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Waco: A Survivor's Story
The basis of the celebrated Paramount Network miniseries starring Michael Shannon and Taylor Kitsch -- Waco is the critically-acclaimed, first person account of the siege by Branch Davidian survivor, David Thibodeau.
Twenty-five years ago, the FBI staged a deadly raid on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco. Texas. David Thibodeau survived to tell the story.
When he first met the man who called himself David Koresh, David Thibodeau was a drummer in a local a rock band. Though he had never been religious in the slightest, Thibodeau gradually became a follower and moved to the Branch Davidian compound in Waco. He remained there until April 19, 1993, when the compound was stormed and burned to the ground after a 51-day standoff with government authorities.
In this compelling account -- now with an updated epilogue that revisits remaining survivors--Thibodeau explores why so many people came to believe that Koresh was divinely inspired. We meet the men, women, and children of Mt. Carmel. We get inside the day-to-day life of the community. We also understand Thibodeau's brutally honest assessment of the United States government's actions. The result is a memoir that reads like a thriller, with each page taking us closer to the eventual inferno.
Twenty-five years ago, the FBI staged a deadly raid on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco. Texas. David Thibodeau survived to tell the story.
When he first met the man who called himself David Koresh, David Thibodeau was a drummer in a local a rock band. Though he had never been religious in the slightest, Thibodeau gradually became a follower and moved to the Branch Davidian compound in Waco. He remained there until April 19, 1993, when the compound was stormed and burned to the ground after a 51-day standoff with government authorities.
In this compelling account -- now with an updated epilogue that revisits remaining survivors--Thibodeau explores why so many people came to believe that Koresh was divinely inspired. We meet the men, women, and children of Mt. Carmel. We get inside the day-to-day life of the community. We also understand Thibodeau's brutally honest assessment of the United States government's actions. The result is a memoir that reads like a thriller, with each page taking us closer to the eventual inferno.
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First published October 1, 1999
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April 10, 2018
Huhhhhhhh... This book.
David Thibodeau had an experience. And it was his experience; his life, his deal. But I can’t get over his perspective. He glossed over Koresh’s criminal activity, & I won’t accept his position. Let me be painfully clear: having sex with children IS WRONG. MORALLY REPREHENSIBLE. Thibodeau was made “uncomfortable” by Koresh raping children, because god told Koresh to, but doesn’t outright condemn it.
A couple of other points I don’t agree with - He chafes at the word “cult” to describe David Koresh’s community. And places no blame at Koresh’s feet for the violent end, but instead chooses to place full culpability on law enforcement.
Reading Thibodeau’s account enrages me. At one point near the end, he wrote “Silence is a form of consent.” Did you hear yourself, Thibodea? Koresh was having SEX WITH CHILDREN, & you continue to support him & his vision. How dare you. Disgusting.
And in case there’s any question, here’s a checklist:
If your spiritual leader claims to be the only one who can acurrately interpret the Bible, call your dad; you’re in a cult.
If your community has a specific date for the end of the world, call your dad; you’re in a cult.
If your community’s “end of the world” date has come & gone, call your dad; you’re in a cult.
If your spiritual leader claims to have been given new “revelation,” call your dad; you’re in a cult.
If your spiritual leader is the only one allowed to have sex with all the women, call your dad; you’re in a cult.
If your spiritual leader WANTS TO HAVE SEX WITH CHILDREN, STAB HIM IN THE NUTS, THEN CALL YOUR DAD; YOU’RE IN A CULT.
Thibodeau displays a huge lack of understanding of the mind of a sociopath & the power/control they try to wield over people. In recounting his time with Koresh, Thibodeau comes across as still under Koresh’s influence. Thibodeau fails to grasp how someone like Koresh craves control over people, to the point of death - which is exactly what occurred in the end. When Koresh decided not to surrender, he made sure to take his human possessions with him to death.
This memoir of Thibodeau’s reveals his need for further therapy & treatment for the brainwashing he received while in the cult. His personality & nature was the perfect rube for Koresh’s influence.
And oh yeah, hey, SEX WITH CHILDREN IS WRONG.
David Thibodeau had an experience. And it was his experience; his life, his deal. But I can’t get over his perspective. He glossed over Koresh’s criminal activity, & I won’t accept his position. Let me be painfully clear: having sex with children IS WRONG. MORALLY REPREHENSIBLE. Thibodeau was made “uncomfortable” by Koresh raping children, because god told Koresh to, but doesn’t outright condemn it.
A couple of other points I don’t agree with - He chafes at the word “cult” to describe David Koresh’s community. And places no blame at Koresh’s feet for the violent end, but instead chooses to place full culpability on law enforcement.
Reading Thibodeau’s account enrages me. At one point near the end, he wrote “Silence is a form of consent.” Did you hear yourself, Thibodea? Koresh was having SEX WITH CHILDREN, & you continue to support him & his vision. How dare you. Disgusting.
And in case there’s any question, here’s a checklist:
If your spiritual leader claims to be the only one who can acurrately interpret the Bible, call your dad; you’re in a cult.
If your community has a specific date for the end of the world, call your dad; you’re in a cult.
If your community’s “end of the world” date has come & gone, call your dad; you’re in a cult.
If your spiritual leader claims to have been given new “revelation,” call your dad; you’re in a cult.
If your spiritual leader is the only one allowed to have sex with all the women, call your dad; you’re in a cult.
If your spiritual leader WANTS TO HAVE SEX WITH CHILDREN, STAB HIM IN THE NUTS, THEN CALL YOUR DAD; YOU’RE IN A CULT.
Thibodeau displays a huge lack of understanding of the mind of a sociopath & the power/control they try to wield over people. In recounting his time with Koresh, Thibodeau comes across as still under Koresh’s influence. Thibodeau fails to grasp how someone like Koresh craves control over people, to the point of death - which is exactly what occurred in the end. When Koresh decided not to surrender, he made sure to take his human possessions with him to death.
This memoir of Thibodeau’s reveals his need for further therapy & treatment for the brainwashing he received while in the cult. His personality & nature was the perfect rube for Koresh’s influence.
And oh yeah, hey, SEX WITH CHILDREN IS WRONG.
August 18, 2008
I have the distinction of having been at Mount Carmel in 1993 during the seige, covering the trial of the Branch Davidian 11 in San Antonio in 1994 and being in Jonestown, Guyana after the massacre there in 1978. I doubt anyone else can truthfully make that claim.
Like David Thibodeau in his Waco book, I also wrote about my experiences in Jonestown LINK. I found David's work to be much more compelling than mine. I did meet him once, maybe twice, as well as two elderly ladies who survived the seige. I found David and Catherine Matteson, who I interviewed at length, to be honest spiritual souls who were totally committed to their beliefs.
David's book is a compassionate and passionate account of what I have always believed is the most blatant example of religious persecution of an American religious group since the Mormons were driven from New York to Utah. Thank you David Thibodeau. Because of your work, the past will not be forgotten.
Like David Thibodeau in his Waco book, I also wrote about my experiences in Jonestown LINK. I found David's work to be much more compelling than mine. I did meet him once, maybe twice, as well as two elderly ladies who survived the seige. I found David and Catherine Matteson, who I interviewed at length, to be honest spiritual souls who were totally committed to their beliefs.
David's book is a compassionate and passionate account of what I have always believed is the most blatant example of religious persecution of an American religious group since the Mormons were driven from New York to Utah. Thank you David Thibodeau. Because of your work, the past will not be forgotten.
July 14, 2018
I have read numerous memoirs of cult survivors, but I have never had such a negative reaction to an author. By the time I finshed this novel, I wanted to slap Thibodeau... repeatedly. I had to constantly remind myself that he is a cult victim and has gone through extensive conditioning and was probably never properly deprogrammed. Even though to a certain extent it is probably the lingering effects of his time in Waco, in his book Thibodeau comes across as shockingly ignorant at best and complicit and enabling at worst. I might be able to muster up sympathy for him at the end of the day because he has been through a horrific ideal, but this book is incredibly misguided.
My biggest frustration with this book, and by extension the author, is Thibodeau's continued admiration of David Koresh. Despite admitting the fact that Koresh committed statuatory rape, Thibodeau continues to praise Koresh as a great spiritual leader. To me, going to a child molestor to explain spiritual enlightenment is not unlike going to a murderer and asking them to explain the value of human life. Thibodeau consistently insists that Mount Carmel was a religious community and not a cult but his ignorant defense of Koresh only convinces me that yes, he was in fact a member of a cult. One of the most infuriating aspects of this book is Thibodeau's incredibly narrow definition of child abuse. Judging by what he wrote in this book, Thibodeau only views physical hitting or striking as child abuse. He readily admits that Koresh had sex with underage children all while rather stupidly insisting that all of the abuse allegations were unfounded. Statutory rape IS child abuse, a particularly cruel and heinous form of child abuse. Minors are not capable of consent. Therefore, any sexual contact with a minor is considered rape even if they were "married" or appeared to consent. To be fair, he does mention that Koresh's child brides made him uncomfortable, but he never outright condemns Koresh for the abuse. In fact, he seems more upset over the fact that Koresh's abuse caught the attention of law enforcement than the fact that Koresh severely harmed the cult's most vulnerable victims, the children he claims to care so much about. He continues to insist that the governments child abuse claims were "unfounded" but this is clearly inaccurate by his own admission! In addition to heaping an unreasonable amount of praise on a clearly questionable leader, Thibodeau consistently dismisses the accusations of numerous women and children, including a fourteen year old girl who testifies against Koresh. His rather feeble response is always along the lines of "I never saw him do that. I know him he wouldn't do that." This does not hold water. I'm not sure if he was aware of it, but numerous children, including Koresh's own biological children have since come forward and claimed that physical and sexual abuse was common place and the adults of Mount Carmel were aware of it if not willing participants. In interviews since, Kiri Jewell claimed that her own mother took her to a motel to have sex with Koresh. Sky Okimoto, Koresh's son, claimed that his mother hit him with the Helper paddle until he bled. The same paddle that Thibodeau insists was only used for "light spankings to discipline the children". According to these same children, they were also subject to emotional abuse in the form of intense marathon Bible sessions that included terrifying descriptions of armageddon, being trained from a young age to fight and be prepared to die for or have sex with Koresh, a constant paranoia of the outside world, no real education, and being forced to live in horrific living conditions. I first suspected that I was not going to like this book, when Thibodeau described an underground bus as a tornado shelter without any sort awareness that this not a safe place to take shelter. At first I thought that maybe, his statements were the results of the book originally being published so quickly after the initial events of the siege (it was originally published in 1996, a mere six years after the events at Waco). However, the version that I read was re-released before the Waco mini series based on the events was released. The series was based on this book (and incidentally critically panned largely because it was found to be sympathetic to Koresh) and Thibodeau provided an additional epilogue that was painfully tone deaf. Thibodeau assures the surviving children of Waco that he will always be there for them and that they were loved. These are the same children that he discredited in the previous chapter. The same children who were abused by his beloved spiritual mentor. The fact that he doesn't seem to grasp this disconnect just proves to me that he was completely conditioned and needs to seek help.
