It Seemed Like Good Idea

by Forstchen, William R.

• ISBN13: 9780380807710
• ISBN10: 0380807718
• Format: Paperback
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publications

Summary

Throughout the annals of history, the best of intentions-and sometimes the worst-have set in motion events with a vastly different outcome than originally intended. In this entertaining, fact-filled chronicle, William Forstchen and Bill Fawcett explore the watersheds of history that began as the best of ideas and ended as the worst of fiascoes. A Holy War-The Medieval Crusades for religious liberation become centuries of slaughter and destruction. Sibling Rivalry-Leif Erikson spares his sister's life and delays the discovery of the New World for five hundred years. Big Guns-Emperor Constantine XI refuses to buy a new supercannon that would let him dominate his enemies, so its creator sells the cannon to the Turks, who then crush Constantinople. With casual wit and subtle insight, It Seemed Like a Good Idea...tucks tongue in cheek and rides out the fiascoes of history.

Table of Contents

Introduction	xi
A Bad Way to Take a Walk: 4th Century B.C. Macedonia	1	(6)
Divide and Conquer: 219 B.C. Rome	7	(6)
Stab at Stability: 10 B.C. Rome	13	(6)
Sins of the Sister: 1001 A.D. Scandinavia	19	(6)
There's Nothing Worse Than an Idealistic War: 1095 Jerusalem	25	(8)
Safe and Sorry: 1097 The Byzantine Empire	33	(6)
The Burning of Beards: 13th Century Khwarezm Empire	39	(8)
Dangerous Delusion: 13th Century Europe	47	(6)
Crackdown Crack Up: 1282 Palermo, Sicily	53	(4)
A Plague on All Your Mouses: Europe 1300s	57	(4)
Never Look a Gift Cannon in the Mouth: 1453 Constantinople	61	(4)
One Dispensation Too Many: 1533 Rome and England	65	(4)
Wrong Turn: 1588 Spanish Armada	69	(8)
How to Lose an Empire: 1776 America	77	(8)
From Paper to Reality, How to Lose a War: 1777 United States	85	(8)
France Gets Even: 1780 America	93	(6)
Bligh's Guys: 1789 Two Months Out From Tahiti	99	(4)
Not Steamed Up: 1800 France	103	(4)
To Give Away a Country: 1800s Texas	107	(4)
Choose the Captain Well: 1842 Atlantic Ocean	111	(10)
Great Dred Scott!: 1857 Washington, D.C.	121	(4)
Buy American: 1860 United States	125	(6)
The Man Who Would Be Emperor: 1864 Mexico	131	(6)
For Want of a Horse: 1876 Montana	137	(4)
Too Wilde for His Own Good: 1895 England	141	(4)
Sea Powerless: 1900 German Empire	145	(10)
The Archduke Goes for a Ride: 1914 Sarajevo	155	(8)
Of Clocks, Oysters and Politics: 1914 Britain	163	(12)
Courage Over Firepower: 1914 British Expeditionary Force	175	(4)
For the Good of the Empire: 1917 Moscow	179	(4)
The Hindenburg and Ludendorff Follies: 1917 Germany	183	(8)
Just to Make Trouble: 1917 Europe	191	(6)
Strangle the Monster in the Cradle: 1917-22 Russia	197	(6)
Reilly Busts ``the Trust'': 1926 Moscow	203	(4)
How to Train an Enemy: 1930s Russia	207	(8)
Choose Your Allies Carefully: 1939 Germany and Italy	215	(8)
Build a Fort, But Leave the Back Door Open: 1939 France	223	(8)
Bushido Politics: 1941 Japan	231	(10)
``We Thought It Would Be Singapore'': 1941 Pearl Harbor	241	(4)
Loyal to a Fault: 1941 Germany	245	(6)
The Other Maginot Line: 1944 Germany	251	(6)
In Exchange for Nothing: 1945 Yalta	257	(4)
Documented for Posterity: 1945-46 Germany	261	(4)
Keep the Colony, But Start a War: 1945 France and America in Indochina	265	(6)
Stand Back Boys and Give the President Some Room: 1963 Dallas, Texas	271	(4)
Philby-Britain's Best and Moscow's Man Inside: 1963 Moscow	275	(4)
Throwing Out the Baby and Saving the Bath Water: 1967 Britain	279	(4)
Snow Job: 1978 Chicago	283	(6)
One Hour Too Short?: 1990 Persian Gulf	289	(4)
Index	293

Excerpts

It Seemed Like a Good Idea...
A Compendium Of Great Historical Fiascoes

Chapter One

So many bad decisions, so few pages. When one studies history and has the advantage of 20/20 hindsight you are constantly amazed at the decisions made by otherwise very intelligent leaders. Stalin helped train the German Panzer Corps, Napoleon turned away Robert Fulton and his paddlewheelers, and the Kaiser's own spies actually smuggled Lenin into Russia to start his Bolshevik revolution. There are so many examples of seemingly irrational decisions that one sometimes has to wonder about the sanity of the decision maker and the many other equally possible courses history might have taken.

To be included in this volume the decisions had to meet a few qualifications. First they had to be seriously and unquestionably bad. Further, the decision had to be of some importance, affecting thousands, if not millions, of people. Generally we avoided using decisions made in file heat of battle. Too many can be explained by poor generalship or limited intelligence. Finally the decision, given the information at hand and the way things were done at the time, had to seem like a good idea, even the best of all possible options, but for some small fault in logic or unconsidered possible circumstance that would prove in the end catastrophic.

So enjoy a look at history's follies and feel superior to some of the past's greatest leaders. But occasionally stop and ask yourself which of the decisions being made today, the ones that seem our leaders' most rational, will be included in the 2099 edition of this book.

Bill Fawcett

It Seemed Like a Good Idea...
A Compendium Of Great Historical Fiascoes. Copyright © by William R. Forstchen. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Available now wherever books are sold.

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Excerpted from It Seemed Like a Good Idea...: A Compendium of Great Historical Fiascoes by William R. Forstchen, Bill Fawcett
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