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| HK Bus Hostage Tragedy 2010 (aftermath. etc.); updates, discussions | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Aug 23 2010, 12:08 PM (6,537 Views) | |
| Fmr TOPP Awardee 82'PNP | Aug 27 2010, 11:10 AM Post #131 |
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PDFF Moderator
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It's time for Mr. Magtibay to tender his resignation before tons of bricks befalls upon him. He is not only a disgrace to the PNP, but also caused a huge black mark on the Aquino Administration. Mr. Verzosa is also culpable of command responsibility. His presence in the crime scene was highly sought but where was he at that time that needs his physical presence to lead the operation ? In times of hostage crisis so serious at that, moreso, that the hostage taker was a dismissed officer of the PNP, he (Versoza) should be the leading character from the PNP hierarchy to act as the crisis manager.
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| spearhead | Aug 27 2010, 08:02 PM Post #132 |
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DoctorNO, Your Neutral Observer.
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Seems like Mr. Magtibay's mind during those moment maybe feeling too much about his fellow MPD man, mr. Mendoza's life. Maybe while he was too confident about his SWAT squad leader's skills to end it peacefully after they made those rehearsal rescue attempt behind the grand stand, he might be also thinking that the LRC and SAF were too overkill for this lone gunman. Now ofcourse, since he relied too much from his local SWAT teams' capabilities despite the fact that they lacked training and equipments too, there is no way for him to justify his misjudgment of the whole operation. Lots of flaws like for instance, they never realized that the bus' windows were made of fiber glass and not a pure glass in which could easily be blew up by frame charges or even by their sledgehammers. When they did the rehearsal, none of his men realized this s@#t. Also seems like none of them were expecting that the gunman would even fire back at them as soon as they entered the bus through the side emergency door. So in fairness, any frame charges or even ladders will mostly be useless on this operation, especially that the windows too were blocked by curtains aside from having a plastic/fiber glass windows w/c i dont think any frame charges could ever blow them all out. |
"Men of War must learn the art of numbers or he will not know how to array his troops." - Plato![]() ![]() | |
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| saver111 | Aug 27 2010, 10:18 PM Post #133 |
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A sniper with a thermal scope would be appropriate. |
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Justice for Daniel Lorenz Jacinto HELP END PIRACY NOW!: http://www.itfseafarers.org/petition.cfm | |
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| spearhead | Aug 28 2010, 05:23 AM Post #134 |
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DoctorNO, Your Neutral Observer.
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Yes i agree, as i mentioned this before. Using such scope could have also reduced any colateral damages which is still being investigated at their warehouse where the bus is parked now. While they're at it they should ask those snipers involved if indeed they were using or weren't using any thermal scopes. Kasi kung wala, aba malaking pusibilidad na nanghula nlang ng target ang mga snipers sa dilim ng bus sa loob nun, tapos sabay may teargas pa nun. |
"Men of War must learn the art of numbers or he will not know how to array his troops." - Plato![]() ![]() | |
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| israeli | Aug 28 2010, 11:12 AM Post #135 |
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‘Super SWAT’ was kept out of the loop By DJ Yap Philippine Daily Inquirer First Posted 02:23:00 08/28/2010 MANILA, Philippines—At the Manila Police District (MPD), there’s a faction within the Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) unit known mockingly as “Super SWAT,” an elite squad composed of veteran marksmen and arms experts. But Super SWAT was kept out of the loop during the Aug. 23 hostage drama at the Luneta Park that left eight tourists and the hostage-taker dead, much to the frustration of its leader, Senior Insp. Jonathan dela Cruz. “That’s not the SWAT I know,” he said of the unsure, bumbling unit of men whose assault on the bus taken hostage by former Senior Insp. Rolando Mendoza was captured live by cameras and made the subject of international derision. “It’s embarrassing. We’re going to be used as an example of what not to do in a hostage situation,” he said Thursday night in an interview with some of his team members in a Manila restaurant. Dela Cruz was supposed to have taken command of the MPD SWAT on Aug. 23, but a petition by some existing members—those who did not belong to his trusted circle—succeeded in retaining Chief Insp. Santiago Pascual as commander and keeping Dela Cruz and his team out of the action. Pascual was later relieved with three other SWAT leaders as a result of their handling of the hostage crisis. “Everybody here knows that it’s Dela Cruz who’s good. It’s a shame he wasn’t in command,” an MPD official not connected with SWAT nor with Dela Cruz said in a