Hate American Made ////// Waco Siege

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By an unspeakable act.

Eight.

The apocalypse would occur soon.

More white supremacist groups, more anti-government groups.

David Koresh.

Ruby Ridge siege.

Timothy McVeigh.

More than 80 people dead.

Bombed a federal building in Oklahoma City.

Eight.

By an unspeakable act, there is so little hope

I'm saying that when I get through writing these and they're given to my attorney and my attorney hands them over, what's the two theologians' name?

Philip Arnold.

Philip Arnold and Jim Tabor, because you've shown that they have a sincere interest in these things,

you see, then I can spend all my time in jail and people can go ahead and ask me all the stupid questions they want, because they're not going to ask me about this.

They're going to say,

do you molest young ladies?

Have you eaten babies?

Do you sacrifice people?

Do you make automatic weapons?

Do you have bombs?

That's what they're going to be interested in.

Sensationalists.

That's why you need to get it done before you leave there, then.

That's why I'm going to complete it.

Because, you see, you know as well as I do that people in this world they want something dramatic and sensational.

They don't want to have to sit.

No one's going to sit there and let me sit there in front of a camera and read Psalms 40 to them to prove the first seal.

Nick, it's a a real world, and that's why I'm sympathetic with your position.

I realize you're frustrated, and I agree with you.

I'm not frustrated.

I went home, and I'm in fact, I'm no longer frustrated.

I never was frustrated.

Did you take a shower for me?

Well, yeah, I took a couple of them for you.

Thank you.

I appreciate it.

Now, listen, let's get back to the point at hand.

This, you know, the writing of the seals.

Okay, you've got to do that from in there, and it's going to take you X amount of time.

But just tell me this, David.

Are you saying that when you finish that manuscript?

Then I'm not bound any longer.

no commitment

I know you'll be out but that could I couldn't excuse me I've got a cold that could mean a lot of things David that could mean

I'll be in custody in the jailhouse you can come down there and feed buttons no I know I know at some point in time that's true but I'm I'm getting from you I'm asking you that when that is finished are you then telling me that you are coming out

the next day or two hours after you send that out?

Well, I'll tell you when when I bring it out, see, my attorney is going to get you the copy.

Right.

Okay?

And as soon as he hands it over to the scholars, the theologians, right, that's when he's going to come back and that's when I'm going to go out with him because he said point blank that, you know, one of the guarantees of me arriving down there is that he's going to go with me.

Sunday, February 28th, 1993, agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms are attempting to execute warrants against David Koresh and the Branch Davidian compound located in or near Waco, Texas.

This was supposed to be an operation that they wanted to include the media.

And spoiler alert, it does it goes horribly wrong.

At 9 a.m., Waco news reporters arrive near the compound.

Police radio communication indicates authorities may be preparing for a raid.

So they actually notified

the

news in advance.

The media is on the scene in a small capacity at 9 a.m.

Now at 9:55 a.m.,

the ATF agents move in on the compound,

and things do not go well right from the get-go.

A gun fight, a gun battle begins at this time and lasts for approximately 20 minutes.

They have to go into cleanup mode right away because negotiations begin shortly after 10 p.m., about 10:15, 10.20,

to start moving the injured people from the gun battle.

And it's going to become a he said, she said, who shot first, we don't know.

Yeah, and we saw the same thing here with Ruby Ridge.

You have two sides, all heavily armed.

And to be frank with everyone, I've looked at both of these scenarios, Ruby Ridge and Waco, dozens of times.

It doesn't really seem to me like anybody had a great idea of what they were going going to be doing and how to do it.

And so you get a bunch of people that are heavily armed and scared out of their wits.

Who knows?

It gets really difficult to say, especially when we have this number of people on both sides at Waco, who did what first, who cast the first stone.

And a lot of times you have to wonder: could you be in a situation where it's a nervous fire?

Somebody hears something and reacts with nervous gun fire that leads to everybody shooting at everybody.

A little after 12 noon, we get hospital helicopters that are flying away from the compound.

And inside these helicopters, Captain, we have injured federal agents.

By 1 p.m., remember, keep in mind, their attempt to go into the compound started at five minutes to 10 a.m.

We're roughly three hours later.

We have a spokesperson at the Waco Hospital confirming the death of an ATF officer by 1 p.m.

So this is the first casualty or the first listed casualty in these news reports of the Waco siege standoff as it is on day number one.

By 5 p.m., we have an ATF spokesperson who is saying that gunfire continued sporadically throughout the afternoon.

At 7.30 p.m., Vernon Howell, or as we know him, David Koresh,

is interviewed by CNN.

At 8.15, ATF spokesperson says negotiations continue with,

they're referring to them as cult members to the media at this time.

And Koresh then goes for about 20 minutes in a talk with KRLD Radio, which is located in Dallas, Texas.

And during this 20-minute talk with Radio DJ,

he's describing his beliefs, what the Branch Davidians believe, or at least what he's telling them that his followers believe, and saying that he, he, David Koresh, is the most seriously wounded member of the Branch Davidians at that time.

We would ultimately learn here, Captain, the ATF agents Conway, LeBlue, Todd, McCahan,

Robert Williams, and Stephen Willis all were killed.

On March 1, in the early morning hours, we have acting attorney general Stuart Gerson.