In addition to his problematic views on child abuse, Thibodeau offers a pretty weak explanation for other highly suspicious activities that took place on the compound. He insists that the majority of the firearms on the compound were sold to provide funds for the community. My initial reaction to that was to groan outloud and exclaim "COME ON!" Of all the ways to fund a community, why on earth would you choose such an unpredictable method of earning money? Not to mention the monumental risk of having that many firearms around children? Like other claims Thibodeau makes in the book, this claim has been more or less disproved. In 2018, a former UPS delivery man revealed that he went to the Waco sheriff after accidentally discovering that a package that he was going to deliver to the compound was filled with hand grenades (In the US, it has been illegal for civilians to own hand grenades since 1968). He also discovered that he unknowingly delivered grenade launchers, AK-47s, AR-15s, and magazines. If this is true, the ATF would have been within their jurisdiction to inspect the compound, despite the fact that Thibodeau insists that they overstepped their authority. Besides the weak explanation of the guns, Thibodeau does not seem to find Koresh's "no has sex but me and I can pick whoever I want regardless of their age or marital status" rule unreasonable or suspicious. He spends a significant amount of time complaining about his lack of a sex life (more time than he spends worrying about the child brides and without any real concern about who might be harmed by this practice I might add), but seems to suggest that this was spiritually good for all of them. His involvement with Thibodeau also dramatically altered his physical appearance (he claimed to like his emaciated frame) and led to him abandoning his love of music. Thibodeau insists that he has strong instincts, but the fact that he seems unaware of how deeply he was controlled by Koresh.
Despite the fact that Thibodeau and Clive Doyle (I have read his memoirs as well) have praised Koresh's spirual guidance, both are mum on the specifics of their belief system. Whether this is because it has some questionable morals that they do not want the public to know or if there just wasn't much of an established system, I honestly don't know. From what I read, Koresh more or less infiltrated the Branch Davidians group that was settled in the area and combined it with elements from both Christianity (Biblical preaching) and Judaism (celebrating passover). Thibodeau consistently claims that the group was persecuted for their religious beliefs, but never outlies what those beliefs are. It seems very non sequitar. Apart from the acceptance of child brides there was very little objection to any religious beliefs or their communal living situation.
The only reason that this book gets two stars instead of one is because despite the infurating justification throughout the book, Thibodeau does present a few valid points about the siege. The government did a horrific job of addressing the situation. Koresh was a monster, but the majority of the victims were innocent and the ATF did not conduct the negotiation with the delicacy needed to help cult victims. The excessive violence and cruel siege tactics that of the ATF was out of line, especially with so many children on the premise. The media was also a bit hasty to condemn the entire compound without really acknowledging that they too were victims of cruelty.
Unfortunately, I don't think we will ever get a conclusive account of what actually occurred for a very tragic reason. The people most affected by Koresh's abuse probably died in the fire and were victims of both Koresh AND the mishandled siege. Nine adults survived the blast and the two written accounts that I know of were written by Koresh's Mighty Men (members of Koresh's inner circle). Both accounts seem particularly biased and unwilling to address certain topics and present a very skewed perspective. The most charitable I can be for Thibodeau is to give him the benefit of the doubt. He is (despite my intense frustration at him) a victim as well. Even as I reread my review and realized how much of my frustration leaked out, I can at least acknowledge that he might have been unaware of some of the abuse or is still so conditioned to defend Koresh that he can't help himself. Waco was a terrible tragedy thanks to some horrific mishandling of both parties. It's important to remember this horrific event and its victims and learn from it so that it can never happen again. I just wish that the victims had a more reliable speaker.
My biggest frustration with this book, and by extension the author, is Thibodeau's continued admiration of David Koresh. Despite admitting the fact that Koresh committed statuatory rape, Thibodeau continues to praise Koresh as a great spiritual leader. To me, going to a child molestor to explain spiritual enlightenment is not unlike going to a murderer and asking them to explain the value of human life. Thibodeau consistently insists that Mount Carmel was a religious community and not a cult but his ignorant defense of Koresh only convinces me that yes, he was in fact a member of a cult. One of the most infuriating aspects of this book is Thibodeau's incredibly narrow definition of child abuse. Judging by what he wrote in this book, Thibodeau only views physical hitting or striking as child abuse. He readily admits that Koresh had sex with underage children all while rather stupidly insisting that all of the abuse allegations were unfounded. Statutory rape IS child abuse, a particularly cruel and heinous form of child abuse. Minors are not capable of consent. Therefore, any sexual contact with a minor is considered rape even if they were "married" or appeared to consent. To be fair, he does mention that Koresh's child brides made him uncomfortable, but he never outright condemns Koresh for the abuse. In fact, he seems more upset over the fact that Koresh's abuse caught the attention of law enforcement than the fact that Koresh severely harmed the cult's most vulnerable victims, the children he claims to care so much about. He continues to insist that the governments child abuse claims were "unfounded" but this is clearly inaccurate by his own admission! In addition to heaping an unreasonable amount of praise on a clearly questionable leader, Thibodeau consistently dismisses the accusations of numerous women and children, including a fourteen year old girl who testifies against Koresh. His rather feeble response is always along the lines of "I never saw him do that. I know him he wouldn't do that." This does not hold water. I'm not sure if he was aware of it, but numerous children, including Koresh's own biological children have since come forward and claimed that physical and sexual abuse was common place and the adults of Mount Carmel were aware of it if not willing participants. In interviews since, Kiri Jewell claimed that her own mother took her to a motel to have sex with Koresh. Sky Okimoto, Koresh's son, claimed that his mother hit him with the Helper paddle until he bled. The same paddle that Thibodeau insists was only used for "light spankings to discipline the children". According to these same children, they were also subject to emotional abuse in the form of intense marathon Bible sessions that included terrifying descriptions of armageddon, being trained from a young age to fight and be prepared to die for or have sex with Koresh, a constant paranoia of the outside world, no real education, and being forced to live in horrific living conditions. I first suspected that I was not going to like this book, when Thibodeau described an underground bus as a tornado shelter without any sort awareness that this not a safe place to take shelter. At first I thought that maybe, his statements were the results of the book originally being published so quickly after the initial events of the siege (it was originally published in 1996, a mere six years after the events at Waco). However, the version that I read was re-released before the Waco mini series based on the events was released. The series was based on this book (and incidentally critically panned largely because it was found to be sympathetic to Koresh) and Thibodeau provided an additional epilogue that was painfully tone deaf. Thibodeau assures the surviving children of Waco that he will always be there for them and that they were loved. These are the same children that he discredited in the previous chapter. The same children who were abused by his beloved spiritual mentor. The fact that he doesn't seem to grasp this disconnect just proves to me that he was completely conditioned and needs to seek help.
In addition to his problematic views on child abuse, Thibodeau offers a pretty weak explanation for other highly suspicious activities that took place on the compound. He insists that the majority of the firearms on the compound were sold to provide funds for the community. My initial reaction to that was to groan outloud and exclaim "COME ON!" Of all the ways to fund a community, why on earth would you choose such an unpredictable method of earning money? Not to mention the monumental risk of having that many firearms around children? Like other claims Thibodeau makes in the book, this claim has been more or less disproved. In 2018, a former UPS delivery man revealed that he went to the Waco sheriff after accidentally discovering that a package that he was going to deliver to the compound was filled with hand grenades (In the US, it has been illegal for civilians to own hand grenades since 1968). He also discovered that he unknowingly delivered grenade launchers, AK-47s, AR-15s, and magazines. If this is true, the ATF would have been within their jurisdiction to inspect the compound, despite the fact that Thibodeau insists that they overstepped their authority. Besides the weak explanation of the guns, Thibodeau does not seem to find Koresh's "no has sex but me and I can pick whoever I want regardless of their age or marital status" rule unreasonable or suspicious. He spends a significant amount of time complaining about his lack of a sex life (more time than he spends worrying about the child brides and without any real concern about who might be harmed by this practice I might add), but seems to suggest that this was spiritually good for all of them. His involvement with Thibodeau also dramatically altered his physical appearance (he claimed to like his emaciated frame) and led to him abandoning his love of music. Thibodeau insists that he has strong instincts, but the fact that he seems unaware of how deeply he was controlled by Koresh.
Despite the fact that Thibodeau and Clive Doyle (I have read his memoirs as well) have praised Koresh's spirual guidance, both are mum on the specifics of their belief system. Whether this is because it has some questionable morals that they do not want the public to know or if there just wasn't much of an established system, I honestly don't know. From what I read, Koresh more or less infiltrated the Branch Davidians group that was settled in the area and combined it with elements from both Christianity (Biblical preaching) and Judaism (celebrating passover). Thibodeau consistently claims that the group was persecuted for their religious beliefs, but never outlies what those beliefs are. It seems very non sequitar. Apart from the acceptance of child brides there was very little objection to any religious beliefs or their communal living situation.
The only reason that this book gets two stars instead of one is because despite the infurating justification throughout the book, Thibodeau does present a few valid points about the siege. The government did a horrific job of addressing the situation. Koresh was a monster, but the majority of the victims were innocent and the ATF did not conduct the negotiation with the delicacy needed to help cult victims. The excessive violence and cruel siege tactics that of the ATF was out of line, especially with so many children on the premise. The media was also a bit hasty to condemn the entire compound without really acknowledging that they too were victims of cruelty.
Unfortunately, I don't think we will ever get a conclusive account of what actually occurred for a very tragic reason. The people most affected by Koresh's abuse probably died in the fire and were victims of both Koresh AND the mishandled siege. Nine adults survived the blast and the two written accounts that I know of were written by Koresh's Mighty Men (members of Koresh's inner circle). Both accounts seem particularly biased and unwilling to address certain topics and present a very skewed perspective. The most charitable I can be for Thibodeau is to give him the benefit of the doubt. He is (despite my intense frustration at him) a victim as well. Even as I reread my review and realized how much of my frustration leaked out, I can at least acknowledge that he might have been unaware of some of the abuse or is still so conditioned to defend Koresh that he can't help himself. Waco was a terrible tragedy thanks to some horrific mishandling of both parties. It's important to remember this horrific event and its victims and learn from it so that it can never happen again. I just wish that the victims had a more reliable speaker.