separate interview. “Politics did him in,” said the official, who did not want to be named for lack of clearance to speak on the subject. Watching in frustration At the height of the crisis, Dela Cruz said he was relegated to the sidelines, watching in frustration as the events unfolded. “I kept getting calls from people, from SWAT units in Metro Manila and my SWAT friends in the United States and Australia, and even British reporters, asking me what I was doing. They thought I was in command,” he said. “I just told them: ‘I’m not there.’” He said even his young daughters asked him, “Nandon ka (Were you there)?” and he felt embarrassed. He would do it differently Dela Cruz, 46, said he was not in any position to criticize and point out mistakes the SWAT members committed during the hostage crisis. However, he said he would have done things differently. First, with regard to intelligence work, he would work closely with the negotiators and interrogate hostages who had been released to determine the positions of those inside the bus, he said. Once their positions were known, the next step would be to determine the entry point and where to breach the vehicle. He said he would deploy only three people to storm the bus, but all of them must be fully decked in “Level 4” gear with bullet-proof vests and kneepads, Kevlar helmets, flashlights, M-16 rifles and handguns. “Then we would decide on what action to take during the worst case scenario. If the worst case scenario is that the hostage-taker starts shooting at the hostages, then we go in,” he said. Breach the front Dela Cruz said he would order his men to use a detonating cord to blast the front part of the bus, which, in his opinion, was the ideal place to breach. The three men would storm the vehicle, with halogen lights in position behind them to momentarily blind the hostage-taker. Their M-16 rifles would be equipped with flashlights to immediately zoom into the suspect and shoot him if necessary. “The most damage he could have done was to shoot one of us, but he wouldn’t be able to take all three of us down,” he said. “This would have been a good opportunity for Manila SWAT to show what it’s made of,” he said. “If the operation was successful, and I or one of my men died as a result, it would be worth it,” he said. Glory days Dela Cruz was commander of the MPD SWAT from 2007 to 2008, a period his subordinates liked to consider the “glory days” of the unit. “At that time, we were the ‘Best of the Best SWAT’ in the country, according to the SAF (Special Action Force),” he said. Super SWAT earned the moniker from its members’ penchant for wearing Level 4 gear all the time—decked out in bullet-proof vests, helmets and kneepads and carrying top-of-the-line M-16 rifles and handguns. “Some people thought we looked arrogant because we were wearing all our equipment. That’s when they started calling us ‘Super SWAT.’ They said we were elitists,” Dela Cruz said. One of his men chimed in: “It was not meant to be a compliment.” Improvise But Dela Cruz said: “We would need all that gear and equipment if we’re going to walk into a situation with confidence.” He said confidence was crucial in dealing with potentially deadly situations, citing one hostage-taking incident when his squad was called in. “When the hostage-taker fired a shot, the men from other units ducked for cover, but we remained standing. Then we walked over to get to the suspect.” He said his team, composed of less than 20 members, was a tightly knit family bonded together by a common interest in weapons and tactics. Dela Cruz said a good SWAT unit did not need astronomical funds to be effective. The commander just has to be resourceful in finding equipment for his team, he said. He said this was what he did when he was SWAT commander, constantly on the lookout for new devices and equipment and would improvise based on the resources they had. “In SWAT you don’t buy your equipment, you make your own,” he said, noting that the MPD SWAT currently uses Kevlar helmets and kneepads that he helped design when he was still commander. “But more than the equipment and gear, the most important thing in a SWAT unit is the people. These are the people behind you and in front of you. You want men who are skilled and you can trust,” he said. Trimming the fat Which was why as SWAT commander, Dela Cruz trimmed the unit’s personnel down from 100 to 25, provoking an outcry from those who did not make the cut. Dela Cruz said with scarce resources, he did not need 100 men to run a capable and efficient SWAT unit. “One bullet can give you experience ... It’s not about quantity of the manpower. It’s about the knowledge that your men have,” he said. He said his team was composed of men mostly in their 30s, unlike those deployed during the Luneta hostage crisis. “Those guys looked like they were still courting girls. They didn’t look like men raising families and building a future.” Floating status In 2008, Dela Cruz left the MPD SWAT to join the team of his former boss, Roberto Rosales, who was then just recently appointed director of the National Capital Regional Police Office (NCRPO). He was assigned to the NCRPO’s Light Reaction Unit. Then early this year, he was recommended to resume duty at the MPD SWAT. If he had been allowed to re-assume command, he would have trimmed the bloated personnel again. This was probably why the current SWAT members were reluctant to have him on board. The complaining