I don't think Columbine was that simple as you think, there was not much time to gather the proper intel on the situation and get a plan together and start taking down the building.

So you go in searching the building for threat targets, you take one down they the other threat hears the gunfire, what if then in another room he decides to start shooting fellow students, how do you handle that.

In that situation you need to collapse the building and get the threats in one area so that they are easier to neutralize.

Quoted: It is never as simple as we can make it on monday morning.  Nor is columbine anythign like what happened in russi, other than it being school kids involved. Columbine was doable, Russia was a lost cause form the moment the terrorists got control. It just takes will I gather, the russian alpha teams that used their bodies to draw fire form the kids had the unfortnately right idea, one I woudl hope that the LEO's who ever have to face this situation remember.  Kids are more valuable that adults, it is a simple fact.

Two kids with pistols is MUCH different than dozens of terrorists with machine guns, explosives, and up to 1500 hostages.

If this is meant to be a kiddie pool discussion, then those of us with some common sense will leave. But if it is meant to be a serious discussion of what happened, then MAYBE just the people with some idea of what taking down a building actually involves or with enough common sense to see what is happening should comment.

MmmmmKay?

this would have happened here:

-delta/fbi/whoever would eventually storm the building - 100 of the hostages would be dead (instead of 400) lawyers would class action suit the delta/fbi/whoever for not saving ALL the hostages and the press woul slam the teams for not trying to negotiate more.  There would be an "inquiry" set up that prints out a 5000 page report stating the problems within the ranks and that they should give more money to lower class citzens while lowering taxes and GWB should be impeached .

tell me I am wrong

Quoted: Quoted: short of burning the place down, there is no way we could have done worse. Ummm.....Sure....kay..... Whatever you say man. How much time have you spent planning for an op like this to make you qualified to say that? This situation sucked. It could have very easily gone so bad that NOBODY would have come out alive. As it is, the Russians got most of the people out alive. That's pretty good given what they were faced with.

most are saying now the the death toll will be around 600, out of around 1,200.
all you have to do is look at the footage, the russians looked like a bunch of farm leaguers running around out there.
American counter-terrorist forces are much better trained and equipped, and would at least know how to set up a simple perimeter.

Quoted: Quoted: It is never as simple as we can make it on monday morning.  Nor is columbine anythign like what happened in russi, other than it being school kids involved. Columbine was doable, Russia was a lost cause form the moment the terrorists got control. It just takes will I gather, the russian alpha teams that used their bodies to draw fire form the kids had the unfortnately right idea, one I woudl hope that the LEO's who ever have to face this situation remember.  Kids are more valuable that adults, it is a simple fact. Two kids with pistols is MUCH different than dozens of terrorists with machine guns, explosives, and up to 1500 hostages. If this is meant to be a kiddie pool discussion, then those of us with some common sense will leave. But if it is meant to be a serious discussion of what happened, then MAYBE just the people with some idea of what taking down a building actually involves or with enough common sense to see what is happening should comment. MmmmmKay?

MMMMno.  WHy not read all of the thread, instead of jsut taking the one that gets your dander up. No apology when you realize the foolish mistake you made, MMMMMOkay?

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: short of burning the place down, there is no way we could have done worse. Ummm.....Sure....kay..... Whatever you say man. How much time have you spent planning for an op like this to make you qualified to say that? This situation sucked. It could have very easily gone so bad that NOBODY would have come out alive. As it is, the Russians got most of the people out alive. That's pretty good given what they were faced with. most are saying now the the death toll will be around 600, out of around 1,200. all you have to do is look at the footage, the russians looked like a bunch of farm leaguers running around out there. American counter-terrorist forces are much better trained and equipped, and would at least know how to set up a simple perimeter.

The russians were running around because a common thing happened:

Mr. Murphy showed up.

When those kids got loose, all plans went straight to hell.

Success in a situation like this requires precise coordination and exact timing. The Russians did not have the resources to pull off an op this large. Our hostage specialty teams in the US are geared to dealing with MUCH SMALLER situations. IF you had been able to assemble enough good operators on such short notice, and IF you had one single command, and IF you had enough time to come up with a plan, you MIGHT have been able to do better.

