Greetings, and welcome to the World Affairs Board!
The World Affairs Board is the premier forum for the discussion of the pressing geopolitical issues of our time. Topics include military and defense developments, international terrorism, insurgency & COIN doctrine, international security and policing, weapons proliferation, and military technological development.
Our membership includes many from military, defense, academic, and government backgrounds with expert knowledge on a wide range of topics. Registration is fast, simple and absolutely free so why not register a World Affairs Board account and join our community today?
We're just as shocked to note your government doesn't trust the citizenry enough to permit it as you are to note that we have that Right enshrined in the Constitution. As a matter of fact, it's way up there: the Second Amendment, following only The Bill of Rights. That is how important the Original Dads thought it was, and I agree. Because an armed man is a citizen, and an unarmed man is a subject.
hey you didnt get the context I was speaking, here also you have peoples roaming with guns, what i mean was how the hell would he take a gun and get in university premise?
That is something not allowed here, virginia tech is a big univ, should be checking in gates i guess?
though normally even with gatekeepers students entering regularly and such a incident is so odd that the stakes of not being noticed in first gets very high i guess.
Latest on the killings 33 dead. And some bad news for some Indians a Prof from coimbature and IIT-K graduate and awell respected senior staff of the university is also among the fatalities. An Indian student is also missing since the shooting has occured.
May they rest in Peace and my condolense to all the 33 people's family and friends.
Actually there were two shootouts one of them has killed himself, but in other he was arrested and charged with manslaughter i heard in the news.:frown
hey you didnt get the context I was speaking, here also you have peoples roaming with guns, what i mean was how the hell would he take a gun and get in university premise?
That is something not allowed here, virginia tech is a big univ, should be checking in gates i guess?
though normally even with gatekeepers students entering regularly and such a incident is so odd that the stakes of not being noticed in first gets very high i guess.
I think you're unfamiliar with how universities operate here. You're talking about a campus of several square miles with many entrances and parking lots. There are no gates you go through to get to campus, just many roads and sidewalks. The dorms and buildings may have locks, but certainly no security screening or checkpoints. Here at WSU, students may transport firearms on and off campus, but they must be kept at the police station (with 24-hour access to retrieve) if you're a campus resident. Even then, if a student really wanted to, they could retrieve their firearm and go on a rampage. Completely pointless rules.
The black flag is raised: Ban them all... Let the Admin sort them out.
I know I'm going to have the last word... I have powers of deletion and lock.
BLACKSBURG, Va. - A gunman massacred 32 people at Virginia Tech in the deadliest shooting rampage in modern U.S. history Monday, cutting down his victims in two attacks two hours apart before the university could grasp what was happening and warn students. The bloodbath ended with the gunman committing suicide, bringing the death toll to 33 and stamping the campus in the picturesque Blue Ridge Mountains with unspeakable tragedy, perhaps forever.
ADVERTISEMENT
Investigators gave no motive for the attack. The gunman's name was not immediately released, and it was not known whether he was a student.
"Today the university was struck with a tragedy that we consider of monumental proportions," Virginia Tech President Charles Steger said. "The university is shocked and indeed horrified."
But he was also faced with difficult questions about the university's handling of the emergency and whether it did enough to warn students and protect them after the first burst of gunfire. Some students bitterly complained they got no warning from the university until an e-mail that arrived more than two hours after the first shots rang out.
Wielding two handguns and carrying multiple clips of ammunition, the killer opened fire about 7:15 a.m. on the fourth floor of West Ambler Johnston, a high-rise coed dormitory, then stormed Norris Hall, a classroom building a half-mile away on the other side of the 2,600-acre campus. Some of the doors at Norris Hall were found chained from the inside, apparently by the gunman.
Two people died in a dorm room, and 31 others were killed in Norris Hall, including the gunman, who put a bullet in his head. At least 15 people were hurt, some seriously. Students jumped from windows in panic.
Alec Calhoun, a 20-year-old junior, said he was in a 9:05 a.m. mechanics class when he and classmates heard a thunderous sound from the classroom next door — "what sounded like an enormous hammer."
