Analysis of the Beslan School Siege in Russia
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To briefly summarize Russia’s preparedness for and response to the terrorists’ seizure of the Beslan school—both the Russian government and the Beslan school staff displayed poor risk management skills. Chivers (2007) makes note of “The incompetence of their government’s counterterrorism response”. Furthermore, the school staff had not taken any necessary precautions to manage a hostage situation. The probability of this risk would be reduced by the presence of armed security at the September 1, 2004 ceremony. Furthermore, many lives may have been saved had the staff been trained in the capability to neutralize a threat, or exercise systemic resilience. The lack of adversarial deterrents caused the direct consequence of hostages engaging in risk acceptance. “Speechless with fear, she stepped out, joining a mass of people as obedient as if they had been tamed” (Chivers, 2007). The hostages were initially left with the risk perception that their lives may be spared if they cooperate with their captors.
Upon losing civilians to the Chechen terrorists, Russian government officials assumed the responsibility of verbally responding to the terrorists demands. Larisa was capable of learning about one of the terrorists, Ali—“He was a negotiator and spent much of the time talking on a mobile phone with Russians outside” (Chivers, 2007). Additionally, the Chechens rightly assumed that Russian federal emergency responders would be tasked with physically eradicating this unacceptable risk. “The terrorists worried that Russian Special Forces would attack” (Chivers, 2007). Due to the absence of well-trained security and staff, there was a lack of civil defense capability present at the Beslan school.
The deficiency of risk communication and mitigation strategies made the Beslan school an extraordinarily vulnerable place for a terror attack. Reasons include not only the civil contribution of poor training, but also the fact that the school—particularly during the ceremony—was crowded with unimposing people like children and grandparents. Moreover, the structure of the school and its surroundings made it easy for the adversaries to seize the property and centralize the hostages. “The terrorists hearded the panicked crowd into a rear courtyard, a place with no outlet. An attached building housed the boiler room...The room had no rear exit” (Chivers, 2007).
As previously mentioned, these events posed the direct consequence of the endangerment of the civilians’ lives. But this was not the only consequence. The terrorists also asserted the psychological consequence of eliciting fear in order to gain compliance. “If any of you resist us...we will kill the children and leave the one who resists alive” (Chivers, 2007). Furthermore, the detainers instilled the psychological consequence of uncertainty as to whether the hostages would be able to save their own lives merely by complying to their captors’ orders. ““Everybody be silent!” he said. “You have been taken hostage. Calm down. Stop the panic and nobody will be hurt…”...The terrorist let him speak...The terrorist shot him in the head” (Chivers, 2007).
Although there was no systemic resilience to being held hostage, some individuals were able to adapt to the evolving situation. The act of killing a man even though he was following the terrorist’s orders was a risk indicator that allowed Larisa to qualitatively assess that she could not guarantee her survival, regardless of her actions. Therefore, she chose to be noncompliant and demand first aid supplies for the wounded. “Give me some of those bandages” (Chivers, 2007). Also, Aslan “...hit in a push-up position and propelled himself out” of a window (Chivers, 2007).
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Reference
Chivers, CJ. (2007) “The School.” Esquire. Mar 14. URL:
http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a1173/esq0606beslan-140/.