October 25, 2018
Actual rating: 3.5 stars.
I was asked by a publisher to read & review "A Place Called Waco: A Survivor's Story." I wondered why, given that David Thibodeau's memoir was published in 1999. Now I see a TV mini-series titled "Waco" is set to air in January 2018, and suspect the publisher hopes buzz about the show will generate renewed interest in the book. In a new afterword to the paperback edition, Thibodeau himself makes the tie-in clear, describing his excitement over meeting members of the cast and production crew.
The memoir is well-written, though windy and repetitive between the parts readers will come for: the sections about cult leader Koresh's sexual infatuation with underaged girls; about the initial assault on the Mount Carmel compound by ATF agents; about the final siege and assault by the FBI and ATF 50 days later, about the fiery deaths of men, women, and children trapped in the compound with Koresh.
Thibodeau was an aspiring rock musician in Los Angeles when he fell in with members of a Christian rock band led by David Koresh. He gradually fell under Koresh's sway, and after some dithering found himself a committed member of the cult, living full-time at the compound, yet not a member of Koresh's inner circle, the "mighty men."
I wish Thibodeau had made more of an effort to describe Koresh's "teachings," which from the bits he does reveal seem to be utter nonsense, as most Revelations-based apocalyptic cult preaching is. When it comes to Revelations and the End Times, I take my spiritual guidance from a fictional character, Lee Child's Jack Reacher, who in one novel makes the commonsense observation that Revelations has been breathlessly promising the imminent arrival of Armageddon every day for 2,000 years.
Was Thibodeau, despite his half-hearted denials, an all-in member of the cult? There's no doubt in this reader's mind: with a straight face, Thibodeau recounts Koresh sidekick Steve describing his own background this way: "I went from England to Hawaii, changed into a heathen, lived a swinging life of booze and broads, partying with the fast crowd, the likes of Pat Boone and Clint Eastwood." One feels one is inside the addled mind of Jack Chick, reading something like that. Cultists mimic normal humans, but there's always a tell to let us know they're from an alternate universe. Pat Boone?
Thibodeau is honest enough to question some of what he thought he knew about Koresh. He drops hints of Koresh's perfidy here and there while simultaneously downplaying them, but my impression is that Thibodeau, afterward, came to see Koresh for what he obviously was, a charlatan who frightened willing believers with tales of mystical Seals, Horsemen of the Apocalypse, and the cleansing fires of God's wrath; but mainly a creep who perved on pre-teen girls.
Even if your motivation for reading this memoir is hatred of the jack-booted thugs of the ATF and FBI and their murderous assaults on Koresh's compound, you cannot avoid concluding that Koresh was guilty on many counts, from bedding ten- and eleven-year-old girls and cracking jokes with insiders about the tightness of their vaginas, to claiming God told him in a vision only he was allowed to have sex with Branch Davidian women (including the wives of married couples), to amassing an arsenal of semi-automatic and automatic weapons, to browbeating his band of believers into staying with him to the fiery end, to murder and worse.
Take this for what it's worth: in the last chapter Thibodeau recounts congressional testimony from a 14-year-old girl who was 10 when Koresh first had sex with her, who went on to repeat Koresh's crude remark about another pre-teen girl's vagina. While Thibodeau is honest enough to include this damning information, he immediately backpedals by casting doubt upon the girl's credibility. I wonder if he's been following the news lately, and if he has, whether he thinks the women recounting their experiences with Harvey Weinstein and Roy Moore are lying as well. That is where I lost what little sympathy I had for David Thibodeau.
Of course there's a solid link between the disastrous federal assaults on civilians at Ruby Ridge and Waco, and the growth of domestic right-wing militia terrorism, starting just two years after Waco with Timothy McVeigh's bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City, all the way to the Bundy militia today. Thibodeau forthrightly discusses the link in his memoir, detailing as well his own post-Waco involvement with the movement as a speaker at militia and survivalist rallies.
If you bring prejudices to the book you will leave with them intact, as I did. I guess I'm glad I read Thibodeau's memoir. I didn't learn much I didn't already know, but I better understand my own conflicted view of federal authority now that I know the details of what the ATF and FBI did to women and children at Waco. Nevertheless, I remain repelled by cultists of any stripe, particularly end-times hucksters and the people who believe them. There is something wrong with their brains.
A final note: I read the Kindle edition, a digitized version of the original paperback plus the author's more recent afterword. As is too often the case, the Kindle edition is loaded with formatting errors, but still readable.
I was asked by a publisher to read & review "A Place Called Waco: A Survivor's Story." I wondered why, given that David Thibodeau's memoir was published in 1999. Now I see a TV mini-series titled "Waco" is set to air in January 2018, and suspect the publisher hopes buzz about the show will generate renewed interest in the book. In a new afterword to the paperback edition, Thibodeau himself makes the tie-in clear, describing his excitement over meeting members of the cast and production crew.
The memoir is well-written, though windy and repetitive between the parts readers will come for: the sections about cult leader Koresh's sexual infatuation with underaged girls; about the initial assault on the Mount Carmel compound by ATF agents; about the final siege and assault by the FBI and ATF 50 days later, about the fiery deaths of men, women, and children trapped in the compound with Koresh.
Thibodeau was an aspiring rock musician in Los Angeles when he fell in with members of a Christian rock band led by David Koresh. He gradually fell under Koresh's sway, and after some dithering found himself a committed member of the cult, living full-time at the compound, yet not a member of Koresh's inner circle, the "mighty men."
I wish Thibodeau had made more of an effort to describe Koresh's "teachings," which from the bits he does reveal seem to be utter nonsense, as most Revelations-based apocalyptic cult preaching is. When it comes to Revelations and the End Times, I take my spiritual guidance from a fictional character, Lee Child's Jack Reacher, who in one novel makes the commonsense observation that Revelations has been breathlessly promising the imminent arrival of Armageddon every day for 2,000 years.
Was Thibodeau, despite his half-hearted denials, an all-in member of the cult? There's no doubt in this reader's mind: with a straight face, Thibodeau recounts Koresh sidekick Steve describing his own background this way: "I went from England to Hawaii, changed into a heathen, lived a swinging life of booze and broads, partying with the fast crowd, the likes of Pat Boone and Clint Eastwood." One feels one is inside the addled mind of Jack Chick, reading something like that. Cultists mimic normal humans, but there's always a tell to let us know they're from an alternate universe. Pat Boone?
Thibodeau is honest enough to question some of what he thought he knew about Koresh. He drops hints of Koresh's perfidy here and there while simultaneously downplaying them, but my impression is that Thibodeau, afterward, came to see Koresh for what he obviously was, a charlatan who frightened willing believers with tales of mystical Seals, Horsemen of the Apocalypse, and the cleansing fires of God's wrath; but mainly a creep who perved on pre-teen girls.
Even if your motivation for reading this memoir is hatred of the jack-booted thugs of the ATF and FBI and their murderous assaults on Koresh's compound, you cannot avoid concluding that Koresh was guilty on many counts, from bedding ten- and eleven-year-old girls and cracking jokes with insiders about the tightness of their vaginas, to claiming God told him in a vision only he was allowed to have sex with Branch Davidian women (including the wives of married couples), to amassing an arsenal of semi-automatic and automatic weapons, to browbeating his band of believers into staying with him to the fiery end, to murder and worse.
Take this for what it's worth: in the last chapter Thibodeau recounts congressional testimony from a 14-year-old girl who was 10 when Koresh first had sex with her, who went on to repeat Koresh's crude remark about another pre-teen girl's vagina. While Thibodeau is honest enough to include this damning information, he immediately backpedals by casting doubt upon the girl's credibility. I wonder if he's been following the news lately, and if he has, whether he thinks the women recounting their experiences with Harvey Weinstein and Roy Moore are lying as well. That is where I lost what little sympathy I had for David Thibodeau.
Of course there's a solid link between the disastrous federal assaults on civilians at Ruby Ridge and Waco, and the growth of domestic right-wing militia terrorism, starting just two years after Waco with Timothy McVeigh's bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City, all the way to the Bundy militia today. Thibodeau forthrightly discusses the link in his memoir, detailing as well his own post-Waco involvement with the movement as a speaker at militia and survivalist rallies.
If you bring prejudices to the book you will leave with them intact, as I did. I guess I'm glad I read Thibodeau's memoir. I didn't learn much I didn't already know, but I better understand my own conflicted view of federal authority now that I know the details of what the ATF and FBI did to women and children at Waco. Nevertheless, I remain repelled by cultists of any stripe, particularly end-times hucksters and the people who believe them. There is something wrong with their brains.
A final note: I read the Kindle edition, a digitized version of the original paperback plus the author's more recent afterword. As is too often the case, the Kindle edition is loaded with formatting errors, but still readable.
April 26, 2023
There are still lessons to be learned. Although this occurred decades ago the parallels today are certainly apparent. I have seen documentaries and series on Waco, but this is the first book I've read on the subject. It probably won't be the last.
December 13, 2020
There's so much to say about this book! I could go into every detail about how much I believe the government grossly abused their power during the Waco tragedy. It was not about ending the siege or even protecting the lives of those inside, it was about defeating David Koresh. I wholeheartedly believe the government set out to murder these people that were painted as crazy cultists, which is what I too believed until I read this book.
This book invoked so much emotion in me. It challenged me to reconsider everything I thought I knew about the siege, about the government (which my faith in our government has already vastly been diminished over the past four years) and about what we see in the media and how facts can be distorted to fit certain narratives by powerful figureheads. In essence, don't be a sheep! Do your own due diligence on everything.
The prose of this book was excellent. It inspired my own writing style. I stumbled in the beginning, not sure if I would finish the book but I'm so so so glad that I did. This book widened my horizons and I am grateful for it. I have immense respect for the author and his emotional intelligence, which I know probably came with hindsight in the years following the tragedy, but what is wisdom if not years of self reflection?
All those people died needlessly and were murdered by the United States government for their religious beliefs even though this is the land of the free. More like land for the free if your a straight white cisgender man. Don't get me wrong, David Koresh made mistakes (I'm appalled by his sexual activities with underage girls) and I think he may have had some mental illness and trauma. I'm not one for scriptures and religion, but I do believe in spirituality and that there are greater forces at play. But why was Koresh not arrested for his crimes at any given time? Why was the raid necessary when most of the evidence they "had" was fabricated or misconstrued.
