List of political conspiracies

In a political sense, conspiracy refers to a group of people united in the goal of usurping, altering or overthrowing an established political power. Typically, the final goal is to gain power through a revolutionary coup d'état or through assassination. A conspiracy can also be used for infiltration of the governing system.

A conspiracy is to be contrasted with a cabal. The two are similar but have quite different connotations; in contrast to a cabal, a conspiracy usually looks to overthrow a fixed power instead of usurping it from within.

A "Conspiracy theory" is a belief that a conspiracy has actually been decisive in producing a political event which the theorists strongly disapprove of.^[1]

Notable political conspiracies

• 1552 BCE - Apophis Kush Alliance against Egypt as attested to in the second Kamose stele^[2]
• 1st century BCE - Catiline conspiracies^[3]
• 44 BCE - Liberatores plot assassination of Julius Caesar to restore Roman Republic^[4]
• 65 CE - Pisonian conspiracy^[5]
• Late 15th century (1478) Pazzi conspiracy, which included the Pope^[6]
• 1506 - Conspiracy against the life of the brothers Alfonso I d'Este, Duke of Ferrara and Cardinal Ippolito d'Este, coordinated by their half brother Giulio d'Este and full brother Ferrante d'Este^[7]
• 1570 - Ridolfi plot against Elizabeth I of England^[8]
• 1583 - Throckmorton Plot to murder Elizabeth and replace her with her cousin Mary, Queen of Scots^[9]
• 1586 - Babington Plot, second major plot against Elizabeth, that led most directly to execution of Mary, Queen of Scots^[10][11]
• 1603 - Main Plot to remove James I of England and enthrone Arbella Stuart

— Bye Plot, leads to the execution of Sir George Brooke^[12]

• 1605 - Gunpowder Plot to blow up the House of Lords during the State Opening of Parliament as prelude to a popular revolt in the Midlands, during which James's nine-year-old daughter, Princess Elizabeth, was to be installed as the Catholic head of state; often called the Gunpowder Treason Plot; origin of Guy Fawkes Day^[13]
• 1749 - Conspiracy of the Slaves by Muslim slaves to kill Grand Master Manuel Pinto da Fonseca and take over Malta with the help of the Barbary states.^[14]
• 1788 - Anjala conspiracy^[15]
• 1832 - Georgian plot, assassination of the Russian imperial administration and restoration of the Georgian monarchy
• 1865 - Abraham Lincoln assassination plot, to include assassination of cabinet members^[16]
• 1898 - The Dreyfus Affair, a coordinated attempt to falsely accuse Alfred Dreyfus of treason^[17]
• 1903 - The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, presented as authentic text by the Tsar's secret police efforts to foment anti-Semitism^[18]
• 1914 - The Black Hand, a secret society controlled by Serbian Military Intelligence, coordinates the assassination of Franz Ferdinand, thus causing World War I.
• 1938 - Presumed Hitler Youth Conspiracy, NKVD case in Moscow involving some 70 arrests and 40 executions of teenagers and adults, later found to be baseless^[19]
• 1939 - Operation Himmler and its Gleiwitz incident, "False Flag" terrorism by Nazi Germany as pretext for invasion of Poland

— Shelling of Mainila, "False Flag" terrorism by USSR as pretext for Winter War^[20]

• 1943 - Bomb on Hitler's aircraft, an attempt on Adolf Hitler^[21]
• 1944 - July 20 Plot, attempt to assassinate Hitler with suitcase bomb, and then use Operation Valkyrie to grab power^[22][23]
• 1953 - 1953 Iranian coup d'état Anglo-American conspiracy under the names of 'Operation Ajax' (CIA ) and 'Operation Boot' (MI6)^[24]
• 1954 - Lavon affair Operation Susannah, "False Flag" terrorism by Mossad^[25]
• 1968 - The Markovic affair, French Secret Service Gaullist plot destabilise future president Georges Pompidou^[26]
• 1969 to 1972 Secret war in Laos, and Operation Menu in Cambodia, concealed from Congressional oversight^[27]
• 1972 - Watergate scandal, burglary and cover-up scandals^[28]
• 1982 - Fighting Solidarity^[29]
• 1984 - Brighton hotel bombing - attempted assassination of Margaret Thatcher and her cabinet by the Provisional IRA^[30]
• 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack^[31]
• 1987 - Iran-Contra Affair^[32][33]
• 1991 - Nayirah testimony to rally U.S. public support to launch the Gulf War^[34]

