I have no idea whether or not the FBI fired on members of the Branch Davidians during its final assault on the compound on April 19, 1993. Many people thought the issue would be settled by a re-enactment ordered by the judge to evaluate infrared video footage taken from an FBI plane.
That footage shows flashes that anti-government activists claim are shots being fired by FBI agents. The FBI, meanwhile, maintains that the flashes are not gun shots but essentially background noise. The re-enactment was supposed to resolve this. FBI agents went out and performed similar maneuvers in which they fired their weapons. Meanwhile a plane took infrared video of the action on the ground and compared it to the video taken in 1993.
The new video was site by Sen. John Danforth (R-MO) as proof that the FBI had not fired on the Davidians. But according to an article by James Bovard, that may not be the end of the story.
According to Bovard, Mike McNulty — who released the award winning but flawed documentary “Waco: Rules of Engagement” — has produced another film demonstrating that there were significant differences between the original assault on the Branch Davidian compound and the re-enactment.
The two main claims of the movie are that a) in 1993 agents in Waco were equipped with weapons that had only 14-inch barrels, but during the re-enactment used weapons with 20-inch barrels, and b) in 1993 agents were equipped with off-the-shelf standard ammunition, but for the re-enactment used military-issue ammunition that is designed, among other things, to minimize muzzle flash (to reduce the ability to be spotted during combat).
Of these claims are accurate it will be interesting to see how Danforth and others attempt to spin them. I have no idea if the difference in barrels and ammunition would make a significant difference in what the infrared video camera would detect, but on first blush it is difficult to imagine why the FBI would do a re-enactment that didn’t duplicate both the type of guns and ammunition its agents were using at the Waco siege except to rig the outcome.
Source:
The Latest Waco Fireball. James Bovard, The American Spectator, April 5, 2001.