Before I go off on a long tangent I just gotta say this was an excellent book and I recommend it to anyone who wants to challenge themselves to see things differently.
This book invoked so much emotion in me. It challenged me to reconsider everything I thought I knew about the siege, about the government (which my faith in our government has already vastly been diminished over the past four years) and about what we see in the media and how facts can be distorted to fit certain narratives by powerful figureheads. In essence, don't be a sheep! Do your own due diligence on everything.
The prose of this book was excellent. It inspired my own writing style. I stumbled in the beginning, not sure if I would finish the book but I'm so so so glad that I did. This book widened my horizons and I am grateful for it. I have immense respect for the author and his emotional intelligence, which I know probably came with hindsight in the years following the tragedy, but what is wisdom if not years of self reflection?
All those people died needlessly and were murdered by the United States government for their religious beliefs even though this is the land of the free. More like land for the free if your a straight white cisgender man. Don't get me wrong, David Koresh made mistakes (I'm appalled by his sexual activities with underage girls) and I think he may have had some mental illness and trauma. I'm not one for scriptures and religion, but I do believe in spirituality and that there are greater forces at play. But why was Koresh not arrested for his crimes at any given time? Why was the raid necessary when most of the evidence they "had" was fabricated or misconstrued.
Before I go off on a long tangent I just gotta say this was an excellent book and I recommend it to anyone who wants to challenge themselves to see things differently.
August 6, 2018
I've been reading other books about cults this summer (I just finished Prophet's Prey) and this was my first time reading a survivor's account. I left this book disgusted.
Thibodeau provides an interesting perspective, but he is a fundamentally flawed narrator who seems to be truly unable to come to terms with Koresh's evil. How is it that it took well into the book for the author to even broach the fact that Koresh sexually assaulted children? I'm neither American nor old enough to remember much about the cult, and so it astonished me that Thibodeau seemed to deliberately obscure Koresh's predilection for children and teenagers. I learned a lot about Thibodeau's passion for the drums, Koresh's preaching about revelation and the seven seals, etc. and only then did the chapter on Koresh's sexual life come into frame. Thibodeau lets us know that he was uncomfortable with Koresh's pedophilia, but that "For sure, all of the young girls I knew at Mount Carmel, particularly Michele, seemed perfectly at ease with being David’s lovers." After all, he explains "Girls ripen young there" (in Texas). How is this anything other than implying the consent of abused children who are legally and morally unable to consent? Thibodeau suggests that maybe it wasn't pedophilia but a self destructive bent that made Koresh assault children to hasten his conflict with the outside world. Uh... pardon? Is he actually trying to rationalize Koresh's pedophilia?
Elsewhere Thibodeau critiques the testimony of those child survivors brave enough to testify about their abuse. He writes, for example, that "Kiri told a dramatic - one might say melodramatic - tale of being sexually assaulted, but not penetrated, by David in a Texas motel when she was a mere ten years of age." The author was horrified until "I began to doubt the details of her story." About his own testimony, Thibodeau says "I tried to tell her [a congressional investigator] that I had never seen anything of the sort." But he is open about the fact that he knew Koresh was having sex with kids!
This isn't a moral gray area. This isn't a question of religious freedom and government overreach. I will probably read other books on cults and maybe even others on Waco, but Waco: A Survivor's Story disgusted me - if Thibodeau isn't ready to condemn Koresh for child abuse, we as paying customers shouldn't continue to support him.
Thibodeau provides an interesting perspective, but he is a fundamentally flawed narrator who seems to be truly unable to come to terms with Koresh's evil. How is it that it took well into the book for the author to even broach the fact that Koresh sexually assaulted children? I'm neither American nor old enough to remember much about the cult, and so it astonished me that Thibodeau seemed to deliberately obscure Koresh's predilection for children and teenagers. I learned a lot about Thibodeau's passion for the drums, Koresh's preaching about revelation and the seven seals, etc. and only then did the chapter on Koresh's sexual life come into frame. Thibodeau lets us know that he was uncomfortable with Koresh's pedophilia, but that "For sure, all of the young girls I knew at Mount Carmel, particularly Michele, seemed perfectly at ease with being David’s lovers." After all, he explains "Girls ripen young there" (in Texas). How is this anything other than implying the consent of abused children who are legally and morally unable to consent? Thibodeau suggests that maybe it wasn't pedophilia but a self destructive bent that made Koresh assault children to hasten his conflict with the outside world. Uh... pardon? Is he actually trying to rationalize Koresh's pedophilia?
Elsewhere Thibodeau critiques the testimony of those child survivors brave enough to testify about their abuse. He writes, for example, that "Kiri told a dramatic - one might say melodramatic - tale of being sexually assaulted, but not penetrated, by David in a Texas motel when she was a mere ten years of age." The author was horrified until "I began to doubt the details of her story." About his own testimony, Thibodeau says "I tried to tell her [a congressional investigator] that I had never seen anything of the sort." But he is open about the fact that he knew Koresh was having sex with kids!
This isn't a moral gray area. This isn't a question of religious freedom and government overreach. I will probably read other books on cults and maybe even others on Waco, but Waco: A Survivor's Story disgusted me - if Thibodeau isn't ready to condemn Koresh for child abuse, we as paying customers shouldn't continue to support him.
March 25, 2018
There’s probably a really good in-depth survivor’s insight story about the Branch Davidian slaughter in their communal home in Waco, Texas, but this isn’t it.
Waaaaaaay to much ink devoted to the author’s life as a bad-ass rock-n-roll vagabond drummer, his rich and marvelous sex-life and the GREAT pain he endured when giving up the ladies for The Cause (did he never realize that controlling the women’s sexuality in any group is how leaders consolidate and maintain power?)
He provides chronologically clumsy timelines of the Siege, bouncing back and forth between what Washington ordered vs. what the FBI/ATF actually did; and never once explains WHY the Davidians, namely their leader, didn’t arrange to speak more cogently and clearly to the powers-that-be, nor invite them in for inspection. Never once did he touch on Koresch’s burgeoning paranoia and how he walked himself into the Fed’s greatest script.
I’ve wasted far too much time on this awkward, poorly edited book. I’m done writing thinking about it.
Waaaaaaay to much ink devoted to the author’s life as a bad-ass rock-n-roll vagabond drummer, his rich and marvelous sex-life and the GREAT pain he endured when giving up the ladies for The Cause (did he never realize that controlling the women’s sexuality in any group is how leaders consolidate and maintain power?)
He provides chronologically clumsy timelines of the Siege, bouncing back and forth between what Washington ordered vs. what the FBI/ATF actually did; and never once explains WHY the Davidians, namely their leader, didn’t arrange to speak more cogently and clearly to the powers-that-be, nor invite them in for inspection. Never once did he touch on Koresch’s burgeoning paranoia and how he walked himself into the Fed’s greatest script.
I’ve wasted far too much time on this awkward, poorly edited book. I’m done writing thinking about it.
May 10, 2018
The level of this author’s denial, justification, and moral mitigation is astounding... I have never read a cult survivor book in which the member continues to drink the kool-aid while extolling the virtues of artificial colors between gulps.
This book reads as an advertisement to Koresh’s legitimacy by choosing to obfuscate reality in order to make the government the Bad Guy. It’s this simplistic and reductive frame of mind that creates cults in the first place.
I gave this book 125 pages worth of my time. I’m not picking up what this guy’s putting down and besides, he writes like a total chode. I couldn’t stomach the whitewashing. Truly sickening
July 26, 2007
David Thibodeau was a young LA musician when a chance meeting with the charismatic David Koresh led to his involvement with the Branch Davidian community outside Waco, Texas. This book is a well-written, articulate account of his life within that community and the events leading to the tragic 1993 inferno that claimed the lives of all but nine of the members.
Thibodeau honors his community by putting a human face on a group of people who have been badly demonized by the media. The author does a decent job of explaining the group’s appeal, but he is also unflinchingly honest in his descriptions the darker sides of the group. He appears, however, to remain a true believer in his path. While he does address the discomfort he felt that Koresh chose to engage in such behaviors as having sex with underage girls in the community, he falls short of asking the hard questions that observing such behavior in a spiritual leader should require someone to ask.
It’s easy to get distracted from those tougher questions, however, by the chilling depiction of the government siege against the Branch Davidians. While it was clear that Koresh himself had broken some laws, it is equally clear from this account that the government’s heavy-handed approach to the situation contributed to the horrific deaths of many people who were entirely innocent of any crime other than believing in something unorthodox. Thibodeau’s account of the facts surrounding the siege, the fire, and the resulting investigation is deeply, deeply disturbing, and is crucial reading for anyone who is concerned about the state of civil rights in the US.
Thibodeau honors his community by putting a human face on a group of people who have been badly demonized by the media. The author does a decent job of explaining the group’s appeal, but he is also unflinchingly honest in his descriptions the darker sides of the group. He appears, however, to remain a true believer in his path. While he does address the discomfort he felt that Koresh chose to engage in such behaviors as having sex with underage girls in the community, he falls short of asking the hard questions that observing such behavior in a spiritual leader should require someone to ask.
It’s easy to get distracted from those tougher questions, however, by the chilling depiction of the government siege against the Branch Davidians. While it was clear that Koresh himself had broken some laws, it is equally clear from this account that the government’s heavy-handed approach to the situation contributed to the horrific deaths of many people who were entirely innocent of any crime other than believing in something unorthodox. Thibodeau’s account of the facts surrounding the siege, the fire, and the resulting investigation is deeply, deeply disturbing, and is crucial reading for anyone who is concerned about the state of civil rights in the US.
November 15, 2018
Yuck. That was highly unpleasant.
Big ole CW: child abuse, sexual abuse of minors
What I wanted was to fill in the gaps in my knowledge about what happened at Waco (I'm interested in fringe religions and cults, but I was a baby when Waco went down, so I have no memory of the news coverage). I was looking for a non-fiction book on the topic, but my library had this survivors account and I thought it would be an interesting perspective.
And... it was interesting? But also absolutely infuriating, because I really disliked basically everything about the author. I was expecting a first-hand account of a tragedy and some insight into what teachings could possibly have lured the author in. What I got was a wannabe rock star whining about how the real world only wants drummers who can actually play to time and how, since David let him in the band, he had his undying loyalty. Even now, he supported the cult leader! He tried to make the book a scree about how a religious minority was oppressed by its own government and how horrifying it was to watch innocent Christians being murdered.
