Welcome back to the deep dive. Usually we take
a topic, we find the answers, we package it all
up, and then we move on. But today, today is
different. We are not just looking at a historical
event. We are, I think, looking at an open wound.
We're looking at 51 days in Texas that didn't
just end in tragedy. They fundamentally rewired
the American psyche. We are talking about the
Waco siege. It's the scar that really hasn't
healed. I mean, you can't tell the story of modern
America, specifically the story of domestic terrorism,
the militia movement and that deep entrenched.
distrust of the federal government without starting
at the Mount Carmel Center in 1993. Right. It
is in so many ways the origin point for the political
friction we still feel today. Exactly. And I
think for a lot of people, Waco is just a shorthand.
It's this word that means government overreach
or, you know, crazy cult, depending on your Twitter
feed. Yeah, depending on who you talk to. You
picture the fire. You picture that building burning
down on live television. But the mission today
is to move past those headlines. We've got a
massive stack of sources here. Wikipedia articles,
the Danforth Report, survivor autobiographies,
tactical analyses. We want to unpack the timeline,
the theology, which is huge and so often overlooked,
and the tactical errors that led to 76 people
losing their lives on April 19th. And I think
that word theology is the key. It's the key that
unlocks this whole tragedy. If you treat this
event just as a hostage situation or just as
a gunfight, you miss the entire engine that was
driving the people inside that compound. You
missed the why. You missed the why. To understand
the fire, you have to understand the belief system
that made that fire in their minds almost inevitable.
We have to look at this through the lens of what
sociologists call asymmetric reality. Asymmetric
reality. I like that. Explain that a bit. It
means you had two groups operating in completely
different universes. The FBI was in one reality,
a secular, tactical, hostage rescue scenario.
But the Branch Davidians were operating in a
completely different one, a biblical apocalyptic
script where the government was literally playing
the role of the beast from the book of Revelation.
Wow. And when those two realities crashed into
each other, disaster wasn't just possible. It
was practically written in stone. So let's start
at the very beginning, because before it was
a siege, before it was a tragedy, it was just
a group of people. And frankly, I was surprised
to learn that this didn't start with David Koresh.
This wasn't a one -man show, at least not initially.
No, not at all. The group's lineage actually
goes way back to 1955. They didn't just pop up
out of nowhere in the 90s. They were a schism,
a breakaway group from another group called the
Shepherd's Rod, who themselves were a breakaway
from the Seventh -day Adventists. So you already
had this history of splintering. So they were
originally called the Davidians. The Davidians,
yes. And the core belief, right from the jump,
was about the imminent apocalypse. They believed
they were living in the end times and that the
second coming was right around the corner. They
were preppers before prepping was a reality TV
genre. Essentially, yes. They were spiritual
preppers. They thought they had a front row seat
to the end of the world. And they set up shop
on a piece of property near Waco, Texas, which
they named... Mount Carmel. And even that name,
Mount Carmel, that's not an accident. That is
a very specific signal. Oh, it's hugely significant.
It's named after a biblical mountain in Israel.
And it's not just any mountain. No. It's specifically
the site of Elijah's confrontation with the prophets
of Baal. In the Old Testament, Mount Carmel is
where Elijah challenges the false prophets to
a contest to see whose God can call down fire
from heaven. So it's a place of showdowns. It
is a place of spiritual warfare. So, Simply by
naming their home Mount Carmel, the geography
itself was steeped in this idea of a final confrontation.
