Mass Slaughter in Our Public Schools

[Venus Pax]

Just move along people...Move along...Nothing to see here...

sorry, just made me think of him...

"ahem.. You will respect my authorityyyyy!" Eric Cartman.


And Skippr and Jeremae, thank you for the compliment.

[Photoman]

A few reactions:

1. Teachers keeping pistols in trunks: If your plan requires going to the car and getting a pistol, make that pistol an AR-15 (or other suitable rifle). If the situation is such that you are willing to break the rules/law with a pistol, you might as well use something more effective.

2. I think it's much more likely that a Christian church or Jewish synagogue would be targeted. With the current anti-Christian climate in the US, it would produce less political fallout for them compared to killing a bunch of innocent kids at a grade school.

[Mithras61]

A few reactions:

1. Teachers keeping pistols in trunks: If your plan requires going to the car and getting a pistol, make that pistol an AR-15 (or other suitable rifle). If the situation is such that you are willing to break the rules/law with a pistol, you might as well use something more effective.

2. I think it's much more likely that a Christian church or Jewish synagogue would be targeted. With the current anti-Christian climate in the US, it would produce less political fallout for them compared to killing a bunch of innocent kids at a grade school.

Didn't scenario #2 happen once already out in Oregon? I seem to recall an incident in which someone who self-identified as a terrorist sympathizer walked into a Jewish facility (day care, maybe) & opened fire...

Edited to add: Actually, it appears to have been in Seattle, WA http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/07/28/seattle.shooting/. The report doesn't indicate that the attacker was a terrorist or sympathizer, only that he was Pakistani...

[TX Rancher]

Well, I throw my two cents in…

First of all let me state I’m all for carry in schools. But I don’t think it’s the answer to this scenario. Part of a tiered approach…yes, but not a stand alone solution.

My nightmare isn’t the untrained Jihadist want-a-be that gets with 3 or 4 friends and decides to take a school down. My nightmare involves trained and determined Jihad warriors. These guys/gals trained for months under trainers every bit as good as the ones in the US. They learned explosives, rifles (auto and semi), pistols, knifes, intel gathering, attack methodologies, and many other fine arts of war. Are they Ninja’s or supermen? No, but they’ve probably had more trigger time and as good training as our metro SWAT. Maybe they’ve done a tour or two in Iraq or Afghanistan, they’re not push-overs. They were picked because they were the best. Some of them came into the US through Canada, some through Mexico, but none came through customs since their names are on the watch list. They brought their weapons with them for multiple reasons, but primarily because they couldn’t procure automatics and explosives without attracting too much attention.

They know their target. They have floor plans (ain’t the internet great) and videos they’ve been studying, and the two leaders have even been in the school both during the day and after hours. The take over is carefully planned, and they realize they have to use extreme force against any resistance. There is no escape plan because they know there not getting out of this alive.

Why would they hit our schools? Because they’re soft targets with high impact potential, and here’s a key point that’s often forgotten, in their mind children are a legitimate target during war…and it doesn’t mater whether they’re Christian, Jewish, atheist, or Muslim.

Just prior to the take down they create a disturbance across town, maybe a bomb, a shooting, anything that would draw away the first responders. The point is the first responders are in the wrong place when the school is taken down. That buys them time to consolidate their hold and set up defenses.

When they enter, anyone who even verbally challenges them (“Hey, what are you doing?�) is immediately shot. Speed of the take down and maximum terror are important. They have to gain control of the hostage’s minds before they get a chance to think.

And into that, we’re going to place teachers with concealed handguns, against trained terrorist with automatic weapons? Granted, it’s better then nothing, but just barely. Sure, they can go down like Vikings, and maybe take one or two terrorist with them. But then the remaining terrorist will just shoot every adult immediately, and they still end up with the kids…

As I said above, arm teachers and administrators, during the majority of active shooter scenarios it drastically increases the kids chances of survival, but not for a terrorist attack. Let Venus take her pistol to work, and if she’s willing, pay for weapons training with some of the fine folks on this forum, none of it at her expense. Heck, I’ll volunteer my services free of charge as I suspect a lot of folks on this forum would (not that I know much, I don't, but even little things can make a difference)

But for terrorist attacks I think we need to copy the Israeli model…trained folks in the school with automatic weapons and communications. The armed teachers are the last line of defense.

