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10 Historical Lies That Shook the World

Historical Lies
Photo by Everett Collection at Shutterstock

The fake Anastasia

Back in 1918, the Bolshevik Revolutionaries executed the last standing members of the Romanov dynasty: Tsar Nicholas II, his empress, and their five children. However, rumors started to spread that the couple’s youngest daughter, Anastasia, managed to escape.

Out of all the impostors that tried to exploit this rumor, there’s one that has gone down in history as the greatest con artist ever – Anna Anderson. After a failed suicide attempt, a mute Anderson family member was discovered in a German canal with no ID whatsoever.

The authorities then there her into an asylum, where everyone believed she looked just like Anastasia. While lots of former Romanov aides and relatives had immense doubts about her legitimacy, she still had many supporters who believed she was the duchess.

The Watergate scandal

Back in May 1972, five men broke into the Democratic National Committee headquarters that was located in the Watergate complex in Washington, DC. They were there to bug office phones and steal some of the most confidential documents.

A month later, the spies were successfully arrested, as they came in a second time. However, authorities discovered after a while that these men were actually sent by President Richard Nixon’s reelection campaign.

Even if the population had suspicions, Nixon managed to get re-elected to serve his second term, after denying being involved in the scandal. However, it wasn’t enough, as The Washington Post managed to expose the president’s cover-up of the Watergate crimes, as an anonymous whistleblower from the FBI told everything.

The Ponzi scheme

Charles Ponzi was an Italian immigrant who made a fortune out of lying to people. Even more, he was so good at it, that the government decided to name the type of fraud he invented: the Ponzi scheme.

Back in 1920, Ponzi managed to trick thousands of New England residents into putting their money in a postage stamp speculation scheme. He promised all his investors that he is able to provide a whopping 50 percent return in only 90 days.

Every time a new investor gave him money, he would use those funds to pay off earlier investors, which created an illusion that they were profiting from a legitimate business. He raked in $250,000 every day, which was about $3 million in today’s currency.

Team Ultra

During World War II, there were a lot of lies, as you could probably see. Besides the Japanese code, there was another code that was extremely difficult to break – the Nazi Enigma Code. The Allies were desperately trying to decipher that code, as the German U-boats were constantly sinking a vast number of merchant ships that were in charge of food, oil, and supplies from North America to England.

But in 1941, a British mathematician called Alan Turing, alongside his team, managed to break the code that revealed all the German submarine positions. From that point, Ultra, which was the Allied intelligence project, used a slew of false messages so they can keep the Germans off their trail. Ultra’s knack for craking difficult codes was one of the major contributors to the final win.

The Pentagon Papers

President Lyndon B. Johnson managed to keep his lies about the Vietnam War well-hidden and sealed until a military analyst leaked all the records that were exposing the president’s decisions about the war to the New York Times in 1971.

The Pentagon Papers were actually a top-secret Department of Defense study that was in charge of documenting the extent of America’s political and military involvement in the Vietnam war, from 1945 until 1967.

However, President Johnson was only one of the many presidents that were named in those papers, including Harry S. Truman, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and John F. Kennedy. They were all involved in misleading the United State’s involvement with Vietnam.

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25 Responses

  1. What? Why isn’t the Trump russia collusion hoax or the 2020 election fraud in the top 10. I think it should be #1 and #2!

  2. Daniel, knows many through the Seven Hills in Aurora.
    As threading pulled from a jacket seam curly quicker wit.

    :Mundane plains drifter.
    :status:

  3. EXCELLENT ARTICLE. I HAVE HEARD OF MANY OF THESE DURING MY LIFE AS FAR BACK AS I CAN REMEMBER. THE WORST ONES ARE THE POLITICAL LIES THAT PROBABLY INFLICT MORE DAMAGE AND SUFFERING TO ALL MANKIND THAT ALL THE OTHER CATEGORIES COMBINED. MY FATHER TOLD ME OVER SIXTY FIVE YEARS AGO THAT NO MATTER HOW MUCH YOU LIKE ANY GIVEN POLITICAL FIGURE, YOU CAN NEVER TRUST ANYTHING THAT COMES OUT OF THEIR MOUTHS. HE SHOULD HAVE KNOWN AS HE WAS DEEPLY INVOLVED IN LOCAL POLITICS AT THE LOCAL AND STATE LEVEL AND WAS PRETTY MUCH DISGUSTED WITH THE SYSTEM IN HIS LATER YEARS.