He gives an update to President Bill Clinton, who implicitly endorses a negotiation, right?

Let's talk through this to create a solution, a nonviolent solution.

Clinton is asking his cabinet members and his staff to keep him abreast to the situation, keep him up to speed.

So negotiations will continue on this day over the course of the day.

We do get 10 children that are sent out of the compound.

The FBI takes control.

with a fully functioning command post that they set up.

So notice that we've morphed right away from ATF into FBI, right?

Because the ATF was attempting to conduct those search warrants and execute those search warrants.

Well, now we have people who've been killed.

So ultimately, the FBI is the group that's going to be investigating

the shooting deaths and now starting to take control over.

the situation.

Well, in David Koresh's compound, it's a large one and the building looks odd, right?

Yes.

I mean, it seems very wonky.

Like, like every six months, let's just add another room onto this compound.

But across the street was a banded building.

So I think that's where initially the ATF set up.

And now

basically, because the FBI is getting involved, we basically have a whole military compound being set up directly across from David Koresh's compound.

And God bless you for using the word wonky because that was

that was the exact word that came and popped into my brain when I'm looking over the layout of the compound.

But to paint a very basic picture for everyone, maybe you're too young and you don't recall seeing the photographs in the newspapers or seeing news coverage of this horrific event.

But it essentially looks like a fortress, right?

Like

fortress that was built by Boy Scouts surrounded by a military operation is really what it kind of is.

Yeah, it looks like a suburban fortress because it's, you know, the vinyl siding.

And we have a lot of things at play here.

We have a big mistake by the ATF.

See, a lot of people don't talk about how Dave Koresh had.

contracts with some of the local schools where he would take care of their yards, mow, and do other such chores.

They had other options to serve these search warrants, and they could have done it where not everybody in the compound was involved, or by basically setting up some kind of military operation to serve these search warrants.

But they chose not to.

Gunfire happens.

But you also have to remember: we also have members of this quote-unquote cult that are now in contact with the

ATF and the FBI.

And so they're giving them some kind of insight

to who David Koresh is, how he thinks, how the followers think,

what is involved with this compound, where the weapons could be.

And I mean, this is just a bad situation escalating quicker and quicker.

And the captain's right.

In full review of everything here,

I almost believe if they would have got Dave Koresh

when he he was already outside of those four walls, pick him up on the warrants, or at least bring him in for questioning, and then execute the search without him present.

I have to believe this would have gone down an entirely different way because I don't who, I mean, they could have had a contingency plan, the Davidians.

But as you will see throughout the course of this standoff, is not only is Koresh the leader, but at times the Davidians themselves seem to be hesitant to make any decisions of their own without his leadership.

The compound, the fortress, or the fort, as we called it, is

the captain's exactly right.

Wonky is a great description.

It's like a patchwork quilt where they just kept adding on wings and hallways and additional rooms.

So it's really kind of a labyrinth within those walls.

And

near the center of the structure is a concrete room, which

is used sort of as a storage area for their firearms and their food rations, but also will act as a bunker for portions of, especially the portions that involve gunfire.

of this standoff.

Now, the walls themselves of the compound are, I mean, this thing was basically built out of recycled lumber and scrap wood.

And they have the siding there, but it's,

I mean, it's built by human hands and it does not look like your house or mine.

And I'm talking to the listeners there.

Unless you live in a fort out in the middle of nowhere, it doesn't look like your house.

So we do get 10 children that are sent out of the compound.

So that's some progress here.

And by 5 p.m., the FBI has taken control.

They set up their command post.

Quresh is reportedly extremely agitated,

as one would expect him to be.

The FBI agents deploy armored vehicles surrounding, basically surrounding the compound's perimeter.

And they're kind of moving them closer and closer.

And he becomes, David Koresh becomes extremely agitated when the phone line is cut.

So they cut the phone line.

He's still able, the Davidians are still able to have outside communication, but that's only to the negotiators at this point.

And the people doing the negotiating for law enforcement will be the FBI.

And at least twice during this day, it's reported that David Koresh himself says to negotiators that suicide is not being contemplated by him or the group.

So now we go to Tuesday, March 2nd.

In the early morning hours, David Koresh makes a one-hour audio tape of his religious teachings, promising to surrender upon the national broadcast of this tape, this cassette tape.

At 1:30 p.m., the tape is broadcast over the Christian Broadcasting Network.

Near 6 o'clock p.m.

that evening, the word is relayed to negotiations from David Koresh that God has spoken to him and has told him to wait.

So initially saying we will come out, we will surrender, but then later, hours later, changing that to, I've been instructed by God and we are, we're in a holding pattern right now.

Well, yeah, and I'm not trying to argue because this is a small detail.

This case has been covered so much

that it's really hard to get every detail, I believe, correct because I don't know if we know the details.

And some of these documentaries that are put together or these TV series.

There's the Waco TV series, which is very good.

Great.

Paramount on Paramount, which is brilliant.

Yeah.

And I believe they did a follow-up Waco Aftermath, which I thought was incredibly well done as well.

Yeah, it's almost like a season one and season two, but they get some of the details wrong here.

I think what the weight that's happening here is he's supposed to surrender, but then he tells the FBI, wait, I don't know if I'm going to surrender.

I have to wait.

I need to pray on this.

So it's not that God is telling him to wait.