The parents also take some responsibility. I saw mothers, fathers, uncles, and just concerned citizens on their day off grab their weapons and go on field trips with their children. Some rode on the busses, some drove their own cars so the kids traveled in convoy fashion. I saw employers grant paid time off to be escorts for school trips or to cover events. In some areas, the ratio was one armed adult to 5 children, and the children knew what to do in the event of an attack. That sure doesn’t sound like here…

Why haven’t they hit our schools? I guess for the same reasons they haven’t hit our shopping malls, train stations, sporting events, churches, or a thousand other soft targets. Is it because they are busy in Iraq and Afghanistan? Is it because the response to 9/11 knocked them on their heels and they’re scared? Is it our Intel/LEO organizations are that good? I don’t know why they haven’t, I just know it’s not because they don’t want to shoot children, or our schools are well defended.

My nightmare is what happens if what’s currently stopping them stops working…

[austin]

Schools, large office buildings, and professional sports venues are obviously extremely vulnerable to sapper-style attacks.

Large office buildings are the worst with limited, easily defended exits and very little communication ability between the hundreds of tenants and thousands of people within the building.

[anygunanywhere]

Glen Beck is covering this on his TV show this week.

Pretty scary stuff.

Anygun

[Calabash-kid]

Regarding Islamic terrorist attacking schools -- they already have -- in Russia. Everyone remember that?

Given that I think that this is probably the correct scenario - but public officials will not publicly acknowledge such. It would create a backlash.

Jerry

[shootthesheet]

I hate it for Muslims all over the country and around the world if they do.

[stroo]

So instead of recognizing the threat, our elite continue the gun free zones. While arming teachers who want to be armed isn't the complete answer, it would provide a set of initial responders right there when the attack happened. Surely that would help to reduce casualties. I really hope the NRA will take this on as the legislative priority next year and in all coming years until we get rid of the gun free soft target school zones.

[CoveRuger]

I teach in a school that is 80% military dependants and has been repeatedly featured in both national and international news because of that high military population. We are not "on-base" and have limited security. I have tried to tell people that while the attention we are getting is helpful to the students at times, but it is also putting a bigger and bigger target on our school. How better to hurt out soldiers than to hurt those they love the most?

[135boomer]

To some, an attack like that would be like another Pearl Harbor. Sadly, the sheople would forget within a week. After all, it wasn't their children's school.

[phddan]

The islamo terrorist have plenty of patience. Time is on their side. Remember, it was 10 years between the first truck bomb at the twin towers, and the plane hits.
Short of having a contingent of police officers at the school, and locking it down with all vehicles approaching being searched, you are not going to be able to secure a school. And that is way to costly, just not going to happen.
The alternative is to do it Israel style. Arm the staff, and have armed volunteers patrolling. And that is sooooo un-PC you would be laughed right out an office for bringing it up.
Unfortunately, the only thing a parent with kids in school can do is teach their children that at the first sign of serious trouble or if they hear gunshots, is to get the heck out of their immediately. Break a window with a desk if you have to and leave. Don't take no for an answer. Don't listen to anyone that tries to keep you there. Get out and run and dont stop running till you are far away.
Our kids are our greatest asset. Our most cherished possession. And yet we allow them to be herded into extremely soft target buildings, with minimal to non existing protection. Tells alot about where Americas priorities are at.
Unfortunately it will take a wide spread scenario such as this to reawaken a sleeping, disgustingly overly PC America, before anything of importance will be done about it. But when thousands of school girls are raped, and boys and girls are beheaded, probably shown on the web, it will be too late.
Lord, I truly hope I am wrong. But in this day and age of political correctness and soccer mom mentality, with our young men being gelded mentally, I see it getting far, far worse before it starts getting better.

(Steps off of soapbox)

Dan

[Big Calhoun]

At least the story still seems to be getting regular circulation in some corners of the press. I was talking to a peer the other day at work about this as he had just now heard about it.

Sadly, I concluded that their probably won't be much that can be done to stop it and that it more than likely won't be done by the 'usual' suspects -- adult male jihadists.