They were scripturally priming themselves for
a fight from the very beginning. Okay, so you
have this group, the Branch Davidians, living
on this compound, they're waiting for the end,
but then enters the man everyone knows, Vernon
Howell. Right. Before he was David Koresh, he
was Vernon Howell. A stuttering, dyslexic, high
school dropout, aspiring rock musician and an
intensely charismatic Bible teacher. Quite the
resume. Yeah. And his rise to power wasn't exactly
a Democratic vote. It was a succession struggle
that, and I'm not exaggerating, reads like a
thriller novel. Oh, this is where it gets really
wild. I have to do a little story time here because
when I read this in the notes, I had to double
check it was real. So the leader at the time
is Lois Roden. She passes away. And Vernon Howell
is fighting for control against Lois's son, George
Roden. And George Roden. He had a very specific,
very macabre way he wanted to settle who was
the true prophet. It is one of the most bizarre
chapters in American religious history, and it
almost never makes the documentaries. It's just
too strange. George Rodin literally digs up a
corpse, a woman named Anna Hughes from the Davidian
Cemetery. He drags this body out and challenges
Vernon Howell to a resurrection contest. It's
a what? A resurrection contest. He says, essentially,
whoever can bring this dead woman back to life
is the true leader it sounds like fiction it
sounds like something from a gothic horror story
it does and you know you'd expect the cult leader
type to maybe try a seance or start chanting
but howell actually does the rational thing here
he goes to the police which is fascinating he
goes to the mclennan county sheriff's office
and says hey this guy dug up a body that's abuse
of a corpse which shows a certain level of cunning
he knew he couldn't win a resurrection contest
so he tried to win a legal one. But the prosecutors,
they refused to file charges without proof. They
needed evidence. They needed evidence that the
corpse had been disturbed. They told him, bring
us a photo and we'll press charges. Which led
to the gunfight. Which led to the gunfight. Howell
gets seven of his followers. They were later
dubbed the Rodenville Eight. They all dress in
camouflage, carrying rifles, and they sneak onto
the property to get a photo of the corpse as
evidence. This is just unbelievable. George Roden
catches them. He's armed with an Uzi. A gunfight
breaks out. It's this chaotic shootout in the
middle of Texas over a dead body. Just a shootout
over a corpse. Exactly. Roden gets shot in the
hand and chest. Howell and his followers go to
trial for attempted murder. The jury hangs. They
couldn't decide if it was self -defense or not.
Eventually, Roden goes to jail for unrelated
crimes, including contempt of court. And that's
how Vernon Howell takes the throne. That's how
he becomes leader. It wasn't a divine appointment.
It was the result of a gunfight, a mistrial,
and his rival self -destructing. It sets a violent
tone for his leadership right from the start.
But once he is in charge, things change rapidly.
In 1989, he releases what he calls the New Light
audio tape. And this is the pivot point. This
is where the theology shifts from we are waiting
for the end to I am the center of the end. New
light is a term often used in these kinds of
religious circles to describe a new revelation
that supersedes the old laws. And Howell's new
light was effectively a sexual revolution for
one man. New light sounds positive, but the content
was pretty dark. This is where the polygamy comes
in, right? Yes. The doctrine essentially stated
that courage. he legally changed his name from
Vernon Howell to David Koresh in 1990, was the
sinful Messiah. What does that even mean, sinful
Messiah? It's a complex idea he developed. He
taught that he had to live a sinful life to understand
sinners, and that he was a perfect man in a sinful
body. But the mandate that came with it was that
he, and he alone, was commanded by God to procreate
with the women in the group to build a new House
of David. And this wasn't just about unmarried
women. He dissolved the marriages of his followers.
He broke up couples. He separated married couples.
He told the men they had to be celibate to prepare
for the coming spiritual war, but he claimed
entitlement to their wives. He taught that all
the women in the group belonged to him. That's
an incredible level of control. The men had to
be celibate, but Koresh could have, and claimed
he was entitled to, up to 140 wives and some
of these wives were underage we're talking girls
as young as 12 or 13. correct there is significant
documentation and testimony from former members
regarding his marriages to minors and that is
crucial context Because while the later siege
was about guns, the initial heat, the initial
scrutiny from the community and the press was
very much driven by these allegations of statutory
rape and child abuse. The whispers were getting
out. The community in Waco was hearing these
stories from people who had left the group. Which
brings us to the investigation. Because while
the abuse was the moral outrage, that's not what
brought the federal government to the door. Exactly.