But then once those kids got loose, all plans go to hell. You have to move and move now, ready or not. An American op might have been a bit more sanitary, that is true. But there would still be a lot of dead kids. Maybe 50 less, probably a lot less than 50, but it would have still been ugly.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: I don't think anyone has really trained to handle situations with 1000+ hostages. Lessons learned: -Multiple levels of secure perimeters needed. -Assault team needs to be ready to go ASAP -Murphy's Law applies here (the explosions in the gym caused everything to go sideways) Another lesson is that the standard hostage operations book needs to get thrown out. When the terrorists want dead hostages, time is a luxury you do not have. You have to hit them as quickly as possible with as much as you can hit in the hopes that you can stop them before they harden their position. If the Ruskies had been able to mount something within 30 minutes of the takeover, they might have had a shot at a better situation. After that, however, it was pretty much a foregone conclusion. Exactly.  We nowknow that any plane that is being hijacked is a doomed flight that could take thousands more with it, we as airline passengers realize this, and I truley hope that we woudl all fight off a hijack attempt, and if they can't fight it off, lets hope the American public understands the hard choice the president has to make to shoot it down. Our LEO's need to move in on a moments notice now, if the russians had gotten inside before the Islamic terrorists planted their bombs, we would still ahve many dead kids, but surely, less dead kids than we have now. I am sure we will get to the point of having ready assault teams that can cover an area and hit within 10 or 15 minutes.  It will take a lot of dead kids to get othat point though.

What world are you living in 10-15min is no time at all to react, how long does it take a fire truck to show up. You will never have a team that can move that fast ever.

You must gather some intel when you get on-site to save as many lives as possible. You can not go running into a situation blind you are just asking for failure.

Quoted: I don't think Columbine was that simple as you think, there was not much time to gather the proper intel on the situation and get a plan together and start taking down the building. So you go in searching the building for threat targets, you take one down they the other threat hears the gunfire, what if then in another room he decides to start shooting fellow students, how do you handle that. In that situation you need to collapse the building and get the threats in one area so that they are easier to neutralize.

They were shooting fellow students, they did that until they gre tired of it.  You do not have the LEO's hiding behind armored personal carriers outside, they put their manly bodies out there, draw the fire and the rest of the teams kill the shooter.

This is a new metric we are dealing with here.  

Since you guys brought it up

<columbine mode>The Ruskies should have waited until the terrorists stopped blowing things up and stopped shooting, hopefully all committing suicide, before they determined it was safe enought to risk entering the building</columbine mode>

Quoted: MMMMno.  WHy not read all of the thread, instead of jsut taking the one that gets your dander up. No apology when you realize the foolish mistake you made, MMMMMOkay?

I was aiming the kiddie pool comment at all the "killed enough children lately" crowd, not you. I should have made that clearer.

You are partially right in that current doctrine is based on Columbine. But it would have become apparent very early on that we weren't facing the same problem and somebody would have had brains enough to figure on a new plan. That is my point about Columbine.

All things considered (far too many to list both pros and cons but the major points regarding training, armorment, dispersion, expolsives w/switches, size of tango force, mix of good-guy forces, willingness to die, etc.)it was a good op. What did they end up with 30% loss.(not trying to sound calloused, just realistic)

We can only HOPE that we would do as good when it happens here.

Quoted: Quoted: I don't think Columbine was that simple as you think, there was not much time to gather the proper intel on the situation and get a plan together and start taking down the building. So you go in searching the building for threat targets, you take one down they the other threat hears the gunfire, what if then in another room he decides to start shooting fellow students, how do you handle that. In that situation you need to collapse the building and get the threats in one area so that they are easier to neutralize. They were shooting fellow students, they did that until they gre tired of it.  You do not have the LEO's hiding behind armored personal carriers outside, they put their manly bodies out there, draw the fire and the rest of the teams kill the shooter. This is a new metric we are dealing with here.

Hielo got it right.

Quoted: What world are you living in 10-15min is no time at all to react, how long does it take a fire truck to show up. You will never have a team that can move that fast ever. You must gather some intel when you get on-site to save as many lives as possible. You can not go running into a situation blind you are just asking for failure.

No, you won't be able to react that fast. But in this situation that is the ONLY way this would have gone better. Once the bad guys gather their hostages and set their charges, it is game over. From that point on 50% loss of the hostages is a GOOD outcome.

That is why the terrorists did things this way. They used the hostage handbook against the Russian authorities.

Alot of well trained operators here that know just how easy it is to take down a building and take out threat targets mixed in with hostages.

It's just so simple as hey look at me, while my buddy shoots you.

