Branch Davidian 10th Anniversary

[Mojotronica]

Jay,

For what it's worth I think the condemnation of DK in this thread is an ends-justify-the means rationalization. I choose to ignore those arguments as (mostly) speculative.

The ATF and Attorney General made mistakes. I don't think they wanted it to end in the fiery conflagration, but they pumped potentially flammable tear gas into the compound. Did the Davidians purposely light it, or was the fire an accident?

It depends on if you believe the survivors, who claim that they did not intentionally ignite it. But maybe the fire was set by one or two of them who are now dead...

The gov't only admitted that the tear gas was potentially flammable years after the fact. The obfuscation of that information is hard to swallow.

Worst-case scenario (and one many people actually believe) -- the gov't set the fire deliberately to burn down the church and murder the children, just like the villain in "The Patriot."

Second worst-case scenario -- the gov't recklessly endangered the lives of the Davidians by putting potentially flammable tear gas in the compound. The gov't says it was not flammable enough to ignite without a conscious, concerted effort on the part of the Davidians.

 

[onejayhawk]

I was watching the coverage live, so I have a real time perspective. They were making the point as the tanks moved in that they were using a special nonflammable tear gas. It looked at the time like the fire started in two widely spaced places at once. I personally feel that the people inside set the fire. They obviously had had enough time to think about it.

The most likely case is that the government recklessly endangered its own people and the people in the compound by using vastly excessive or vastly inadiquate force, depending on your reading of their intent. They did so on the flimsiest of pretexts with intent to persecute a religious minority for practicing their religious beliefs. They did so in the face of an established history of volentary compliance with legal requests.

I say again, consider the outcry if this had been a group of black militants in the 1960's.

J