Screams followed an instant later, and the banging continued. When students realized the sounds were gunshots, Calhoun said, he started flipping over desks for hiding places. Others dashed to the windows of the second-floor classroom, kicking out the screens and jumping from the ledge of Room 204, he said.
"I must've been the eighth or ninth person who jumped, and I think I was the last," said Calhoun, of Waynesboro, Va. He landed in a bush and ran.
Calhoun said that the two students behind him were shot, but that he believed they survived. Just before he climbed out the window, Calhoun said, he turned to look at the professor, who had stayed behind, perhaps to block the door.
The instructor was killed, he said.
At an evening news conference, Police Chief Wendell Flinchum refused to dismiss the possibility that a co-conspirator or second shooter was involved. He said police had interviewed a male who was a "person of interest" in the dorm shooting who knew one of the victims, but he declined to give details.
"I'm not saying there's a gunman on the loose," Flinchum said. Ballistics tests will help explain what happened, he said.
Sheree Mixell, a spokeswoman for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, said the evidence was being moved to the agency's national lab in Annandale. At least one firearm was turned over, she said.
Mixell would not comment on what types of weapons were used or whether the gunman was a student.
Young people and faculty members carried out some of the wounded themselves, without waiting for ambulances to arrive. Many found themselves trapped behind chained and padlocked doors. SWAT team members with helmets, flak jackets and assault rifles swarmed over the campus. A student used his cell-phone camera to record the sound of bullets echoing through a stone building.
Trey Perkins, who was sitting in a German class in Norris Hall, told The Washington Post that the gunman barged into the room at about 9:50 a.m. and opened fire for about a minute and a half, squeezing off about 30 shots.
The gunman first shot the professor in the head and then fired on the students, Perkins said. The gunman was about 19 years old and had a "very serious but very calm look on his face," he said.
"Everyone hit the floor at that moment," said Perkins, 20, of Yorktown, Va., a sophomore studying mechanical engineering. "And the shots seemed like it lasted forever."
Erin Sheehan, who was also in the German class, told the student newspaper, the Collegiate Times, that she was one of only four of about two dozen people in the class to walk out of the room. The rest were dead or wounded, she said.
She said the gunman "was just a normal-looking kid, Asian, but he had on a Boy Scout-type outfit. He wore a tan button-up vest, and this black vest, maybe it was for ammo or something."
Students said that there were no public-address announcements after the first shots. Many said they learned of the first shooting in an e-mail that arrived shortly before the gunman struck again.
"I think the university has blood on their hands because of their lack of action after the first incident," said Billy Bason, 18, who lives on the seventh floor of the dorm.
Steger defended the university's conduct, saying authorities believed that the shooting at the dorm was a domestic dispute and mistakenly thought the gunman had fled the campus.
"We had no reason to suspect any other incident was going to occur," he said.
Steger emphasized that the university closed off the dorm after the first attack and decided to rely on e-mail and other electronic means to spread the word, but said that with 11,000 people driving onto campus first thing in the morning, it was difficult to get the word out.
He said that before the e-mail went out, the university began telephoning resident advisers in the dorms and sent people to knock on doors. Students were warned to stay inside and away from the windows.
"We can only make decisions based on the information you had at the time. You don't have hours to reflect on it," Steger said.
Some students and Laura Wedin, a student programs manager at Virginia Tech, said their first notification came in an e-mail at 9:26 a.m., more than two hours after the first shooting.
The e-mail had few details. It read: "A shooting incident occurred at West Amber Johnston earlier this morning. Police are on the scene and are investigating." The message warned students to be cautious and contact police about anything suspicious.
Edmund Henneke, associate dean of engineering, said that he was in the classroom building and that he and colleagues had just read the e-mail advisory and were discussing it when he heard gunfire. He said that moments later SWAT team members rushed them downstairs, but that the doors were chained and padlocked from the inside. They left the building through an unlocked construction area.
Until Monday, the deadliest shooting in modern U.S. history was in Killeen, Texas, in 1991, when George Hennard plowed his pickup truck into a Luby's Cafeteria and shot 23 people to death, then himself.