  4. HItler was right! Jews were and still are the enemy of society and now globally. They own every centural bank in the world, news stations, Hollywood, TV shows and all to control and manipulate the world.

    1. I hate ALL religions equally, but why do you hate the Zionist religion badly enough to blame it for everything that ails the world? I would say Christianity id=s far worse than any other religion or group of religions.

    2. Carol, do you have verifiable evidence? Is there a paper trail? A cyber trail? Because if you do, please share it with us.
      Just because many facets of our modern world are owned, or controlled by those who are Jewish, does not constitute a worldwide conspiracy to control and manipulate.
      Based on your logic, one could argue against Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, etc. Such a conspiracy should be laid at the feet of Capitalism, which is multicultural!

    3. The Jews don’t own any traditional banks – the reason they started many investment banks like Goldman -Sachs and Lehman Brothers,etc. was that the white Protestant establishment wouldn’t let them into traditional banking so instead of complaining and getting angry they started their own . Excluding them was one of the most idiotic things we did because they really are the most literate group of people in the world .
      Same thing with newspapers St Louis Post Dispatch (J. Pulitzer) New York Times ( Sulzberger and Ochs) and The Washington Post ( Meyer and his daughter K Graham). Always excluded .Hollywood yes because they invented it because again so many industries were closed to them and they had a creative spirit from the schtetl. Look it up if you don’t know what it means .
      When Christians couldn’t lend money someone had to provide the service and when only us Christians could own land someone had to become merchants . Yea Sam Walton learned a lot from Sol Pace the father of Costco . By the way Sol wouldn’t sell out to Sam Walton .
      So my dear if you want Jews to go away stop spewing anti Semitism because if you do they will keep winning 25 percent of the Nobel prizes and Pulitzer Prizes and representing 30 percent of the 400 richest people in America and 40 percent of the biggest philanthropists when they only represent 1 -2 percent of the population . It is unprecedented. You want them to go away then accept them . And by the way if you hate them so much give back your polio vaccine (Salk and Sabin ) and your Covid vaccine ( Drew Weissman)
      Hate should have no home – every group has contributed . Be a good Christian and accept others and love thy neighbor

      God Bless You

    4. With that attitude you wonder why there are bigots and racism in the world? Why there is violence? Why there are wars that kill thousands of young people all over the world? Why thousands more parents cry over lost offspring? Why BILLIONS of dollars are spent on the military? Money that could be used somewhere else?
      Think on it.

  5. I am having trouble understanding how the 1919 Black Sox scandal qualifies as a “lie,” or the Cuban missile crisis.
    That’s two of the first three: time to quit.

  6. There are no worse lies than political lies as they affect ALL of us. I. E. Watergate was NOT what the WaPo claims…the Kennedy murder was NOT what we’ve been told. The Clinton mafia has never been “outed” though media tries to portray them as gods…families are NOT the enemy of society as portrayed by media…God is NOT “antiquated” but is vital to society…see what happens to society when God is taken out – look at the countries without a HEAVENLY God. (even though they sometimes claim their human “leader” is a god). You and I can go on with examples…just BEWARE of who/what you believe and dig deeper into a subject from ALL views…

    1. I believe you will find that the election in AZ was stolen. Between the election officials, judges, sec of state Katie Hobbs, and the defective machine not working only in Republician precincts it is pretty clear.

