How could empires or dynasties fall?

In every rein of an empire or dynasty, the kings or political leaders would, theoretically, surround himself with the brightest men and women. Exceptions would be the foolish king. But he should be forgiven for his foolishness as he would be incapable of seeing the difference between good men and bad men, good policies and bad policies. In many instances, the kings or leaders are not that daft unless like China when the throne was passed down from father to son, they would have a little smartness to know good and bad. Therefore, the kings and his wise men and women would be doing everything possible to perpetuate their rule and to protect their interests. To them, these are the good things to do and would be good for their rules and their interests. They would not have them if what they were doing were bad and would end their rules.

 

Given such a scenario, all kings and their empires would last forever. It must be. But history has proven all over and over again and again, that empires must fall through their foolish policies and stupid kings and stupid wise men and women. Now this must be a very difficult explanation to do.

 

Just look at the Americans and all the big and small countries, would they be doing things to destroy their countries and their rules? All of them must be putting up their best men and women and coming up with their best plans and policies to be better and better and not to run down their countries. They must sincerely believe that they are doing their best and they are the wisest. A few decades forward, some of these countries would have fallen into disaster. But how could that be when they thought they were doing everything right? They would even tell their people they were the smartest and their policies were the best for the people. They would not say anything that their policies, being the best, were for themselves and self preservation.

 

Would Singapore be an exception? We also have a govt that claims to be the best and with the best men and women running the country. You don’t have to agree to that claim. And the best men and women are telling the people they are the best and their policies are the best. By right, with the best men and women in charge, with the best policies, just listen to them telling the voters in Bukit Batok how good they are, how talented they are, I got goose pimples, Singapore will grow and prosper forever. SG100 will be better and is a matter of reaching there.

 

The verdict will be written by the historians in the future on why so many things they said were so obvious, stupidity of the highest degree, but the leaders and people of the day could not see them and keep praising them and self congratulating themselves. What are the historians saying about the Roman Empire, Chinese Empire, Japanese Empire, the European Empires and how they fell into oblivion? It must be a series of disastrous policies that were supposed to be good policies of clever men and women.

 

There is no exception in history, in the fall of empires. The so called clever men and women of the day would be written in history books as the same people that destroyed the empires with their stupid ways and failed policies. Funny isn’t it?

 

I keep knocking at my head, this cannot be. This cannot happen to Singapore. We have the best of the best men and women in charge and look at all their clever and brilliant policies. How can Singapore fell from grace in the charge of so many super talented men and women? I think there may be an answer, external factors.  Definitely the historians would not be putting the blame on stupid men and women and stupid policies of the day.  Nothing can go wrong with clever men and women and clever policies. It must be, or else it is so illogical.

 

What do you think?