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They killed twenty-eight kids. This suggests that "going after" the compound was not really about the welfare of any children. They could have hardly performe

They killed twenty-eight kids. This suggests that "going after" the compound was not really about the welfare of any children. They could have hardly performed worse in said child welfare unless they had made an itty-bitty Dachau and ran the kids through it.

bacchusracine 3y ago
>They killed twenty-eight kids. >This suggests that "going after" the compound was not really about the welfare of any children. Not just that, but given the way things played out repeatedly (not just Waco, Ruby Ridge, the Elián González situation, etc) it's hard to believe much of what the FBI asserts happened in those cases. It's too difficult to not see some higher up putting their fingers on the scale and trying to whitewash what happened after the fact. What little we do know seems to really reek of REMFer controls over what was allowed to happen. And who can forget the infamous images of some of the agents standing over the ashes with grins? No the official story on Waco is one of the things that I cannot take at face value. It certainly didn't help going to public school and hearing about the events while attending a church that had an (undeserved) reputation due to busybodies who made up stories. I grew up sincerely wondering if one day the government was going to show up at my church one Sunday. For all that we're told the Branch Davidians were a cult (and certainly it sounded like they were depending on the sources you read up on) they had all the trappings of being just another church. It is only because we were told that they were cultists, that we were told they were child abusers that we mostly didn't wonder at how the government was acting towards a CHURCH, a place of WORSHIP. It's a serious blindspot, compounded by the fact that it was the government, their accusers who were responsible for all these deaths. Yeah, I've got questions.
sillystuff 3y ago
Waco was a difficult situation. The authorities claimed a belief that doing nothing could lead to a mass suicide[1] (really a mass murder/suicide due to the children). This belief may have been reasonable based on the apocalyptic beliefs central to this Christian cult. But, the authorities when discussing the decision to go on the offensive with an armored vehicle punching holes into the buildings and firing teargas canisters into those holes made claims that seem contradictory. The authorities said that they were aware that the Dividians possessed enough gas masks for all the adults, but that they hoped that "motherly instincts" would take over, and the parents would allow the children to flee[1]. I don't see why they would believe this, if they believed the Dividians were capable of murdering their children in a mass murder suicide. Money is usually a factor in all things in the US. Perhaps cost was a factor in attempting to end the stand-off? Neighbors seemed to be becoming fatigued by the standoff too. An even more protracted siege may have ended better, or the Dividians might have chosen murder+suicide rather than surrendering no matter how long they were given. Wikipedia article[2] states: "Of the 85 Branch Davidians in the compound when the final siege began, 76 died on April 19 in various ways, from falling rubble to suffocating effects of the fire, or by gunshot from fellow Branch Davidians.[34] The siege had lasted 51 days." But, skimming through that 34th citation[3], I didn't see anything that stated that Davidians were killed by gunfire from other Davidians (perhaps I missed it, but I don't think so). But, it and the LA Times article report on fire investigators who found various fire accelerants including kerosene and lighter fluid in multiple locations and on multiple members of the Christian cult. And, quite the armory of weapons including over a million spent round casings (many firearms illegally modified to be fully automatic) in the possession of the Davidians. I heard an interview with an divinity scholar who said he and others had tried to reach David Koresh to try to convince him that his reading of the Apocalypses was incorrect (IIRC these attempts included messages delivered through advertisements taken out with local media). They believed that if they could convince Koresh he would end the standoff. Having interacted with religious zealots, this seems naive to me, but it certainly would have been worth trying. (I cannot remember the divinity scholar's name and my vague subject searches did not return anything useful) [1] https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-04-20-mn-25027-story.html https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-04-20-mn-25027-... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Branch_Davidians https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Branch_Davidians [3] (this is wikipedia article citation #34) https://web.archive.org/web/20170511015809/https://www.justice.gov/publications/waco/report-deputy-attorney-general-events-waco-texas-aftermath-april-19-fire https://web.archive.org/web/20170511015809/https://www.justi...

bacchusracine 3y ago

>They killed twenty-eight kids. >This suggests that "going after" the compound was not really about the welfare of any children. Not just that, but given the way things played out repeatedly (not just Waco, Ruby Ridge, the Elián González situation, etc) it's hard to believe much of what the FBI asserts happened in those cases. It's too difficult to not see some higher up putting their fingers on the scale and trying to whitewash what happened after the fact. What little we do know seems to really reek of REMFer controls over what was allowed to happen. And who can forget the infamous images of some of the agents standing over the ashes with grins? No the official story on Waco is one of the things that I cannot take at face value. It certainly didn't help going to public school and hearing about the events while attending a church that had an (undeserved) reputation due to busybodies who made up stories. I grew up sincerely wondering if one day the government was going to show up at my church one Sunday. For all that we're told the Branch Davidians were a cult (and certainly it sounded like they were depending on the sources you read up on) they had all the trappings of being just another church. It is only because we were told that they were cultists, that we were told they were child abusers that we mostly didn't wonder at how the government was acting towards a CHURCH, a place of WORSHIP. It's a serious blindspot, compounded by the fact that it was the government, their accusers who were responsible for all these deaths. Yeah, I've got questions.

sillystuff 3y ago

Waco was a difficult situation. The authorities claimed a belief that doing nothing could lead to a mass suicide[1] (really a mass murder/suicide due to the children). This belief may have been reasonable based on the apocalyptic beliefs central to this Christian cult. But, the authorities when discussing the decision to go on the offensive with an armored vehicle punching holes into the buildings and firing teargas canisters into those holes made claims that seem contradictory. The authorities said that they were aware that the Dividians possessed enough gas masks for all the adults, but that they hoped that "motherly instincts" would take over, and the parents would allow the children to flee[1]. I don't see why they would believe this, if they believed the Dividians were capable of murdering their children in a mass murder suicide. Money is usually a factor in all things in the US. Perhaps cost was a factor in attempting to end the stand-off? Neighbors seemed to be becoming fatigued by the standoff too. An even more protracted siege may have ended better, or the Dividians might have chosen murder+suicide rather than surrendering no matter how long they were given. Wikipedia article[2] states: "Of the 85 Branch Davidians in the compound when the final siege began, 76 died on April 19 in various ways, from falling rubble to suffocating effects of the fire, or by gunshot from fellow Branch Davidians.[34] The siege had lasted 51 days." But, skimming through that 34th citation[3], I didn't see anything that stated that Davidians were killed by gunfire from other Davidians (perhaps I missed it, but I don't think so). But, it and the LA Times article report on fire investigators who found various fire accelerants including kerosene and lighter fluid in multiple locations and on multiple members of the Christian cult. And, quite the armory of weapons including over a million spent round casings (many firearms illegally modified to be fully automatic) in the possession of the Davidians. I heard an interview with an divinity scholar who said he and others had tried to reach David Koresh to try to convince him that his reading of the Apocalypses was incorrect (IIRC these attempts included messages delivered through advertisements taken out with local media). They believed that if they could convince Koresh he would end the standoff. Having interacted with religious zealots, this seems naive to me, but it certainly would have been worth trying. (I cannot remember the divinity scholar's name and my vague subject searches did not return anything useful) [1] https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-04-20-mn-25027-story.html https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-04-20-mn-25027-... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Branch_Davidians https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Branch_Davidians [3] (this is wikipedia article citation #34) https://web.archive.org/web/20170511015809/https://www.justice.gov/publications/waco/report-deputy-attorney-general-events-waco-texas-aftermath-april-19-fire https://web.archive.org/web/20170511015809/https://www.justi...