  7. . Joe biden got the most votes ever [81 million]
    .Two weeks to slow the spread
    .Covid 19 [coof- Chinese spoof] the most deadly ever
    . The coof vaccine and boosters is/are the most effective, safe vaccine ever. (It didn’t prevent you from getting it ; didn’t stop you from spreading it; didn’t stop you from going into the hospital; didn’t stop you from dying)
    .”trans men” should use female restrooms and “compete” in women’s sports
    .Joe biden created the most jobs in history
    . The economy is the “best and greatest” ever
    Shall I continue!
    Regards,
    P.

  8. Two massive lies misding: WMDs in Iraq and the “stolen” 2020 Election. Those are the two lies with the greatest repercussions of the 21st Century. How could those have been ignored? No one to date has been held accountable for propagating these lies and the damage they have caused.

    1. Do you think that it was just a coinidence those articles (WMD, AFGH and etc.) were left out? There are many others that were left out also. And ALL were connected to the U S government in some way. hAVE A NICE DAY.

  9. You forgot a real big lie. You forgot to post the lie that commie biden won the election with the largest number of votes ever cast. Talk about a whopper of a lie, total bullshit that only the gullible believe.

  10. Yes, what about the lies surrounding the election in the pandemic they never mention any of that, and those of the lies that are directly affecting the entire world today

  11. You failed to include The Big Lie of Donald Trump. He knowingly misled millions of gullible citizens with his claims of election fraud, leading to an unsuccessful coup. Unprecedented in American history!

  12. How far back must we go to find the start of the lie how about eve and Adam wondering about what is a headache! The word said to offer advantage to not telling what is! In that revelation, government has evolved it into an art-form. Within government, the lie has become part of the apprenticeship.
    The more skilled you become, the higher and faster you advance. The Fallacy of the secret that is part of government to protect our secrets produced by the need to keep the enemy’s advantage at a disadvantage. So it is used to keep the citizens also at a disadvantage.
    Only, instead of protecting our nation, they protect themselves. We no longer have politicians who represent we the citizen, just we the politician. Money is always the basis for the corruption. The proof is easy enough to get.
    Compare the worth of their assets before and after their election. Asking if anyone can legally earn that much money on legally investing on the amount they earn. So they become quite skilled at lying. Not all lie outright, but sure stretch the truth as far as they can.
    How do we ensure that we have elected someone who will serve the people first? Lies are not always intentional. Some must be told to protect the citizens. When they make a statement, do they follow up and do what they say? Or try to? So many citizens don’t understand the government. An ignorance that has been used and taught or excluded in the attempt to make it easier to lie to the people without detection, or understanding what they hear.
    Power is addictive, the more you have and seeing its effect is intoxicating. Even when they haven’t any actual power backed by an assigned power, they use the lie to create one.
    Within the last half century, I have witnessed government grow. Using the pretense (a lie) they claim as a crisis (they have created) to provide a solution that by creating another government agency that will solve, ( control) the problem Having no actual enumerated powers, write regulations. Regulations that are soon used as law and provide a penalty for violation.
    Penalties that provide government with power and put the criminal label on a citizen without a jury trial. All this has been expanded at the expense of our (investments) TAXES. How far has it come? Far enough that an innocent lie to get even with a neighbor will create a no knock entry into their home that has killed innocent people.
    We have reached a point where the lie that keeps them in office is now a tool to control the people. we have devolved from our Republic to a tyrannical form of government with one goal. Having control without the citizen’s ability to confront without fear of retaliation.
    Is it too late to recover our government controlled by our constitution? It may be. The people must understand what the government is to do. We must understand our goal before we can act to attain it. We must have leadership with a direction. Not just a promise of freedom.
    A clear goal, not just free things like health care abortion, schools, unearned wages. All used as a lure for your vote. The best government is the smallest possible. Controlled spending, and keeping our nose out of other government’s affairs.

    Time to chose people? Freedom, or dependency upon the lies that gov. Tells us?——I, Grampa

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