Quoted: Alot of well trained operators here that know just how easy it is to take down a building and take out threat targets mixed in with hostages. It's just so simple as hey look at me, while my buddy shoots you.

????

Uh....Sure. If thinking that helps you sleep at night, go for it.

Quoted: Quoted: MMMMno.  WHy not read all of the thread, instead of jsut taking the one that gets your dander up. No apology when you realize the foolish mistake you made, MMMMMOkay? I was aiming the kiddie pool comment at all the "killed enough children lately" crowd, not you. I should have made that clearer. You are partially right in that current doctrine is based on Columbine. But it would have become apparent very early on that we weren't facing the same problem and somebody would have had brains enough to figure on a new plan. That is my point about Columbine.

You are exactly right Colmubine is not Beslan, not by a long shot.  Columbine is what we have to go by up until Beslan, Beslan is what our teams shoudl be training fro from now on (MUch like airlines as missles has changed alot of thinking).

Overwhelmig force, imeediately, not a half hour later is the only thing that coudl have helped.  Once the explosives are planted, it is no longer feasible to think the hostages are coming out (OR am I wrong here, I don't really know, 600 out 1200 people saved seems pretty damn good in my eyes).

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: MMMMno.  WHy not read all of the thread, instead of jsut taking the one that gets your dander up. No apology when you realize the foolish mistake you made, MMMMMOkay? I was aiming the kiddie pool comment at all the "killed enough children lately" crowd, not you. I should have made that clearer. You are partially right in that current doctrine is based on Columbine. But it would have become apparent very early on that we weren't facing the same problem and somebody would have had brains enough to figure on a new plan. That is my point about Columbine. You are exactly right Colmubine is not Beslan, not by a long shot.  Columbine is what we have to go by up until Beslan, Beslan is what our teams shoudl be training fro from now on (MUch like airlines as missles has changed alot of thinking). Overwhelmig force, imeediately, not a half hour later is the only thing that coudl have helped.  Once the explosives are planted, it is no longer feasible to think the hostages are coming out (OR am I wrong here, I don't really know, 600 out 1200 people saved seems pretty damn good in my eyes).

I agree. I think if you get 50% of the hostages out alive, you are doing good. The un-informed public may not think so, but they get their tactical information from Hollywood. The sad fact is that if a person is hell bent on killing people to the point that he has no problem dying himself, and if he is smarter than a doorknob, somebody will get hurt.

Something on this scale is too big for most any super-ninja unit in the US you want to name. Not to mention that you would have to actually get them from wherever they are to wherever they have to be BEFORE the terrorists figure out what is going on and blow the place up.

The only way to have stopped this was to stop it before it started. After the first 30 minutes, at least 50% of the hostages were dead IMHO.

No matter which way you look at this, it SUCKS. If this were to happen today in the US, there would be a lot of dead hostages and not much the .gov could do about it. And if someone does come up with a plan, I hope they have the good sense not to tell anyone so the bad guys don't figure a way around that.

A lot of planning went into this little shindig, that's for sure.

So let me get this right, If a SAS operator said that the outcome would have been hard to do better. Mind you this is a man that has trained for years to deal with this situation, but you guys have a better idea.

So you want to send in troops in to a building that they do not know were the threats are, and where the hostages are, if they have any booby traps. Also these troops do not know the lay out of the building in order to save lives.

How do you determine what is overwhelming force......... in the first 30 mins you are going to get alot of good intel and alot of bad intel.

It seems so simple since it was not your child that died or is left in a wheelchair. The truth is it will take almost 15 to 30 mins before you know thigs have started, if the had to those guys could have got the bombs ready much faster, most already had belts with devices on them already.

They could have set off those devices as soon as a assault began.

Quoted: So let me get this right, If a SAS operator said that the outcome would have been hard to do better. Mind you this is a man that has trained for years to deal with this situation, but you guys have a better idea. So you want to send in troops in to a building that they do not know were the threats are, and where the hostages are, if they have any booby traps. Also these troops do not know the lay out of the building in order to save lives.

No lets negotiate.  

Quoted: So let me get this right, If a SAS operator said that the outcome would have been hard to do better. Mind you this is a man that has trained for years to deal with this situation, but you guys have a better idea. So you want to send in troops in to a building that they do not know were the threats are, and where the hostages are, if they have any booby traps. Also these troops do not know the lay out of the building in order to save lives.

You were very correct with your previous assessment of some of the board.  I always love the nit picking of the pictures from OIF and OEF, those silly troops don't they know if they only did it this way or that it would be so much the better.