Statutory rape is a state crime. The federal
government, specifically the Bureau of Alcohol,
Tobacco, and Firearms, the ATF, needed a federal
angle to get involved. They don't investigate
child abuse. They investigate weapons. And that
is where the spark comes in. That's the spark.
It started with a UPS driver, didn't it? It did.
May of 1992. A UPS driver is handling a package
destined for the compound. It breaks open and
out roll grenades. Just hand grenades rolling
around in a delivery truck. Now, to be fair to
the Davidians, and this is an important detail,
these were inert grenade holes. They were hollow.
There were no explosives inside them. Legally,
they were just heavy paperweights. Okay. But
then came the other deliveries. Black gunpowder.
Powdered aluminum. Cardboard tubes. Okay, I'm
not a chemist, but even I know that if you have
grenade holes and you order gunpowder and aluminum
powder, you aren't making paperweights anymore.
Precisely. That is the entrance the ATF made.
The combination of those materials is used to
create explosives. They believe the Davidians
were building live grenades. And then there's
the mag bag. The mag bag. That was their gun
store. Right. Because we have to clarify, they
were technically. Legal gun dealers. They were.
Paul Fetta, a high -ranking member, was a licensed
federal firearms dealer. They had a legitimate
business called the Mag Bag. They traveled to
gun shows. They sold vests, ammunition, surplus
gear. It was a revenue stream for the group.
But the ATF agent investigating, David Aguilera,
noticed they were buying very specific items
in bulk. AR -15 conversion kits. Exactly. AR
-15s. Okay, let's unpack the technical side here
because this is where the legal argument gets
really tricky. It is not illegal to buy an AR
-15. It is not illegal to buy parts for it. Correct.
In the United States, owning a semi -automatic
AR -15 is legal. A semi -automatic fires one
round for every pull of the trigger. Bang, bang,
bang. What is illegal, without very expensive
and rare federal permits, is a fully automatic
machine gun. You pull the trigger, you hold it
down, and it goes burp. Continuous fire. And
the ATF suspected they were making the burped
kind. Yes. They were buying parts like drop -in
auto sears and other components that, if you
file them down or modify them just right, can
convert a legal semi -automatic rifle into an
illegal, unregistered machine gun. The ATF operated
under the theory of constructive possession.
It's a legal doctrine. What does that mean? It
means that even if they didn't catch Koresh physically
firing a machine gun, possessing all the necessary
parts to assemble one with no other logical use
for those parts, is itself a crime. The intent
becomes the crime. So you have the ETF building
this case. They suspect a massive stockpile of
illegal machine guns and homemade grenades. They
named the operation Showtime, which honestly
maybe tells you a little bit about the mindset
going in. It does suggest a desire for a high
-profile success. The ATF was actually under
some pressure at the time, they'd had some bad
press, and they needed a win to justify their
budget to Congress. A big raid on a dangerous
cult looked good on paper. But the clock was
ticking because of the press. We mentioned the
abuse allegations earlier. The local paper, the
Waco Tribune -Herald, was about to drop a bombshell.
The Sinful Messiah series. The reporters had
been digging for months. They had interviews
with defectors, details about the polygamy, the
child abuse, the weapons stockpile. It was a
massive expose. And ATF knew it was coming. They
did. They actually met with the editors of the
newspaper and begged them not to publish it yet.
Why? What was their reasoning? They feared that
once the article came out, Koresh would know
the... But the newspaper had a duty to publish.
And they did. On February 27th, 1993, the first
part of The Sinful Messiah hits the newsstands
all over Waco. And Koresh sees it. He knows he's
been exposed. So the ATF panics. They feel like
their hand has been forced. They have to move
their timeline up. They decide to execute the
raid the very next morning, Sunday, February
28th. They accelerated the plan. Codename Showtime
was a go. The plan was a sudden daylight raid.
