
by David Keene
The Bundy cases bears remarkable, and unsettling, similarities to the Waco standoff
Twenty-five years ago this year, federal agents stormed the compound of a religious group in Waco, Texas, with armored vehicles, machine guns and tear gas. Claiming the Branch Davidians were a dangerous religious cult, they killed David Koresh, the group’s leader, along with and some 70 men, women and children who were with him when the assault took place.
The ostensible reason for reducing the compound to rubble was to serve a search warrant on Mr. Koresh for illegal weapons officials believed he possessed. The issuing judge was told Mr. Koresh was a crazed paranoid who never left the compound where he and his violence-prone followers were illegally hoarding automatic weapons and represented a clear and present danger to the Waco community.
Long after the smoke cleared the facts proved that the raid was staged not because Mr. Koresh and his Branch Davidians were a threat to anyone, but as a public relations stunt by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (BATF) to be used to justify a budget increase. Everything was filmed to be shown at future budget hearings, but when things went bad, the PR stunt turned into a murderous massacre.