He's waiting for God to tell him what is his next move.

Yes, and that is part of it.

But again, the information I have is that God, he says, claims that God spoke to him, told him to wait.

And what we will see is, and the captain's exactly right.

It's a small detail.

Who knows who's exactly right here?

But what we will see is throughout, this is a standoff that's going to last days and weeks.

And throughout the remainder of the standoff, is when we will get that communication from Koresh that's saying, I, you know, I'm waiting instruction from God.

I haven't heard anything yet.

So we're still in this holding pattern.

When we get to Wednesday the 3rd, the

FBI tells the Davidians that,

so there's some elderly people that are inside the compound,

and they announce that murder charges for the killed ATF agents

will that the elderly people will not face the murder charges.

And this is this has got to be considered or looked at as a tactical

way

of encouraging them to send out some of the old folks, right?

Like, go ahead and send them out.

We're not charging them with with murder here

in this situation.

Because that's one thing that gets lost in the sauce here when we talk about

this is something I was trying to sort out in my own head and with my own emotions in the past week or so.

Is if I'm sitting inside that compound as a follower, knowing that, you know, I could, even if the claim is true,

you know, Koresh in

the higher-ups with the Davidians

would say throughout a lot of this that

the followers are allowed to leave.

Now, that's up for debate.

You know, that's something that has certainly been debated for decades now.

But that has always been their statement that they are allowed to leave.

They don't want to leave.

Their truth is here.

They fear God more than they fear man.

They fear God more than they fear the government or any government entity agency.

But trying to sort this out of going, okay,

I'm a dude sitting in this compound.

ATF agents have been killed in active duty.

I could stay or I could get up and leave if what Koresh and others are saying is true.

I could get up and leave whenever I want.

But when I get beyond the walls of this compound, I'm likely facing murder charges.

And oh, by the way,

through the course of me walking out the front door, I may get shot to death by those same, by those fellow agents of those fallen agents.

Yeah.

And if things

go from bad to worse and they don't have anybody else to pin these ATF agent murders on, you know, I might be going to prison and somebody might be touching my booty hole.

Speaking with...

negotiators, David Koresh accounts for his failure to surrender as agreed by saying he's dealing now with his father and not with your bureaucratic system of of government.

And he delivers various rambling sermons focusing on such biblical matters as unlocking the seven seals and interpreting God's intentions about the end of the world.

In a late evening conversation, he is expressing how angry he is about the armored vehicles that have surrounded the compound and are moving about.

Yeah, but this is all going to work into his benefit because when you have somebody telling you I'm a prophet and I'm the chosen one, well, the biggest thing is belief.

And so, if some of your members, because I think another thing that's not talked about that often is a lot of people gave up all their possessions and all their money.

And so, even if they disagreed with what was happening with inside their compound, it wasn't just like they could just walk out of there and

catch a flight to Hawaii to get away.

they would have to leave everything.

So, when this again, but again, not just leave everything, face murder charges.

And you know that if you're an adult, you're going to be facing murder charges because the FBI went out of their way to explain to you all those two elderly women that you got in there, we're not going to charge them with murder.

That's no, no, I mean, I meant before we are charging everybody else with murder, but what I'm saying is, even before the siege,

okay, you know, so when people go, well, as David's teachings go from peaceful and and loving and more spiritual and and and good and and more religious based to i'm a prophet and abusive and these three to four hour long sermon rants where he wouldn't let people go to the bathroom and people weren't allowed to fall asleep and they had nowhere to go but once the siege happens and all this stuff is happening around you helicopters and tanks and ATF agents and

armor, basically, and this is all the stuff that he's been telling you is going to happen.

You're seeing it play out.

So then,

you know, what a lot of his followers talked about, or a couple of the ones that have survived, said there was a sense within the compound of like, oh, shit.

This guy has been right the whole time.

He's been telling us this.

And now we're seeing it.

And so, because a lot of religion is believing in something that you can't see or you can't prove.

But when you have that belief anyways, you have that faith anyways.

And now you're seeing it play out in front of your eyes,

the belief becomes even stronger.

The faith becomes even stronger within

the followers to David Kresch.

Well, and the thing too is, yeah, like you said, this is playing out in front of their very eyes.

And on more than one occasion, we've seen, we know from the reports that we reviewed in the first part of our Waco coverage, is that we're told things, fantastical ideas and prophecies by Mr.

David Koresh prior to this, you know, that he had impregnated a 67, 68-year-old woman, that the baby would be the chosen one.

It's some form of, it's a miracle baby.

And that the

other portions of, you know, God's will, that the damage, the arson that was done to our property prior.

This was a judgment by God and a warning from God.

So

they've experienced these prophecies in the past.

And as you said, Captain, which is spot on, this is one that's playing out very similarly to how he's described it months and years prior to what's going on in 1993.

Now, on this day at the end, remember, he's very upset that they're moving around these armored vehicles late in the evening.

And so

this is a threat to the FBI from David Koresh.

He tells them

that

what you guys are doing is terrible.

We're the victims here.

You guys,

you agents out there, you FBI agents are going to have to be the ones.

You will be the ones that will be looking at the pictures of the little ones that end up perishing.

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All right.

We are back.

Cheers, mates.

Cheers to you, Colonel.

Cheers to you, Captain.