Quoted: More importantly How would the Fatbody Rapid Response Team from AR15.com handled it? They would have argued over what ammo, what sight, what length of barrel, what BDU, and which grip to use for the mission.

Now thats funny! Sad, but sooooo true.

Quoted: Quoted: More importantly How would the Fatbody Rapid Response Team from AR15.com handled it? They would have argued over what ammo, what sight, what length of barrel, what BDU, and which grip to use for the mission. Now thats funny! Sad, but sooooo true.

They would respond as soon as they got there Black Hills 77gr loads that is on backorder from GA Percision, or what was it M193 that we said we are going to use........ dam I brought the stuff in the white box, should I have the green followers or the orange, dam when are my magpul followers going to arrive.

But this is all after they decide the easiest question Aimpoint or Eotech

Overwhelming force doesn't work with terrorists who are committed to dying. It's an intimidation tactic designed to make one person or group surrender to a superior force's will without violence.

With the whole place rigged to go, you have to do something mentally, not physically, something unexpected that they had not considered. When you have them in the position of having to re-think their plans, then you have the opportunity to take them out, or do a deal as conditions and options permit.

Finesse the fuckers out of their socks.

(btw, the perimeter, or lack thereof, and friendly (townies) fire alpha team casualties are a demonstration of why the "this will never happen here, I'd get my .270 and go save my kid" idea is little more than idle musings, and likely counterproductive. Doesn't mean you don't love your kids, just that without intel & coordination, more likely to harm them than not.)

Intersting discussion.

Wiggy had good things to say, but one thing I disagreed with.

"- the fact that kids were specifically targeted reveals that these terrosits were not primarily interested in negotiations as they had to have known the outrage and resolve this action against kids would generate. In fact, this outrage may have been the desired objective from the beginning. This indicates that all manner of negotiations would have been unsuccessful."

Terrorists were willing to negotiate, but on unrealistic terms. I would say that kids WERE targeted because they figured it would be insane to storm the school. The Russians were pissed at the govt for gassing the theatre, and as much of the focus after that incident was placed on the govt as the terrorists. From a terrorist perspective, it was a very sucessful attack. Same thing here, the focus is again, more on the govt than on the terrorists. The terrorists in this case want Russia the hell out of Chechnya. If they just wanted a Russian body count, they would have blown up a building, or killed kids right away. At the very least, they wanted more attention, or wanted to spill some blood on the Russians hands as well, which is what they did. Either way, it gave the Russians time.

The Russians did have significant time to get a team in place. If terrorists want to storm and kill people, even if a SWAT team gets there in 15 mins and blitzes the building with no planning or run throughs, its going to be really bad.

However, I agree with other posters above SPEED KILLS!   Active shooters, GO GO GO! SWAT teams around the country need to learn how to blitz assault, and improvise without dry run throughs, before terrorists can setup defenseive positions. In a terrorist situation, it would basically be room clearing, though each subject would be immediately neutralized. There would also have to be training on booby traps, etc, but for the most part, I think SWAT teams know the basics. Columbine is an excellent example on a smaller scale. The cops blew that big time.

Three more comments.

1) Intelligence. Nothing can prevent an attack like this except knowing when and where it is coming. This is a tough balance though, once we start looking at domestic intelligence gathering - civil liberties could easily fall victim to increased intelligence gathering in the US. Stronger foreign intel is especially crucial.

2) Law suits. If this attack happened in America, the troops would be getting sued. People need to fucking learn to apprecaite the ones who save their lives. So by storming the building, a bunch of people died. Things could have been done better. Sure, they always can, and we never know what the turnout would have been if things were done differently. But damnit, these are dynamic situations, and are almost never going to have an ideal ending. If we start/keep suing departments, etc for this stuff, then next time they'll just sit back and let everyone get killed (and then get sued for that too).

3) Military AND diplomacy. Make these fuckers pay big time. The stuff we've done in Afghanistan and Iraq was poorly planned, and corners were cut for political reasons. We need to send people to all corners of the globe to covertly take out terrorists one at a time, and take out the people/governments who sponsor terrorism. We can't invade them all, so that' why we need to pitch the executive order banning assassinations. Mossad did a kick ass job after the 72 Olympics. They hunted these guys down, published their obituaries in the papers days before they were killed. On one hand, you have to fight terror with terror.

