jew himself, Einstein knew that, if they obtained such a weapon,
there would be no mercy for anyone who dared to defy them.
In order to make sure that the allies weren’t at a loss, the letter Einstein signed was
begging the US Government to hasten their own development of an atomic bomb, laying
the groundwork for the Manhattan Project that would later birth the bombs dropped on Hiroshima
and Nagasaki, killing hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians.
A quote often attributed to Einstein is, “I do not know with what weapons World War III
will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.”
And sadly, we have Albert Einstein partly to thank for that.
1.
Gavrilo Princip – The World’s Deadliest Assassin
Perhaps the least well-known person on this list, Gavrilo Princip was a teenage assassin
with the best intentions who happened to kill over 37,000,000 people with one magazine of
handgun ammo.
This Bosnian-Serb nationalist fired the bullets that killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the
heir to the Austria-Hungarian throne.
Once again, to many modern Serbians, Princip’s intentions were as pure and heroic as could
be – freeing the Serbian people from the iron-fisted rule of the Austria-Hungarian
Empire and making a powerful statement about Serbian independence.
He and a gang of like-minded individuals orchestrated a seemingly doomed assassination plan against
the Archduke, that ended up putting Princip right in the path of his oncoming vehicle.
The skinny, 19-year-old Princip took his chance, and blasted Ferdinand with his pistol until
the Archduke was no more, standing his ground against his beloved country’s tyrannical
rulers.
However, many credit the assassination of the Archduke as the match that ignited a powder
keg of European political tensions.
The result of this?
World War I, killing almost 40 million and committing a generation of young people the
world over to face horrific conditions in dehumanising trench warfare.
Literally millions of people dead from just a handful of bullets and the most idealistic
intentions, making Gavrilo Princip the deadliest assassin who ever lived.
If the people today have proven anything, it’s that the purest intentions can still
lead to the most nightmarish results – sometimes due to malice, and other times, due to a simple
lack of foresight.
So, next time you have to make a major decision, try to think a few steps ahead.
Or, at the very least, try to keep in mind who you might be stepping on.
Check out “Shocking Study Reveals How Anyone Can Be Evil” and “The Origin of Evil:
The Devil” for more fascinating meditations into the nature of all that is bad.
And in the meantime, be nice, it’s really the least you can do.