True Crime Tuesdays: Waco: American Apocalypse
Review Overview
Efficiency
8Insight
6Nuance
4Helen Archer | On 04, Apr 2023
On the 30-year anniversary of the siege of the Branch Davidian’s Mount Carmel compound just outside Waco, Texas, and its eventual destruction with 76 people in it – including 25 children – Netflix released this three-part documentary.
Director Tiller Russell handles the material – including some never-seen-before footage – with what can only be described as a ruthless efficiency. Interviewing some of the ATF agents who were on the ground, along with hostage negotiators, journalists, David Koresh’s lawyer, and surviving Davidians who were inside the compound, he tells the story in short soundbites, intercut with footage and audio from the time, at a fairly rapid pace. It makes for a watchable summary of the events of 1993, but is sadly lacking any kind of nuance, with very little in the way of moral or ethical reflection.
Tiller takes up the story from the beginning of the firefight which led to the 51-day standoff, as news reporters accidentally thwart the FBI’s attempt at a surprise raid, by asking a local postman David Jones – who also happened to be a longstanding Branch Davidian, living on the compound – directions to Mount Carmel. Various FBI interviewees remark that the operation should have been stood down the moment their cover had been blown, but they were ordered to carry on regardless. What follows is footage of that botched raid, which turned into a 2-hour gun battle, in which 4 federal officers were killed, with the ATF ultimately begging for a ceasefire.
Much of this has been seen before, as archive footage of ATF’s tactical force attempt to enter the property via an upstairs window, to be met with gunfire before retreating. ATF agent Bill Buford narrates as footage is shown of him being hoist, injured, onto the bonnet of a vehicle, and its slow progress out of the compound. Later, as negotiators attempted to gain the trust of those inside, developing relationships and successfully brokering the release of some members, the tactical team favoured more of a ‘shock and awe’ approach – arresting Davidian Kathy Schroeder, interviewed in this series, who decided to come out to be with her child, then flaunting it on television, which only made those inside the compound more resolute in staying.
At crucial points of negotiations, the agents surrounding the compound used sound torture – 130 decibels of constant noise – on an already paranoid group of adults and scared children, and later, for no apparent reason, ran over the cars of the Branch Davidians with their armoured vehicles, before, finally, showering the compound with tear gas and rolling a tank through their front door.
The cuts between those different factions within law enforcement gives both sides of the story, albeit briefly and with staccato speed. While the negotiators voice their frustration at the breakdown in communication between them and the armed agents surrounding the compound, concluding that many mistakes were made, those involved with the tactical units are united in the fact that Koresh was the one who was ultimately responsible for what happened – glossing over the fact that, if so, their actions played directly into his hands. While Koresh asks over the phone, “Why didn’t you talk first?”, the ATF agents insist that they were the ones being held hostage during the siege.
For the Branch Davidians’ side, there is a sense that some of those interviewed are, perhaps, tired of repeating their part of the story. David Thibodeau is less animated than his mother, who contributes separately, while Kathy Schroeder bizarrely attempts to explain the abuse that went on within the compound, still seemingly under the impression that her fellow Davidians were martyrs and that Koresh was God. Heather Jones, the postman’s daughter, who was nine years old when she was the last child to leave the compound alive, is clearly still traumatised by her experience – which makes the director’s decision to film her as she listens to a tape of her last phone call with her father seem exploitative at best.
The Oklahoma bombing, which came just two years later, on April the 19th 1995 – the same day the Waco siege ended with the worst possible outcome – is mentioned towards the end of series, and footage of Timothy McVeigh selling anti-government bumper stickers outside the Mount Carmel compound is cut into the third episode in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it manner. But there is no mention of the debacle at Ruby Ridge, where ATF snipers shot and killed Randy Weaver’s 14-year-old son, his wife, and the family dog on their own property in 1992, which many see as on the same continuum of events. It’s a telling omission, especially given the interview here with the sniper who feels he should have shot Koresh when he had the chance, while simultaneously lamenting the kind of violence which “appears out of nowhere”. If Waco: American Apocalypse reflects the internecine battle between the ATF agents and the negotiators, it comes down firmly on the side of action rather than mediation – even as it demonstrates the devastating consequences of such an approach.