members sent a petition to Manila Mayor Alfredo Lim asking him to retain Pascual as commander, a request that Lim granted. “I was put on floating status as a result,” he said. US-trained Sought for a reaction, Lim said he did not know Dela Cruz and was not privy to the internal workings of the MPD SWAT. Now, Dela Cruz said he had been recommended anew to head the MPD SWAT. But he said he was not confident that he would be reinstated. “With this interview, I don’t know if I’ll be allowed to go back. But I’m OK with that. I just felt somebody had to say something. Now is the time for everyone to evaluate what went wrong and what should be done,” he said. A civil engineering graduate of the Technological Institute of the Philippines, Dela Cruz joined the police force in 1987. “I rose from the ranks. I was PO1, PO2 and so on,” he said. From 1991-1996, he received training in counterterrorism strategy and tactics from specialized police forces in Louisiana, US. The training was sponsored by the US Embassy. Hostile encounters As MPD SWAT commander, Dela Cruz had faced a number of hostile encounters with criminal elements, from hostage dramas to hijacking incidents and pursuits of fugitives. But none were of the scale of the Aug. 23 incident at Luneta. By reputation, Dela Cruz is seen as something of a loose cannon. He often terrified subordinates by “trying out” bulletproof gear while they were wearing it, that is, he would shoot it to demonstrate that the bullet would not penetrate it. He also liked to experiment with explosives as a breaching tool. He admitted that a civilian was injured during one such experiment. “I took care of the hospital bills,” he said. |
| "To secure peace is to prepare for war." - Carl Von Clausewitz | |
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| israeli | Aug 28 2010, 11:20 PM Post #136 |
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HK forensic team barred from probing hostages’ bus GMANews.tv 08/28/2010 | 11:01 PM The Philippine National Police (PNP) on Saturday prevented a team of forensic experts from Hong Kong from examining the ill-fated tourist bus where 21 Hong Kong tourists were held hostage last Monday, saying there is a need to preserve evidence from the bloody hostage-taking that killed nine people. Five Chinese forensic experts from Hong Kong arrived at Camp Bagong Diwa in Taguig City on Saturday to conduct their own investigation on Monday’s hostage-taking incident, but were barred from entering the bus due to lack of clearance from Philippine authorities. “They would have to go to the Department of Justice… Considering it [the bus] is a (piece of) evidence, we would like to preserve it as such. We would have to ask for a clearance," Senior Superintendent Joel Coronel, team leader of the PNP’s field investigators, said in an interview aired on Saturday over GMA News’ “24 Oras." The Hong Kong forensic team, however, was allowed to look around the bus surrounded by closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras to ensure transparency of the investigation, according to Coronel. On August 23, dismissed Police Senior Inspector Rolando Mendoza hijacked a Hong Thai tourist bus carrying 21 Hong Kong tourists and four Filipinos. After an 11-hour hostage drama, nine people died — the hostage-taker and eight Hong Kong tourists. (See: HK forensic team barred from probing hostages’ bus) The bus, which sustained much damage with some of its seats stained with blood after the incident, was towed on Wednesday from the site of the tragedy at the Quirino Grandstand in Manila’s historic Rizal Park to Taguig City to be able to preserve evidence of the bloody hostage-taking. PNP spokesperson Agrimero Cruz Jr. meanwhile said that the forensic team from Hong Kong is “very welcome" to conduct a parallel investigation of the incident. “Kung ano man examination ang gawin nila (Whatever examination they intend to do), that is well within their turf," he said in a separate television interview. He however appealed to the Hong Kong authorities to provide the PNP with copies of the results of their own investigation for Philippine authorities to be able to determine if the two probes have discrepancies. “Sana ay mabigyan din tayo ng copy or data kung ano man ang makuha nila para maisama natin sa ating reports (We hope that whatever they get, they also provide us with copy or data so we can include these in our reports)," he said. Officials from the Philippines and China have earlier said that investigations on the incident would have to be finished before the two countries start their meetings. |
| "To secure peace is to prepare for war." - Carl Von Clausewitz | |
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| israeli | Aug 29 2010, 12:15 AM Post #137 |
