Over 200 pupils & parents taken hostage at Russian School

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Rest of the article is here.

 

I read about this as well, I hope everything works out. The people behind this are the lowest of the low. Even if the Russians would have slaughtered every child in Chechnya it does not justify things like this.

 

Attacking civilians is simply barbaric. These people are cowards. I hope the Russian authorities string them up by their sensitive parts.

 

No deals with terrorists, and having attention like this gives them just what they want: publicity to their cause. Hopefully militia storms the place quick and puts an end to this fiasco -even if the victim-count rises high...

 

You wouldn't have the same attitude if you or someone close to you were in that school.

Things like this is bad and we need to give terrorists the message "This is pointless , we don't bargain with terrorists", but is the death of many children worth it? Just to get the message out?

I say nay.

 

I would have to disagree. If you give in to terrorist demands at this school next thing you know terrorists will be targeting other schools - after all if it works once it will probably work again. By standing firm now it may cost people their lives but to give in would probably end up costing a lot more in the long run.

 

I agree with JSBB. As an example, look at the current situation in Iraq - the terroists had some success with kidnappings/beheadings, and now it seems there's a kidnapping every other day.

As cold as this may sound, it might cost a few hundred lives now, but future costs will be even greater if the demands are met.

 

Believe it or not, one should never give in to demands in situations such as these. However, that doesnt stop one from doing everything to try to avoid making people pissed off enough to commit acts such as these and it doesnt stop you from trying to work something out so things like this doesnt happen again after you have stormed the location and killed all the kidnappers.

 

The Russians have a history of being able to deal with terrorists. They are ruthless in a way that America will never be.

IIRC at one hostage situation the Russian counter-terrorist squad managed to kill a terrorist away from his comrades. They decapitated him and threw the head to the terrorists with a note attached, something on the lines of "If you don't come out NOW your fate will be worse than his."

Fighting fire with fire. Ain't it a treat?

 

Its the least they deserve. Terrorism is a pretty cowardly way of dealing with an issue, if you think about it.

And though I would say that they shouldn't give into the demands either, I atleast hope that some sort of compromise is reached which prevents the loss of those children's lives. If we lived in a perfect world...they would be released without any sort of compromises...but unfortunately.

 

That maybe so, but I do not have anyone there; thus I can say objectively what would be the best course of action, IMO. The sooner they put a halt to the media-circus and solve the situation, the quicker people can continue to live on with their everyday chores. They are terrorists, so even if the militia would accept the (rather ridicilous) demands, they might just kill them all to "show they could" -then take another school and demand more. There is no trust on either side, and if there were; it wouldn't had come to this.

Not much to it, really; crazy people barging in guns singing, so this is a time when policemen have to do their job.

[ September 01, 2004, 17:52: Message edited by: Wirhe ]

 

I seriously doubt that this is going to be the work of policemen. Land mines and trip wires? I don't think that kind of stuff is covered at the police academy. You can pretty much bet that this is going to be handled by the Russian military, most likely a special operations unit. At the very least, they will send in the Russian equivalent of a SWAT team.

 

That would be the SPETNAZ.

I would like for Russia to leave Chechnya, but this is not the way. However, after the Moscow catastrophe, I would say that Russia gives into their demands and hunt them down afterwards with agents and the like to show that things like this isn't allowed.

 

The no deals with terrorists policy is put to a painful test once they switch to women and children. And it puts the government in a bad light no matter which option they choose. Dealing with terrorists or letting children die, I wouldn't like to have to make such a choice.

 

As Chev said, it is a really hard test. The terrorists have said that for everyone in their group that dies, 50 children dies. Tough luck, war on "terrorism." Let them go, and THEN kick their ass.

 

Agreed, don't storm the place and risk the death of hundreds of children.

Totally agree, I find it unreasonable that the russian people DEMAND that Putin get's a peacefull solution, how can people demand that of one man? Even though he is the president , it's a very delicate situation and they must understand that he can't do miracles.

 

There is nothing delicate in it; they are pointing you with a barrel of a gun, so whatever you do there will be casualties. Better to get it over quick and live on than dwell in it and give them what they want.

Apparently, by our local news, they have chosen to take the latter option: long negotations. You can only hope the militia manages to steam them out of it...

