What if Fredo Replaced Michael Corleone & Became The Godfather? Was this Hyman Roth's Plan?

have you ever thought what would have happened if michael was taken out leaving fredo in charge of ruling the corleone family mafia empire what if hyman roth's plan did indeed follow through and michael wasn't that lucky what exactly would have happened to the corleone family dynasty let's find out how don fredo would have handled being the dawn and what would be the repercussions of his reign [Music] there are two possible scenarios that could have led to the glorious reign of don fredo the first being if for some reason he was allowed to take over by veto either because michael was still in hiding or was in the car with apollonia so the more likely scenario and one that almost happened would have been following the hit orchestrated by none other than the cunningheim and roth where he would have taken out michael the last real corleone even though fredo seems to have been unaware of the hit on michael rather just wanted a piece of the deal to prove himself but it is possible that this would have been part of the deal with roth and johnny ola where he would help them take out michael so that he could take over as dawn hyman roth's plan was very elaborate and had been in preparation for years waiting for the right opportunity we analyzed in one of our previous videos hyman roth's motives behind why he wanted to destroy the corleone family but here is the summary in the years following the death of his close friend and business partner mo greene roth accepted the situation and continued on as usual so when he turned up dead i let it go but he had never truly forgotten about this and swore to avenge his friend however roth was very machiavellian and extremely intelligent he did indeed know exactly who was responsible but he waited for the perfect opportunity and the perfect opportunity would soon present itself hyman roth and his right-hand man johnny ola had major interests in las vegas and so when the young and ambitious michael corleone made his presence known in nevada it seemed that fate had finally gave roth the opportunity he was yearning for but it was not going to be easy and so he began implementing his master plan his plan consisted of three major steps step one the smoke screen in the 48 laws of power law 3 emphasizes the importance of deceptions to disguise your actions always conceal your intentions if you keep people off balance and in the dark they can't counter your efforts send them down the wrong path with a red herring or create a smoke screen and by the time they realize what you're up to it will be too late for them to interfere in this case his smoke screen was the havana deal the deal was indeed legitimate which is why michael believed him step two infiltrating the corleone family step 3 take him out for the final step of his plan roth decided that the perfect moment to strike was after anthony's communion where he knew his guard would be down so from roth's perspective the havana deal was not even part of the equation rather something to lure out michael hiding his real intentions so that he could take him out but when michael miraculously survived roth adapted and saw an opportunity to re-strategize and finish him off once and for all which is why roth was extremely frustrated and broke his character by letting michael know what he was truly thinking it was clear to michael that the 2 million roth wanted was the only reason he was holding back before i reach my hotel i'll be assassinated the money's on the table i'll know i have a partner but isn't i'll no i don't but now let's see what would have happened if roth's assassins had actually succeeded the first time and michael never made it to havana after michael was taken out the corleone family would be in complete disarray fredo being the underboss would be expected to take over but there is a huge problem fredo was not well known for his leadership qualities or even his tactical and strategic brilliance his reputation preceded him in the worst way possible so the question is why did michael put him as his underboss an extremely powerful position basically the second highest rank in the mafia was this a sign of michael's failure to read or understand people maybe even his first major mistake well not quite although it seemed that the only reason michael put fredo in this position was that he was his brother and didn't want to hurt his ego even more but it's actually quite brilliant in the mafia the rank of underboss is of vital importance to the family but more importantly they wield tremendous amounts of power and influence over the family so after clemenza had passed from a supposed heart attack and michael needed to appoint a new underboss he needed to make sure whoever it was would show absolute loyalty to him and not want to even think about betrayal or breaking off the family so instead of giving this position to one of the more obvious and capable candidates he gave it to someone he knew he could easily control someone who would never think of or have the ambition let alone the capability to pull off a coup someone of his own blood who surely would never betray him and if somewhat it worked michael had limited the power of his top men so that all the power was held by him but also to make sure he wouldn't hurt his older brother's reputation and ego even more he gave him some responsibility and status to at least salvage the corleone family name michael trusted very few people but even with his most trusted men he would not be completely open with them in everything so now fredo is the godfather and now with freda with the helm of the most powerful criminal empire in the country or even the world everyone would now watch this once mighty empire be decimated but in fredo's mind he can now finally prove that he really is smart not like everybody says like dumb i'm smart and i want respect from within the corleone organization it would only be a matter of time until the soldiers all the way to the capos would either defect or join a different family where they were going to get as far as possible from this catastrophe even with tom and the other high ranking members trying to hold things together they simply would not be able to even when michael had taken over everyone had doubts of his capabilities to be the dawn and wasn't long before some of the highest ranking members began to switch sides and this is with the fact they recognized michael was intelligent and even a war hero also sharing various qualities similar to veto but even then that was not enough to convince someone like salvatortecio one of the original founders of the corleone mafia family a loyal friend of vito had no faith in michael's ability so you can imagine what the reactions would be if fredo announced himself as the new dawn once word gets out this would be the greatest news that they could wish for old rivals to newcomers all would want a piece of this crumbling empire so they will start circling the corleone family until they decide to strike looking at someone like fredo his reign would be so short-lived that he would not even have time to make any major decisions it's even likely that once he realizes what he had done he would just run away as far as possible leaving everything in a bigger mess than before but in the beginning he would start getting briefed by tom of the current situation he would then make all the possible wrong decisions until he reaches the point where the consequences of his actions have to be answered for in this scenario the person in the toughest position is not actually fredo who at this time is delusional and the weight of this responsibility is slowly weighing on him but it's actually tom hagan who now is in deep trouble by now tom would have realized fredo had some involvement and concluded what exactly happened in the assassination of michael but now he is in a serious dilemma tom has to make a decision and quickly either he lets fredo take over and watch the family slowly crumble and at least give fredo the chance to prove himself or he should take things into his own hands and save the family and that would entail taking out fredo and stepping up to become the dawn as we mentioned his reign would almost certainly be very short-lived and even though he will enjoy the first few days soon everything would crumble around him but before he loses control hyman roth and johnny ola would continue to manipulate him a while longer extracting everything they want from the corleone empire before throwing him away and we all now understand how machiavellian hyman roth was and so he would follow his principles machiavelli states that people should either be caressed or crushed if you do the minor damage they will get their revenge but if you them there is nothing they can do if you need to injure someone do it in such a way that you do not have to fear their vengeance and since roth would not want to risk retaliation from the corleone family he would then attempt to crush them completely but before then tom hagan would have probably forced fredo out and taken over himself and so tom must now take on hyman roth at the same time he is trying to fend off the countless enemies trying to rip apart the corleone family in which is literally at its most vulnerable so i'm going to leave it up to you who would win hyman roth or tom hagan [Applause] you

Channel: The Culture Mafia

Views: 210,510

Keywords: the godfather, al pacino, michael corleone, fredo corleone, the godfather part 1, the godfather clip, the godfather theme, mafia, marlon brando, mafia documentary, families of the mafia, goodfellas, godfather, michael franzese, the culture mafia, don corleone, lucky luciano, cosa nostra, mafia boss, the real life godfather, Hyman roth, real life mobsters, real life mobster movies, entrepreneur, mafia business, francis ford coppola, don vito corleone, Meyer lansky

Id: LVQ3MZdtKlQ

Length: 9min 37sec (577 seconds)

Published: Mon Dec 27 2021