Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy,misc.legal,talk.politics.guns,talk.politics.misc,alt.politics.org.batf
From: [r--gn--r] at [rahul.net] (Ragnar Danneskjold)
Subject: Re: BATF intent on 2/28?
Date: Wed, 26 Jan 1994 17:33:40 GMT

Chris Blask ([c h risb] at [seachg.com]) wrote:
: You're not arguing with a bunch of Flag-Waving Blue-Blooded Die-Hard
: Patriots, here: quite a few of us would not be surprised to see arms of the
: gov't acting crazy.  So CONVINCE us!!  Tell us *why* the BATF *wanted* to
: kill those folks, what they had to *gain* by doing it on national TV, what
: their *plan* was, who ordered it...  

: I've seen some *stupid* actions by governments before, it's not like you
: have a lot of work to convince me, just SAY SOMETHING INTELLIGENT!!!  

: -chris blask

In a way it's too bad you X'd all the ted watch thread.  While the s/n 
ratio was kind of low, and there were lots of things repeated endlessly,
some excellent responses were written.  I will try to summarize the "BD 
supporters" position.

1.  Most BD supporters aren't really supporting the BD's, they're 
maintaining that the BATF and FBI acted illegally, immorally, and 
irresponsibly.
2.  The BATF was likely to suffer from budget cuts soon.  They were thus
motivated to have a highly publicized raid against an someone that could
be portrayed as a public enemy, a cult.
3.  In order to have this raid, the BATF trumped up enough evidence to
have a judge sign a *search* warrant.  There were some obvious faults with
the warrant, including references to the LA riots three weeks before they
occurred, and hearsay references to child abuse that the BATF had no 
jurisdiction over.  In fact, the BD's were accused of child abuse earlier,
and the case was dropped for lack of any credible evidence.
4.  The BATF showed up with over 90 agents, body armor, silenced machine
guns, and hand grenades in order to serve a search warrant.  These agents
may well have been known to be ATF agents by the BD's, but this is really 
irrelevent.
5.  This is where accounts differ:  BATF personnel say the BD's opened fire 
first, as soon as they took up positions.  Media personnel, and people 
that claim to have seen early video's generally claim the BATF started the
shooting.  Koresh is reported to have come to the front door to say there
were women and children inside and have been fired upon and wounded.  One
BATF agent was reported to have said he was made responsible "for taking 
care of Koresh".  One finds it hard to believe that "taking care of" in this 
case meaning "make sure he was not harmed".  I have two notes here - first,
how can the BATF begin to justify 90+ agents to serve a search warrant when
the BD's had a history of getting along fine with local law enforcement
agencies? Second, if the BATF actually had silenced machine guns, they could
have easily opened fire first without the media knowing it.  Why were
silenced machine guns necessary to serve a search warrant?
6.  After gun fire broke out, whoever started it, six (I think, it's from 
memory) BD's died, and four BATF agents died.  There are widespread reports
that three of the BATF agents died of cyclone bullets - which were only 
available to the BATF.  In other words three of the four were killed by
"friendly fire".  This is supported by the Texas Ranger observations of
BATF positions being taken directly down range from BATF "safe houses" with
lots of empty cartridges.
7.  After the initial shootout, which at least one poster alleges ended
simply because the BATF ran out of ammo, everybody collected their dead and
wounded and the seige began.
8.  The news media were all moved to a camp two miles away "For their own 
protection", despite the fact they were on the front lines during the shoot-
out.  People that don't fully trust the government point out that a half
mile would have been more than adequate for the media's safety, and two
miles out meant they could get no good pictures because of the heat in the 
desert.  The FBI took over negotiations at this point, and spooned out press
releases on a daily basis.  These releases were often conflicting with
each other and the actions that had already been observed.  Several lawyers
or reporters that weren't satisfied with this arrangement were arrested.

9.  The FBI ramped up a huge smear campaign.  The BD's were villified to
every possible group in America, to make sure no one had any sympathy for
spending millions of dollars pampering a bunch of child molesting, drug
manufacturing, illegal weapon stockpiling cultists.  By the time this drivel
was all broadcast by all the major networks most Americans were wondering
why we didn't just bomb the place.  Yet the pre-raid record says one
allegation of child abuse was investigated and dropped, their neighbors
considered them peaceful, the sheriff had arrested Koresh once by phoning
ahead to say he was coming, then he drove out and picked him up.  His
trial was thrown out when the jury deadlocked 9-3 in favor of aquittal.
Before the raid they were perceived a peaceful neighbors practicing an
odd religion.

10.  During the seige one BD was shot at by a sniper when he left the
compound.  This is reason enough to me not to surrender - if chasing a 
bucket of water is enough to get shot at, I would definately feel they 
were out to get me.  The BD's were referred to as hostages, yet they were
not detained by the BD's.  They requested interviews with the media and 
were denied.  They asked to show the media around, and to let them search 
for illegal weapons and were again denied.  It can certainly be debated, 
but one plausible explaination for this is the FBI/BATF knew there wasn't 
enough evidence to support the raid or seige and didn't want the media to 
broadcast it.