See also

• Conspiracy
• Conspiracy theory
• Secrecy
• Seditious conspiracy

References

1. Joseph E. Uscinski and Joseph M. Parent, American Conspiracy Theories (2014) excerpt
2. Hawass, Zahi, The Mysteries of Abu Simbel: Ramesses II and the Temples of the Rising Sun, The American University in Cairo Press, 2001, ISBN 977-424-623-3, p. 12
3. "The Catilinarian Conspiracy". ancienthistory.about.com.
4. "The assassination of Julius Caesar, 44 BC". eyewitnesstohistory.com. 2004.
5. "The Pisonian Conspiracy". nazoreans.com.
6. "The pazzi conspiracy". palazzo-medici.it.
7. "The year of Lucretia d'Este, Duchess of Ferrara". mmdtkw.org.
8. "Plots against Elizabeth I". elizabethfiles.com. 29 January 2010.
9. "Queen Elisabeth I". englishhistory.net.
10. "The Babington Plot". history-magazine.com.
11. "Anthony Babington and the Babington Plot". luminarium.org.
12. "Conspiracy". alienscientist.com.
13. "The Gunpowder plot of 1605". historylearningsite.co.uk.
14. Sciberras, Sandro. "Maltese History - E. The Decline of the Order of St John In the 18th Century" (PDF). St. Benedict College. Archived from the original (PDF) on 26 June 2015.
15. "Anjala Manor". spottinghistory.com.
16. "The Death of President Lincoln, 1865". eyewitnesstohistory.com.
17. "Emile Zola writes to Alfred Dreyfus at the height of the Dreyfus affair". shapell.org.
18. "Jews and Politics in the Twentieth Century: From the Bund to the Rise of the Nazis". Judaica in the Collections of the Hoover Institution Archives. Hoover Institution, Stanford University. 2004. Archived from the original on 2006-06-13. Retrieved 2006-04-28.
19. Hans Schafranek, Natalia Musienko, "The Fictitious 'Hiter-Jugend' of the Moscow NKVD" in: Barry McLoughlin, Kevin McDermott (Eds.), Stalin's Terror: High Politics and Mass Repression in the Soviet Union. Palgrave MacMillan (2003), p. 208ff. ISBN 1-4039-0119-8. Retrieved November 24, 2011
20. "Operation Himmler". 911review.com.
21. "The Valkyrie Conspiracy". valkyrie-plot.com.
22. "The 20 July bomb plot - a summary". historyinanhour.com. 20 July 2010.
23. "The July bomb plot". historylearningsite.co.uk.
24. "Operation Ajax: CIA, Muhammad Mossadeq, and the Shah of Iran". coldwar.org.
25. "Israel Military Intelligence: The Lavon Affair". jewishvirtuallibrary.org.
26. "Pompidou dans la tourmente". lexpress.fr. 26 July 2007.
27. "The history place". historyplace.com.
28. "What was the Watergate Scandal?". uspolitics.about.com.
29. "The fighting solidarity organization". sw.org.pl.
30. "Hunger strikes and the Brighton bomb". news.bbc.co.uk. 18 March 1999.
31. "A strange but true tale of voter fraud and bioterrorism". theatlantic.com. 10 June 2014.
32. "The Iran Contra Affair 1986–1987". washingtonpost.com.
33. "Iran contra affair". infoplease.com.
34. "How PR sold the war in the persian gulf". prwatch.org.

External links

Media related to Conspiracies at Wikimedia Commons