The massacre Monday took place almost eight years to the day after the Columbine High bloodbath near Littleton, Colo. On April 20, 1999, two teenagers killed 12 fellow students and a teacher before taking their own lives.
Previously, the deadliest campus shooting in U.S. history was a rampage in 1966 at the University of Texas at Austin, where Charles Whitman climbed the clock tower and opened fire. He killed 16 people before police shot him to death.
Founded in 1872, Virginia Tech is about 160 miles west of Richmond. With more than 25,000 full-time students, it has the state's largest full-time student population. It is best known for its engineering school and its powerhouse Hokies football team.
The campus is centered on the Drill Field, a grassy field where military cadets practice. The dorm and the classroom building are on opposites sides of the Drill Field.
President Bush offered his prayers to the victims and the people of Virginia, saying the tragedy would be felt in every community in the country.
After the shootings, all campus entrances were closed, and classes were canceled through Tuesday. The university set up a spot for families to reunite with their children. It also made counselors available and planned an assembly Tuesday.
Police said there had been bomb threats on campus over the past two weeks but said they had not determined a link to the shootings.
It was second time in less than a year that the campus was closed because of a shooting.
In August, the opening day of classes was canceled when an escaped jail inmate allegedly killed a hospital guard off campus and fled to the Tech area. A sheriff's deputy was killed just off campus. The accused gunman, William Morva, faces capital murder charges.
Among Monday's dead was Ryan Clark, a student from Martinez, Ga., with several majors who carried a 4.0 grade-point average, said Vernon Collins, coroner in Columbia County, Ga.
At a hastily arranged service Monday night at Blacksburg Presbyterian Church, the Rev. Susan Verbrugge gazed out at about 150 bowed heads.
"Death has come trundling into our life, a sudden and savage entity laying waste to our hearts and making desolate our minds," Verbrugge said during a prayer. "We need now the consolation only you can give."
After the service, Clark's friend Gregory Walton, a 25-year-old who graduated last year, said he feared his nightmare had just begun.
"I knew when the number was so large that I would know at least one person on that list," said Walton, a banquet manager. "I don't want to look at that list. I don't want to.
"It's just, it's going to be horrible, and it's going to get worse before it gets better."
Details seem sketchy at this point of time. Nobody knows the motive so far.
They should allow students with concealed carry to carry weapons on campus. If I would've been in that situation, I would've waxed his ass or died trying.
It kinda makes me wonder, since I'm going up to Texas Tech next semester and will live in the dorm...
"The right man in the wrong place can make all the difference in the world. So wake up, Mr. Freeman. Wake up and smell the ashes." G-Man
Heres the only solution. Ban guns in the USA. You don't need a gun too protect yourself from an intruder in your home or someone who is threatening you. Take up boxing or something, or use a knife or baseball bat. These massacre's are only going too continue too happen until gun laws are tightened. Theres no way anyway should be allowed to possess a gun other than military personnel. And no way should all students be allowed too have them too protect themselves thats just moronic. Anyone who is supporting the current gun laws of the USA, is the reason why things like this are happening are only going too continue too happen in the future.
I see the parasites (journalists) are already foaming at the mouth.
Can these idiots give the authorities a day or two before they start to second guess the decisions made by the police?
They keep talking about the "enraged" students asking why the classes were allowed to stay open, why the cops didn't do this or do that, yadda yadda yadda...
The cops might be roasted alive at the end of this and maybe they'll deserve it but can it wait a day or two, until after all the facts are out?
Damn idiots...
The dumbest question of the night was by that chick on MSNBC, while interviewing a student that was in one of the classes that got shot up.
"How do you feel about this?"
Duh!!!!
God, I hate reporters.....or at least what passes for one these days.
A number of years ago, I took a staff development class on emergency procedures at a university. While the class itself was something of a disappointment, it was more of what to do if an athelete does some dispicable, it did have one good point to it: if you don't put out a statement, the news people are going to grab a passerby and that will be presented as the opinion of what happened.
Personally, I think someone really dropped the ball on this, but that's just my opinion in the situation as it stands now.
