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Trust issues? You will after this... Join us as we examine history's most devastating acts of deception and treachery that changed the course of nations and lives forever. From political assassinations to cold-blooded espionage, these real-life betrayals prove that sometimes the deadliest enemies are those closest to you.
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00:00He goes, I'm fine, Stephanie, but it's my father. My father's done something really bad.
00:06Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for the most shocking acts of
00:10betrayal throughout history. We will only be including stories that are widely chronicled
00:14and unambiguously rooted in history, so allegory or biblical stories like Judas and Jesus will
00:20not be included.
00:21You, the...
00:23...at Lebar and Ash, in the shack.
00:30Number 10 – The Romanovs A 300-year-old dynasty came to an end
00:53in 1917 with the fall of the House of Romanov. The House ruled Russia since the 17th century,
00:59but it fell in a flurry of betrayals. Czar Nicholas II was forced to abdicate the throne under
01:05immense pressure from people he once trusted, including his top generals Alexeyev and Ruski,
01:11members of the Russian parliament, and even his cousin Grand Duke Mikhail Alexandrovich.
01:15General Ruski cannot answer for my troops. I implore his majesty to abdicate.
01:23Meanwhile, bodies like the aristocracy and military elite largely stood aside and even supported the
01:29provisional government that replaced him. The twisty story culminated on July 17th, 1918, when the Bolsheviks
01:36executed Nicholas II, his wife Alexandra, their five children, and four loyal servants in one of the most shocking
01:43assassinations of the 20th century.
01:45Number 9 – The Black Dinner
01:47I feel I've been remiss in my duties. I've given you meat and wine and music, but I haven't shown you the hospitality you deserve.
02:01On November 24th, 1440, William Douglas, the 6th Earl of Douglas, and his younger brother David,
02:08were invited to Edinburgh Castle for a banquet. The brothers were among the most powerful noblemen in
02:13Scotland, even rivaling the power of the young king, ten-year-old James II. The dinner was,
02:19ostensibly, a gesture of goodwill and reconciliation by the Scottish Regency Council, but it was really
02:25just a political power play. The Douglas brothers were seized during dinner, subjected to a mock trial,
02:40and then immediately beheaded in the castle courtyard. Killing guests at your own table was considered
02:45not only a major political crime, but a moral outrage. Sound familiar? Yep, George R. R. Martin
02:51later used this story as an inspiration for the Red Wedding. Mother. The Lannisters send their regards.
03:02Number 8 – The Moors Murderers
03:05And the next and most interesting thing about this death, and the thing that actually stops the whole
03:11cycle of killing, is that Ian told Myra to go and fetch David Smith. Between 1963 and 1965, couple Ian
03:19Brady and Myra Hindley committed the Moors murders, killing five young individuals and dumping their
03:25bodies in England's Saddleworth Moor. And it would have continued if it wasn't for Hindley's brother-in-law,
03:30David Smith. Ian Brady was close to Smith, and on October 6, 1965, Brady invited him to witness the
03:37murder of Edward Evans.
03:38Myra went and brought David Smith and brought him back to the house, whereupon Edward Evans was
03:44murdered in a very, very brutal fashion. He was much bigger, it was much harder to kill him,
03:49there was blood everywhere, it was a very, very nasty death. Smith watched Brady bludgeon him to
03:55death with a hatchet, and while he was horrified, he pretended to go along with Brady out of fear. He
04:00helped wrap Evans in plastic, then promised to return the next morning to take the body to Saddleworth
04:05Moor. Instead, he called the police, and they soon arrested Brady and Hindley. They both received life
04:11sentences. Brady had been grooming Myra's brother-in-law for several months, and was confident
04:15he could trust the 17-year-old to not only keep a secret, but also to become actively involved in
04:21their murderous plans. But Brady miscalculated David.