 

I'm going with the Aussies on this one. This article pretty much sums up how I feel about negotiating with terrorists. Sorry, you didn't need to register for it when I first read the article. Here it is below:

Why appeasement is always wrong
September 3, 2004

The old verities of international diplomacy are no answer to the new threat to civilisation, writes Tony Parkinson.

More than 100 schoolchildren in southern Russia are seized at gunpoint on the first day back from summer holidays. Teachers and parents die trying to protect them.

Eleven Nepalese workers in Iraq are lined up and shot in cold blood. A 12th is beheaded, purely for show.

Sixteen bus passengers in southern Israel are blasted to death by suicide bombers. Explosions at a Moscow subway station kill 10 workers. Another 90 lives are lost when terrorists force two Russian passenger jets from the skies.

In almost any other time in modern history, a week of atrocities such as this would have stunned the world.

Yet, today, as the third anniversary of September 11 approaches, it is no longer a shock to see Islamist extremists carrying out these depraved assaults. Many thousands of innocent civilians have already died. Sadly, there will probably be many thousands more.

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But maybe, just maybe, the excruciating horror of watching seven-year-olds monstered by fanatics with bombs strapped to their bodies will prompt more people in free societies to grapple with the true awfulness of this phenomenon - and to confront the reality that muddling through with the old verities of international diplomacy is no answer to the threat.

A vicious narrative built on themes of mass murder and subjugation has taken hold in parts of the Arab and Islamic worlds. At its most extreme, it deems that any who live outside this totalitarian creed are worthless in the eyes of God, and therefore to be counted as legitimate targets in war.

How else could it be that Russian school kids would fall prey to this hateful ideology. Or impoverished Nepalese workers seeking reconstruction jobs in Iraq. Or, for that matter, two French journalists.

Christian Chesnot and Georges Malbrunot were taken hostage on a road outside Baghdad on Saturday night by a group calling itself the Islamic Army of Iraq. Their lives are in jeopardy not because of any crimes against the Muslim world; they were kidnapped because of the nationality stamped in their passport.

The blackmail demand from the terrorists to the French Government has no direct link to events in Iraq. Publicly, the kidnappers said the survival of the journalists depended on President Jacques Chirac revoking a French law banning Muslim headscarves in public schools.

All of France is distraught - and angry. This was not how it was meant to be. It is a bitter lesson for the French - indeed, for all of us - because it represents incontrovertible proof that there is no buying immunity from the war on terror.

Chirac flew to a Black Sea resort for urgent talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder. Here's the paradox: of the three leaders who formed the core of international opposition to US policy on Iraq, two have hostage crises on their hands.

Meanwhile, the Arab League has called for the journalists' release. So, too, Yasser Arafat.

But did France really want or need Hamas in its corner?

Consider the stomach-turning symbolism: on the same day two of its suicide terrorists blew up 16 Israeli civilians in Beersheba, Hamas issues a plea for clemency on behalf of the French journalists, saying they deserved special dispensation in return for France's "honourable" anti-war stance on Iraq.

No democracy should have to jump through these hoops to keep innocent people alive. No self-respecting Western government should endure the humiliation of having bloodstained hands signing a statement of solidarity.

From the 1970s, when the phenomenon of state-sponsored terror, kidnappings and hijackings first began to surface in the Middle East, Western policy was heavily addicted to the notion of preserving stability at all costs - as if maintaining a squalid status quo was in itself a guarantee of security.

One legacy of that policy has been a seething cauldron of political oppression, religious intolerance and social ruin in the Arab and Islamic worlds, where governments deflect responsibility for their own incompetence and lack of popular legitimacy by making the West a scapegoat. Another has been the emergence of megalomaniacs like Saddam Hussein.

Saddam risked the annihilation of his regime because he believed the US-led allies would back down to international pressure. He lost that bet.

Similarly, it appears Osama bin Laden expected the September 11 attacks on America would bring a collapse of morale in the US, and the swift descent of the West into defeatism and despair. This remains the crucial test of will.

The aim of the Islamists is to brutalise and polarise, and their assaults on free societies are not going to stop. They are intoxicated by a belief that their readiness to kill and be killed gives them huge leverage over the rest of mankind.

They have to be confronted and defeated. This much is certain: appeasement was never going to do it.

[ September 02, 2004, 16:53: Message edited by: Sir Belisarius ]

 

It requires registeration -couldn't you just quote it?

 

Quoted now above in my original post...Sorry, there was no registration requirement when I read it.