If you could go back in time and assasinate someone who would it be?

[shiner]

George Lucas in June of 1983

 

[TechHead87]

J. Edgar Hoover in the 1950s.

That way, JFK, MLK Jr, and Malcolm X would never have been killed.

 

[Exterous]

If you killed Hitler how would Keynesians be able to wet themselves at WWII bringing us out of the great depression?

We would just be talking about how WWII against Russia brought us out of the great depression. Couse then we have to deal with Kirov airships over DC

Is this a bad thing? :awe:

Hmmm - if no one is around to appriciate it I think that sounds like a very sad thing...

 

[dank69]

the guy who said 'hey lets put AT forums in the cloud'

 

[mrblotto]

*Pushes assasination button*

Hmmm.......hey guys, I dont think it's hooked up ri............


*mrblotto has been disconnected from the server*

 

[paperfist]

Curt Shilling.

 

[WaTaGuMp]

I cant be selfish and choose only one.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

I kinda wonder if China had stayed non communist and the KMT won in the civil war. Would we have Taiwan on a bigger scale? I mean seeing how Taiwan dominated the entire microelectronics industry in the 90s and 2000s (slowly manufacturing is moving to China), if they had the whole resource of the mainland... that would've been crazy.

But interesting.

While I think we can agree ruthless dictators like Hitler and Stalin could have disappeared, the world overcame these difficulties (particularly Hitler). Sure he messed things up, but we cleaned it up. Killing Stalin wouldn't have ended Soviet Russia. That's why I wonder if we went back and say killed Mao and prevented China from turning communist, if things would have drastically changed today?

Korea would be interesting although the effect would be much smaller, and given that Korea was already divided post WW2, so it's not like killing one guy could change much when the nation was divided already.

 

[pmv]

Well "Hitler" is too boringly obvious.

So I go for...Herbert Henry Asquith. Just before WW1. And I'd somehow ensure it looked like the French did it (this bit is crucial).

Hopefully that would keep Great Britain (and consequently the US) out of WW1. Which means the Germans would simply beat the French (again). No Versailles. No Weimar. No German self-pity. No Hitler, no Holocaust. As a bonus, the Bolsheviks would likely not have come to power in Russia, so no gulag either. And hence no Vietnam war (or at least, not one mixed up with cold war politics) and hence no Cambodian year zero. We might even have been spared Hiroshima and Nagasaki as a side-effect (crystal ball gets a bit hazy here).

Granted, that's a hell of a lot of counter-factuals, and who knows what might have happened if Germany had won WW1. But maybe it would just be the EU a few decades early? And it is kind of hard to imagine that things could have turned out _worse_ than they actually did from 1914 onwards.

Most of the 20th century really didn't go that well, so I say just mix it up and hope for the best.

(Not so great for the subject peoples of the British Empire, admittedly, as GB would not have bankrupted itself in two world wars...also the US would not have had its golden era because the industries of Europe wouldn't have been devastated by those wars either).

 

[satyajitmenon]

The man who came up with the monstrosity posted in this post.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showpost.php?p=32859801&postcount=1

 

[DaTT]

The man who came up with the monstrosity posted in this post.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showpost.php?p=32859801&postcount=1

Yeah, right.....it was a man.....yeah....lol

 

[AyashiKaibutsu]

Well "Hitler" is too boringly obvious.

So I go for...Herbert Henry Asquith. Just before WW1. And I'd somehow ensure it looked like the French did it (this bit is crucial).

I like the cut of your jib. WW1 wasn't the good vs evil battle WWII became; it was just the largest of many European wars. Would be interesting if the German Empire survived it.

 

[pmv]

Would have said "Ögedei Khan", but I've already crossed him off my list. Saved Europe there...not that any of you will ever thank me.

Now gotta fire up the time vortex again and deal with JFK to avert that horrific nuclear exchange we all remember from '64...

Controls set for Dallas...

 

[DaTT]

How about George Lucas the day before he decided to start production on Episodes 1, 2, and 3 of Star Wars.

 

[zinfamous]

I think "how" they get assassinated is a more interesting option than who gets assassinated.

I would send a hobo with a shotgun back like 500 years to assassinate the pope.

I think it would be cool to read about the The demon beast with the devil's boomstick and how he slayed the pope with thundershot.

lol

 

[zinfamous]

Curt Shilling.

greatest


playoff

series


ever!

 

[Golgatha]

George Lucas in June of 1983

The Wachowski Brothers in the year 2000 for much the same reason.

 

[AyashiKaibutsu]

The Wachowski Brothers in the year 2000 for much the same reason.

Then we'd all be wondering what could have been and never know they were one shot wonders.

 

[PrinceofWands]

The problem with this is that single men are often personally responsible for greatness, but seldom far reaching evil. They facilitate, administer, or otherwise contribute, but I have a hard time coming up with a single person whom, if assassinated, would not be replaced with someone similar easily enough.

