Russian Forces Enter Theatre, End Hostage Situation

[Combat Ingrid]

Well, since there died roughly two Russians for each terrorist, one might claim the terrorists made a successful operation

[Saint Marcus]

1 to 3 if things don't improve soon...

[Giancarlo]

Still a lot better than 700 dead...

[Ari Rahikkala]

Ah, hell. Does anyone of you remember why they actually did this? Do you? Was it their intent to just get a lot of Russian civilians killed?

Last time I checked, it wasn't.

[Giancarlo]

I always thought it was. The Chechynans only want to see russians die...

[Combat Ingrid]

Of course not, hence the

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Saint Marcus
1 to 3 if things don't improve soon...

More hostages usually die in the rescue opperation than from the hostage taker's hands. That's why they are usually done as a last resort. On the whole though, the opperation in the theater went pretty well by most standards.

[Saint Marcus]

small comfort.

[The Mad Monk]

Chloropicrin: Chloropicrin is also known as vomiting gas. Though not really a gas but a liquid, the inhalation of it's mist or fumes causes projectile vomiting in humans. It's production is easy but requires some special equipment. Needed are a chemical hood or glove box, protective clothing and a gas mask or clean air respirator. The gas mask must be impermeable to the
fumes of ...

No need to include the rest, as I believe it's quite illegal... Besides, it is just the opening two sentences and the following paragraph that's of most interest to this discussion:

Chloropicrin (known in chemwarfare circles as PS) can be mixed with either CN or CS teargas. The makes a very nasty chemweapon. The effects of both substances are magnified. The effects of this mix does not wear off in an hour or so but can continue for a week or more. There are reports of effected people committing suicide because of the pain and discomfort.
PS can cause the throat and stomach muscles to rip because of the force of the vomiting.

So there you have a non-nerve agent that can cause scores of people to choke on their own vomit and put the rest in the hospital for days, if not weeks.

[Pekka]

Tear gas? Was it a joke?

If you had the same situation, would you use tear gas, even boosted ones? Hahaha, good one, because that must be a joke. That's a huge risk using tear gas in this kind of situation. Of course they used something more working. It had to be instant, powerful and nasty gas.
Maybe nerv gas, but nothing official is about to come out, so I won't speculate on that one.

My guess is it's some kind of a nerv gas, but we won't get to know what it is, because it will be a secret. They might give us some bs stuff about it.
Sleep gas? What's that? What 'sleep gas' works in second/s and knocks everyone out, killing many? What gas knocks out people right away? I don't know.. but it has to be some kind of nerv gas.

Seems like more people are reported dead.. . I still think it was a victory, maybe not a major one, but victory for sure. Kill ratio could be a lot worse. We will see which way this is going soon.

[GePap]

Currently the NY times has an 'expert' saying that it could be BZ gas, which is not a nerve agent, but is also in a sort of 'grey zone' as far as legality goes. it might be a banned Chemical substance, it might not. it most certainly is not tear gas (raise your hands if you know what tear gas is like from personal experience! ).

This is probably the reason the Russians siply won't say what it was.... because they might have broken the law. as for whether it was justified: I am unsure. We can speculate all we want , but we will never know what the possible outcome mihgt have been otherwise. I do know that as the dead toll grows (and it will), Putin might face slightly more critism.

[Sprayber]

Originally posted by GePap (raise your hands if you know what tear gas is like from personal experience! ).

[Capt Dizle]

[Saint Marcus]

raise your hands if you know what tear gas is like from personal experience

me (don't ask )

[The Mad Monk]

I foresee a lot of current and former military personel posting cute smilies over the next day...

[Saint Marcus]

or soccer hooligans

[Lincoln]

[Pekka]

It's GREAT! Two masks didn't work and the other one was mine. It's lovely. Refreshing. At least the military ones .

[Combat Ingrid]

Anyone tried the vomit gas?

[GePap]

Well, damn it, i got to experience the stuff on my brthday, as a kid! Why did they have to ask for a general strike on my birthday!

[uh Clem]

Other than that, how was the play?

[axi]

Well, it seems that the death toll is on the rise. What they used was very deadly and they knew it would be so. They deliberately killed more than 100 of their own people, just to show their decisiveness and their zero-tolerance towards the Chechen rebels. Even Ariel Sharon whould not have commited such a hideous act.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by GePap
Currently the NY times has an 'expert' saying that it could be BZ gas, which is not a nerve agent, but is also in a sort of 'grey zone' as far as legality goes. it might be a banned Chemical substance, it might not. it most certainly is not tear gas (raise your hands if you know what tear gas is like from personal experience! ).

This is probably the reason the Russians siply won't say what it was.... because they might have broken the law. as for whether it was justified: I am unsure. We can speculate all we want , but we will never know what the possible outcome mihgt have been otherwise. I do know that as the dead toll grows (and it will), Putin might face slightly more critism.

Ah! I've heard of BZ gas. Originally touted as a knock out gas it was abandoned because at concentrations high enough to effectively knock people out it tended to have a high fatality rate (among experimental animals). No one uses it. Almost no one uses it.

[Capt Dizle]

Originally posted by axi
Well, it seems that the death toll is on the rise. What they used was very deadly and they knew it would be so. They deliberately killed more than 100 of their own people, just to show their decisiveness and their zero-tolerance towards the Chechen rebels. Even Ariel Sharon whould not have commited such a hideous act.

Oh, you are an idiot. How else were they going to deal with the threat of explosives?

[Saint Marcus]

end justifies all means?

[JCG]

Sad as it sounds, they had to use gas, no way around it...Whether it was the right kind of gas or not is open to debate...

[Gangerolf]

next time the terrorists will bring gasmasks

[Sonic]

As I noted in previous post, they still weren't killing people on regular basis. That means probably everything would have been peacefully settled with much less victims. In all other cases before Chechen terrorists also said they are going to die, but later, when food lack came into case, etc. They all agreed to surrend on much less demands. Probably these terrorists would have also surrendered only for letting them free and some amount iof money later, when they would have seen that it is not possible to get troops removed from Chechnya.

[axi]

Oh, you are an idiot. How else were they going to deal with the threat of explosives?

1. Use another kind of gas, which would not be deadly to so many people.

2. Rush in more paramedics than soldiers to quickly administer oxygen and antidotes.

3. Negotiate some more.

4. Actually withdraw from Chechnya.

I don't really care about what they could have done. Putin and his cronies are responsible for this ****, as well as for the tens of thousands dead in the Chechen war itself.

[Dr Strangelove]

The terrrorists had explosives strapped to their bodies, so we can assume that they were willing to take as many hostages with them as they could. If they distributed themselves among the hostages then triggered the bombs they would have killed more than 3 hostages for each terrorist.

If some macedonians took control of a theater in Athens and demanded part of northern Greece would the Greek government cave in and let them have it?