Retrospective on Waco

The year 2023 marks the thirtieth anniversary of the deaths of eighty-two Branch Davidians, including their twenty-two children, and four agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) in a conflict at the Branch Davidians’ Mount Carmel Center property outside Waco, Texas. After the shootout between ATF agents and Branch Davidians on February 28, 1993, FBI agents took over and presided over a siege that lasted fifty-one days. The siege ended on April 19, 1993 with the FBI’s tank and CS gas assault on the Branch Davidians’ residence for six hours that concluded in a massive fire. In this “Retrospective on Waco,” Texas journalist Dick J. Reavis, author of The Ashes of Waco (1995), shares his observations on the conflict at Mount Carmel Center, and on the recent book, Waco: David Koresh, the Branch Davidians, and a Legacy of Rage (2023), by Jeff Guinn. Despite all the books written since 1993, no definitive account of the complex events at Mount Carmel Center has been published.