Blast from the past. M1 Abrams outside Branch Davidian compound...

Who remembers this incident?

Who recalls watching ATF agents assaulting a compound and getting taken apart by some wild eyed bible thumpers?

Full disclosure.  The ATF LOST ALOT of respect nationwide from fellow law enforcement AND other federal agencies for how they handled this thing. I can't prove it but I believe this was supposed to be a show pony incident to highlight the agency and get them on the front burner for funding.  I know that rumor was floating around for a bit after this thing.

What I know for sure is that I'll never forget an agent doing a slide for life down an assault ladder after they attempted to make a second floor entry.

I'll dig up a tape of the assault later today (hopefully).  We can break it down donkey style on what they did right, wrong and in between but one thing is obvious.  SERIOUS mistakes were made.

Side Note:  I'm not sure but I believe this was the first time in modern policing that we saw suspects "killed" because attempts to engage them would prove too dangerous even though they had been contained, isolated and no longer proved a danger to the public.  We saw it again at Ruby Ridge (although in that case the facts are murky...hard to dig into because so much white nationalist shit is attached to stuff on the net), later in the incident at Big Bear in Cali and finally in Dallas.