Surprise was everything. They needed to hit hard
and fast, catch the Davidians completely off
guard, separate the men from the weapons, and
serve the search and arrest warrants. But, and
this is one of those truth is stranger than fiction
moments. The surprise was blown by a conversation
with a mailman. It's a staggering coincidence.
A true butterfly effect moment that sealed the
fate of everyone involved. A local TV cameraman
who had been tipped off that something big was
happening at the compound was out in the area.
He's trying to get a scoop. He's trying to get
the shot. He gets lost on the rural roads. He
sees a mail carrier doing his route and pulls
over to ask for directions. He basically says,
hey, can you tell me where the Rodenville place
is? which is what locals called it. I hear the
feds are raiding it today. And the mail carrier.
The mail carrier happened to be David Koresh's
brother -in -law. I mean, you cannot write that
script. If you put that in a movie, the audience
would groan and say it's too convenient. It's
unbelievable. So the reporter tells the brother
-in -law the raid is coming. The brother -in
-law, Perry Jones, immediately goes straight
to the compound and tells Koresh. So the surprise
is gone. And that changes everything. The entire
premise of the raid speed and surprise evaporated
in that one moment. Now, the Davidians aren't
sleeping. They are in their Sunday prayer service.
They are arming up. And there was an undercover
agent inside. Yes, Robert Rodriguez. He had been
inside for weeks, posing as a Bible student.
He was in the compound when the warning came.
Koresh actually confronts him. He pulls him aside,
looks him in the eye, and says, They're coming,
Robert. The ATF and the National Guard are coming.
That must have been terrifying for Rodriguez.
His cover is blown. Absolutely. Rodriguez has
to think fast. He makes an excuse, claims he
needs to leave. He gets out, runs to a payphone,
and frantically calls the ATF commanders. He
tells them explicitly, they know the element
of surprise is gone. They're getting their guns
and their vests on. Call it off. And this is
the pivotal moment of decision. The commander
on the ground, Chuck Sarabin, knows the surprise
is blown. Koresh knows they are coming. Common
Sense says you call it off, set up a perimeter
and negotiate. But the order is given. Go anyway.
Showtime proceeds. For decades, tactical experts
have criticized this decision as one of the worst
in law enforcement history. It was likely a mix
of adrenaline, sunken costs. They had almost
80 agents and cattle trucks already moving down
the road and institutional arrogance. They thought
they could still pull it off. They thought, we
are the federal government. Even if they know
we're coming, they'll see our overwhelming force
and surrender. They fatally misjudged their opponent.
So 9 .45 a .m., the cattle trucks arrive. And
that's a detail that always sticks with me. They
pulled up in these big white cattle trailers
covered in tarps to try and look like local ranchers.
It was a failed attempt at subterfuge. Agents
in full tactical gear, helmets, black uniforms,
they jump out. And then... The shooting starts.
And this is one of the biggest points of contention
that remains to this day. Who shot first? It's
the Han Solo versus Greedo of federal law enforcement.
In a very dark way, yes. The ATF's official story
is that they were fired upon from the windows
and the front door as they approached. They say
the Davidians opened up on them immediately.
The Davidians, specifically the survivors, have
always maintained that the ATF fired first. They
claimed that agents shot the dogs that were in
the kennel near the front of the building and
that gunfire triggered the Davidians to return
fire in defense of what they saw as an unprovoked
attack. Whatever started it, it turned into a
war zone instantly. You had agents trying to
get on the roof to breach the concrete room they
believed was the armory. You had National Guard
helicopters creating a distraction and taking
fire. Yes, the helicopters were supposed to be
a diversion, but the Davidians fired on them
with high -powered .50 caliber rifles. The pilots
reported bullets coming through the floor of
the choppers. They had to pull back immediately.
On the ground, it was just chaos. The agents
were pinned down behind vehicles with no good
cover. The casualties were significant and fast.