11.  Why didn't the BD's surrender during the seige?  Would you trust the 
FBI or BATF at that point?  After the smear campaign they put forth, and
lack of access to the media and very limited access to lawyers, how could 
you? While the negotiations between the BD's and the FBI weren't published
(to the best of my knowledge), a number of posters suggested they were
trying to arrange a surrender to the Texas Rangers, a law enforcement
agency with a better reputation.  An objective observer in hindsight can
say it was their best chance for survival, but this was their prophecy
coming true.

12.  During the seige the FBI trumped up charges about a meth lab in the
compound.  This was done because they wanted to use a real army tank, and
you can't use army weapons against US citizens unless it's part of the drug
war.  If, during the court actions going on the meth lab charges can be
shown to be baseless then charges of felony murder can be brought against
the FBI.  

13.  Despite the FBI's policies regarding this type of seige (official
policy is to wait them out) an assualt was planned to take place after 51 
days.  A plan was developed to try to smoke them out over a period of 48
hours.  The implementation of this plan, however, was accelerated to less
than ten hours.

14.  CS tear gas was used in an attempt to force the occupants out.  It was
pumped in for four or more hours.  CS tear gas is illegal to use in time of
war. Against our enemies.  In open space.  In an enclosed space it can be
deadly.  It is frequently dispersed with acetone, an extremely flammable
liquid.  Early reports from Reno said it was dispersed with acetone.  When
pointed out to her how stupid it is to pump acetone into an enclosed space
with coleman and kerosene lamps, she 'got better information' and amended
that to "dispersed with carbon monoxide".  We can only hope that she really
meant carbon *dioxide* as carbon monoxide is deadly in small concentrations.
One of the reasons given for the final assault was 'evidence of child abuse'
meaning 'Those god awful cultists are abusing the children. We have to save
the children!' CS tear gas is even harder on children than on adults.  It is
frequently fatal to them.  The adults were known to have gas masks. It was
incredibly irresponsible to assume the children had gas masks: their faces
are too small, too irregular, and changing too fast to believe any of them
had masks that would fit.  Yet the FBI used an army tank to pump CS tear gas
into the compound for hours "to save the children".

15.  While injecting CS tear gas into the compound the tanks knocked it
off the foundation, collapsed staircases and doorways.  The trap door to the
buried bus would not open, which would likely have saved many from the 
ensuing fire.  It will never be known for sure, but it's plausible that the
BD's couldn't have left once the fire started if they wanted to take their
chance getting shot once in the open.  Remember, this was Koresh's prophecy
coming true.

16.  A fire started.  No one but the BATF/FBI says it was part of a suicide
pact.  Some say the BATF/FBI deliberately set it, some say it happened
accidently.  Linda Thompsons tape aside, it can probably never be proved
exactly how the fire started.  My personal opinion is that the FBI was
criminally negligent in the means of the attack and the force used in the
assault, whether they set the fire to destroy the evidence or it was an 
lamp knocked over by their tank.

17.  Before the assault, local hospital personnel report calls suggesting 
they prepare for a lot of burn victims.  Before the assault the fire trucks
were ordered back to town, after being on site for the duration of the seige.
After the fire was well underway, the fire trucks were summoned, then they
were detained at a roadblock for 30 minutes.  By the time they were on the
scene there was no hope of stopping the blaze.

18.  After the place burns down the spin doctors take over.  The BD's are
said to have committed suicide in fine Jim Jones fasion.  After all, they
were a cult. Janet Reno "takes full responsibility".  Clinton "takes full
responsibility"  The FBI scours the ashes and bulldoze the remains in a
timetable so compressed that many say they were 'destroying the evidence'.
The treasury department issues a 1300 page scathing report on the BATF in
action, but (I believe, I've not seen an actual copy) fails to cite the BATF
for grandstanding or acting in an illegal manner.

19.  The trial begins.  Reported on the Internet, '11 tons of weapons were
introduced by the prosecution.  Numerous Texas Rangers on the stand 
testified under cross exam that all of the weapons introduced were 
completely legal in any quantity'.  I'm in search of the Jan 17 Newsweek,
which I'm told reports that 'over 100 assault weapons were introduced which
had been illegally converted to full auto, and over 1 million rounds of ammo
were found'.  Quite a difference - I'm trying to follow the trial and am 
concerned that none of the media is covering it at all.

I think that's a fair summary of about a megabyte of ted watch articles.
My personal belief is the BATF is criminally negligent in the death of 80+
BD's they tried to raid to protect their budget.  I believe they should
be tried for those crimes.  I don't believe the BD's were saints - I have
some difficulty with Koresh marrying multiple girls less than 15, if that
was the case.  There have been so many accusations/counter-accusations that
seperating fact from fallacy is very difficult at this point.

I hope you find this useful and non-ranting Chris.  I am suprised that 
others haven't posted more or all of this in responsed to your note already.
I guess they're all burned out from flaming Ted and Adam, who are both
unlikely to write a response like this.  Their view appears to be 'Sure,
the government made a few mistakes, but the initial raid and the final
assault were well founded'.

--- Ragnar
-- 
Ragnar Danneskjold <[r--gn--r] at [rahul.net]>