[Stunaep]

Another subject we haven't discussed here yet. If you haven't heard (for some odd reason) of the Nord-Ost crisis, then this is where you'll want to look.

Well, looks like the Nord-Ost crisis is turning worse and worse. The russian military has killed exactly 119 times more hostages than the military. And what do you expect from a country, whose president is an ex-KGBist. Also, from inside sources I have heard that the priority in the hostage freeing mission were not the safety of the hostages. It wasn't even the elimination of the terrorists. It was the safety of the special forces. . That's not nice. So the russian SpecOps waited calmly until everyone had inhaled everything of the Agent 15 (not confirmed, but likely that it was Agent 15, , I doubt we'll ever get ANY kind of confirmation from the russians), so that no harm could possibly come to the SpecOps forces. How moving.

Well, and now they have conviently killed 119 hostages and they are calling the tchetchens terrorist.

[CP5670]

I am not too familiar with the details of this, but in this particular case, while the friendly casualties would normally be fine if they got all the "terrorist" guys also, it might have been better to rush in and let the terrorists execute as many hostages as they can until they are found. Still, as long as the terrorists are dead it is fine.

[Stunaep]

Originally posted by CP5670
I am not too familiar with the details of this, but in this particular case, while the friendly casualties would normally be fine if they got all the "terrorist" guys also, it might have been better to rush in and let the terrorists execute as many hostages as they can until they are found. Still, as long as the terrorists are dead it is fine.

well, 1/6th of the hostages are a bit too much.

[Styxx]

Yeah, lots of people died, but it's the terrorists' fault, don't forget that. Blaming the government for acting against it won't help much, unless you'd rather let the terrorists kill all hostages instead.

[Stunaep]

They could have handled it differently:

• They should have use something other than a top-secret possibly lethal nerve gas
• They should have entered the building earlier instead of frantically protecting the SpecOps forces lives
• They should at least give the medical peoples the specs of the gas, so they'd at least knew what they were dealing with. But, nooooo military secrets, yub yub

[Righteous1]

They made one mistake, imo.  They should have had medical personnel on hand with the anidote(sp) available immediately.  If someone had been on hand to administer medication at the scene, the casualties would have been far fewer.

But, hindsight is 20-20.  The responsibility still lays with the terrorists.

[mikhael]

My wife and I argued this. Like you, all she saw was the civilian casualties.

There's lots of ways it could have been handled. I challenge you to name one that would have A) worked, B) resulted in no civilian casualties, and C) not given the terrorists what they wanted. If you can satisfy all those conditions, I'm sure that every governement in the world would like to hire you. I think they went for A and C and accepted a compromise on B.

Yeah, it sucks that a lot of hostages died. Yes it sucks that they used a "calmative" agent. More importantly, it sucks that a bunch of people strapped in explosives decided to screw with a bunch of people who didn't have anything to do with the political/military issue.

What really amazes me is that the terrorists didn't go the full course and use deadman switches on the bombs, so that sniping, gassing or other means of disabling-at-range would be counterproductive. A DMS is lower tech item than the bombs they were wearing: one half of a pair of jumper cables works just dandy.

[Stunaep]

how 'bout using sleeping gas, or whatever instead of a top-secret nerve gas. The nerve gas wasn't even tested under combat situations. Something tested and foolproof.

[Top Gun]

It was an opium based anasthetic gas you ignoramus. Get your facts right before making sweeping judgements.


Oh and on the Putin Thing: The KGB is the Russian answer to the FBI/MI5. Niether have a glossy record in terms of human rights. Even in so called "democratic" countries. They just supressed different groups of people. The American government is packed to the rafters with Crooked Ex CEOs, multi millionaires (that are there for that reason alone) and War Criminals.


There many be many reasons why Putin is not a good president (namely his brutality towards the chechens) but that certainly isn't one of them. He's certainly more representitive of the average person than that abomination America has.


Western Governments have made bigger, more costly blunders in less precarious situations (the Waco Siege to name but one)

[phreak]

the reason it probably was so fatal was that the hostages had nothing to eat or drink in 3 days, so they were already in a weakened state.

[Unknown Target]

You have inside sources?

EDIT: BTW, the gas was designed for outside, open-battfield use. It was never meant for close-quarters, which is why it was so lethal.

[Stunaep]

Originally posted by Top Gun

Oh and on the Putin Thing: The KGB is the Russian answer to the FBI/MI5. Niether have a glossy record in terms of human rights. Even in so called "democratic" countries. They just supressed different groups of people.

well, yeah the KGB pratically supressed everyone in the USSR. Thats a bit different that the FBI/MI5.

Sorry about the misfacts though.
And don't take me for the most objective argumenter here, folks, I'm stilled pissed at the 50 years of occupation, so I'm not really fond of Russian politics.

[IceFire]

I was actually surprised about the useage of gas.  And its pretty brilliant I guess...its cold and hard but 1/6th of the hostages is not bad compaired to 100% casualities which may have happened had the 'Alpha' forces (Russian SF) marched in there with guns ablazing.