Four ATF agents were killed. 16 were wounded.
Inside, six Davidians died in the initial firefight.
David Koresh himself was shot in the hand and
the stomach. And eventually the unthinkable happens
for a federal raid. They run out of ammo. The
ATF literally ran low on ammunition. They were
in a sustained firefight they were not prepared
for. They had to negotiate a ceasefire with Koresh
over the phone just to withdraw safely. So it
was a tactical defeat. It was a tactical defeat
and a public humiliation. They had to retreat.
leaving their dead initially until the ceasefire
allowed them to retrieve the bodies. Instead
of a quick service of a warrant, the United States
government was now in a 51 -day standoff. This
is where the ATF steps back and the FBI takes
command, specifically the hostage rescue team
HRT. And for the next 51 days, the world watched
this slow motion train wreck unfold. And conflict
is the right word to describe the FBI's approach
internally, too. Because inside the FBI command
post, you had a civil war happening. You had
two very different philosophies clashing constantly.
The negotiators versus the tactical team. Exactly.
You had the FBI negotiators who wanted to talk
Koresh out. Their approach was patience. They
wanted to build trust, listen to his theology.
de -escalate. They treated it as a complex psychological
puzzle. And then you had the tactical team, the
HRT. These are the door kickers. Their philosophy
was pressure, constant escalating pressure. They
wanted to make life inside the compound so miserable
that it would force them out. It was like good
cop, bad cop, but they weren't coordinating.
They were actively sabotaging each other. That's
a perfect way to put it. The negotiators would
be on the phone having these long rambling discussions
with Koresh, which the tactical guys dismissed
as Bible babble. The negotiators would be saying,
David, we want to work with you. We want a peaceful
resolution. And at the exact same time, the tactical
teams are outside cutting the power, cutting
the water, and driving M60 tanks over the Davidians'
personal cars and motorcycles. It sends a completely
mixed message. We want peace, but we just crushed
your Chevy. It destroyed any trust the negotiators
were trying to build. Koresh would get on the
phone and say, you say you want to help, but
your tanks are destroying my home. It validated
his paranoia. It proved to him they weren't sincere.
And then came the psychological warfare tactics,
the psyops. I read the list of sounds they blasted
over loudspeakers all night to deprive them of
sleep. It's an incredible list. It is. They used
jet plane noises. Pop music from artists like
Nancy Sinatra, Tibetan Buddhist chanting, and
most infamously, the recorded screams of rabbits
being slaughtered. Why rabbit screams? The theory
is it's a deeply primal, unsettling sound that
bypasses rational thought and creates stress.
It was all about sensory overload. Sleep deprivation.
The idea is to break their will to resist. But
this is where the asymmetric reality comes back
in a huge way. This is the critical failure.
Scholars like James Tabor and Philip Arnold,
experts in apocalyptic religions, they tried
to warn the FBI. They were desperately calling
the command post, sending faxes, trying to tell
the commanders, you are dealing with a man who
believes he is living in the fifth seal of the
book of Revelation. Explain that. What does the
fifth seal mean for them? In Quresh's specific
theology, the fifth seal is the time when the
faithful are persecuted and martyred by the forces
of Babylon, which in his mind was... the U .S.
government. He believes the beast is coming to
destroy them before the end. So when you roll
up in tanks and blast rabbit screams. You aren't
breaking his will. You are playing your part
in his movie. You are validating his prophecy.
That's the paradox of force we talked about in
the intro. Exactly. Every tank that crushed a
fence, every helicopter that buzzed the compound,
every threatening message just confirmed to his
followers that Koresh was a true prophet. Look,
you could say, I told you the beast would come,
and here they are. The FBI thought they were
applying tactical pressure. In reality, they
were applying theological glue. They were bonding
the group tighter together against their prophesied
common enemy. There were some successes in the
negotiations, though. We shouldn't glaze over
that. 35 people did come out. That is true. 21
children and 14 adults were released, mostly
in the early stages of the siege. But as the
tactical pressure ramped up, the exits stopped
completely. Koresh kept moving the goalposts.
