M: Recent actions by the US administration have prompted this question… There have been a few empire declines in history – or if not an empire, more localized declines – whose source has seemed sort of mysterious. Can you identify a few whose downfall could be potentially traced to a leader Who, while not having the type of cultural megaphone that Donald Trump has, could possibly or even probably be traced to a leader who convinced everyone they were doing a great job right up until the point where everything fell apart?

G: Yes—there are multiple historical cases where empires or states declined under the leadership of figures who projected competence or stability, even as they either accelerated or failed to halt collapse. These leaders weren’t necessarily flamboyant demagogues like Donald Trump, but they did often create an illusion of control or prosperity. Here are some relevant examples:

1. Emperor Honorius (Western Roman Empire, early 5th century)

2. Nicholas II (Russia, early 20th century)

3. Louis XVI (France, late 18th century)

4. Ferdinand Marcos (Philippines, 1965–1986)

5. Mobutu Sese Seko (Zaire/Congo, 1965–1997)

Honorable Mentions:

Summary Criteria:

These figures:

In contrast to Trump, many were quieter autocrats or traditional rulers—less noisy, more “respectable”—which may have made their delusions even more dangerous to institutional awareness.

M: You seem to have the point, but I’m looking for something a little bit more unknown, the things where people haven’t quite gotten to grips with the cause of the decline. I wasn’t as clear as I could have been with the description of the situation: I’m looking for situations where the decline of the dominance – whether international or simply regional, but notable – is considered somewhat mysterious, but would be explainable if you assumed that not just the leader, but the elite and even a significant portion of the peasant class, started to believe some degree of bullshit regarding the wisdom of the leadership approaches despite it being obvious that approach wouldn’t work (and I mean the kind of obvious that would have been clear to a contemporary, not just from our 21st century armchair).

G: Ah—thank you. That clarification sharpens the request: you're not just looking for collapse under seemingly competent rulers, but for collapses whose causes seem mysterious or overdetermined, yet may be best explained by a collective buy-in to elite delusion. These are cases where people at every level ignored warning signs—not out of fear, but out of belief—and where this widespread cognitive capture might explain what still confuses historians.

Here are several historical candidates where that kind of phenomenon may have occurred:

1. The Bronze Age Collapse (~1200 BCE, Eastern Mediterranean)

2. Ming Dynasty’s Decline (especially early 1600s China)

3. The Maya Collapse (Southern Lowlands, ~800–900 CE)

4. Easter Island (Rapa Nui, ~1600–1720 CE)

5. The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (late 1700s)

6. Songhai Empire (West Africa, 15th–16th century)

Honorable Mentions:

Common Pattern:

In each case:

This maps well to a Trumpian delusion model: not autocracy or incompetence alone, but a critical mass of society believing a failing formula still works—even loving it more as it fails.

Let me know if you want more from the modern era or less canonical cases.