This brings us to Friday, March 5th.

We do get somebody else that's able to leave the compound here.

We get nine-year-old Heather Jones.

She leaves, but she's wearing a note that is pinned to her jacket.

The note was written by her mother, or at least the reports state that the mother wrote the note, and the note says, once the children are out, the adults will die.

The FBI concludes that the Davidians have one year, have a full one-year supply of food, including abundant military rations.

Well, they are

running water system.

They are set up to be holed up inside that compound for an extended period of time.

But the note pinned to the poor child, or at least she was lucky enough to get out, would imply that there could be massive death here,

no matter how this thing shakes out.

And the reports at this time, too, are that Koresh continues preaching, but also threatening violence.

The FBI, at this point, they got the helicopters.

They're shining the lights on them at night.

They're playing music at all hours.

The one that was disturbing to me was one of the survivors were saying it sounded like they were playing audio tape of like rabbits being

slaughtered.

Slaughtered.

And these are like war tactics.

And I think that's why, I mean, the initial

you're bringing basically

an army to serve a warrant in a

situation that you didn't have to serve him in in the first place.

I mean, it just seems like there was

bad decisions after bad decisions.

And it's on both parties.

There's bad decisions happening and

torturous, horrible decisions being made by law enforcement, but also torturous and horrible decisions being made by the individuals in this.

Well, not just David, but other individuals within this religious group.

And it's like we said with Ruby Ridge, when nobody's right, everybody's wrong.

And this, this is more of that, sadly.

Now,

what was right,

the few things that did go right

here is

Regardless if we agree of any of the tactics by law enforcement and the negotiators.

Regardless if we agree with Koresh in any of his decision making on his side, one thing that I, the only thing that I really truly see that is right by both parties is the FBI negotiators are continually asking'resh to send people out.

And

we do,

at least to up to this point in our timeline, we have seen some people sent out.

So that's the only good,

the only smart decisions that really seem to be being made here.

Now,

on Sunday the 7th, March 7th, they're continuing their negotiations with Quarrech.

The talks basically are going round and round in circles.

The FBI is refusing to deliver milk to the compound.

They say, look,

you guys are requesting milk.

And they're saying we need it for the children, especially the young ones.

Unfortunately, they are some very young kids, one, two years old kids inside this structure.

And so they're saying we need milk for the children.

FBI is saying, we're not bringing you that unless you release some more people.

And Koresh is saying, look, all of the children that remain inside of the compound are my biological descendants.

On March 8th, Koresh, it's reported that his wounds, remember, he was wounded in the gunfire.

Yeah, he was shot in his hand, right?

And his

abdomen.

Yeah.

And so it's reported that he is healing well and not just well,

better and above what was expected at the time when he was injured.

Of course.

He's so manly, he can impregnate an elderly woman.

Of course, he's going to heal like Wolverine.

Yeah.

The FBI does deliver six gallons of milk this day.

This is just the day after saying we're not going to going to unless you release more people.

They didn't release anybody, but a videotape of the children inside the compound was sent out by the Davidians to law enforcement.

Negotiators

say

that the tape, upon review, there is concern that if the tape is released to the media, that Quresh may gain a lot of sympathy.

Yeah, well, what David Koresh was doing, which I think was smart, is he was filming his followers to say, let's introduce the world

to

the followers and what they believe and who they are as people.

And so if this gets out to the world, then people will not see these individuals as crazy cult members, but they'll see them as actual humans.

And families.

Yeah.

And nobody wants children to be involved in this.

No, but also nobody wants a 14-year-old to be married to a cult leader.

Or, yes, or having babies with

the cult leader.

And,

you know, I think if you look up David Koresh, I believe that

it is said that he fathered 16 children.

We know of the one child that he had no involvement with because the mom wanted nothing to do with him.

But so he had 15 kids on top of that.

And I don't know why all these guys that want to be cult leaders also play music.

And if you look at like a Charles Manson, if you ever hear a recording of him, it's questionable on what talent level he has.

But I do have to say, I think out of all the crazy cult leaders, Dave Krush might

hold the top spot as far as guitar talent, and he had a good singing voice.

And that's the um, and that's enough praising

the wacko.

The top 20 cult leader Casey Kasem countdown.

Yes, we have David Koresh sits at the top on Tuesday, March 9th.

They cut off the electricity to the compound.

Koresh says he will not negotiate further until the power was restored.

They do restore the power, and we get reports here at this time that the hostage release team for the law enforcement they're reporting that they are seeing weapons in the windows of the compound and that firing ports were being cut so what they did was they covered up the windows for their own protection because they were taking on gunfire with these large pieces of plywood well on this day it's reported again by law enforcement that they are seeing the davidians cut holes in the plywood which is an implication that

they intend to use those as firing ports for their long guns, their rifles, and what have you.

The following day, electricity is temporarily cut off again,

and there is about four and a half hours of negotiation, but no progress.

On Friday, the 12th, Janet Reno,

who

is a large name in this story, but it was interesting to learn that she was not.

I didn't recall this.

I mean, you and I were little boys when this went down.

I didn't recall this part of it.

I recalled her being a big part of the story, but I didn't know that she wasn't the attorney general when the standoff started.

So she's sworn in on March 12th

and actually takes over.