And, yes, you can't read this book without having some real discomfort about federal incompetence and the escalation of military violence against civilians, but OMG those cultists were NOT just a fringe religious minority. They were a cult that aided and abetted a serial child rapist! In the same sentence, the author brushes off David's "young wives" as a weird sexual aspect of the religion and then protests that there was absolutely no abuse happening in the compound. The woman he married was impregnated by David when she was 12. That IS child abuse. No adult in that group was "innocent". They were facilitating the repeated rape and impregnation of children and the author's constant dismissal of it as a weird side issue was infuriating.
The FBI acted horrifically and it is a tragedy that all those people died, but the group at Waco WERE a cult and they WERE abusing children and the author's refusal to see that the serial rape of children automatically condemned his prophet meant that I absolutely couldn't take anything else he said seriously. He knew David was raping those children and his refusal to acknowledge it as abuse made my stomach turn. I didn't even care about the guns or the drug charge. They weren't innocent and either he's still brainwashed or he legitimately doesn't see rape as abuse and I don't know which is more horrifying.
Big ole CW: child abuse, sexual abuse of minors
What I wanted was to fill in the gaps in my knowledge about what happened at Waco (I'm interested in fringe religions and cults, but I was a baby when Waco went down, so I have no memory of the news coverage). I was looking for a non-fiction book on the topic, but my library had this survivors account and I thought it would be an interesting perspective.
And... it was interesting? But also absolutely infuriating, because I really disliked basically everything about the author. I was expecting a first-hand account of a tragedy and some insight into what teachings could possibly have lured the author in. What I got was a wannabe rock star whining about how the real world only wants drummers who can actually play to time and how, since David let him in the band, he had his undying loyalty. Even now, he supported the cult leader! He tried to make the book a scree about how a religious minority was oppressed by its own government and how horrifying it was to watch innocent Christians being murdered.
And, yes, you can't read this book without having some real discomfort about federal incompetence and the escalation of military violence against civilians, but OMG those cultists were NOT just a fringe religious minority. They were a cult that aided and abetted a serial child rapist! In the same sentence, the author brushes off David's "young wives" as a weird sexual aspect of the religion and then protests that there was absolutely no abuse happening in the compound. The woman he married was impregnated by David when she was 12. That IS child abuse. No adult in that group was "innocent". They were facilitating the repeated rape and impregnation of children and the author's constant dismissal of it as a weird side issue was infuriating.
The FBI acted horrifically and it is a tragedy that all those people died, but the group at Waco WERE a cult and they WERE abusing children and the author's refusal to see that the serial rape of children automatically condemned his prophet meant that I absolutely couldn't take anything else he said seriously. He knew David was raping those children and his refusal to acknowledge it as abuse made my stomach turn. I didn't even care about the guns or the drug charge. They weren't innocent and either he's still brainwashed or he legitimately doesn't see rape as abuse and I don't know which is more horrifying.
April 30, 2020
I began listening to this on my way to a Ligonier dinner for ministry partners in Dallas. Kara and I had just taken a Waco tour the previous weekend (May 19, 2018). We are leaving Waco at the end of July, and since I did not read up on this Waco event before we moved here, I thought I'd look into it before we left. It's a fascinating possibility that Waco is now known more for Chip and Joanna Gaines than for the Waco Siege.
The Mount Carmel Center is not in Waco. It's about a 15-minute drive east of Baylor. The initial raid on Feb. 28, 1993, led to the death of several agents, plus some of the Branch Davidians. The siege lasted 51 days and ended on April 19 with the fiery deaths of more than 70 people, including 18 children age 10 or younger. (Interestingly, the plot of Homer's Iliad covers 51 days.) I took our three girls to visit on June 6, 2018.
Koresh = Cyrus. Cyrus is called "messiah" in Isaiah 45:1, and he allowed Israelites to return to the homeland from Babylon and rebuild their temple. David thought of himself as a second Melchizedek (2,000 years after Christ; first Melchizedek was 2,000 years before Christ) (48). David's teaching included lots of "study sessions" of misinterpreting Revelation (the seven seals had particular significance [48–49]).
The beginning of the book includes almost too much of the author's backstory, but it does provide rationale for his decision to join the Branch Davidians. Toward the end of Chapter 2, he writes, "Looking back, I ask myself a tough question that never quite occurred to me with any clarity during the early days of my connection with David, perhaps because I was so young and so unconscious: How could someone like me, who'd shown little previous interest in belief or Scripture, who had almost no religious background, later become so entranced by the Bible? [par. break] The key was David [Koresh] himself. He first touched me as a fellow musician and a warm friend, and I was taken by his deep sincerity and natural authority. I soon realized that he was an extraordinary personality, but his unique interpretation of the Old and New Testaments only gradually came to fascinate me, when the music and the man had already opened my mind and heart" (23). Reminds me of the first sentence of Milton's First Prolusion.
From Chapter 4: "As a teacher, David's style was all his own. He was not charismatic in the manner of a Jim Jones or some television preachers. Neither was he formal or dignified, like a robed priest or a rabbi in his prayer shawl. In fact, his whole style was a kind of debunking of such expectations. He spoke fluently but he was never preachy, which for me would've been an instant turnoff. [49] In his teaching mode, David Koresh was a Texas good ol' boy transformed by the spirit" (49–50).
The actions of the ATF were condemned by other professionals, and some people involved were suspended or fired. Colonel Charlie Beckwith "damned the assault on several counts" and "criticized the agency for its failure to consider the risk to human life on both sides; for the lack of a contingency fallback when the ATF discovered it had lost the element of surprise; for the time chosen for the attack—after 9:00 A.M., rather than at night or sunrise" (190). Beckwith said, "Every principle involved in mounting and conducting a successful raid/assault operation was violated" (190).
From Chapter 16: "When the FBI mounted the final assault, just before the building burst into flames, one of the combat engineering vehicles broke into the cafeteria. Despite the fact that more than thirty women and children were crowded into the narrow concrete chamber at the base of the residential tower, the tank crashed into the ceiling, shoving chunks of broken concrete onto the people bundled below. Six women and kids were immediately crushed by falling blocks; the rest were suffocated by the dust and gas vapors as the tank injected massive doses of CS directly into their windowless, unventilated shelter. . . . The charred corpse of [one six-year-old girl] was found with her spine bent into a backward bow until her head almost touched her feet. Her muscles were contracted by the combined effect of the fire's heat and the cyanide in her body, a byproduct of CS suffocation. Cyanide contraction is so violent it can [276] break bones, which is why prison death-chamber officials who use the gas strap their victims down" (275–76).
According to the coroner, "David [Koresh] died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head" (276), but the author writes that "the mass-suicide line was a crock. If any of the people who died shot themselves or their children, it was a desperate response to finding themselves trapped in the gas-filled, crumbling, burning building. As Dr. Crow, the Tarrant County coroner, concluded, these would surely have been acts of compassion, not religious mania" (291).
While David Koresh was involved in some very deviant behavior (including polygamy and statutory rape, and unsubstantiated claims of weapons stockpiling and child abuse), it's not clear that the religious actions of the community warranted a brutal military assault by the FBI and ATF. (The author credits the Texas Rangers with being much more fair-minded in their attempt to get at the truth [274].) I did not begin reading this book with this opinion, but my knowledge of the situation was admittedly sketchy.
In early 2018, a six-episode miniseries appeared (now available on Netflix). According to the author, until 2018, the only movie/documentary of the events in Waco that wasn't "crap" was The Rules of Engagement (Wikipedia). Other media include In the Line of Duty (movie with factual errors that valorizes the officers that died on Feb. 28), The Big Lie (Part 2 here), and ABC's "Truth and Lies". Short History Channel video here. Megyn Kelly talks with Thibodeau in 2018. See more media here.
Ruby Ridge occurred in 1992, and both it and the Waco siege motivated Timothy McVeigh in his bombing in 1995, which occurred on the two-year anniversary of the explosion at Mt. Carmel.
The Mount Carmel Center is not in Waco. It's about a 15-minute drive east of Baylor. The initial raid on Feb. 28, 1993, led to the death of several agents, plus some of the Branch Davidians. The siege lasted 51 days and ended on April 19 with the fiery deaths of more than 70 people, including 18 children age 10 or younger. (Interestingly, the plot of Homer's Iliad covers 51 days.) I took our three girls to visit on June 6, 2018.
Koresh = Cyrus. Cyrus is called "messiah" in Isaiah 45:1, and he allowed Israelites to return to the homeland from Babylon and rebuild their temple. David thought of himself as a second Melchizedek (2,000 years after Christ; first Melchizedek was 2,000 years before Christ) (48). David's teaching included lots of "study sessions" of misinterpreting Revelation (the seven seals had particular significance [48–49]).
The beginning of the book includes almost too much of the author's backstory, but it does provide rationale for his decision to join the Branch Davidians. Toward the end of Chapter 2, he writes, "Looking back, I ask myself a tough question that never quite occurred to me with any clarity during the early days of my connection with David, perhaps because I was so young and so unconscious: How could someone like me, who'd shown little previous interest in belief or Scripture, who had almost no religious background, later become so entranced by the Bible? [par. break] The key was David [Koresh] himself. He first touched me as a fellow musician and a warm friend, and I was taken by his deep sincerity and natural authority. I soon realized that he was an extraordinary personality, but his unique interpretation of the Old and New Testaments only gradually came to fascinate me, when the music and the man had already opened my mind and heart" (23). Reminds me of the first sentence of Milton's First Prolusion.
From Chapter 4: "As a teacher, David's style was all his own. He was not charismatic in the manner of a Jim Jones or some television preachers. Neither was he formal or dignified, like a robed priest or a rabbi in his prayer shawl. In fact, his whole style was a kind of debunking of such expectations. He spoke fluently but he was never preachy, which for me would've been an instant turnoff. [49] In his teaching mode, David Koresh was a Texas good ol' boy transformed by the spirit" (49–50).
The actions of the ATF were condemned by other professionals, and some people involved were suspended or fired. Colonel Charlie Beckwith "damned the assault on several counts" and "criticized the agency for its failure to consider the risk to human life on both sides; for the lack of a contingency fallback when the ATF discovered it had lost the element of surprise; for the time chosen for the attack—after 9:00 A.M., rather than at night or sunrise" (190). Beckwith said, "Every principle involved in mounting and conducting a successful raid/assault operation was violated" (190).
