
Who Is History’s Worst Political Adviser? - diodorus
https://www.historytoday.com/archive/head-head/who-history’s-worst-political-adviser
======
n_t
> 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 ;)

------
RcouF1uZ4gsC
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_Khwarezmi...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongol_conquest_of_Khwarezmia)

~~~
throwawaysea
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.

------
BurningFrog
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.

~~~
yellowstuff
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-
terro...](https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-09-09/war-on-terror-could-
be-costliest-yet)

~~~
rmrfstar
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.

~~~
JamisonM
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.

~~~
akiselev
_> 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._

Manufacturing output is measured using "manufacturing value added," which is
the price the output is sold at minus the price of the input - raw materials,
parts from other suppliers, tooling, etc. The United States has such a high
"value add" because of cheap parts and raw materials sourced globally for
overpriced products sold to the Armed Forces/DoD, the healthcare system, and a
vast government/corporate bureaucracy with more money than sense.

It's great to be high up in the value chain but claiming the wealthiest
country has 1/6th of the world's manufacturing output because it has the most
money to waste isn't accurate.

~~~
JamisonM
You should take a close look at what the US actually makes and then reconsider
this opinion.

------
nl
"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
> "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.

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

------
alex_young
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/)

------
andrewstuart
Grima Wormtongue.

~~~
Doctor_Fegg
Since reincarnated as Dominic Cummings.

------
DonHopkins
Roy Cohen. We have him to thank for Trump.