The FBI orders all electricity to be cut off for good because the negotiators wanted those inside the compound to experience experience the same wet and cold conditions at night that the tactical personnel was experiencing outside of the compound.

And they also say that they wanted

the just part of that justification, Captain, was cutting the power.

It's going to be very cold at night.

It's March.

They wanted maximum effect.

on the Davidians to be uncomfortable.

Because if they truly were allowed to leave as Koresh is telling them, they're trying to give good reason for these followers to get up and leave, if that's the truth.

But they also want to make a statement here, right?

Cutting off the power was also making a statement designed to challenge David Koresh's control of the situation.

And again, the tough thing, too, is they have

former members and former leaders.

They have his former right-hand man basically begging them from the beginning.

You are playing into

his hands because this is what he's been preaching.

So, and I couldn't imagine being one of his followers.

And if you have any doubt about him,

I think that doubt goes away when the siege starts.

And I think every day.

For a lot of these followers, it became stronger.

And we do have, you know, interviews of some of the surviving members that were like,

yeah, at first we were afraid, but then there became this strength of, well, what he's telling us is true.

And then people weren't even afraid to die because their leader has been telling them, this is how it's going to go down.

And now it's going down this way.

So now we believe what he's saying even more.

And he's saying, hey, there's a place in the kingdom of heaven for you because of all this.

Of course, because

with these apocalyptic beliefs, they almost all end in a battle between good and evil.

Yeah.

And so, of course, you're going to go to heaven because you were fighting for the good side.

You didn't bow down to evil.

On Saturday, March 13, of course, we got the people inside.

They're cold.

They're freezing.

They have no electricity.

The FBI notifies David Koresh that his mother has retained two attorneys on his behalf to represent him.

So, Mr.

Koresh, you have legal representation at this time.

The following day at nightfall, the FBI begins to illuminate the compound with bright lights.

This is as

the FBI would tell us that this is supposed to have a two-pronged effect.

One, to disrupt the sleep of the persons inside of the compound, putting additional pressure and stress on them, them, but two, to increase the safety of their outside teams, of the hostage release teams.

If anybody that's been in a situation like this where you are in the dark and there are bright lights that surround you,

anything beyond those bright lights, you usually can't see any of that.

So effectively, it's creating a wall of light for the agents to hide behind.

On Monday, March 15th, the FBI establishes a modified negotiation strategy, continuing to insist on peaceful resolution, but refusing to listen to any more of what they are referring to as Bible babble.

On Thursday, the 18th, the FBI broadcasts a message to those in the compound over a loudspeaker saying that they will be treated fairly if they come out.

Nobody.

Nobody comes out, but on the 19th, the FBI,

I guess this is an attempt to address some of the Davidians' concerns about the legal matters.

The FBI delivers to the compound legal documents and letters from Koresh's attorneys and some other items.

And Koresh says that he is ready to come out and face the music.

Two Davidians, this is Brad Branch and Kevin Whitecliffe.

They come out of the compound.

The next day, Rita Riddle comes out of the compound.

So we got three more people that have been released.

And then on Sunday, March 21st, we get Victorine Hollingsworth and Anita Richards exit the compound.

Gladys Ottman, Sheila Martin, James Lawton, and Ophelia Santoya come out of the compound as well.

In the evening hours, the FBI begins playing very loud music, including Tibetan chants over the loudspeaker.

This is at some point it morphs into what the captain said about the rabbits being slaughtered, which sounds horrific.

Well, I could be wrong, but some of these individuals are coming out on their own.

Some of them are being released.

But

that small group that you just talked about, I think they were actually released by David to be like talking heads.

Hey, we're going to release you so then you can talk to law enforcement directly and you can be kind of the talking heads for our group.

On Tuesday, March 23rd at 10 a.m., an individual named Livingstone Fagan leaves the compound.

This is going to be the last one during the standoff to leave the compound.

And we have Assistant U.S.

Attorney William Johnston of Waco writes a letter to Janet Reno complaining about the FBI's handling of the scene, especially the moving of the vehicles around the compound.

So he's at the local level and he's saying, look, I don't don't really like what I see or how the FBI is conducting themselves at the scene.

At 10 p.m., the FBI shines floodlights on the compound and plays over the loudspeakers tapes of previous negotiations.

And now they're also playing messages from those who had exited the compound.

On Wednesday, the 24th, the FBI, they're back.

to their tactics of playing Tibetan chants, Christmas music, and all kinds of shenanigans.

The Davidians refuse to talk.

At the daily press briefing, the FBI escalates its verbal assault against David Koresh, calling him a liar and a coward.

The next day, there's an FBI ultimatum.

10 to 20 people must leave by 4 p.m.

or some action will be taken.

At 4 p.m., armored vehicles move into the compound and remove

motorcycles and golf carts and go-karts that belong to the Davidians.

When they cut the electricity, it was cold.

We know they were, it was cold because the Davidians were complaining that they were freezing inside.

And we already talked about how this structure was put together and how it was constructed.

And so it's not this structure that's built to keep people warm inside of there.

So, what they were doing with these hay bales,

the bales of hay, they were stacking them along the window,

sorry, along the walls inside, almost creating like a insulation

to help them keep warm.

And then the other part of this, too, is: look, David Koresh, and

I'm not going out of my way to throw him any compliments here, but he was not a dumb guy.

