I've seen a simpler version many times -- a chronically under-resourced group overworks itself until people leave and catastrophe strikes, and only then is it funded/etc.

I've seen it in the form of an employee desiring a negative outcome for the business because that outcome is tied to vengeance for another employee's perceived professional mistake.

E.g., "I'm not going to help that team because they need to feel the pain of the decision I didn't like."

Sometimes you just don't have ability to help. You are only observer and fail makes you happy, because you predicted it and you tried to stop it. But no one was listening.