He made a promise about a radio broadcast, right?
He did. He demanded that a 58 -minute sermon
of his be played on national radio. He promised
that if they did it, he would lead his people
out. The FBI, desperate for a breakthrough, arranged
for it to be broadcast. They played the tape.
And he didn't come out. He didn't come out. He
claimed God had spoken to him again and told
him to wait. To the FBI, this was the ultimate
act of bad faith. They saw him as a liar and
a manipulator who would never come out peacefully.
And then came the manuscript. This was the final
delay, right? Yes. In mid -April, as the siege
dragged on, Kirish claims he has been authorized
by God to finally write his interpretation of
the seven seals from the book of Revelation.
He promises that as soon as he finishes this
manuscript, he and all his followers will surrender.
And the FBI is sitting there thinking, is this
just another stalling tactic, another radio broadcast
promise? The negotiators were actually hopeful.
They thought, OK, this is different. He has a
concrete task. Let him write. If he finishes
the manuscript, maybe he comes out. It was a
tangible goal. But the tactical commanders were
done waiting. They were out of patience. They
saw the manuscript as just another lie. Conditions
inside were deteriorating. No water, no electricity,
reports of sewage backing up. And there were
persistent reports of ongoing child abuse. That
was the justification given publicly. Yes. The
justification for the final assault was the safety
of the children. Though it's worth noting that
HRT leaders later denied having any concrete
evidence of ongoing abuse during the siege itself.
So the decision goes up the chain. Janet Reno,
the newly appointed attorney general, she's only
been on the job for a few weeks. She has to make
the call. She approves the plan for the final
assault. April 19, 1993. The plan was to use
CES gas, tear gas, but not just spray it like
you would for crowd control. They used combat
engineering vehicles, CEVs. Think of a tank with
a giant boom arm attached to it, like a construction
vehicle on steroids. They were punching holes
in the building. Right. The plan was to drive
the CEV right up to the building, ram the boom
through the exterior wall, and then inject the
CES gas deep into the structure. The idea was
to create a gas chamber effect, make the air
inside so unbreathable that the mothers would
grab their children and run out the front door
into the waiting arms of the FBI. It was supposed
to be a non -lethal solution and the standoff.
That was the plan. But they didn't run out. No.
They hunkered down. Some put on gas masks. Some
retreated to a concrete bunker inside the main
building, a room they called the cooler. They
had been preparing for this moment for 51 days.
They believed this was the final test of faith.
The operation starts at 6 .00 a .m. They are
punching holes, pumping gas for hours. The Davidians
are firing back at the tanks. And then around
noon, the fire. 12 .07 p .m., to be precise.
The first wisps of smoke are spotted. And because
of the high gusting winds on the Texas plain
and the fact that the building had been punched
full of holes, creating a perfect draft, within
minutes, the entire wooden structure became a
raging inferno. And this is the part that everyone
argues about. Who started the fire? This is the
central controversy of Waco. It is. If we look
at the government side, the official investigation,
the Danforth report, which was a massive special
counsel investigation years later, concluded
definitively that the Davidians started the fire
themselves. What was their evidence for that?
Their primary evidence was audio recordings from
listening devices the FBI had managed to plant
inside the compound. On those tapes, you can
hear voices saying things like, have you poured
it yet? And light the fire. They also point to
the fact that the fire started in three different
places at once. Right, which suggests it wasn't
an accident. Correct. Aerial infrared footage
shows smoke rising from three distinct locations
almost simultaneously, which suggests a coordinated
effort to burn the building down from the inside.
The government's view is that this was a mass
suicide or a final act of apocalyptic defiance.
But the survivors and critics tell a very different
story. They do. They have two main theories.