He was probably pretty brilliant,

maybe brilliantly wrong, but

very smart.

He was an evil genius in a sense.

He was quite intelligent.

But then I also wonder here, Captain, are we at this point where this dude is so far gone that on some level, does he, you talk about, well, if this goes good,

how do I come out of this?

If this goes bad, how do we come out of this?

I have to wonder, too, if at this point, is this dude so far gone that

he may believe that he's right, that he is in the right and doing the right thing and doing what's in the best interest of him and his group all at the same time?

well again because you have these followers

I mean he's taking some of his followers children as his wives and they're allowing it so yeah

the more you're as his church wives yeah yeah I mean what do you call that

he's living in an echo chamber So the echo chamber is just telling him, reinforcing him for years that he is right, for years that he is the prophet, for years.

I mean, when these individuals, whether it's because of the abuse or because they have issues themselves, to be able to stand up in a group of people and have them listen to you with no bathroom breaks or anything for hours upon hours.

And a lot of these individuals is hanging on to every word he says.

and every belief he has.

And pinching their peepees so they don't wet themselves.

Right.

Like a little boy.

God said, pinch your peepee.

You know,

I would just, I would let it flow and just water myself.

And

if anybody looks at me with a side eye, I just, it was God's will.

The, you know,

Mr.

Koresh

wanted me to listen to his teachings, and it was God's will.

I was bound to wet myself at some point.

Yeah.

Jesus turned water into wine.

I'm turning water into pee-pee.

I'm turning my jeans into stank.

So

this is right around the time where I believe that they they start.

Remember they started using the armored vehicle to tear down vehicles to tear down some of the fencing that was around the compound.

Yeah.

And also putting these vehicles very close to the compound itself.

And I think this is when they're making this decision that this is not going to end well, period.

And maybe we're going to be the ones to end it.

Well, and this has got to make the guys, the people inside, the families inside terrified.

And of course, Koresh at this point is

reminding the FBI, hey, I'm still,

we have no intentions of dying in here, and I'm still waiting for the word of God, waiting for word from God as to what we are to be doing.

Now, over the course of a couple of days, David Koresh and one of the attorneys that his mother got for him, they are allowed to meet face to face.

There are some pretty famous photos of this activity as well, where you can see David Koresh and the attorney standing talking face to face for hours at the front door of the compound.

On March 30th, on a hill, approximately three miles away from the compound,

there's a large number of folks gathered to observe what was happening at the Mount Carmel compound.

We have journalism student Michelle Roch,

who interviews a Gulf War veteran, 24-year-old U.S.

Army veteran Timothy James McVeigh.

He is there handing out bumper stickers and pro-gun rights pamphlets with slogans on them like,

when guns are outlawed, I will become an outlaw.

He told the the student reporter, the government is afraid of the guns people have because they have to have control of the people at all times.

Once you take away the guns, you can do anything to the people.

You give them an inch and they take a mile.

I believe we are slowly turning into a socialist government.

The government is continually growing bigger and more powerful, and the people need to prepare to defend themselves against government control.

On April 1st, the two attorneys spend the day inside the compound.

So now the attorneys are allowed inside by the FBI.

The Davidians say that they will leave.

The attorneys go back to the FBI and say, this is what we heard.

This is what we were told.

The Davidians are saying that they're going to leave either tomorrow, April 2nd, or on April 10th.

This

has something to do with Passover and the observance of Passover.

I don't quite know the details of that, but we do know that on Sunday, April 4th, the lawyers meet again with David Koresh and reiterate that everyone will come out after Passover.

Now, on April 5th, the Davidians observe Passover.

On April 7th, David Koresh refuses to confirm an exit date.

Hostage release team commander Richard Rogers proposes a tear gas plan to force the Davidians out of the structure.

Yeah, one of the most interesting interviews was with the FBI negotiator

because they're trying to negotiate with somebody where they're giving him what he wants and then he's basically changing his mind.

Well, I'll give you this if you give me this.

But then he doesn't follow through with his end of the bargain the majority of the time.

And then they're getting pressure from anybody that's on the tactical side going, let's stop negotiating with this Yahoo and let's bring force.

So it'd be a very tough place to be in as far as the negotiator's standpoint.

On Friday, April 9th, David Koresh sends a letter to the FBI saying

the heavens are calling you to judgment.

And he actually sends a series of letters to the FBI over the course of the next couple of days.

We get two FBI experts, psychological experts from the FBI that analyze these letters, and they walk away with the conclusion that David Koresh was possibly a psychotic and he had actually truly had no intention of leaving voluntarily from Mount Carmel.

The FBI finalizes plans to use tear gas and seeks Janet Reno's approval on their new course of action.

Sunday, April 11th is Easter Sunday, and there are some negotiations, there are some talks, but they don't go anywhere on Easter Sunday.

On the 12th, the tear gas plan is presented to Janet Reno, not as an all-out assault on the Davidians, but as a tactic whereby gas will be inserted in stages, periodically, into the compound.

Initially, into only one small area of the compound.

The goal of this, obviously, if you're only putting it into one small section of the compound, is to not only drive them out of that area, but away from that area and encouraging them to exit through an uncontaminated portion of the compound.

On the 13th, for most of the afternoon, David Koresh,

he's on the phone with negotiators and he is

Bible thumping them, essentially, right?