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5 SWAT members admit firing ‘warning shots’ during hostage crisis GMANews.tv 08/28/2010 | 11:59 PM Five members of the Manila Police District’s Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team on Saturday admitted firing “warning shots" at the height of Monday’s hostage crisis, which left eight Hong Kong tourists dead and the hostage-taker himself killed by sniper fire. Philippine National Police (PNP) spokesperson Agrimero Cruz Jr. said the five MPD-SWAT members stated in their affidavits that they fired the gunshots “to distract the attention" of the hostage-taker, dismissed Police Senior Inspector Rolando Mendoza. “Nagpaputok sila pataas to distract the attention (of the hostage-taker)... ‘Yung mga SWAT members na nagpaputok doon sa labas, nandoon sila sa gawing harap ng bus," Cruz said in an interview on Saturday aired over GMA News’ “24 Oras." (They fired in the air to distract the attention of the hostage-taker. Those SWAT members who fired guns outside, they were at the front area of the bus.) He added that 22 other members of the SWAT team who responded during Monday’s incident also executed their affidavits in relation to the bloody hostage-taking. On August 23, Mendoza hijacked a Hong Thai bus carrying 21 Hong Kong tourists and four Filipinos. After an excruciating 11-hour drama, negotiations between the dismissed police officer and the Philippine authorities rapidly unraveled and led to shooting, which left nine people dead and nine others wounded, including two bystanders. (See: Hostage crisis ends in bloody carnage; 8 hostages dead) The resulting carnage, which has outraged many Chinese nationals, has been blamed by many observers on the poor handling of the crisis by the Philippine authorities, including the MPD-SWAT team that spearheaded the assault. Cruz said that the five SWAT members’ affidavits support the PNP’s earlier claim that it was Mendoza’s gunshots, not friendly fire, that caused the deaths of the Hong Kong tourists. “Initially, ang nakita natin sa statements nila, puro papataas lang ang ginawa nilang pagpapaputok," he said. (Initially, what we saw in their statements, all the shots they fired were aimed upwards.) He however assured that all those responsible for the deaths of the victims — even if they turn out to be from the rescuing forces — will be held accountable. Paraffin test Senior Superintendent Lorlie Arroyo of the PNP Crime Laboratory meanwhile said that Mendoza’s both hands were found positive for gun powder residue based on the results of the paraffin tests. Arroyo likewise said that all 58 fired cartridges earlier recovered from the tourist bus came from Mendoza’s M16 rifle. The hostage-taker’s .45-caliber pistol, however, yielded negative results for gun powder residue, which indicates the possibility that it was not used during the incident. Arroyo added that authorities of the PNP Crime Laboratory are still determining the trajectories of the gunshots fired during the incident based on the bullet holes on the windows of the tourist bus. |
| "To secure peace is to prepare for war." - Carl Von Clausewitz | |
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| saver111 | Aug 31 2010, 08:34 PM Post #138 |
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A Botched Hostage Rescue in the Philippines August 26, 2010 | 0855 GMT By Scott Stewart On Aug. 23, Rolando Mendoza, a former senior police inspector with the Manila police department, boarded a tourist bus in downtown Manila and took control of the vehicle, holding the 25 occupants (tourists from Hong Kong and their Philippine guides) hostage. Mendoza, who was dressed in his police inspector’s uniform, was armed with an M16-type rifle and at least one handgun. According to the police, Mendoza had been discharged from the department after being charged with extortion. Mendoza claimed the charges were fabricated and had fought a protracted administrative and legal battle in his effort to be reinstated. Apparently, Mendoza’s frustration over this process led to his plan to take the hostages. The fact that Mendoza entertained hope of regaining his police job by breaking the law and taking hostages speaks volumes about his mental state at the time of the incident. After several hours of negotiation failed to convince Mendoza to surrender, communications broke down, Mendoza began to shoot hostages and police launched a clumsy and prolonged tactical operation to storm the bus. The operation lasted for more than an hour and left Mendoza and eight of the tourists dead at the end of a very public and protracted case of violence stemming from a workplace grievance. Hostage-rescue operations are some of the most difficult and demanding tactical operations for police and military. To be successful, they require a great deal of training and planning and must be carefully executed. Because of this, hostage-rescue teams are among the most elite police and military units in the world. Since these teams are always training and learning, they pay close attention to operations like the one in Manila and study these operations carefully. They seek to adopt and incorporate tactics and techniques that work and learn from any mistakes that were made so they can avoid repeating them. Even in highly successful operations, there are always areas that can be improved upon and lessons that can be learned. Indeed, in the Manila case, the events that unfolded provided a litany of lessons for hostage-rescue teams. The case will almost certainly be used in law enforcement and military classrooms across the globe for years as a textbook example of what not to do. Breakdown of the Incident Shortly after 10 a.m. on Aug. 23, Mendoza commandeered the bus and its occupants (his police inspector’s uniform was likely helpful in gaining him access to the vehicle). Within minutes, he released two female hostages. Soon thereafter he released four hostages (a woman and three children). Mendoza used a cell phone to call the Manila police, inform them of the situation and make his demands: that the charges against him be dropped by the police