Russian school siege: 200+ hostages

The Russian school was surrounded by soldiers with automatic weapons and radio coms.
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The problem was, that it wasn't sufficiently contained even on the third day.

How much of a screw up that was aside, we should be thinking about all these problems because the first twenty four hours of a similar crisis here could be just as badly handled. Stop and consider this, Beslan is not a major city. Its population as of 2000 was 34500. How many of US police agencies, in towns of similar size, are prepared for a hostage barricade of this size or character? Two hundred to a thousand hostages? Flipping through the old atlas, here are some US cities about the size of Beslan. (the atlas is a few years old, but it gives you an idea)
  • DeKalb IL
  • Jackson MI
  • Cape Giradeau MO
  • Scribner NE
  • Beaver Creek OH
  • Bartlesville OK
  • Matagorda TX
I submit to you that in such a crisis, the question is not whether citizens with rifles will show up, but how the overwhelmed agencies involved will manage the problem. We are fortunate in that Al-Qaeda has been fixated on New York, and other major cities thus far.

Edited to add: If I missed a digit pulling the examples out of the atlas in a hurry I apologize in advance, I was working quickly to illustrate that this didn't happen in a major urban center. Thanks.
 
As I said, different tactics. One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. I'd agree though that the line should be drawn at children. Adults citizens from the controlling regime are arguably not "innocent" if they support the gov't that oppresses the independence. But children, c'mon....
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This implies that it is acceptable for those Iraqis opposing the US invervention to kidnap and behead any civilian working for the US forces or interim government.

Oddly enough, in a speech on June 14, 1971, John Kerry stated that Ho Chi Minh was the George Washington of Vietnam.
 
Well, it's now obvious to me what any sensible citizen would do:

Go down to the school, bank, whatever. Use your private firearm to attack and kill the incompetant police, take their weapons, and then you and the rest of the posse can storm the place yourselves. Obviously, the emotional intensity and good intentions of parents and friends will result in zero hostages injured, and a 100% terrorist death rate. :o



If anything, the Russian soldiers in this, particular, situation were not undergunned. They might have been out of their league and outwitted, but mobs are usually not known for their intelligence.
 
This is a very sad event. Only monsters could do something like this. The Russians did all they could to free those kids, while the terrorist did as much as they could to kill those poor kids. It is just tragic.

For me personally I don’t think there was a good way to end this. I do not think the terrorist wanted a peaceful way to end this. The cease-fire was to lure the Russian’s force into the killing zone so they could begin the slaughter. The terrorist wanted to take as many with them as possible and use the situation as a political message against the Russian’s government.

This kind of thing is a wake up call for the USA. It might happen in our country and I think LEA should train for a no win situation like the one we just witnessed in Russia.
 
If anything, the Russian soldiers in this, particular, situation were not undergunned.
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I haven't seen anyone suggesting that they were, the failure to establish an adequate perimeter by the third day is obviously an IC problem, not a firepower problem. On the other hand, if you believe the early hours of a similar terrorist attack here in the US would be better organized, I have a bridge to sell you. Early on, an attack like this one will not be recognized as a terrorist event. Information and reports will be fragmentary, and contradictory. First responding officers will most likely be confronted with what appears to be an active shooter scenario. Consequently, the outer perimeter will not be their first priority.

Pretending that we don't need to discuss the problem because you think it is a bad idea, is a really bad idea.
 
Pretending that we don't need to discuss the problem because you think it is a bad idea, is a really bad idea.
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Huh?

The problem I'm discussing is whether it's a good idea for civilians to feel the right to shoot at criminals during a police controlled hostage situation.

Is that what you're in favor of?
 
The early stages of a terrorist incident, similar to what happened in Beslan will not be "controlled" for many hours. The question is not whether armed citizens should be shooting over an established perimeter, it's how a smaller agency will deal with the armed citizenry that turn up in the middle of things during the first chaotic hours. I believe the problem is getting shortchanged in the active shooter training most likely to be applied.
 
I am surprized (or maybe not) that so many people are not familiar with the Whitman shooting incident.
 
Surprisingly there were no ambulances on standby at the school. The children were driven to hospitals in private vehicles. Regardless of the size and experience of the local law enforcement, this was a serious oversight. Commanders seem to have let themselves be overwhelmed with the situation rather than controlling what they could.
 
Maybe there weren't enough ambulances to have them sit for three days, but that certainly would have been nice to have at least military aid vehicles.
 
I am surprized (or maybe not) that so many people are not familiar with the Whitman shooting incident.
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That was a bit before LAPD started the first SWAT team and long before the spread of such teams throughout the USA and elsewhere. If this had happened in, say, 1968, your statement may have had relevance.
 
Destructo6,

The emergence of SWAT teams hardly has anything to do with people doing what they can, with what's available to them, in the absence of anyone else - or the inability of anyone else to fix the problem.

SWAT teams have to be organized and deployed, and in the case of thousands of smaller cities and towns do not exist even in 2004. If the State having jurisdiction has it's act together it will have one on standby; but it still must be deployed.
 
The point is, there was a tactical team deployed. I would agree that in initial stages doing what you can with what you have is better than nothing. But, once the guys with the gear (comm most of all) and coordination arrive en mass, it's better to let them have the ball, if nothing but to keep good guy identification confusion to a minimum. After all, the goal is to take out the bad guys and rescue the hostages, not duke it out with each other.
 
Agreed, in theory. But Russia is not the United States, and even here in the United States many might argue that the boys with the gear, communications and command haven't always been on the ball. Columbine is a good example here.
 
What would happen if armed civilians showed up at a bank robbery?
Do a search for Coffeyville, Kansas and read about what happened to the Dalton gang when they tried to hit the banks there. If you happen to be reading a history of the Dalton gang then the account would be at the end of the book... where the Dalton gang gets wiped out by the townspeople.
 
I'm gonna have to on that one. I'm sure that if you really believe that, there is no problem I could ever help you with. Too far gone.
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he's quite correct. after all little russians grow into big ones. actually just come back from russia, nice place.
 
Speaking of organizational problems...

It would appear that this incident is going to result in the belated creation of a Russian Incident Command System. It will be interesting to see how it compares to our ICS.

Third, it is essential to set up an effective, crisis management system, including a fundamentally new approach to the actions of the law-enforcement agencies.
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From Vladimir Putin's Saturday Address
 
First Freedom - you say their tactics are different. OK, let's set aside the attack on school children. What's your take on the theatre they took in Moscow? Furthermore, even if some Patriots and Tories were brutal (and that can't be denied) towards against other, can you refresh my memory where women were killed because of their political loyalties during the Revolution?

If you want to read about brutalities, look at the fighting between the Indians and the settlers along the frontier. Now we have numerous incidents of women being killed and crying babies having their brains smashed against a tree. Probably the best known one today is the story of Jane McCrea whose fiance was a British officer. Two Indians were to deliver her safely to British lines and they fought over who should have the award of bringing her in safely. One resolved it by killing and scalping her. Opps. By the way, killing of frontiersfolks of all ages and gender occurred before, during and after the American Revolution.
 
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