04:25Number 7. The Rosenbergs. Julius and Ethel Rosenberg went to the electric chair for stealing the secret of
04:31the atom bomb for the Soviet Union. The star witness for the prosecution was David Greenglass,
04:37who happened to be Ethel Rosenberg's brother. Julius Rosenberg worked as an engineer for the
04:43U.S. Army Signal Corps, and his wife Ethel was a former secretary. Both were committed communists,
04:48and secret spies working for the Soviet Union, although many have questioned Ethel's involvement.
04:53Ethel's brother David Greenglass was a machinist at the Los Alamos laboratory,
04:58and was recruited by Julius to provide information about the atom bomb, supposedly so he could send
05:03the information to the Soviet Union. At their trial, he described an evening he and his wife
05:08Ruth spent at the Rosenbergs New York apartment in 1945. He brought sketches and handwritten notes
05:15about the atom bomb with him, and after dinner, Greenglass told the court they got down to business.
05:21But in 1950, under pressure from the FBI investigators, Greenglass confessed to spying,
05:27and agreed to testify against his sister and brother-in-law in exchange for a lighter sentence.
05:31His testimony resulted in a guilty conviction for the Rosenbergs,
05:35and they became the first American citizens to be executed for espionage.
05:39How do you think history will remember you?
05:43As a spy that turned his family in.
05:46Do you care?
05:47Not particularly. I don't care.
05:49Number 6. Aldrich Ames
05:52Such was his importance to London and Washington that he met President Reagan,
05:57and was personally debriefed several times by Vice President Dan Quayle.
06:02But in the light of the Ames revelations, should this triumph for Western intelligence now be reassessed?
06:08One of the most damaging spies in American history, Aldrich Ames joined the CIA in 1962,
06:14and specialized in Soviet counterintelligence. As such, he had access to highly sensitive information
06:19about CIA operations and informants. But in 1985, Ames had a period of financial and personal difficulty,
06:26so he used this sensitive information against the US, and began spying for the KGB. He was paid
06:32millions of dollars in return for counterintelligence strategies, surveillance techniques, and the
06:37names of at least 25 double agents working inside the Soviet Union.
06:41And now we know from the FBI affidavit that Mr. Ames had received a payment of 6,000 pounds
06:51the 18th of May, just a few days after my recall to Moscow.
06:58Many of these spies were then arrested and executed. After an extensive investigation,
07:03Ames was arrested on February 21, 1994, and sentenced to life in prison, his work having
07:09significantly compromised national security. For nine years now, for nearly nine years,
07:14I've been guessing who was the man, who was the source, who had betrayed me. And I didn't know any
07:21answer. And now I'm pretty certain that it was him. Number five, Richard III.
07:27But yet I run before my horse to market. Clarence still breathes. Edward still lives.
07:36After Edward IV died in April 1483, his son Edward V became king, albeit very briefly. What followed
07:43was one of the most notorious power plays in English history. Edward's uncle, Richard III, was named Lord
07:49Protector to rule until the young king came of age. Instead, Richard placed Edward and his brother,
07:55Richard of Shrewsbury, in the Tower of London, ostensibly for their protection.
08:08Instead, Richard conspired to name Edward illegitimate, and therefore unfit for the throne.
08:13He then took the throne for himself, being crowned King Richard III on July 6th, 1483. The princes in
08:19the tower were never seen again, and many historians believe that Richard either had them murdered or
08:24personally killed them himself. The son of Terence have I pent up close. His daughter meanly have I
08:30matched in marriage. The sons of Edward sleep in Abram's bosom. And Anne, my wife, hath bid this world
08:38good night. Number four, Bernie Madoff. Yeah, this morning we want to show you an extra clip of the
08:44interview that did not make it on TV on Sunday, where Andrew Madoff talks about how he and his
08:48brother told the FBI about their father. American financier Bernie Madoff pulled off the most
08:53successful Ponzi scheme in history, costing investors billions of dollars. For years, Madoff ran
08:59this scheme through his seemingly legitimate business, Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, LLC.
09:05But the house of cards collapsed in December 2008, when Madoff informed his sons, Mark and Andrew,
09:11of the scheme. And the decision to turn him in, how did that evolve?
09:16Well, we knew right away that that was our only course of action.