ombudsman’s office and that he be reinstated to the police force. These early hostage releases would generally be seen as a positive sign by the authorities, showing that Mendoza had some compassion for the women and children and that even if he was reducing the number of hostages for pragmatic, tactical reasons (to allow him better control over the group), he was at least reducing the number by releasing people and not killing them. The police maintained communications with Mendoza, who stayed aboard the bus and kept the motor running. This not only kept the vehicle cool, but allowed Mendoza to watch events unfold around the bus on the onboard television set. He had his hostages close the curtains on the bus to make it more difficult for the authorities to determine where he was in the bus. Shortly after 1 p.m., Mendoza requested more gasoline for the bus and some food. He released another hostage, an elderly man, in return for the gas and food. Two other hostages, both Philippine photographers, were released as a 3 p.m. deadline for action set by Mendoza came and went (one of the photographers was released before, one after). There were also reports that Mendoza had initially set a 12:30 p.m. deadline for action. The fact that these deadlines passed without violence would be an encouraging sign to the authorities that the incident could be resolved without bloodshed. Food was again taken out to the bus just before 5 p.m. During the afternoon, Mendoza could have been engaged by snipers on at least two occasions, but since negotiations were proceeding well and Mendoza did not appear to be close to shooting, the decision was made to try and wait him out and not attempt to kill him. If the snipers failed to incapacitate Mendoza, it could have risked the lives of the hostages. During the ordeal, Mendoza continued to watch events unfold on the television inside the bus and reportedly even talked to journalists via cell phone. Mendoza also ordered the bus driver to park the vehicle sideways in the center of the road in an apparent attempt to make it more difficult to approach without detection. Things took a marked turn for the worse around 6:20 p.m., when negotiators, accompanied by Mendoza’s brother Gregorio (who is also a police officer and who had earlier helped convince Mendoza to extend his deadline), approached the bus with a letter from the office of the ombudsman offering to reopen his case. Mendoza rejected the letter, saying he wanted his case dismissed, not reviewed. At this point, there are conflicting reports of what happened. The police negotiators told the Philippine Daily Inquirer that Mendoza’s brother told Mendoza that the letter from the ombudsman’s office was garbage and that he should not surrender. Other press reports indicate that the brother pleaded with Mendoza to take him hostage and release the tourists and that his pleading was seen as counterproductive to the negotiations. Whatever the story, Mendoza’s brother was then arrested and his arrest was carried live on television and seen by Mendoza in the bus. Shortly after his brother’s arrest, Mendoza fired two warning shots and demanded in a radio interview that all the Manila Police Department SWAT officers be removed from the scene. Shortly after 7 p.m., Mendoza repeated his threats and refused to speak to his family members. Growing increasingly agitated, Mendoza shot two of the hostages when his demand for the SWAT officers to retreat was not met. He released the Philippine bus driver, who reportedly told police that all the hostages were dead. (We are unsure why the driver said this when only two of the passengers had been killed, but the police would have been able to tell from the volume of fire that Mendoza had not truly killed all the hostages.) At about 7:30 p.m., the tires of the bus were shot out and a police tactical team approached the vehicle and began to smash its windows with a sledgehammer. The police attempted to slowly enter the back of the bus by crawling through one of the shattered windows from the top of a police truck but were forced back out of the window by gunfire. At about 8:40 p.m., police deployed tear gas into the back of the bus through the missing windows. Gunfire erupted and Mendoza was finally killed in a hail of bullets. Six additional hostages also perished during the exchange of gunfire. It is unclear at this point if they were intentionally shot by Mendoza or if they were caught in the crossfire. Hostage Situations By the time of the rescue attempt, the saga of Mendoza’s firing from the police force had been going on for some time, and it is important to recognize that he did not make a spontaneous decision to seize the tourist bus. Even if the bus was targeted shortly before the attack, Mendoza’s path toward violent action would have included several significant warning signs. As in almost any case of violence that stems from issues in the workplace, once the chain of events are examined more closely, reports will emerge that warning signs were either missed or ignored. Had those warning signs been noted and acted upon, this situation might have been avoided. Since the event was not pre-empted, once it happened and developed into a hostage situation, the primary objective of the authorities was to resolve the incident without violence. Skillful hostage negotiators do this by allowing the hostage-taker to vent. They also work hard to defuse any tension that has the