He's using that, what the FBI was referring to as Bible babble.

And he starts reminding them that he is, he still not, doesn't know when they will come out and he's not coming out until God tells him to do so.

On the 14th,

we get, we get some, this is where things start to shift a little bit.

And, and really, in full review of this here, Captain, when I reviewed this part, part of me, I mean, of course, we all wish that it didn't go down the way that it went down.

Right.

I've not talked to one person that's like, oh, they did the right thing.

And when I say they, I mean either side.

Right.

This is the part that makes me wonder: could it have been possible to just wait a little bit longer and maybe they would have come out?

Because on the 14th, and this plays, this goes toward their teaching and to

what they follow and what they believe.

David Koresh tells the FBI that we're looking, we're not going to, we will surrender

eventually, but we are not going to surrender until I have written a manuscript that explains the seven seals.

On the 16th, so this is two days later, Koresh tells negotiators, you know, just be patient.

I have completed the manuscript on the first seal.

So there are seven of them.

It would seem to me that if he's telling the truth on these matters, then it's, it could be a 14-day waiting period if, in fact, he's completed this manuscript in a two-day time period.

Well, he's got six more to go, and if he could do it at the same pace, we might be 12 days away from people walking out of this compound.

Yeah, but again, it's a difficult situation for law enforcement because this Yahoo has been lying to you the whole time.

Correct.

And he is doing what law enforcement hates.

He's controlling the situation.

Law enforcement cannot stand that.

In fact, at times, it's downright dangerous for law enforcement to not be in control of a situation.

Now, Janet Reno does reject the tear gas plan on the 16th.

I don't know if that is in direct relation to Koresha telling them that he's making progress on his manuscript.

The next day,

There's an individual.

It was a man, his name Lewis.

He was not a branch Davidian, but somehow, I guess, snuck into the compound early during this standoff.

I have no idea why anybody would want to do something like this and put themselves directly in harm's way.

But on this day, he leaves the compound.

This is also the same day that Janet Reno approves the FBI's tear gas plan.

But she, remember,

what's going on here is she basically states,

I'll leave the details and the tactical decisions up to those at Waco.

Right.

I do believe this Lewis guy was actually an agent that they had, infantry, the compound.

He was, if I'm thinking of the same guy.

That would make a lot of more sense.

Yeah.

So he was like, he was in there before the siege even happened.

He was pretending.

to be a member because what you have to remember is, yes, the guns, that's a concern.

But when you have all these other reports of

child abuse, sexual abuse, physical abuse, they had to be able to confirm this on some level.

And so that's who I believe this Lewis guy is.

You know what?

I think you're exactly right.

What I think we have here is, if I remember correctly, they didn't identify him as an undercover agent until well after

the events of Waco.

And part of that is, you know,

these entities should not be in the business of outing their undercover agents.

On Sunday, April 18th, Janet Reno briefs Bill Clinton on their CS gas plan of forcing the Davidians out.

The president...

concurs with Reno, but asks questions about assuring the children will be safe, but adds, you know, it's your decision.

You're in control here.

He does push.

Clinton did push and remind the parties involved here and the parties

in power that he was still hoping that it could be negotiated and whatever problems or in the murders that took place,

whatever accountability needed to be dealt out with along with punishments, he wanted to see this play out in the court system,

not

in

a war-type setting.

This portion of the story is

heavily debated, but it was well reported, especially early on

after the events of Waco.

So I didn't want to skip over it here, Captain.

But there were reports that the...

So on the 18th, armored vehicles, they continue to

get closer and closer to the compound, right?

They're working their way in.

They're closing in.

And they even clear out David Koresh's personal vehicle and a bunch of other vehicles that were in front of the compound.

They remove those, and the FBI is warning the Davidians to stay out of the tower.

They're seeing them up in the tower, the FBI reports.

As the reports go, they're holding up children in the windows.

And one window,

there's a sign that says flames await.

And then that takes us to the sad, tragic, and horrifically unfortunate events of the following day, April 19th, 1993.

From midnight till about 5:30 a.m.,

everything's quiet.

There's no reports of even blaring music or sounds previously used by the FBI.

At about 10 minutes to 6 a.m.,

federal agents reportedly call

the compound and inform the members to give up or they will be gassed.

And I think their thought was,

we have these tanks.

We're going to hit parts of their building

with these tanks,

not with explosives.

And then we're going to start shooting in this gas, and we're going to see a flood of people leave.

I hope that was their intention, and I hope that was their hopes as well.

Yes, yeah.

Yeah, so what you would have is you would use the tanks to basically bust in

or bust through a portion of a wall, a perimeter wall of the fortress,

and then

send in the gas, fire in the gas,

and

draw them out, force them out.

At 6 a.m., there's a Department of Public Safety officer that is warning.

Remember, we have those people that are just there in observance, right?

You have the media that has gathered.

You have Timothy McVay and other people that have gathered.

And so these people are all approximately two to three miles away, but they're being warned to take cover and and to get the hell out of here because

you see those tanks up there?

We're about to start using them.

And we don't know exactly what's going to happen.

And we don't want any members of the public to be injured or worse.

At 6.04, an armored vehicle smashes through the front wall of the compound

just left of the front door, leaving a hole about eight feet or sorry, eight feet in height and 10 feet wide.

