How often does it happen that a single tiny mistake causes an entire civilization to collapse? More often than you think.
Jared Knott is a historian and author of Tiny Blunders/Big Disasters: Thirty-nine Tiny Mistakes that Change the World Forever.
Knott says he was inspired to write the book after reading a famous quote from Benjamin Franklin.
“For the want of a nail the shoe was lost, for the want of a shoe the horse was lost, for the want of a horse the rider was lost, for the want of a rider the battle was lost, for the want of a battle the kingdom was lost, and all for the want of a horseshoe-nail.”
-Benjamin Franklin
Tiny Blunders/Big Disasters: Thirty-nine Tiny Mistakes that Change the World Forever features well-researched, factual stories that will keep you turning pages past your bedtime. Human weakness at its very worst at critical moments. This book is the “Butterfly Effect” in human history reviewed.
An example of some of the stories include a soldier who accidentally kicked a helmet off of the top of a wall and caused an empire to collapse.
Croesus, the king of Lydia, was in his fortress, Sardis. It was very-well fortified. Cyrus of Persia was attempting to lay siege to the castle. The fatal mistake occurred when one of Croesus’ soldiers dropped his helmet off the wall of Sardis. When he went to retrieve it through a passageway, one of Cyrus’ soldiers witnessed him and took note of where he had exited and entered the fortress. Cyrus’ soldiers swarmed in the next night and opened the gate for the rest of the army and quickly took the city as a result.
Another example of a mistake gone terribly wrong is when a piece of tape placed in the wrong direction changed the outcome of the Vietnam war.
When the Watergate burglars were breaking into the Watergate complex from the parking garage into the office building to spy on the democratic presidential campaign, they were told to hold down the striker of the door with a piece of tape in a vertical position against the door edge.
They made a mistake and put the piece of tape in the horizontal position instead, which allowed it to be seen from the hallway. The night watchman saw the tape and called the police. They arrest James McCord and Cuban operatives and the Watergate scandal begins.
The scandal caused the Nixon administration to collapse and for lack of popular support and military aid, South Vietnam collapsed, all because of a piece of tape placed in the wrong direction.
These are two of 39 tales of tiny blunders which led to big disasters.