From Chapter 16: "When the FBI mounted the final assault, just before the building burst into flames, one of the combat engineering vehicles broke into the cafeteria. Despite the fact that more than thirty women and children were crowded into the narrow concrete chamber at the base of the residential tower, the tank crashed into the ceiling, shoving chunks of broken concrete onto the people bundled below. Six women and kids were immediately crushed by falling blocks; the rest were suffocated by the dust and gas vapors as the tank injected massive doses of CS directly into their windowless, unventilated shelter. . . . The charred corpse of [one six-year-old girl] was found with her spine bent into a backward bow until her head almost touched her feet. Her muscles were contracted by the combined effect of the fire's heat and the cyanide in her body, a byproduct of CS suffocation. Cyanide contraction is so violent it can [276] break bones, which is why prison death-chamber officials who use the gas strap their victims down" (275–76).
According to the coroner, "David [Koresh] died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head" (276), but the author writes that "the mass-suicide line was a crock. If any of the people who died shot themselves or their children, it was a desperate response to finding themselves trapped in the gas-filled, crumbling, burning building. As Dr. Crow, the Tarrant County coroner, concluded, these would surely have been acts of compassion, not religious mania" (291).
While David Koresh was involved in some very deviant behavior (including polygamy and statutory rape, and unsubstantiated claims of weapons stockpiling and child abuse), it's not clear that the religious actions of the community warranted a brutal military assault by the FBI and ATF. (The author credits the Texas Rangers with being much more fair-minded in their attempt to get at the truth [274].) I did not begin reading this book with this opinion, but my knowledge of the situation was admittedly sketchy.
In early 2018, a six-episode miniseries appeared (now available on Netflix). According to the author, until 2018, the only movie/documentary of the events in Waco that wasn't "crap" was The Rules of Engagement (Wikipedia). Other media include In the Line of Duty (movie with factual errors that valorizes the officers that died on Feb. 28), The Big Lie (Part 2 here), and ABC's "Truth and Lies". Short History Channel video here. Megyn Kelly talks with Thibodeau in 2018. See more media here.
Ruby Ridge occurred in 1992, and both it and the Waco siege motivated Timothy McVeigh in his bombing in 1995, which occurred on the two-year anniversary of the explosion at Mt. Carmel.
January 9, 2018
If the truth is to be known, I’m not the biggest lover of non-fiction books. I read so many academic books and journal articles that I find I much prefer the escapism offered up by fiction reads. I’m not too picky about the genre within fiction, obviously I have favourites but I do read around, but I almost always pick up fiction over non-fiction. There are exceptions, of course. When a book covers an interesting topic I’m willing to give the book a try.
Waco: A Survivor’s Story caught my interest as I knew almost nothing about the event. It’s American history before my time, therefore my knowledge is not up to the level I would like it to be. British history I can do much better with, but I have a lot of blanks in my American history. Thus, I was more than willing to dive into the book and find out more.
Waco: A Survivor’s Story was a very informative read, giving me much more information on the event than I originally had. I would not call myself an expert in the event, even after reading the book, but I do know more than I did before. Moreover, being told from the perspective of a survivor of the event gives readers a very different insight into what happen. It’s not just the actual event this story covers, it also includes information both before and after what happened, providing a much bigger picture of all that occurred and how things came together.
Without a doubt, this was an interesting read. Anyone interested in American history should give this book a read, and then go on to watch the mini-series that is being created, to get a better understanding of the event.
Waco: A Survivor’s Story caught my interest as I knew almost nothing about the event. It’s American history before my time, therefore my knowledge is not up to the level I would like it to be. British history I can do much better with, but I have a lot of blanks in my American history. Thus, I was more than willing to dive into the book and find out more.
Waco: A Survivor’s Story was a very informative read, giving me much more information on the event than I originally had. I would not call myself an expert in the event, even after reading the book, but I do know more than I did before. Moreover, being told from the perspective of a survivor of the event gives readers a very different insight into what happen. It’s not just the actual event this story covers, it also includes information both before and after what happened, providing a much bigger picture of all that occurred and how things came together.
Without a doubt, this was an interesting read. Anyone interested in American history should give this book a read, and then go on to watch the mini-series that is being created, to get a better understanding of the event.
May 4, 2018
It took me longer than usual to finish this book as I had a hard time reading and coping with the words on the pages. I was a teenager when this event happened and I remember being sad that all those people killed themselves, especially sad that there were a large number of children. This book gave me a whole new perspective and understanding that I didn’t have. I no longer hold that view and believe that the Davidians set the fire. Events were definitely more political than I ever realized. This should have never happened; certainly not on American soil. And certainly even more astonishing that it happened to a Christian group in Texas. This liberal snowflake agrees with Thibodeau on many points. I don’t understand how our government let this happen and yet I know the events now and it did. I plan on reading Noesner’s (?spelling) book as well. This book really moved me and got under my skin at the same time. I was especially grateful for the added pages included in this copy released 25 years later as I read a maturity that came with Thibodeau’s words. I imagine Koresch was very knowledgeable concerning the Bible and had some kind of spark that held the Davidians together. It was refreshing that he wrote of Koresch’s misgivings and acknowledged things he did wrong. I hope now that people are more understanding and want to hear from the few who survived at Mount Carmel. Two wrongs didn’t make a right, but especially now the lessons from Waco are so important. With so much division, we need to really hear and listen to the other side. And not that it matters, but I especially liked that Thibodeau lastly spoke/wrote to the Davidian surviving children to tell them how loved they were. And that he also listed all the Davidians who died. Thank you for giving me this insight Mr. Thibodeau.
March 18, 2018
I am so glad I read this book!!! I confess that before I read it, I’m not sure exactly what I really understood about the Waco tragedy. And, a true TRAGEDY it was. It’s hard to believe that something of this magnitude could actually have happened in America. And to think that the ATF and FBI essentially went unpunished! That is so unbelievable to me. I’m so glad this author, this brave survivor, had the incredible courage to write this beautiful and factual book. David Thibodeau-THANK YOU for this very special and heartbreakingly beautiful book!!!
February 6, 2018
This is one of the most interesting books I’ve ever read. I vividly remember when Waco was happening. The media and government vilified the Branch Davidians and at the time I thought it was the truth. Since the miniseries on Waco came out I’m suddenly realizing we never heard ANYTHING about the people who were part of this religious sect. This was definitely a sect, not a cult. The people living at Mount Carmel were free to leave if they wished. What I’ve learned is these are my people.
I’m Messianic. It’s a religious sect that follows Yeshua, but also celebrates the Biblical feasts and Torah. This is exactly what the Branch Davidians followed. Like the Branch Davidians were vilified by the media in the aftermath of February 28, my husband Nick was vilified in the media after he was murdered in the San Bernardino terrorist attack. One reporter actually said he was a terrorist because of his beliefs.
For anyone interested in religious cults and sects, and anyone who wants to see the other side of the siege at Waco I his is a must read.
I’m Messianic. It’s a religious sect that follows Yeshua, but also celebrates the Biblical feasts and Torah. This is exactly what the Branch Davidians followed. Like the Branch Davidians were vilified by the media in the aftermath of February 28, my husband Nick was vilified in the media after he was murdered in the San Bernardino terrorist attack. One reporter actually said he was a terrorist because of his beliefs.
For anyone interested in religious cults and sects, and anyone who wants to see the other side of the siege at Waco I his is a must read.
April 5, 2021
Actual rating 3.5 stars rounded up. I'm torn about this book. There are parts that are shocking and horrifying. It's devastating to think about the innocent people who died in Mount Carmel due to the way the ATF handled the situation. It also seems clear the FBI wasn't honest about some of their promises and later covered up some of what happened. I remember back in 1993 when this happened and the feeling of horror watching Mount Carmel go up in flames, knowing there were innocent children inside.
Something I can't wrap my head around is Thibodeau saying over and over that Koresh wasn't charismatic and that he was just drawn to Koresh because of his knowledge of scripture. That just doesn't ring true. Thibodeau states over and over that he was never religious. And he knew Koresh was sleeping with teenage girls. If Koresh wasn't charismatic, why would Thibodeau be drawn to this pedophile? I have to think that Thibodeau was either embarrassed by the way he was taken in by Koresh or he went through extensive conditioning and didn't ever quite recover from the trauma. That said, I appreciated having the opportunity to read what it felt like to be inside Mount Carmel during the siege. Before this book I'd only heard what was allowed to be shared by the government. I do believe there was some cover-up going on. Even the jury forewoman, when she'd heard there was going to be a Branch Davidian trial, thought it was going to be a trial to bring some of the FBI people to justice after 76 Branch Davidians were killed and she was shocked to learn it was the Branch Davidians who were on trial for murdering four ATF agents on February 28.
What is clear is that David Koresh was a pedophile and was sleeping with young girls. Not one young girl, but multiple girls. And it was stomach-turning to read that many of the girls thought it a privilege to "get to enter the House of David". When a girl entered the House of David, it meant she was sleeping with him. Supposedly, the ATF wanted to get Koresh because he was stockpiling weapons. Where they bungled everything, and the reason could be none other than ego, was they attacked even though they were told the Branch Davidians knew they were coming and they'd lost the element of surprise. But why did they have to come barreling in in the first place? This whole tragedy could have been prevented if they had simply arrested Koresh on one of his many trips into town. The Waco sheriff stated David came to town often and he jogged every day.
I appreciated getting some insight into what it was like inside Mount Carmel during the time of the siege, but I did feel like I'd have respected Thibodeau's views a bit more if he just admitted he was taken in by Koresh and that he fell hook, line, and sinker for his story of being the messiah. I can't quite figure out Thibodeau's motivation for some of his statements in the book. He clearly states he was traumatized and developed serious anger issues after what happened. So perhaps, after the FBI coverup and not having his story heard for a long time, he felt he had to hide some parts of the truth in order for people to listen and take him seriously.
Something I can't wrap my head around is Thibodeau saying over and over that Koresh wasn't charismatic and that he was just drawn to Koresh because of his knowledge of scripture. That just doesn't ring true. Thibodeau states over and over that he was never religious. And he knew Koresh was sleeping with teenage girls. If Koresh wasn't charismatic, why would Thibodeau be drawn to this pedophile? I have to think that Thibodeau was either embarrassed by the way he was taken in by Koresh or he went through extensive conditioning and didn't ever quite recover from the trauma. That said, I appreciated having the opportunity to read what it felt like to be inside Mount Carmel during the siege. Before this book I'd only heard what was allowed to be shared by the government. I do believe there was some cover-up going on. Even the jury forewoman, when she'd heard there was going to be a Branch Davidian trial, thought it was going to be a trial to bring some of the FBI people to justice after 76 Branch Davidians were killed and she was shocked to learn it was the Branch Davidians who were on trial for murdering four ATF agents on February 28.