I know this is cliche, but at the same time, understand the REAL CAUSES of terrorism. "Because they are evil" just doesn't cut it. I know some will think we should do what we want, no matter what anyone else thinks, but we need to consider how others will react at our policies. Fine if we keep them, but at least then we will see it coming. I support Israel, however, our support has been unquestioning and that is what pisses off Arabs. I think people sometimes forget that Israel and the US are different countries, and we still spy on each other. I want to support Israel and protect her, but with any alliance/relationship, there has to be limits.

If you ever watched news outside of the US, you could have predicted 9/11 years before it happened. Whether our policies are right or not, they make some people upset. Dont flame me because Im NOT calling for them to be ended because some terrorist pukes, but this is the reality of the international system. Our military is not strong enough to rule the entire world, and we may get to a point where it is better to take our marbles and go home, and let the fucks live as backwards and undemocratic as they want. -Adrian

It's been reported that the Russians were offered SAS assistance but turned down the offer…

Andy

I personally believe that rescuing everybody is impossible in this situation.

I also believe the SEAL teams ( 8 might have been called ), 1st SFOD or FBI HRT might have done a better job.

Perfect, not at all. They are not superhuman, but I do think the Russians could have been a little cleaner.

Then again, most of us are not really in a position to criticize. The challenge of entering a weird structure with little time to assault, and having explosives go off AS you are going in, as well as having terrorists open fire... I can't imagine it.

Quoted: It's been reported that the Russians were offered SAS assistance but turned down the offer… Andy

The Russians might have been best served by getting SAS advice off the record, too many complications when getting involved publicly in other's conflicts (I understand the commonalities but there are things that are unique to Russia in this instance)

On the other hand, when the Kursk went down, the Russians should have swallowed their pride and accepted help from any & all (Brits, Norwegians, US), their obstinance there was inexcusable.

I notice that no one has mentioned French Special Forces. Is there such a group? They could have taken the terrorists out by sheer rudeness.

However, I agree with other posters above SPEED KILLS!   Active shooters, GO GO GO! SWAT teams around the country need to learn how to blitz assault, and improvise without dry run throughs, before terrorists can setup defenseive positions. In a terrorist situation, it would basically be room clearing, though each subject would be immediately neutralized. There would also have to be training on booby traps, etc, but for the most part, I think SWAT teams know the basics. Columbine is an excellent example on a smaller scale. The cops blew that big time. -Adrian

Before you can get a team on site they have already done this is most situations, they have also planned out the attack. A "blitz assault" may work and it may result in your only attack, so you want the best situation for success.

If that assault fails then what, what if you only take out a few before they set off the belts they are wearing, what if they throw grenades into a room full of kids as you are attacking.

then you look like you are just as bad as them, since the hostages died, and you did not save as many lives, and now they won to a degree.

It takes alot of time to get a team on-site and geared up and ready to enter a building, these guys train to save everyone not just a few, that is the goal.

The Russia sceniro was a no win situation as far as I could tell, a few things may have been done better but alot of people were going to die.

Bunch of arm-chair commandoes.  "I wouldn't of done one thing different , I would have done everything different."    

Some of you seem to be suggesting the very armed government camp that you  always decry.    There is no freaking way that you can get a reaction team anywhere in the US fast enough to prevent the bad guys from setting up their first explosives, and then they have the time to rig the rest. (Well if it was Hollywood, maybe both LAPD and LASO teams could be on site in less than half an hour if they were already formed in a training scenario, but that's the real Hollywood in Los Angeles under optimum circumstances)  This was a no-win situation.  We don't have big teams in the vast vast majority of the country and we never will.  Face it.

Set up a perimeter?  Read all the threads by the yahoos here that no LEO is going to keep them from going in.   So do we kill the parent yahoo to keep them from rushing in and fucking everything up?  Yeah we might have to.

Unless the rescue team was right behind the bad gys this was going to be bad.  The hostage takers were prepared to kill everybody and die doing it before they went in.

I don't know how things are where you are but in So. Cal, actually all of CA the gyms are built to be earthquake proof.  You stick 1500 students in there, and you won't get anybody out, you cant go through the walls, you can't go through the windows almost all are small and up near the roof and small panes, you can't get in through locker room.  Doors with masses of  student.

Get real the Russians did as well as anybody could.

Quoted: Quoted: FBI would have burned the place to the ground. They haven't had an opportunity to kill that many kids in a long time No that would be the ATF that would have burned it to the ground

Yeah, there were too many survivors at the Russian school to qualify for the FBI.