Around here, I occassionally wonder about what the potential for such is. Why? Because this area tends to be a regional center where cops from all around come for conferences, degrees. At any particular time, one can see police cars from various juristictions on campus, cops in the classrooms with guns .......................................... maybe what we ought to do is promote more advanced education for cops so we will have more of an armed presence on campus.
Finally, rather disagree with Commando's statement of banning all guns which would stop this. I hardly think the presence of a gun in the killer's hand influenced his mind to make him want to start killing. I would think the thought was there first and the guns were just the means. But what if he didn't have the guns? Well, among other things, one can always make a hell of a mess in a crowded building, especially if the doors are locked, with Malotov cocktails.
Besides, have we not already seen this? Of remove the instrument and the offender finds another instrument to use? Remove the ability to carry box cutters on to airliners and the offender found a way to use liquid components for destruction?
Eliminating the instruments isn't going to solve the problem.
------------------------------------------------
([while conversing with a candy-striper, Violet realizes the coat she's stolen is a doctor's] "I'm a doctor. So why the hell am I talking to you? Piss off."--Violet, (w,stte), "9 to 5")
I am not watching the TV on this report. It is too sad an event and it sort of depress me immensely.
However, I read on the posts here that the bloke was an Asian. And one guy who was trussed up sort of, and being taken away had Mongoloid features. Though they did not mention he was the criminal.
I have read about the right to have guns in the US and the debate on this forum quite a few times and on this forum there was a distinct anger about gun laws. Even the Constitution was quoted. It is not for me to comment on what people of a Country is comfortable with.
Asian laws allow weapons to individuals, but the laws are so strict and complicated that owning a weapon and obtaining the licence puts off anyone who wants to have a weapon.
Guns are not carried in Asia or at least in India as a matter of one's accoutrement.
Therefore, the penchant to have weapons or the psychology to have weapons seems to be absent in Asia or at least India, except for the 12 bore, unless you are a criminal and then of course you don't require anyone's permission. The Gun culture is absent.
Therefore, I wonder what changes the psychology when any of these Asian hit the US shores. What prompts them to become extra macho?
If the killer is an Asian, I feel embarrassed and sad, because he is a disgrace to Asia.
He should hang, even without a trial.
I, for one, will not shed a tear!
Still, it leaves one wondering as to how anyone from a continent which has no gun culture should develop this unique and singular psychology where the guns talk where the fists sang when there was a dispute!
Martial arts of the Orient which can be lethal are all confined more on the physical agility and prowess without resorting to lethal weapons.
"Some have learnt many Tricks of sly Evasion, Instead of Truth they use Equivocation, And eke it out with mental Reservation, Which is to good Men an Abomination."
I don't have to attend every argument I'm invited to.
.........Martial arts of the Orient which can be lethal are all confined more on the physical agility and prowess without resorting to lethal weapons.
Comme ce, comme ca. By your very statement, martial arts of the Orient are a lethal weapon.
If I have to bring those skills on line, then he's going in the hospital and it is up to the Fates whether it is the ER or the Morgue.
That's one of the bitter laughs I get when others, not necessarily you of course, speak of using HtH instead of guns. HtH isn't nice but rather, pure desperation. In a split second, one is probably bringing blows down on his head, blows by their very nature are potentially lethal, but in such a situation, one is probably going to take what they can get.
This, in part, is one of the things that kind of bugs me. The things I was taught long ago are now rather illegal and I will probably have to extensively retrained. Sleeper holds are wonderful ..............
---------------------------------------------------
("He (the beaten up perp) says a woman did this to him."--1st cop
"You think so?"--2nd cop
"Are you kidding? Looks like a commando worked him over.", (w,stte), La Femme Nikita "Voices")
If the killer is an Asian, I feel embarrassed and sad, because he is a disgrace to Asia.
Um, no he isnt. Asia is the most diverse continent on Earth and the actions of a single individual do not reflect on the many different peoples who live on that continent or their cultures.
The nationalities of the victims and of the killer should be the least of anyone's worries right now unless it can be established there was a racial motivation behind it all. Which i doubt.
Tweet
Comment