Beslan Hostage Crisis Documentary
 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lehzc...ure=plpp_video

Came across this while browsing youtube, hard to believe this kind of horrible stuff happens and people forget about it.

I would highly recommend watching the entire thing.

Truth is stranger than fiction--or in this case, worse than fiction, indeed.

Things the Beslan terrorists did:

*Indiscriminately fired upon unarmed civilians -- check!
*Used the civilians as human shields/hostages -- check!
*Used "dead man's switch" bombs in an effort to maximize civilian casualties even if the terrorists were killed -- check!

Incidents like these prove there is no limit to human brutality or depravity. None.

As bad as this incident was, the Russian government's response was arguably worse - and just because of the number of people who died in the shootout. The crisis gave Putin an excuse to consolidate control over the Duma and the media under the guise of fighting terrorism.

Interestingly I was reading about a rumor that the Russian military summarily executed the terrorists who were not killed during the initial assault. No sympathy to them of course.

That reminds me of what almost happened in the Iranian embassy siege in 1980. From The Guardian:

"Five of the six gunmen died in a hail of SAS bullets. One, Fowzi Nejad, survived by passing himself off as a hostage. Once "rescued" and taken outside the embassy, he was identified as a gunman by a real hostage and almost joined his dead comrades. One SAS soldier appeared to be about to drag him back inside the building until Horsfall advised him against it since the world was watching. "That would have been totally against policy and it would have been a very foolish thing for somebody to make that sort of mistake." "

Don't forget that there were reports of the terrorists raping the students and posting it online