Ok, here is some blue sky stuff.

Is there a technology available to short out wiring?  Like EMP?  If EMP would have worked here, to save 1,200 kids do you destroy 1/3 of your nations electrical grid and tech resources?  IF it is not EMP is there a focused beam weapon that can melt the wires, while not harming the kids?  (I have read about something like that, somwehere, but am unsure of the plausability).

Forward looking, to make sure that this does not happen again, does a government like Russia remove the power form the hands of the terrorists, by a preemptive destruction of the building holding the hostages and terrorists?  Does this dampen a terrorists enthusiam or does it just make their job easier?

This was a shit sandwich; those poor Russkie assaulters were effed from the get-go by the islamic terrorists plans to mine the place.

The ONLY thing that might have stopped this or significantly reduced the casualties would have been if during the initial assault, many of the parents and teachers were armed and shot it out with the islamic terrorists.

As to the US response in this sort of situation: Terrorist incidents are the jurisdiction of the FBI.  Local agencies would initially respond.  SWAT takes forever to get there, maybe two hours if you're lucky. Local FBI SWAT is a little longer, depending on location.  HRT has to fly out of Washington/Virginia, you can figure out how long it would take, there is open source material on this.

Local LE, I hope, would establish a better perimeter to keep family members and others out.  Let's not forget, one of those in the crowd might have a cellphone and providing intel to the terrorists.

Columbine was a watershed event for US police agencies.  Please note, the "I'm going home tonight," stuff that has been offered as the excuse for why the police did not go in is pure, unadulterated horseshit.  The police had established a successful routine of SWAT(Sit, Wait and Talk) to be used in most hostage incidents and it worked very successfully for many years.  The problem is that it doesn't work when the hostage taker is extremely homicidal/suicidal.  Please note, that Dylan and Klebold didn't kill anyone after they were engaged by the on-site school resource deputy.  We now have active-shooter protocals we follow that address this issue.

As someone who has initiated an "active-shooter" (actually stabber) forced entry and hostage rescue, I will say that in extremis hostage rescue is extremely difficult and something that most LE officers are under-trained to execute.  The problem is that we don't have the funding, trainig time, range time, or warrior-ethos that will be needed in the future.

God Bless America and lead us to victory against Islamicist Terrorism.

Quoted: Columbine was a watershed event for US police agencies.  Please note, the "I'm going home tonight," stuff that has been offered as the excuse for why the police did not go in is pure, unadulterated horseshit.  The police had established a successful routine of SWAT(Sit, Wait and Talk) to be used in most hostage incidents and it worked very successfully for many years.  The problem is that it doesn't work when the hostage taker is extremely homicidal/suicidal.  Please note, that Dylan and Klebold didn't kill anyone after they were engaged by the on-site school resource deputy.  We now have active-shooter protocals we follow that address this issue.

This is bull because it was not a hostage situation.  Phone recordings from calls to 911 are of people screaming that guys with guns are running around shooting everybody, with sounds of gunshots in the background.  "Wait it out" was the absolute WORST idea ever.

EMP would likely trigger a device, you need something that sucks energy out, not puts energy in.

I'd imagine that a fast(er) acting narcotic or perhaps acoustic or RF weapon might be worth a look. Very difficult considering the captors expected attacks and likely had switches (hand or foot operated) at the ready.

Nice to see the usual group of internet tacticians are offering up their view on how things could have been done btter and how previous ops were "bullshit".  Some of you need to put the Xbox controler down and limit your play time on Counterstrike.

Quoted: Nice to see the usual group of internet tacticians are offering up their view on how things could have been done btter and how previous ops were "bullshit".  Some of you need to put the Xbox controler down and limit your play time on Counterstrike.

Damn, for 150 posts, you are frigging absolutely prescient!

As a couple people have mentioned already, the rescuers were screwed the second the terrorists strung bombs.  And they set it up so there was no way in hell that they would get breached before that point.  

Think about it.  All the shit was already in the school.  No unloading an army truck or pickup that was sitting outside the school that the cops could have blown up to reduce the explosives on site.  The school was right across from the cop station, so whatever LEOs the town had on duty should have had decent response time.  

So, we take the 30 minutes from raid to breach out of the equation.

Now we're left with breaching with explosives strung.   This will be messy REGARDLESS of who does the entry.  I'm surprised only 30% of the people died.  