09:23The brothers worked at the firm, but they were unaware of the fraudulent activities.
09:27They were shocked upon learning the truth, and immediately went to the authorities and reported
09:31their father. The next day, Madoff was arrested by the FBI. Making the story even more Shakespearean,
09:37Mark Madoff later took his own life, and Andrew died of cancer in 2014. Cancer he
09:43partly attributed to the stress of the dramatic ordeal. It was, she writes in her newly released
09:47memoir, too much for Mark to bear. On the two-year anniversary of Bernie's arrest, while at Disney
09:53World with her daughter and mother, Stephanie learns her husband hanged himself in their apartment.
09:59Number three, Robert Hansen. According to the Office of the FBI's inspector in general,
10:04we're quoting here, Hansen compromised some of the nation's most important intelligence and
10:09military secrets, including the identities of dozens of human sources, at least three of whom
10:15were executed. Arguably the worst Cold War spy, the Department of Justice called the work of Robert
10:20Hansen, quote, possibly the worst intelligence disaster in U.S. history. Hansen's spying lasted over
10:2620 years, spanning from 1979 to 2001. In that time, he compromised intelligence operations,
10:32revealed the identities of double agents, and turned over thousands of classified documents,
10:37all for Rolex watches and about $1.4 million in cash.
10:42This interagency group sat there looking at a fingerprint that was uncovered from a so-called
10:47dead drop. They were able to run that. That matched to Robert Hansen. As you see on your
10:51video screen there, he was eventually taken into custody by the FBI.
10:55After years of suspicion and multiple mole hunts, Hansen was arrested on February 18,
11:002001, and sentenced to life in prison. He spent the rest of his days at ADX Florence,
11:05an inescapable supermax prison in Colorado that houses the worst criminals in the country. He died
11:11there in 2023. The FBI once called him the most damaging spy in bureau history. And today,
11:18convicted former agent Robert Hansen has died in a federal prison.
11:222. Benedict Arnold
11:24In 1779, Benedict Arnold is a famed hero of the American Revolution. But a month after marrying 18-year-old
11:33Peggy Shippen, Arnold begins to plot treason. Born in 1741, Benedict Arnold was originally a hero of the
11:41Revolutionary War. However, he felt unrecognized and underappreciated, often being passed over for
11:47important promotions. By 1779, Arnold was deeply disillusioned with the American cause and began
11:53conspiring with the enemy, even offering to surrender West Point, a major American stronghold,
11:58to the British army. Stunningly, the plot was hatched by West Point's commander, and the war's greatest hero,
12:05general Benedict Arnold. When that specific plot failed, Arnold's deception was uncovered,
12:12and he fled, becoming a brigadier general in the British army. With them, Arnold commanded raids
12:17against the American forces he once led, and burned various cities to the ground. His name became
12:23synonymous with treason and betrayal in his Native America, but Arnold never faced justice. He retired
12:30to London after the war, and died there in 1801.
12:33General George Washington and his senior aides, including Alexander Hamilton,
12:38are in a state of shock. Before them are captured documents that reveal the most notorious act of
12:45treason in American history. Number 1. Julius Caesar and Brutus
13:06Do it. Et tu, Brute? You all know the line. It's become synonymous with betrayal,
13:15the most succinct manner of conveying the pain and surprise that comes with it. It stems from
13:19the assassination of Julius Caesar. Brutus was a Roman senator, known for his intense commitment
13:24to the ideals of the Roman Republic. Meanwhile, Julius Caesar had amassed incredible power,
13:30and many senators feared that he had aimed to become a monarch,
13:33thereby betraying the political values of the Republic.
13:36What are you waiting for? No! No! No!
13:40So, they betrayed Caesar and stabbed him to death in the Curia of Pompeii,
13:44with Caesar supposedly uttering,
13:46You too, child? after seeing Brutus among them.
13:49Brutus has remained a cultural symbol of moral conflict,
13:53torn between loyalty to a friend and duty to his country.
13:56Do you know of any other shocking betrayals? Let us know in the comments below!
14:17to be continued...
14:24We Kubik
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