TYB
These Boots Are Made For Walking
Let's not forget this song's historical context
On February 28, 1993, Seventy seven heavily armed ATF and FBI agents arrived in two cattle trailers and rushed up to the Mount Carmel compound, screaming, "Show Time," like kids about to take their parts in a new video game. Several smashed the front door and ran inside. Nine others scrambled up two ladders to get onto the roof. Three smashed a second floor window, struggled with a curtain, and ran inside. A fourth stood guard outside until he heard shots from inside. Then he threw in a flash-bang grenade, fired two bursts from his M-16, and fled down the ladder. Meanwhile, gunmen on helicopters strafed the compound from above. Four agents died that day, including the three who entered the window. Several others later admitted they shot first.
The agents shut down all of the Davidians' utilities-electricity, water, natural gas, and telephones. They also shot out the windows, leaving the residents with only sheets for protection against the weather.
They brought in "massive floodlights" to light up the compound at night to prevent the Davidians from getting any sleep. With loudspeakers, they broadcast all kinds of distracting noises, including everything from screaming to rabbits being slaughtered to Nancy Sinatra's song, "These Boots Are Made for Walkin'." The harassment lasted continuously until the final day-April 19.
Then from nearby Fort Hood, agents brought in M113 armored personnel carriers, M2 Bradley fighting vehicles, Sikorsky UH-60 Blackhawk, McDonnell Douglas AH-64 Apache and Bell UH-1 "Huey" helicopters, Abrams M1 tanks, 7.62 mm machine guns, grenades, and FBI psychological warfare experts and SWAT snipers. One of the tanks bore the Alabama state flag.
They forced news reporters and TV crews to retreat five miles away (hence the poor quality of the photos and videos) and cleared a perimeter around the compound to prevent wildfires from spreading out into the countryside. Outbuildings, children's playground equipment, and go-carts were smashed in the process. The women and children fled into the compound's second floor for safety.
The tanks surrounded the complex. Some had booms that punched holes into the buildings and destroyed the stairways inside. Then they sprayed potent, flammable CS gas inside-a gas that is so toxic, it is banned even in warfare by an international treaty. Had this action occurred on foreign soil, it would have been an outright war crime.
The Davidians were gasping and choking. Some fled into an underground bunker next to the compound. The tanks punched holes and inserted the gas into that also. Then one drove over its entrance to prevent escape.
After more than four hours, the FBI had exhausted nearly all of its gas. Then the tanks came eight times over the next hour and demolished over a quarter of the structure with the women and children trapped inside.
A couple of vehicles came equipped with booms that contained flaming gas jets that they fired into the holes in the building. Soon the entire compound was ablaze. It burned completely down in about an hour.
Thompson, Linda D., Waco,the Big Lie, YouTube Video, 1993. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktubTy_6SVU
https://www.alabamagazette.com/story/2023/03/01/opinion/the-waco-holocaust/2508.html