When Europe had its chance at running the world (...) they were a "tad" bit more ruthless than we are now.
What an insane post!
Not that insane, Milo.
Here's a well-known photo - I'm sure you saw it, but maybe you forgot. We forget easily...

In the photo we see a Congolese man named Nsala, looking at the severed hand and foot of his 5-year-old daughter, named Boali.
Back then villagers were forced to meet rubber quotas under threat of violence and colonial agents, working for King Leopold II of Belgium, routinely cut off hands to prove killings or punish failure to meet quotas. Nsala's wife and daughter were murdered after their village failed to deliver enough rubber.
Forced labour, systematic mutilation, chicotte flogging (often resulting in death), mass hostage system, racial hierarchy enforced by law - and it's just Belgian Congo.
You are an educated Brit, Milo, so you surely remember how your fellow countrymen quelled rebellions in India and Kenya (e.g. Amritsar and Mau Mau), and how millions died in colonial famines exacerbated by famine-inducing policies. You know what the French did in Algeria and Madagascar. You also know that before Germans decided to exterminate Jews, Slavs and Gypsies, they managed to wipe out about 80% of the Herero and 50% of the Nama populations.
So, when Bobko says that Europeans were a "tad" more ruthless, he's not being insane - he's understating the case.