While our SWAT teams are good, they're not trained or equipped to deal with a hostage situation like this.  SWAT teams by design are to deal with 25-50 hostages.  Maybe 100.  Think a bus.  Think a movie theater.  They are designed to deal with a low number of terrorists/HTs.  In the 1-5 range.  So now we're talking multiple SWAT teams, with communication headaches, command disputes, and the whole works.  All things that disrupt the cohesiveness of the entry.  Then mix in kids fleeing while being shot in the back, and everything goes out the window.

People like to believe we could have done better.  Maybe.  I personally don't.  I think if something like this happens here (God forbid) I think we should be happy with only a 30% loss.

Feel free to correct me where I'm wrong.

Quoted: I don't think Columbine was that simple as you think, there was not much time to gather the proper intel on the situation and get a plan together and start taking down the building. So you go in searching the building for threat targets, you take one down they the other threat hears the gunfire, what if then in another room he decides to start shooting fellow students, how do you handle that. In that situation you need to collapse the building and get the threats in one area so that they are easier to neutralize.

So, waiting it out and allowing the two kids to kill people at will until they got tired was a so much better tatical option.

Quoted: Quoted: Columbine was a watershed event for US police agencies.  Please note, the "I'm going home tonight," stuff that has been offered as the excuse for why the police did not go in is pure, unadulterated horseshit.  The police had established a successful routine of SWAT(Sit, Wait and Talk) to be used in most hostage incidents and it worked very successfully for many years.  The problem is that it doesn't work when the hostage taker is extremely homicidal/suicidal.  Please note, that Dylan and Klebold didn't kill anyone after they were engaged by the on-site school resource deputy.  We now have active-shooter protocals we follow that address this issue. This is bull because it was not a hostage situation.  Phone recordings from calls to 911 are of people screaming that guys with guns are running around shooting everybody, with sounds of gunshots in the background.  "Wait it out" was the absolute WORST idea ever.

Please point out where I say that the tactics used were successful.  Previously, in situations like this we did the contain and negotiate thing.  And it mostly worked.  If the police had gone in, guns blazing, people would have complained that they acted recklessly.  I agree, it was the wrong tactic to use in this type of situation.  But it wasn't used because the officers were afraid, like the"just make sure they go home at night" comments imply.   After Columbine, these tactics changed.  You've got to remember, the people who make policy for LE agencies are politicians and lawyers, not street cops.

This situation was not a active shooter situation. These people came prepared with explosives to mine the place and they came to kill and were prepared to die. There was no way anyone seal/delta or anyone else could have breached this gym and prevented the massive loss of life. There is one thing and one thing only that would have prevented this and that is these animals never should have penetrated the border and/or someone should have been keeping an eye on any that were in the country legally. Because of Russia's poor economic situation with poor training/equipping and lack of resolve to have an excellent border patrol and a political system that for various reasons fails to keep track of foreign nationals that enter their country legally or illegally the one and only chance to prevent this was missed.

Hey this reminds me of another country that seems to be doing the same thing!

Quoted: Nice to see the usual group of internet tacticians are offering up their view on how things could have been done btter and how previous ops were "bullshit".  Some of you need to put the Xbox controler down and limit your play time on Counterstrike.

It's just a question for discussion...relax!

I am assuming that you do not possess the capacity to read, because my disclaimer is clearly spelled out...maybe I need to use smaller words for your (obvious) impaired ability to understand simple English.

- feeling slighted?  My comment was directed at you, but it appears you took it that way.  Oh well.

As for my low post count, its that way due to the fact I stay away from the usual crap that gets posted here in GD. I'm sure it would be higher if I sat around all day harping about what happened 10 years ago and thinking things still ran in the same manner.

Oh and for you Wiggy - The above paragraph wasn't meant for you. Just in case you didn't get it.

Quoted: It's just a question for discussion...relax!

- Oh I'm relaxed.  I'm just tired of seeing the same old "waco" crap all time from people that have less than a clue as to what they are talking about.  You should see me when I really get fired up.

the hostages were screwed to begin with, regardless of how high speed the guy kicking in the door thinks he is

Tagged for later.

My heart goes out to the parents, and the men who tried to put this right.

Quoted: Quoted: It's just a question for discussion...relax! - Oh I'm relaxed.  I'm just tired of seeing the same old "waco" crap all time from people that have less than a clue as to what they are talking about.  You should see me when I really get fired up.

A fired up troll, we better all pack it in now.

Pot meet kettle