Posted on 09/04/2004 11:13:11 AM PDT by yonif
BESLAN, Russia (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin called Saturday for a radical rethink of security forces' tactics against terror after the seizure of a school by Chechen militants ended in chaos and bloodshed.
As the death toll rose above 320 from the bloody denouement when troops stormed the southern Russian school Friday, Putin urged his countrymen to be strong in the face of a string of devastating attacks linked to Chechen separatists.
The small town of Beslan, which Putin visited briefly before dawn Saturday, was shattered by the carnage, in which 155 children died as well as parents and teachers. Barely a family was left untouched.
Some in Beslan vented their anger against the Kremlin leader for visiting the town so briefly and accused him of posturing for television cameras instead of meeting its traumatized residents.
"He saw no one and talked to no one," said Boris, whose neighbor and her family disappeared. "He just wanted to show the world how young and handsome he is but he hasn't helped and he won't help and he can't stop this happening again."
In the nearby city of Vladikavkaz, hundreds of distraught Ossetians queued outside the overwhelmed morgue to look for missing relatives among the lines of bodies.
Dozens of corpses, their skin the color of powdered milk, lay outside the morgue on stretchers. Most were children or women, their naked bodies covered with black tarpaulin or plastic sheets.
Relatives accompanied by nurses picked their way along row after row of stretchers, holding handkerchieves or gauze masks to their faces against the stench.
Many of the victims had been held inside the school gym by their captors for two days without food or water before being killed. It was the grimmest outcome of a hostage-taking in modern times.
In a somber television address Putin, dressed in a dark suit and standing beside a Russian flag, denounced the gunmen who attacked "defenseless children."
But, in the first criticism of the troops' handling of the siege, he said Russians had a right to demand more from security forces in times of crisis. "We must create a much more effective system of security. We must demand that our security forces act at a level appropriate to the level and scope of the new threats," he said.
This demanded "an effective anti-crisis management system -- including fundamentally new approaches in the activity of the security forces."
Putin said Russia had been punished for its failure to adapt to new defense and security needs and must take rapid action to put this right.
"We have to admit we showed no understanding of the danger of processes occurring in our own country and the world at large," he said. "We failed to react appropriately to them and, instead, displayed weakness. And the weak are always beaten."
Grief, anger and uncertainty mingled in Beslan, a normally sleepy town of 30,000, a day after the crisis ended with half-naked and wounded children dodging hostage takers' bullets as they fled and security forces stormed the school building.
"Everyone in this town has lost someone," said Alan, looking for news of his sister who had been at the school. "What they say on television is a lie. There could be 600 dead."
Blinking repeatedly to stop tears, Alan walked through crowds of pale, exhausted people, searching desperately for news of relatives and friends in the town's squares and street corners.
The Kremlin leader, speaking after a week of calamities linked to Chechen separatists, pledged to restore control over the North Caucasus, the part of southern Russia which includes the turbulent region of Chechnya.
But Putin, who rejects any notion of talks with separatists, made no direct reference to Chechnya in his 10-minute address.
Officials announced they had completed their search of the charred ruins of Middle School No. 1, and confirmed for the first time media reports that the gunmen had taken more than 1,000 people hostage when they stormed the school Wednesday.
A total of 26 militants, 10 of them Arabs according to Russian officials, had seized the school, said Deputy Prosecutor-General Sergei Fridinsky. All had been killed. Putin said earlier he had ordered Beslan and the surrounding region of North Ossetia sealed off in follow-up operations. He declared Monday and Tuesday days of mourning.
"One of the tasks pursued by the terrorists was to stoke ethnic hatred, to blow up the whole of our North Caucasus," he told security officials.
"Anyone who feels sympathetic toward such provocations will be viewed as accomplices of terrorists and terrorism."
His harsh tone suggested no weakening of his determination to crush the rebellion in mainly Muslim Chechnya and keep it within Russia, using tactics criticized by rights activists.
President Bush, campaigning for re-election in November, said he felt for the families of children caught up in the Beslan school siege.
"We saw the horror of terror in Russia and I can just imagine the heartfelt anguish of the moms and dads of those Russian kids," he said during a campaign stop in Ohio. The death of 155 children was a "grim reminder of the nature of the terrorists we face."
There have been reactions by some IDF veterans saying this was a great failure by Russia's security forces:
"The fact of the matter at the place were civilians taking pictures, and various other curious people stading around says a lot of things. They didn't clean the area around the school and close it off. There were even parents who were armed with personal weapons firing on the terrorists. The Russians didn't understand who was firing against who and at times even shot the parents who they thought were terrorists. During the chaos many terrorists ran away. Their anti-terror force always messes up. They always can't get the job done correctly. They have no organization or coordination and their decisions come out to be terrible like the last time with them sending gasses into the building, killing people. This time the building collapse on everyone before they shot the terrorists, who just started to shoot at everyone who tried to run away and exploded their devices. It is a shame they didn't consult with Israel. There are simple ways to break into the building. Israel is a small country and the Russian bear will never admit it can't do something and the political price the children pay with their lives."