At 6.15, an ambulance rushes toward the compound with lights flashing.

At 6.55, authorities call the Hillcrest Baptist Medical Center in Waco, and they say, be on alert.

Be on alert.

They're notifying them, hey, we think we're going to be sending you a whole bunch of people real soon.

At 8 a.m., an armored vehicle with a large battering arm rips into the second floor of the compound.

And minutes later, another hole is punched into the back side of the compound.

At 8.05.14

hospital staffers are called in and four additional doctors are called in right remember this is still a ready response team essentially is being built at the local hospital.

At 9 a.m., President Clinton says he has been briefed on the assault and the U.S.

Attorney General Janet Reno has given the go-ahead for the tactical plan.

At 9.20 a.m., an armored vehicle returns to the compound and bashes another hole in the front wall of the compound, taking out the front door.

At 10:30, FBI Special Agent Ricks says that the continued ramming of the building and the introduction of tear gas is intended as the next logical step to ending the 51-day standoff.

The agents and the armored vehicles are met with 65 to 80 gunshots from inside the compound as they approach.

He says agents did not return fire.

No one was injured.

He says the compound was rammed

10 or 11 times in the original assault, tearing holes in walls and the roof.

Each ramming met with 10 to 12 shots.

Again, that report is coming from the FBI.

So take that for what you will.

But also when they're interviewing AFT agents, FBI agents, and

because we have to remember,

there's also a bunch of followers that are on the outside now watching this play out in real time,

live on the news.

And everybody's wondering, why aren't they coming out?

Where are the people?

What the hell is going on in there?

At five minutes after noon, a vehicle hits the corner of the compound, knocking another sizable hole in it.

Five minutes after that, flames and smoke are seen pouring from the compound.

High winds are whipping the building and fanning the flames.

And one thing that is reported to us constantly is in regard to the gas, the CS gas,

and

then the flames being seen is they do they do constantly remind us about the the

time period, right?

That the window of time between when we stopped firing gas into the compound and when the flames actually were seen.

And I believe that

those statements are that there was roughly one hour between

those two events.

Because truly, look, there's a lot of opinions about what happened,

who

should be

facing more blame, what side

should be facing more blame here.

But really, truly,

I've reviewed this thing and reviewed this thing and looked for every bit of information out there.

And some of it is one-sided.

Some of it is very opinionated.

Some of it says that the Davidians did nothing wrong and that they were murdered and

tortured and killed.

And then there are other opinions out there that

the FBI had to do something.

And the Davidians were

crazy or just led by this psychotic,

crazy individual that

let his followers take the fall

alongside of him, which we've seen

in other cults.

We've seen it time and time again throughout history.

So it's not hard to believe or too terribly difficult to believe that this may have happened again here.

But really, truly, Captain, the only thing I feel confident saying

when we want to talk about things like blame or ultimately who was to blame the most is there's three scenarios here, and all three of them are plausible.

A, that the FBI murdered these extreme Christian people who just wanted to be left alone and carry out

their beliefs,

their belief system.

Or two,

the Davidians were a bunch of wackos

in Waco, led by a wacko who convinced them, just stay inside and let's burn to death and martyrdom.

Or the other option is that the FBI never intended for the building to

to go up in flames.

The Davidians never set fire to the structure.

And there was a spark somewhere in that building.

And we talked about the structure.

We talked about how it was built.

We talked about the hay barrels.

We talked about them firing CS gas into the building, which is not, I want to be clear here, my general understanding.

And there's several ways that you can.

There's several different chemical cocktails that can make up tear gas.

And depending on what kind they were using using or what chemical

cocktail they were using,

this is not highly flammable

stuff here.

However, it is somewhat combustible.

It might not be easily or readily

lit

on fire, but it can be lit on fire.

So, I mean, it's, I mean, look, it's,

I, I,

maybe I'm holding back a few opinions here, but

I know a lot of people out there have strong opinions one way or the other on this, but I think all of us can agree that this was a horrible outcome to a bad situation.

And nobody wanted it to end this way.

I hope that, I really do hope that.

And I mean that when I say nobody wanted it to end this way, I'm not talking about people listening to

us, to our presentation.

I'm not talking about people that were sitting at home on their couches watching this play out on the 6 o'clock and 11 o'clock news

back in 1993.

I'm talking about David Koresh, and I'm talking about the negotiators for the FBI and the people that make decisions, good or bad,

on behalf of the FBI.

Those are the people that I'm saying I hope nobody wanted any kind of outcome like this at all.

On April 19th, the fire at the Mount Carmel compound, it completely destroyed the compound, according to the FBI, FBI agent Steve Schneider.

David Koresh's top aide shot and killed Koresh and then himself.

76 people died in the fire, including 20 children.

ATF agents Conway LeBlue, Todd McCahan, Robert Williams, and Stephen Willis.

They were killed prior to the fire.

They were killed when the standoff started.

Meanwhile, many miles away, convicted cop killer, murderer, and white supremac Richard Wayne Snell was still being held at the Tucker unit at a maximum security prison in Jefferson County, Arkansas.

His appeals were running out.

And his execution day, a date with a needle injected into the veins of his right arm, accompanied by a lethal dose of the Arkansas state death penalty, was drawing closer and closer every day.

For everything True Crime, check out TrueCrimeGarage.com.

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