Posted on 11/29/2008 11:17:52 AM PST by Leisler
It is the photograph that has dominated the world's front pages, casting an astonishing light on the fresh-faced killers who brought terror to the heart of India's most vibrant city. Now it can be revealed how the astonishing picture came to be taken by a newspaper photographer who hid inside a train carriage as gunfire erupted all around him.
Sebastian D'Souza, a picture editor at the Mumbai Mirror, whose offices are just opposite the city's Chhatrapati Shivaji station, heard the gunfire erupt and ran towards the terminus. "I ran into the first carriage of one of the trains on the platform to try and get a shot but couldn't get a good angle, so I moved to the second carriage and waited for the gunmen to walk by," he said. "They were shooting from waist height and fired at anything that moved. I briefly had time to take a couple of frames using a telephoto lens. I think they saw me taking photographs but theydidn't seem to care."
The gunmen were terrifyingly professional, making sure at least one of them was able to fire their rifle while the other reloaded. By the time he managed to capture the killer on camera, Mr D'Souza had already seen two gunmen calmly stroll across the station concourse shooting both civilians and policemen, many of whom, he said, were armed but did not fire back. "I first saw the gunmen outside the station," Mr D'Souza said. "With their rucksacks and Western clothes they looked like backpackers, not terrorists, but they were very heavily armed and clearly knew how to use their rifles.
"Towards the station entrance, there are a number of bookshops and one of the bookstore owners was trying to close his shop," he recalled. "The gunmen opened fire and the shopkeeper fell down."
But what angered Mr D'Souza almost as much were the masses of armed police hiding in the area who simply refused to shoot back. "There were armed policemen hiding all around the station but none of them did anything," he said. "At one point, I ran up to them and told them to use their weapons. I said, 'Shoot them, they're sitting ducks!' but they just didn't shoot back."
As the gunmen fired at policemen taking cover across the street, Mr D'Souza realised a train was pulling into the station unaware of the horror within. "I couldn't believe it. We rushed to the platform and told everyone to head towards the back of the station. Those who were older and couldn't run, we told them to stay put."
The militants returned inside the station and headed towards a rear exit towards Chowpatty Beach. Mr D'Souza added: "I told some policemen the gunmen had moved towards the rear of the station but they refused to follow them. What is the point if having policemen with guns if they refuse to use them? I only wish I had a gun rather than a camera."
Gee, I hope that they don’t water board him during interrogation.
That would be a war crime!
Which made it worse than a equipment/gun issue withe the LA cops vs them. These guys not only didn't give a fig, they wanted to go out blazing. Until the end,when the one tried to hijack the car. By the way, I think the LA cops purposefully let the guy bleed to death. Not that I blame them, at all.
Actually, there’s the whole “as Allah wills” thing in the Koran. Basically, some of the Islamicists believe that the wearing of armor is evidence of lack of faith in Allah - for if you are doing Allah’s will, surely Allah will protect you and none of the infidel bullets/knives/swords/arrows will hit you, right?
My ancestors had a *field day* with that particular idiocy when Islamic armies came against us.
With all due respect, some of us do. And you can be sure our service member freepers who have been in the sh!t know how they would react, too.
It is fair to say that until you have been in a life-or-death situation, you don’t nay can’t know. I’m guessing that’s what you meant, and I agree 100%.
Those were evangelicals, weren’t they?
BULL $hit! Anyone armed and silently hiding should be shot! LEO or not!
Don’t try this here, the terrorists first would know better and second would find out just how armed citenzen are.
May be. But definitely they are from the same ethnic group of portugese descendants. Any Inian with names D’Souza, D’Mel etc. Bombay( Mumbai) was a potugese hub for long time before the British took over.
Epic Fail.
muslim acquaintances who are actually blaming the Hindus
Only good muslim seems to be a dead one!
Yeah...Muslim evangelicals.
Well that is a stupid statement considering you are commenting on FR when many of us have been is situations similar to this one and found out exactly what we would do. Speak for yourself. Anyone who fails to shoot back in a situation such as this is simply to cowardly to be a cop, or claim human status as far as that goes. Even if they only killed one or two of the terrorists(Not gunmen, terrorists)they would probably have saved some lives and, at the very least, have disrupted their plans.
“Which raises a question. Why are cops militarized? Why do they refer to their fellow citizens as ‘civilians’? Why do they have military rank?”
All good questions. Do you want civilian law enforcement to be the military?
“Why did we have a Sheriff system and why did we create at the end of the 1800’s a Police system?”
We still have a Sheriffs system.
“If not military, who are the militarized cops military to?”
huh
I’m guessing the Indian cops didn’t fire because of complete surprise and a lack of leadership to get them organized and fighting. Without that they were useless. I read a report once concerning the number of infantry soldiers in combat who, even though they were trained to do so, didn’t even fire their weapons in combat. The percentage was alarmingly high. That is really the defining difference between the common infantry soldier and an elite unit. The soldiers in an elite unit will fight. These cops probably weren’t even trained to the standards of the common infantry soldier. Probably mostly traffic cops etc.
That’s pretty much it. There’s a corollary for Islamic marksmanship; it’s only taken them 700 years or so to start figuring out what they did wrong...
If you’re talking about the US, I think you’re dead wrong. Every US LEO I know would engage mooks like that until out of ammo. Which could take a while....
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“I have muslim acquaintances who are actually blaming the Hindus for the attack.”
This does not surprise me in the least. After 9-11, muslims around the globe were saying there was no way a muslim was responsible. They said it was not possible.
That kept on right until the release of Bin Laden himself not only taking credit for 9-11 but then saying if they were called terrorist, then fine, their terrorist.
You only hear the muslim denials up until they can deny no more. Until that point they will look you in the eye and deny up and down.
The concept of right and wrong is not the same. It’s all about a shame based society. To deny the shame is to forego any blame.
For them, it’s THAT simple.
You are correct.
The security man would not fire nor would he give up his gun.
Thank heavens Jeanne Assam (private citizen) was there to put the guy down before he could start killing people packed inside the sanctuary.
So there was no need of police.
Police are an invention of large government types, and are not for citizen to citizen dispute, but for government over citizens.
They are the army of the government, over the citizens.
Their very existence is a presumption of the state over the individual. They are the armed force. They enforce political actions that might well otherwise not be freely obeyed by the citizens.
And that is the country and the dominate political thinking we live in now. Whether it is police, or the Federal Reserve or any of a thousand institutions they are to be obeyed. They are supposed to be so apparently good that they need civilian military force, to be forced upon people.
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