Another person:
"Putin was too naive about it, it wasn't even the Russian army planning the operation. This storming just started after a "work accident" one of the terrorists had."
Another quote by an Israeli:
"The Russians, and really the entire western world, is starting to understand there is no "good terror" and "bad terror." All of it must be uprooted"
Finally
"To Mr. Putin, maybe you forgot that Russia has always supported Arab countries. It doesn't matter what country it is, as long as it is against America. Today you are even helping Iran get nuclear weapons and sooner or later you will pay a price. Supporting these countries is like a boomerang. You make money today, but when the boomerang comes back you lose the lives of dear people and that is much more expensive."
"Russia all the time supports decisions criticizing Israel in its fight against terror. Russia helps the Iranians who are supporting terror. So don't expect the terror reaching you."
Something went dreadfully wrong yesterday in the handling of this crisis situation. As the days and weeks go by, we'll learn more.
Glad to hear the Russians have decided to think more about terrorism and security.
If Mr. Putin seriously wants to rethink security, he needs to do something other than pull another "Joe Stalin" on the entire Chechen people.
If he is serious about battling terror, Putin should join us in cleaning out the spider holes throughout Iraq and in tracking al Qaeda operatives in the mountains of Afghanistan, Pakistan, Uzbeckistan, and the bordering republics.
He needs to force Syria to pull in the "welcome mat" it leaves out for radicals and he needs to clean out any repositories of WMD stashed in Syria or Lebanon or give someone else the blessing to do it for all of us.
He needs to join the US when we and we alone among the UN nations condemn the attacks on Israeli civilians.
And he needs to halt Russian assistance in helping Iran's mullahs to build their own Islamic bomb.
For starters.
And he apparently needs to train his security forces better.
http://www.rambler.ru/db/news/msg.html?s=260005085&mid=5003085
This article quotes a general procurator (like an attorney general I think) who says that the security forces have apprehended all the terrorists. They say it was 26.
they have liquidated all the bandits. That is Stalin-talk so they are mad.
Some terrorists are citizens of Russia and some are foreigners. 10 were from Arab countries and near East.
One terrorist was a "negro." Now the authorities are trying to establish the identies of the killers.
He says there are different versions of how all the weapons got into the school.
The security agencies are said to have covered the children with their own bodies.
I think 10 commandos/special forces were killed and 18 wounded.
Can't argue with that. Islam respects strength, and responds well to force.
"The fact of the matter at the place were civilians taking pictures, and various other curious people stading around says a lot of things. They didn't clean the area around the school and close it off. There were even parents who were armed with personal weapons firing on the terrorists. The Russians didn't understand who was firing against who and at times even shot the parents who they thought were terrorists.
Alot of the stories printed in Left leaning papers are beginning to say that the deaths were cause by the storming of the troops.... as opposed to say a bomb accidently going off and terrorists shooting children in the back......
The slant is happening.
I only know one thing.
When Muhammadanism is banished from the earth along with it's fundamentalist adherents and sympathizers, so will the world terror problem in the largest part.
I hear Crusading music...
I thought this as well. There are many countries who could help in this but the old macho, can't admit we need help, insecurity is in play here. And over 300 people are dead.
Putin needs to wake up and get some allies in this fight.
Yes, even North Ossetia is experiencing "trickle-down" terrorism. The swamps must be drained.
Then look at the outcomes.
I have written plenty bashing Russians, but this was not their fault. They didn't want to storm the school, but the terrorists opened fire on the kids.
I think when dealing with this sort of situation it may be better to just go right in before they have a chance to wire up all their explosives and kill the men and big boys. A lot of kids and women would at least have a chance to run for their lives.
Damned if they did and damned if they didn't. The terrorists wanted to have this theater on TV and then blow up the kids.
Some political terrorists you could have given into in this case, but not these religious ones.
The left is just not able to really understand people like this. They think people are basically good and that society is bad. The far left may be getting money from Islamic propagandists.
Terrorists. Why can't you say the f'ng word Reuters? TERRORISTS, not insurgents, not spearatists, not freedom fighters. The word is TERRORISTS!!!!!!
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1207663/posts?page=1
Go here and learn of the terrorists inhumanity. This is why I can't get into pointing fingers at the Russian forces.
I will keep my anger, disgust and blame focused solely on the terrorist scum. When the children were blown up, burned and shot in the back, it was the terrorists who did it.
I will leave the second guessing to Putin and his administration. I will be assigning the blame to the terrorists.
You confuse machismo with Russia's xenophobia they are two entirely different attitudes,remember the 72 Munich Olympics & how the German Border Police goofed on that one . The Russians don't have any experience with this sort of work & they are having to do the homework for it under the gun literally.
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