What is clear is that David Koresh was a pedophile and was sleeping with young girls. Not one young girl, but multiple girls. And it was stomach-turning to read that many of the girls thought it a privilege to "get to enter the House of David". When a girl entered the House of David, it meant she was sleeping with him. Supposedly, the ATF wanted to get Koresh because he was stockpiling weapons. Where they bungled everything, and the reason could be none other than ego, was they attacked even though they were told the Branch Davidians knew they were coming and they'd lost the element of surprise. But why did they have to come barreling in in the first place? This whole tragedy could have been prevented if they had simply arrested Koresh on one of his many trips into town. The Waco sheriff stated David came to town often and he jogged every day.
I appreciated getting some insight into what it was like inside Mount Carmel during the time of the siege, but I did feel like I'd have respected Thibodeau's views a bit more if he just admitted he was taken in by Koresh and that he fell hook, line, and sinker for his story of being the messiah. I can't quite figure out Thibodeau's motivation for some of his statements in the book. He clearly states he was traumatized and developed serious anger issues after what happened. So perhaps, after the FBI coverup and not having his story heard for a long time, he felt he had to hide some parts of the truth in order for people to listen and take him seriously.
October 16, 2023
Only one person's perspective so potentially a little skewed. It certainly changes how you may have perceived the event: I personally thought that Koresh was a sick sociopath who had brainwashed his cult followers to commit mass suicide. In fact, the book describes how atrociously the ATF and FBI certainly acted, and how the press and the media were quick to assume the worst.
The most interesting part of the book is the first half - where the author describes why and how he joined the Davidians, and the effect that David Koresh had on his life at the time (which was, as you might expect, a little bit lost).
The reveal comes about half way through. Koresh is complicated. He has a way with words and believes he is the Lamb performing the Seven Seals (I didn't fully understand this part). He imposed certain community rules - the most controversial being that he did not want adults to have sex with one another, even if they were married. He explained that he was the only one who could have sex, and he'd sleep with other men's wives. Even worse was that he was allowed to have sex with children as young as 11 (maybe even younger). This undoubtedly makes him a kind of monster, and he convinced (brainwashed?) the adults into believing that, although he did not want to do this, God insisted on it.
It's a fairly routine cult-leader practice - abuse of power to satisfy his own, warped, desires - and once this has been called out, the book spends the rest of its time on how badly the situation was handled, citing numerous examples of how the government lied to protect itself against potential claims of its mismanagement of the affair.
The most interesting part of the book is the first half - where the author describes why and how he joined the Davidians, and the effect that David Koresh had on his life at the time (which was, as you might expect, a little bit lost).
The reveal comes about half way through. Koresh is complicated. He has a way with words and believes he is the Lamb performing the Seven Seals (I didn't fully understand this part). He imposed certain community rules - the most controversial being that he did not want adults to have sex with one another, even if they were married. He explained that he was the only one who could have sex, and he'd sleep with other men's wives. Even worse was that he was allowed to have sex with children as young as 11 (maybe even younger). This undoubtedly makes him a kind of monster, and he convinced (brainwashed?) the adults into believing that, although he did not want to do this, God insisted on it.
It's a fairly routine cult-leader practice - abuse of power to satisfy his own, warped, desires - and once this has been called out, the book spends the rest of its time on how badly the situation was handled, citing numerous examples of how the government lied to protect itself against potential claims of its mismanagement of the affair.
October 11, 2017
WACO by David Thibodeau, Leon Whiteson is a fascinating account of the Siege that gripped not only America but the world news for two months in 1993. The scenes played out in our living rooms were the stuff of Hollywood, just not possible that the government would use tanks and helicopters and tear gas to attack a religious compound in Mount Carmel Texas - or was it?
Perhaps we'll never know what truly happened, who fired the first shot and who was to blame. The obvious answer is that there was blame on both sides but was violence called for? Again a question that in WACO, this book, we only get a one sided account from David Thibodeau, one of only nine survivors.
From a chance encounter with David Koresh in a guitar shop to falling under the leader's spell, Thibodeau recounts his life story from beginning to end, we learn about his parents, his relationships and how he fell under Koresh's spell.
The book is well written and although the author tries his best at giving a balanced account of what truly happened, we have to take his word for it. There is no Government voice here and I did find that lacking for me to definitely say this is a balanced view. The author does very well and it's a gripping read for sure. There were things I had not known, the intricacies of daily living in Mount Carmel to how the siege ended, the use of weapons, tanks and tear gas. No quarter was given or truly expected.
This is definitely worth reading if you'd like to delve deeper into the branch davidians, their life, community and the charismatic David Koresh, more often lambasted by the media. The book gives a human slant to the terrible events in 1993.
Perhaps we'll never know what truly happened, who fired the first shot and who was to blame. The obvious answer is that there was blame on both sides but was violence called for? Again a question that in WACO, this book, we only get a one sided account from David Thibodeau, one of only nine survivors.
From a chance encounter with David Koresh in a guitar shop to falling under the leader's spell, Thibodeau recounts his life story from beginning to end, we learn about his parents, his relationships and how he fell under Koresh's spell.
The book is well written and although the author tries his best at giving a balanced account of what truly happened, we have to take his word for it. There is no Government voice here and I did find that lacking for me to definitely say this is a balanced view. The author does very well and it's a gripping read for sure. There were things I had not known, the intricacies of daily living in Mount Carmel to how the siege ended, the use of weapons, tanks and tear gas. No quarter was given or truly expected.
This is definitely worth reading if you'd like to delve deeper into the branch davidians, their life, community and the charismatic David Koresh, more often lambasted by the media. The book gives a human slant to the terrible events in 1993.
March 1, 2012
In my research for my novel-in-progess about cults, A PLACE CALLED
WACO by David Thibodeau gave me just what I was hoping for: an
opportunity to hear a Branch Davdian’s side of the Waco tragedy. I’ve
read plenty of condemnation of David Koresh, but I wanted to
understand the reason he attracted followers. Apparently, in
Thibodeau’s case, it was the charisma of the man himself. I’m not
sure if Koresh was guilty of beating children or stockpiling illegal
weapons, but I’m certain he was a pedophile. Like Warren Jeffs of the
Fundamentalist Mormon Church, he raped numerous children, often with
parental permission, because God told him to do it. I still don’t
understand why the ATF and the FBI killed so many innocent people
because of this, children included. Why didn’t the authorities just
pull Koresh over in his soup-up Camaro on his frequent trips into town
and arrest him? I’m still unclear on how many deaths in the final
attack were suicides and murders of Branch Davidians, but the law
enforcement agencies must certainly have known that gassing small
children and infants and toppling a concrete structure on them would
also lead to deaths. Male Koresh followers gave up sex and offered
him their wives. In the end most of his followers were also willing
to give up their lives and those of their children.
WACO by David Thibodeau gave me just what I was hoping for: an
opportunity to hear a Branch Davdian’s side of the Waco tragedy. I’ve
read plenty of condemnation of David Koresh, but I wanted to
understand the reason he attracted followers. Apparently, in
Thibodeau’s case, it was the charisma of the man himself. I’m not
sure if Koresh was guilty of beating children or stockpiling illegal
weapons, but I’m certain he was a pedophile. Like Warren Jeffs of the
Fundamentalist Mormon Church, he raped numerous children, often with
parental permission, because God told him to do it. I still don’t
understand why the ATF and the FBI killed so many innocent people
because of this, children included. Why didn’t the authorities just
pull Koresh over in his soup-up Camaro on his frequent trips into town
and arrest him? I’m still unclear on how many deaths in the final
attack were suicides and murders of Branch Davidians, but the law
enforcement agencies must certainly have known that gassing small
children and infants and toppling a concrete structure on them would
also lead to deaths. Male Koresh followers gave up sex and offered
him their wives. In the end most of his followers were also willing
to give up their lives and those of their children.
October 30, 2020
Waco is well written and easy to follow, but parts were realllyyyy frustrating. The synopsis says that Thibodeau is “brutally honest” about Koresh. I’d say biased would be a better word to use here. Thibodeau doesn’t say anything close to negative about Koresh throughout the first 90% of the book. At which point, he FINALLY admits that Koresh is guilty of statutory rape. However, He didn’t pick up on this throughout the section of the book (that he authored) titled “Rape”??? Multiple times throughout the book he says the female victims retelling their stories are “being dramatic.” He also praises Koresh for his ability to handle multiple women and relationships. Gross. I definitely wouldn’t say the American government handled this situation well and I agree they could have chosen a number of times to arrest Koresh alone. I’d still recommend this book to people interested in Waco, because it is a firsthand account with interesting information. Just know that you are reading a book written by a devout follower of Koresh and not the brutally honest account the book advertises. And that you’ll probably groan in frustration a time or two.
January 17, 2018
I was hoping for more of a retelling through the authors first hand experiences, but what I got was a dense read that bounced back and forth. It included way more testimonials and quotes than I thought necessary and I felt like he was trying to convince me as the reader that he did no wrong or maybe he was still convincing himself that what he did and the choices he made were right. I don’t know, but I was wanting this to be told in more of a chronological story than what it was. There were several times I found my mind wondering and not caring about what I read and honestly I wanted to DNF it, but I always feel so guilty. I think what if something happens that I want to know about or if a turning point occurs and I end up loving it. Sadly it didn’t happen. I did however appreciate the passion behind the book and learning more about the tragic event that took place. This is one though that I’m more excited for the miniseries than I was of the book.
June 29, 2023
I read with an open mind but I absolutely cannot with the author’s continued admiration of a man who raped girls as young as twelve, while others younger still were groomed to become one of his wives one day. For the author to refer in the updated epilogue on page 344 as Koresh’s “huge mistakes” being that he was guilty of statutory rape is an understatement. He then justifies it by saying it might have been legal (marriage at 14 allowed with parent permission), yet calls it morally reprehensible and bigamous. Bigamy is hardly a concern when one remembers David Koresh was a RAPIST.
July 28, 2019
I'm glad to have read this book to get a different perspective of the Branch Davidian tragedy in Waco. Thibodeau presents a reasoned memoir from an insider at the Mount Carmel compound.
June 4, 2020
Needed a better editor; some of the timeline was hard to follow. Very interesting to read a survivor's account, but wish it included more of the Branch Davidian beliefs.
December 22, 2021
Waco happened in 1993. This book was first published in 1999. The current book which is indicated as revised and edited was released in 2018 and was related to a film that was created and distributed at that time. I wonder what the revisions were to the original book.
