I guess that depends on how you define “scientist”. I don’t want to play a game of semantics, but I do think there is a difference worth noting. I view scientists as those who gain new knowledge through experiments and observation. Applying that knowledge to earn profits, political power, or personal gains seems to fall outside of what I view to be science. The application of scientific knowledge would probably be better described as engineering.
Let’s use nuclear fission as an example. Fermi and others discovered that you could produce a run-away nuclear cascade that produced a lot of energy. At that point it could go in many directions. You could engineer a nuclear reactor to produce energy, or you could engineer a bomb. Is it a scientific decision of which to do? I don’t think so. It is a political and economic decision.
At the same time, I am not saying that scientists should not be held accountable for what they do. Most scientists are quite aware of ethics and how they apply to science. I have had to take training on those topics, in fact. There are also IRB’s that review the work of scientists to make sure the research is being done ethically, and those review boards include non-scientists from the community. Scientists do want accountability, and they have built oversight into the process of doing research.