The first is that the CEVs, the tanks, when they
smash through the walls, knocked over propane
tanks or kerosene lanterns, starting the fire
accidentally. The other theory, and this was
a huge controversy, is that the FBI used pyrotechnic
tear gas rounds that ignited the building. Let's
pause on that because that was a massive cover
-up, wasn't it? For years, the FBI denied using
anything that could spark a fire. Absolutely.
For six years, from 1993 to 1999, the FBI categorically
denied, under oath and to Congress, that they
had used any pyrotechnic devices on April 19th.
And then they admitted it. Then, in 1999, under
intense scrutiny and facing new evidence, they
finally admitted that, yes, they did use a few
military -grade pyrotechnic CS gas rounds. That
is a huge admission, a game -changer. It is.
However, and this is the government's crucial
defense, they claimed these rounds were fired
early in the morning, hours before the fire started
at noon. And they claimed they were fired at
a concrete construction pit, a bunker located
away from the main wooden building to try and
clear it out. They maintained those specific
rounds did not and could not have started the
main fire. But the damage to their credibility
was done. That admission alone destroyed so much
trust. People asked, if they lied about the pyrotechnics
for six years, what else are they lying about?
It fueled the conspiracy theories, absolutely.
It gave oxygen to the idea of a cover -up. But
regardless of what the spark was, the result
was horrific. 76 people died in that fire. Including
the children. Including somewhere between 20
and 28 children. David Koresh died, though he
didn't burn to death. His body was found with
a gunshot wound to the head. The official finding
is that it was likely a mercy killing or suicide
by proxy committed by his top lieutenant, Steve
Schneider, who then killed himself. The images
of that building burning. I mean, you watched
it live on TV if you were old enough. It was
horrific. It looked like hell on earth. And in
the aftermath, the questions just piled up. You
mentioned the Danforth report clearing the government
of starting the fire, but it did find them negligent
in other ways. Yes, specifically regarding the
failure to disclose the use of the pyrotechnics.
But there are other lingering physical evidence
issues that keep the skepticism alive. The missing
door. The steel door from the front of the building.
Exactly. The right -hand entry door. The Davidians
claimed that the ATF shot in through that door
during the initial raid in February, unprovoked.
They said the bullet holes would prove the agents
shot first. But after the fire, when the debris
was cleared by federal authorities, the left
door was there, but the right door was gone.
It had disappeared. That is incredibly suspicious.
I mean, how do you lose a 200 pound steel door
from a crime scene that is under complete federal
control? It's the kind of detail that keeps the
controversy alive. Then you have the FLIR footage
forward looking infrared. This is the thermal
imaging, the black and white footage from the
airplanes circling above. Right. Critics and
a documentary called Waco. The rules of engagement
claim that on the final day, you can see rhythmic
flashes coming from the government lines toward
the back of the building while it's burning.
And they argue these flashes are. They argue
these are machine gun muzzle flashes. The accusation
is that agents were shooting at Davidians who
were trying to escape the fire from the rear
of the building. That is a dark accusation that
the FBI was gunning down people fleeing a fire.
It is the darkest accusation leveled against
the government. Now, the government brought in
expert after expert who testified that those
flashes were reflections of sunlight on debris
or heat signatures from the fire itself causing
artifacts in the camera. The Danforth report
supported the government's view, noting that
none of the victims' bodies had bullet wounds
consistent with being shot from outside. But
for those who distrust the official narrative,
the visual of those flashes remains very compelling.
So the smoke clears, the trials happen, 12 Davidians
are invited. What happened to them? It was a
mixed bag in court. They were acquitted of the
most serious charge conspiracy to murder federal
agents. The jury clearly felt the self -defense
argument regarding the initial raid, that they
thought they were being attacked by an unknown
force, had some weight. But several were convicted
of lesser charges, like... Voluntary manslaughter
and various weapons charges. They received very
stiff sentences, some up to 40 years, largely
due to the machine gun definitions, though some
of those sentences were reduced later after Supreme
Court ruling. But the real legacy of Waco wasn't
in the courtroom. It was out in the world. It
was in the minds of people who were watching
this all unfold on their TVs. That is where the
tragedy compounds. And one man in particular
was watching very, very closely. Timothy McVeigh.