Hitler was charismatic and intelligent (before he went nuts), but he was not unique in his ideas. Moreover many of the rest of the Nazi party were arguably more effective and important. In fact, even if you kill him before he became prominent (and thereby avoid martyrdom) there's the potential that whoever you get to replace him would have been a more effective end game leader/strategist and made things worse. Kill Hitler and nothing much changes overall. The same is true of most 'monsters' from history.

It's the times, organizations, groups, religions, beliefs, mindsets, etc which are monstrous. Now, if you can eradicate an entire group, THEN you can make some real changes.

 

[Kadarin]

Then we'd all be wondering what could have been and never know they were one shot wonders.

Well, they did do V for Vendetta.

 

[kyrax12]

There is still Japan ...

Germany was the prime instigator for putting the U.S into full manufacturing/all time employment mode.

Without Germany's role in keeping Western Europe at bay the U.S would never have become the economic/manufacturing powerhouse it was during WWII.

Not to mentioned, the production capabilities of Western Europe was constantly decreasing because they were the ones getting attacked putting the U.S at a major comparative advantage.

 

[pmv]

The problem with this is that single men are often personally responsible for greatness, but seldom far reaching evil. They facilitate, administer, or otherwise contribute, but I have a hard time coming up with a single person whom, if assassinated, would not be replaced with someone similar easily enough.

Hitler was charismatic and intelligent (before he went nuts), but he was not unique in his ideas. Moreover many of the rest of the Nazi party were arguably more effective and important. In fact, even if you kill him before he became prominent (and thereby avoid martyrdom) there's the potential that whoever you get to replace him would have been a more effective end game leader/strategist and made things worse. Kill Hitler and nothing much changes overall. The same is true of most 'monsters' from history.

It's the times, organizations, groups, religions, beliefs, mindsets, etc which are monstrous. Now, if you can eradicate an entire group, THEN you can make some real changes.

As far as Hitler is concerned, I believe that's a huge topic that historians and biographers still argue about (how central was Hitler himself to what happened? Especially to the Holocaust). I'm not sure how we can know the answer for sure. Hitler alone made key decisions all through the Nazis rise to power. Things would still have been bad without him, but maybe not the same type of bad?

But surely its clear that at least at certain key moments the death of an individual can make a big difference? I refer again to Ögedei Khan. His dying when he did meant all the Mongols had to trapise all the way back to Mongolia to pick a new Khan - preventing them from continuing their rampage through Western Europe.

Likewise, I'm pretty sure _something_ would have turned out differently if Lenin hadn't made it back to Moscow in his sealed train. Lenin was crucial in the Bolsheviks taking over when they did, the rest of them were reluctant to seize the moment. Again, bad things would have happened anyway, but the details would have been different and the results over time very different.

I don't think its _all_ deterministic social forces. Its also contingency.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Eve. She was a bad influence that affected all man kind. :biggrin: Woman are evil. :awe:

 

[gevorg]

All kings, generals and military commanders of the evil British Empire. More than half of the whole planet, especially Africa and surroundings, would have been a better place by now. Even Nazi Germany pales to what the British did to the world.

 

[PrinceofWands]

As far as Hitler is concerned, I believe that's a huge topic that historians and biographers still argue about (how central was Hitler himself to what happened? Especially to the Holocaust). I'm not sure how we can know the answer for sure. Hitler alone made key decisions all through the Nazis rise to power. Things would still have been bad without him, but maybe not the same type of bad?

But surely its clear that at least at certain key moments the death of an individual can make a big difference? I refer again to Ögedei Khan. His dying when he did meant all the Mongols had to trapise all the way back to Mongolia to pick a new Khan - preventing them from continuing their rampage through Western Europe.

Likewise, I'm pretty sure _something_ would have turned out differently if Lenin hadn't made it back to Moscow in his sealed train. Lenin was crucial in the Bolsheviks taking over when they did, the rest of them were reluctant to seize the moment. Again, bad things would have happened anyway, but the details would have been different and the results over time very different.

I don't think its _all_ deterministic social forces. Its also contingency.

I can accept that for the most part. I just don't like people attributing broad movements to narrow people. While key elements might be changed I don't think it would make major differences. In my opinion destiny is not determined, but it does have inertia. Takes a LOT of force to move it off course...generally more than can be focused into one individual.

In your Mongolian example we have to ask what would have happened with a continued European campaign. Would they have conquered coast to coast? Probably. Could they have held it? Certainly not. Would it have had major influence on the eventual social/cultural evolution in Europe? Some perhaps, but you can't turn westerners into easterners or vice versa. Would the attempt to take it all and hold it have weakened them and made them more vulnerable to other incursion? Possibly. Would there have been genetic or biological differences stemming from the intermixing? Possibly, but that's happening now anyway.In the end, I see little difference overall, except maybe with regards to time frames.