attacker on edge and to gently wear the attacker down to the point of surrender. One of the essential principles in this effort is to isolate the hostage-taker so that he or she cannot receive outside communication, motivation, encouragement or other forms of support. Hostage negotiators seek to control the flow of all information into or out of the crime scene. That did not occur in this case. Mendoza was able to talk to outsiders on his cell phone and even gave media interviews. He was also able to use the television in the bus to watch live media coverage of the incident, including video of the deployment of police officers. This gave him a considerable advantage and far more information than what he could have observed with his eyes from inside the curtained bus. As shown in the November 2008 attack in Mumbai, India, it has become more difficult to isolate assailants from outside communications in the cell phone era, but there are ways that such communications can be disabled. It is not known why the Manila police did not attempt to jam the outside communication signals going to and from the bus, but that is certainly something that will come up in the after-action review, as will their handling of the media and onlookers (one of whom was wounded) during the incident. As negotiations are proceeding in a hostage situation, the authorities must always be busily preparing to launch an assault in case negotiations fail. When the assailant is agitated or mentally disturbed, the situation on the ground can sometimes change quite rapidly, and the rescue team needs to be prepared to act on a moment’s notice. Usually the team will come in with an initial assault plan and then alter and refine their plan as more intelligence becomes available, and as they become more familiar with the site and the situation. If the hostages are being held in a building, the rescue team will get the blueprints of the building and collect as much information as possible in an effort to plan their assault on the location where the hostages are being held. In this case, the hostages were being held on a stationary bus, which made it far easier to collect that type of intelligence — a bus is a bus. The authorities also had access to released hostages who, had they been debriefed, could have described to authorities the situation inside the bus. In a protracted hostage situation, the authorities will frequently employ technical measures to gather additional intelligence on the activities of the hostage-taker. This may involve the use of overt or clandestine video equipment, parabolic microphones or microphones surreptitiously placed in or near the site. Even thermal imaging sets and technical equipment to intercept cell phone communication or radio transmissions are sometimes used. All the information gleaned from such efforts will not only go to the negotiators, to help them understand the hostage-taker’s frame of mind, but will also be used to help the rescue team fine-tune their assault plan. Meanwhile, as the assault plan is being tweaked, negotiations continue and the hostage negotiators work to wear down the hostage-taker. It appears that the negotiators in the Mendoza case were doing a fairly good job of keeping the situation calm until the situation flared up involving Mendoza’s brother and the letter from the ombudsman’s office. Authorities clearly erred by not sending him a letter saying they had dropped the case against him. (They did not need the extortion charges now that they could arrest him and charge him with kidnapping and a host of other crimes.) It is hard to understand why the police department quibbled over words and refused to give him the piece of paper he expressly demanded. The police then aggravated the situation greatly with the public arrest of Mendoza’s brother. Those two events caused the situation to deteriorate rapidly and resulted in Mendoza’s decision to begin shooting. Once he shot the first two hostages, the negotiations were clearly over and it was time to implement a tactical solution to the problem. The Use of Force In a hostage situation, the use of force is a last resort. If force is required, however, the rescue team needs to hit hard, hit fast and hit accurately. There is little time for hesitation or error: Lives hang in the balance. This is where things began to get very ugly in the Mendoza case. Not only was there a delay between the murder of the first hostages and the launching of the first assault attempt, the assault was not hard, fast or accurate. To succeed, an assault should be dynamic, assume control of the scene by overwhelming force and use surprise and confusion to catch the hostage-taker off guard and quickly incapacitate him. The rescue team needs to dominate the place where the entry is being made and then quickly and accurately shoot the assailant. When the police began to smash the windows of the bus with sledgehammers and then continued to beat on the windows for more than a minute, Mendoza had ample time to kill his hostages had he wished to do so. The only thing that saved the hostages who did survive was Mendoza’s apparent reluctance to kill them. It appears that the intent of the police was to smash the rear window to provide an opening and then to continue smashing windows as they moved forward in an effort to draw Mendoza’s attention to the front of the bus while the assault team entered from the rear. When the police did attempt to enter