I listen to the audible book and I lived through the time when Waco was in the news although I was not close geographically or emotionally to the events. The first 1/4 or 1/3 of this book is about the spiritual journey of the author to come into the orbit of David Karesh who is the central figure in the Waco events. I found that part of the book way beyond my level of interest. If you accept that these people had a religious belief and that they were simply trying to live out their beliefs, you may find this information interesting and useful. If you think they were just a wacky cult, I suppose you can join a lot of other people.
You probably won’t get through this book and end up believing that these people got just what they deserved. Quite a few of the dead people were under the age of 15. How the attack of the ATF on the home of this community in Waco Texas came about seems clearly way beyond acceptable.
I bring the additional prospective to my view as a person who has committed nonviolent civil disobedience because of some deeply held moral beliefs that I have. I am a war tax resistor and at least on one occasion in 1985 the US Justice Department focused on me and there is a federal court case (USA v. BASSETT) in the Brooklyn Federal district Court that I actually won. I have actually on occasion in my life thought about people who had beliefs that were strong enough that they would die for them. This is a very complex human emotion and there are plenty of causes that people sincerely believe in that I do not personally support. But I do basically believe in the rights of people to try to live according to their beliefs and values.
The Waco event seems to have a couple of pretty major incidents that lead it down the road that it did. The initial approach of the ATF to the community immediately resulted in gunfire between the parties. Who shot first? Regardless of the answer to that, you can see that it put both sides in a complex and hostile environment. Why didn’t more people come out of the house during the siege? Some did but many did not including quite a few children who obviously were not in a position to act of their own volition. Why did the ATF attack with tanks and helicopters and poisonous gas?
It seems clear that there were some people on both sides who were distinctly assholes! But there must’ve been some rational people on both sides of the fence. The author clearly indicates that there were people in the house who were determined to go down with David Karash. And the media definitely does not get a free pass on this one! There was a congressional hearing about Waco. But, guess what, it came down to a battle between the R’s and the D’s! 30 years later it is not clear to me what we ever managed to learn from Waco. And I am not sure what the author has contributed to that learning process.
I listen to the audible book and I lived through the time when Waco was in the news although I was not close geographically or emotionally to the events. The first 1/4 or 1/3 of this book is about the spiritual journey of the author to come into the orbit of David Karesh who is the central figure in the Waco events. I found that part of the book way beyond my level of interest. If you accept that these people had a religious belief and that they were simply trying to live out their beliefs, you may find this information interesting and useful. If you think they were just a wacky cult, I suppose you can join a lot of other people.
You probably won’t get through this book and end up believing that these people got just what they deserved. Quite a few of the dead people were under the age of 15. How the attack of the ATF on the home of this community in Waco Texas came about seems clearly way beyond acceptable.
I bring the additional prospective to my view as a person who has committed nonviolent civil disobedience because of some deeply held moral beliefs that I have. I am a war tax resistor and at least on one occasion in 1985 the US Justice Department focused on me and there is a federal court case (USA v. BASSETT) in the Brooklyn Federal district Court that I actually won. I have actually on occasion in my life thought about people who had beliefs that were strong enough that they would die for them. This is a very complex human emotion and there are plenty of causes that people sincerely believe in that I do not personally support. But I do basically believe in the rights of people to try to live according to their beliefs and values.
The Waco event seems to have a couple of pretty major incidents that lead it down the road that it did. The initial approach of the ATF to the community immediately resulted in gunfire between the parties. Who shot first? Regardless of the answer to that, you can see that it put both sides in a complex and hostile environment. Why didn’t more people come out of the house during the siege? Some did but many did not including quite a few children who obviously were not in a position to act of their own volition. Why did the ATF attack with tanks and helicopters and poisonous gas?
It seems clear that there were some people on both sides who were distinctly assholes! But there must’ve been some rational people on both sides of the fence. The author clearly indicates that there were people in the house who were determined to go down with David Karash. And the media definitely does not get a free pass on this one! There was a congressional hearing about Waco. But, guess what, it came down to a battle between the R’s and the D’s! 30 years later it is not clear to me what we ever managed to learn from Waco. And I am not sure what the author has contributed to that learning process.
April 16, 2022
I appreciate a different POV to the Waco story- especially considering the news coverage, but I'm not sure Thibodeau is always a reliable narrator. When it comes to David Koresh's pedophilia, Thibodeau seems to mostly give him a pass, even though several of the children that died in the tragedy were around the age that David liked to pick brides from (Thibodeau's own "wife" was 11 when Koresh wanted to marry her... even though he was already married to her older sister).
After Waco, Thibodeau tries reading the bible, but finds it boring. He feels envious of his fellow cult members in jail because they have structure to their days... so he makes his own argument for the Branch Davidians being a cult. He was drawn to Koresh because Koresh told him what was in the bible, told him how he should live, gave him structure. To be fair, Thibodeau was young and unmoored- which is exactly the type of member cults like to ensnare.
I just found Thibodeau annoying in this second reading- one minute he's an innocent, scared bunny, and the next he's considering grabbing President Clinton and shaking him... he's only ever "tough" in his head. He talks a lot about his sensuality, his music, his struggles, and seems to downplay anything negative about Koresh or the Branch Davidians, and it just feels very self serving, especially in light of the fact that he didn't get in any real legal trouble, got away with his life while his wife and step children died, and doesn't seem to think until the very end that yeah, in hindsight, they should have made the children leave.
The book does highlight the absolute clusterfuck handling of the standoff by the ATF and FBI. It's infuriating and sad and led to so many unnecessary deaths, when they could have arrested Koresh earlier. Or investigated better, waited longer. However, I kind of believe that Koresh eventually would have come to a bad end no matter what- I feel like he could have gone in a Jim Jones way if he'd been alive longer. Jim Jones was a nut job, but his cult also did a lot of good acts in the communities where they served. It was one of the reason his followers were so loyal and happy. But as his ego and paranoia grew (as well as his drug use), he lost the plot. I feel like Koresh, especially with his attraction to young girls, would have ended up down a similar path. People who loved God and children don't let those children die horrific deaths.
After Waco, Thibodeau tries reading the bible, but finds it boring. He feels envious of his fellow cult members in jail because they have structure to their days... so he makes his own argument for the Branch Davidians being a cult. He was drawn to Koresh because Koresh told him what was in the bible, told him how he should live, gave him structure. To be fair, Thibodeau was young and unmoored- which is exactly the type of member cults like to ensnare.
I just found Thibodeau annoying in this second reading- one minute he's an innocent, scared bunny, and the next he's considering grabbing President Clinton and shaking him... he's only ever "tough" in his head. He talks a lot about his sensuality, his music, his struggles, and seems to downplay anything negative about Koresh or the Branch Davidians, and it just feels very self serving, especially in light of the fact that he didn't get in any real legal trouble, got away with his life while his wife and step children died, and doesn't seem to think until the very end that yeah, in hindsight, they should have made the children leave.
The book does highlight the absolute clusterfuck handling of the standoff by the ATF and FBI. It's infuriating and sad and led to so many unnecessary deaths, when they could have arrested Koresh earlier. Or investigated better, waited longer. However, I kind of believe that Koresh eventually would have come to a bad end no matter what- I feel like he could have gone in a Jim Jones way if he'd been alive longer. Jim Jones was a nut job, but his cult also did a lot of good acts in the communities where they served. It was one of the reason his followers were so loyal and happy. But as his ego and paranoia grew (as well as his drug use), he lost the plot. I feel like Koresh, especially with his attraction to young girls, would have ended up down a similar path. People who loved God and children don't let those children die horrific deaths.
January 30, 2021
I read this book thinking it would help me understand the Trumpers. How does one get sucked into joining these ridiculous cults? It seems like some people are just susceptible to these groups that separate from normal society. They would rather live on a ranch in the middle of nowhere or live on a mental ranch watching religious news networks like they are living in a Christian Saudi Arabia.
Back in the 90's the government reacted to this sort of behavior by murdering everyone. Now we just let the crazies march their way into the Capital building with their Trump flags and Jesus Saves signs. It seems like there is probably a middle ground. Maybe its time to bring back the asylum's.
Anyway, unlike the Trumpers, the Branch Davidians seemed fairly innocent. They gave all their wives and children to David Koresh, who should have been arrested for statutory rape. Aside from that, they just wanted to live in a shithole and try to predict the end of the world by reading the bible. Definitely some certified lunatics but nothing that warranted the government going in and killing all their children.
Back in the 90's the government reacted to this sort of behavior by murdering everyone. Now we just let the crazies march their way into the Capital building with their Trump flags and Jesus Saves signs. It seems like there is probably a middle ground. Maybe its time to bring back the asylum's.
Anyway, unlike the Trumpers, the Branch Davidians seemed fairly innocent. They gave all their wives and children to David Koresh, who should have been arrested for statutory rape. Aside from that, they just wanted to live in a shithole and try to predict the end of the world by reading the bible. Definitely some certified lunatics but nothing that warranted the government going in and killing all their children.
February 16, 2022
I listened to this book at work. It was slow at the start, but over all it was a good book about the events that took place during the Waco siege from someone who was there. Based on the writing, the author's thoughts, and information given, it's very clear that Thibodeau at least was not a brainwashed man.
It also lays bare the horrible mistakes made by the US Government.
I will say, this book does not go into details about the cult itself, or why they were set upon, this is a story from the viewpoint of a singular man in the compound. So if you're trying to learn, this wouldn't be a good first book, but if you already have background knowledge on the situation, this is a good book to provide extra details.
I think what I like the most about this book is that Thibodeau goes into all the details of healing and readjusting after the siege. It was a viewpoint I hadn't seen before, and definitely welcome when talk of cults rarely look at the individual.
It also lays bare the horrible mistakes made by the US Government.
I will say, this book does not go into details about the cult itself, or why they were set upon, this is a story from the viewpoint of a singular man in the compound. So if you're trying to learn, this wouldn't be a good first book, but if you already have background knowledge on the situation, this is a good book to provide extra details.
I think what I like the most about this book is that Thibodeau goes into all the details of healing and readjusting after the siege. It was a viewpoint I hadn't seen before, and definitely welcome when talk of cults rarely look at the individual.
June 12, 2023
Well written, though at times there are extraneous details. Whether it was the book’s title, or possibly a review I read, I began reading with the understanding this is Thibodeau’s story and not an investigation into the criminal acts with which Korean was charged. The narrative is certainly biased, but that was expected and it is reasonable given the ATF, FBI, and national media statements and stories from 1993 and since. I appreciate the author sharing his story, a unique and important perspective.
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