Malcolm Gladwell’s retelling of the Branch Davidians and the Waco Siege lets a survivor, Clive Doyle, do most of talking.
They did not worship Koresh, the way you would a deity. He was just the latest of many teachers, in a religious tradition that dated back half a century. “I’m just a messenger of the truth,” Koresh would say. “I’m like a Dixie cup that God will crumple up and throw away when he’s done with it.” Or, as his deputy, Steve Schneider, put it, “All of these places talk about a man in the last days that’s a sinner. He can do one thing, open up the words of the book, open up the Seven Seals. Can’t do any miracles, doesn’t raise the dead, heal the sick, isn’t a psychic but . . . if people have questions about life and death, eternal life, no matter what the question is, he will show it in context from the book.”
The argument that follows–that the FBI gave itself no meaningful way to communicate with true believers–is fascinating: “For those who don’t take the Bible seriously, talking about Scripture when there is a battle going on seems like an evasion. For those who do, however, it makes perfect sense.”