the bus using the roof of the police vehicle, however, it was a slow, clumsy attempt that was quickly repelled by Mendoza once he opened fire on the team. They did not enter the bus quickly, and their tepid approach caused them to lose the element of tactical surprise, denied them the opportunity to employ overwhelming force and allowed Mendoza time to think and react and begin firing. There was no hope of the assault team’s dominating the breaching point (or the rest of the bus) when they entered in such a half-hearted manner. Then, instead of following through with the assault by storming the front door while Mendoza was firing at the police in the rear of the bus, the police withdrew and went back to the drawing board. Again, had Mendoza wanted to kill all his remaining hostages, the withdrawal of the assault team gave him ample time to do so. More than an hour after the first assault, the police again approached the bus and deployed tear gas grenades through the broken windows at the back of the bus. This flushed Mendoza toward the front of the bus and, after a brief exchange of gunfire, he was killed. There were some reports that he was killed by a police sniper, but we have seen no evidence to corroborate those reports, and it appears that he was shot from a relatively short range. Eight of the hostages survived the ordeal. Granted, a bus does offer some challenges for a takedown operation, but is also a very common form of transportation throughout the world, and there have been numerous hostage situations involving buses in many different countries. Because of this, professional rescue teams frequently practice bus takedowns in much the same way they practice building takedowns or aircraft takedowns. It was very apparent that the Manila SWAT unit lacked the experience, equipment and training to conduct effective hostage-rescue operations, and we have seen this problem in other local police departments in the developing world. We have not been able to learn why the police did not seek the help of a national-level hostage-rescue unit for the tactical aspect of this situation rather than leaving it to the Manila SWAT team to resolve. Given the prolonged duration of the situation and the location in the nation’s capital, higher-level assets should have had time to deploy to the scene. Unlike many cases of workplace violence, this one did not involve a disgruntled employee charging into his former office with guns blazing. Instead, Mendoza embarked on a course of action that would, as it turned out, cause a great deal of public humiliation for his former employer. Indeed, the head of the Manila police district tendered his resignation Aug. 24. Four leaders of the Manila SWAT team were also placed on administrative leave. In the past, some botched rescue attempts have spurred inquiries that have resulted in countries creating or dramatically improving their hostage-rescue capabilities. For example, the failed rescue attempt in Munich in 1972 led to the creation of Germany’s GSG-9, one of the most competent hostage-rescue teams in the world. It will be interesting to see if the Mendoza case spurs similar developments in the Philippines, a country facing a number of security threats. Reprinting or republication of this report on websites is authorized by prominently displaying the following sentence, including the hyperlink to STRATFOR, at the beginning or end of the report. "A Botched Hostage Rescue in the Philippines is republished with permission of STRATFOR." Read more: A Botched Hostage Rescue in the Philippines | STRATFOR <a href="http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20100825_botched_hostage_rescue_philippines">A Botched Hostage Rescue in the Philippines</a> is republished with permission of STRATFOR. http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20100825_bo...f44530536f2561a |
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Justice for Daniel Lorenz Jacinto HELP END PIRACY NOW!: http://www.itfseafarers.org/petition.cfm | |
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| spearhead | Sep 1 2010, 01:59 AM Post #139 |
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DoctorNO, Your Neutral Observer.
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That article forgot to mention the rehearsal of bus-assault by the same SWAT team, just right behind the grandstand. So now what, have they decided yet for the new name for this new rescue-team as ESF Elite Strike Force?
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"Men of War must learn the art of numbers or he will not know how to array his troops." - Plato![]() ![]() | |
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| MSantor | Sep 2 2010, 02:06 AM Post #140 |
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More new information about what transpired: [url=[URL=http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/nation/09/01/10/20-bullets-assault-team-hit-tourist-bus-document]http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/nation/09/01/10...st-bus-document[/URL]]ABS-CBN link[/url]
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"If you think you can do a thing or think you can't do a thing, you're right." - Henry Ford "Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm." - Winston Churchill "If everyone is thinking alike, someone isn't thinking"- Gen. George S. Patton | |
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8:49 AM Jul 11