The way I see it, in the last several years, women and children have been employed more in the role of martyrs. Many women in the Middle East that believe in the current jihad have no qualms about using their children to become martyrs. Also factor in that with the current war/terrorism situation, more Middle Eastern families are feeling disenfranchised and as a result, more children are being born into the jihadist mindset as opposed to be indoctrinated at a later age.

Sadly, I think this type of attack will be carried out by children with explosives in their bookbags. IMO, the most likely scenarios would be to somehow get all the children to congregrate together in order to have the most targets available (false fire alarm, for example). Or, coordinate multiple explosions on packed school buses. These I see as very real possibilities that frighten the bejebus out of my wife and I. A. The fact that these jihadists would want to harm *any* children and B. my wife and I spent the last 4 years trying to have a baby and just had our first child, it's very possible we may not have another. For anyone to lose a child in this type of scenario would be devestating, to say the least.

I hope it's all a pipe dream and I need to check myself into rehab soon. But with the way things are going, it increasingly becomes the most logical scenario that could happen.

[Venus Pax]

Sadly, the sheople would forget within a week. After all, it wasn't their children's school.

Sadly, this is true. People are very forgetful if it isn't them personally.

I was surprised at how little was said Tuesday about 9-11.

[phddan]

Terrorists have been arrested on the border, security chief says

Associated Press
September 13, 2007 - 10:22AM
DALLAS -- Texas' top homeland security official said Wednesday that terrorists with ties to Hezbollah, Hamas and al-Qaida have been arrested crossing the Texas border with Mexico in recent years.

"Has there ever been anyone linked to terrorism arrested?" Texas Homeland Security Director Steve McCraw said in a speech to the North Texas Crime Commission. "Yes, there was."

His remarks appear to be among the most specific on the topic of terrorism arrests along the Texas-Mexico border. Local and elected officials have alluded to this happening but have been short on details.

Leticia Zamarripa, a spokeswoman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement in El Paso, said Wednesday she was unaware of any border arrests of people with terrorist ties. An ICE spokeswoman in San Antonio did not return phone messages left by The Associated Press. U.S. Border Patrol spokesman Lloyd M. Easterling was unable to comment.

However, McCraw's remarks are similar to those made recently by National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell, who last month told the El Paso Times that a small number of people with known links to terrorist organizations have been caught crossing the border.

McCraw identified the most notable figure captured as Farida Goolam Mahomed Ahmed, who was arrested in July 2004 at the McAllen airport. She carried $7,300 in various currencies and a South African passport with pages missing. Federal officials later learned she waded across the Rio Grande.

After her arrest, U.S. Customs and Border Protection issued a release saying she was wanted for questioning about the bombing of a U.S. Consulate office, jibing with similar statements from a U.S. congressman.

But the department quickly retracted the terrorism connection, calling it "inaccurate on several levels." Michael Shelby, then the U.S. attorney in Houston, said in January 2005 that any suggestion Ahmed was involved in terrorism "is in error."

According to federal court records, Ahmed pleaded guilty to improper entry by an alien, making a false statement and false use of a passport. She was sentenced to time served and deported to South Africa. Other details of the case were sealed.

But on Wednesday, McCraw described Ahmed as having ties to an insurgent group in Pakistan and whose specialty was smuggling Afghanis and other foreign nationals across the border.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman Michael Friel could not confirm details about Ahmed on Wednesday.

McCraw also said that since March 2006, 347 people from what he called "terrorism-related countries" have been arrested crossing the border in Texas. The number of Iraqis captured at the border has tripled since last year, he said.

"A porous border without question is a national security threat," he said.

Terrorism isn't the only concern for homeland security officials in Texas, McCraw said. The state's size, population and geography make it susceptible to all sorts of disasters, both natural and man-made. Emergency responders must also be prepared for natural disasters such as hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and wildfires, he said.

The state has made significant strides in emergency planning since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and Hurricane Rita, McCraw said. Plans include cooperating with large private companies, including grocery stores, Wal-Mart and the oil industry, to help the state respond during disasters.

"This is not a shot at FEMA, but we can't depend on FEMA to protect Texas," McCraw said. "The governor's mandate has made it clear: If those buses don't come, we better have our own buses. If that food doesn't come,we better have our own food. If that water doesn't come, we better have our own water to take care of Texas."





Well, that just about ties right in to the subject at hand, don't ya think?



Dan