Another Unsolved Mystery by Matt Giwer (c) 1994 It is commonly repeated that David Koresh and his followers were hell bent upon some form of suicide. We heard and read constant comparisons to the mass suicide lead by Jim Jones. And as the clincher we are told they burned themselves alive. I have a problem with this. Why would people who were desperately seeking a cease fire be considered suicidal? And on top of that, why were we mislead? For fifty one days the government was releasing statements suggesting David Koresh and the Branch Davidians were suicidal, that they were looking for some massive confrontation with the government, that they would kill themselves rather than surrender. Now let us imagine what our perception would have been if we had known what the government knew. The government knew from the first day these people purported seeking a confrontation and death were in fact the people who sought a cease fire. We did not learn this until after the FBI Bar-B-Que and then not until we heard the full tape and not the FBI doctored tape. The government, having this tape and knowing full well they were not suicidal, proceeded to mislead us for seven weeks. Why? Was it truly necessary? Why would it be necessary to mislead us? I hate to get paranoid here but it appears we have a remarkably prescient government in expecting suicide or there was in fact no suicide. How is it that people demonstrably not suicidal on 28 February can become suicidal in fifty one days AND the government knowing it all along? Something just does not ring true here. Were I the paranoid type I would call the government stories a matter of scene setting. It is the Chinese story telling style starting off with, "I am going to tell you of a mass suicide," and then going on to tell the story. It is difficult to imagine how the government could have set up such an event. Certainly they were shooting enough burning gas grenades into the second floor and in fact the second floor is where the first network videos show the first flames. This does not equate to starting fires at all the exits in order to prevent escape. On the other hand we do not have evidence of fires at all the exits yet very few escaped. This does fit with mass suicide but it requires a grave deliberation of purpose for a person to remain calm while being consumed by fire. We have to accept that obviously non-suicidal people turned suicidal in 51 days and that the government's psychic powers were sufficient to predict it. I can conceive of no reasonable explanation for either this drastic change or for the government's ability to predict it. Shall we say, we are left with a mystery.