It seems to me that you are blaming capitalism for a broader human phenomenon. After all, the conquistadors found and exploited the Americas due to improved ship building techniques long before the rise of the mercantile class. The aztecs slaughtered people in ritual sacrifice not for wealth, but for religion. Hell, smash-head-with-rock technology was invented in the stone age before “the means of production” even existed for someone to own them.

I have the utmost confidence in humanity’s ability to inflict terrible harm and injustices upon itself regardless of the economic system that happens to be in vogue at the time.