He actually visited Waco during the siege, didn't
he? He did. There are photographs of him there.
He drove down to Texas, he stood at the roadblocks,
and he sold bumper stickers with anti -government
slogans. He saw the government tanks surrounding
the building. He saw the fire. on TV. And exactly
two years later, to the day. April 19, 1995.
April 19, 1995. Timothy McVeigh parked a Ryder
rental truck loaded with thousands of pounds
of fertilizer explosives in front of the Alfred
P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.
He detonated it, killing 168 people, including
19 children, in a daycare center. And he didn't
hide his motivation. It was clear. No. He explicitly
cited Waco and another federal standoff at Rupert
Ridge as his motivation. He saw it as revenge.
He viewed the Murrah Federal Building as a legitimate
target, specifically because it housed offices
for the ATF and other federal agencies he blamed
for Waco. So you cannot talk about the Oklahoma
City bombing without talking about Waco. They
are inextricably linked. Waco was the radicalization
point for McVeigh and the burgeoning militia
movement of the 1990s. And it hasn't gone away.
We mentioned this at the top. Even today, in
2024, there are echoes. Yes. Just recently, Canadian
authorities arrested men with ties to their military
who were accused of creating an anti -government
militia. And one of the suspects was recorded
in a wiretap explicitly warning of another Waco.
The symbolism of Mount Carmel is still incredibly
potent in the anti -government extremist sphere.
It is the Alamo of that movement. It's entered
the culture, too. You have the Paramount miniseries,
multiple documentaries on Netflix. It's a story
we keep retelling, trying to understand it. But
I guess the real question is, have we learned
the lesson? That is the big question. The FBI
did change. To their credit, they updated their
negotiation protocols after this. They are much
more hesitant to use that kind of overwhelming
tactical force in a barricade situation now.
They try to integrate behavioral science and
religious experts more, but the scar remains.
The trust that was broken that day for a lot
of people has never been fully restored. So what
does this all mean? When we look back at the
whole timeline, from the digging up of a corpse,
to the sinful messiah article, to the lost element
of surprise with the mailman, to the rabbit screams,
to the fire. It feels like a tragedy of errors,
a cascade of failure. It was a cascade of failure.
A failure to understand religion, a failure of
tactical discipline on day one, a failure of
communication between the negotiators and the
tactical commanders during the siege, and, of
course, the catastrophic failure of a leader
inside, David Koresh, who was willing to sacrifice
his followers, including children, for his apocalyptic
vision. It's a lot to process, an incredible
weight. It is. But if I can leave you with one
final... Final thought. It's this. We often think
of force as the ultimate problem solver. If you
just have enough tanks, enough gas, enough armed
men, you can control any outcome. But what Waco
teaches us is the paradox of force. Break that
down for us one last time. When you apply overwhelming
aggressive pressure to a group that already believes
the world is ending and that the government is
the prophesied enemy, that force doesn't subdue
them. It validates them. It makes their delusions
real. It confirms their prophecy. And once you
make their apocalypse real, you can no longer
stop it. That is a chilling thought, validating
the apocalypse. It is. And it's the question
we need to remember every time we see a standoff
like this begin to unfold. Are we solving the
problem or are we just playing the role they
wrote for us in their end of the world script?
That is going to stick with me. Thank you for
walking us through this. It's a dark chapter,
but one we clearly need to understand. My pleasure.
It's important history to grapple with. And thank
you for listening to this deep dive. As always,
check the source notes if you want to fall down
the rabbit hole yourself. There is plenty more
there. Until next time, stay curious. And stay
critical. Bye for now.