9 Hong Kong tourist dead in Manila hostage shootout

im very very very surprised
it takes this long before this topic was discussed in this forum
my thoughts? too much controversy, suspicions.
first of all, the movements of the units and coordination seemed nothing of what SWAT, not to mention special operators, will do

This is an extract from Bloomberg.com news.

Phillipine's police force is obviously in very bad shape.

The Philippines didn’t need the deadliest attack on foreign tourists to expose the flaws in its security forces: the police write about them on their own website.

The Philippine National Police site highlights a chronic shortage of vehicles, radios and fuel in a country prone to kidnappings, gun violence and attacks by insurgents. Those deficiencies were shown up on Aug. 23 when an ex-officer took 25 people hostage on a tourist bus in Manila to protest his dismissal -- and eight members of a Hong Kong tour group died in the rescue attempt.

The 12-hour standoff and its bloody ending were broadcast live on national television, with footage relayed around the world. The assault team had “inadequate” skills and failed to control the crowd or media, according to a police review.

“The Philippines security forces are not sufficiently equipped by any stretch of the imagination,” said Pete Troilo, Manila-based director of business intelligence at Pacific Strategies & Assessments, who watched the drama unfold on TV. Incidents like this make the Philippines “a tough sell.”

The Philippines budgeted 49.7 billion pesos ($1.09 billion) to police its 104 million people this year, less than Hong Kong’s outlay to protect a population 1/15th the size. The dearth of funds is mirrored in the military, which has seen spending rise at a quarter of the rate of inflation in the past two decades.

To make up the shortfall the government relies on paramilitary groups linked to local politicians to help fight Communist rebels, Muslim separatists and the Abu Sayyaf terrorist group. One such private army contributed to a massacre of 57 people in the south last year in the nation’s worst act of election-related violence

I would like to say those people who want to travel Philipines are brave men,becaurse Philipines is a famous kidnapping country,From 2007 to the present, Philippines had occurred five times the famous kidnappings, including one kidnapping incident, more then 40 people were killed.
I would like to say in this Hong Kong Tourist bus hijacking incident, those Philippines " police special force " are a group of fools.

im very very very surprised
it takes this long before this topic was discussed in this forum

Me too. I posted photos of this tragedy on Monday;

http://www.sinodefenceforum.com/gene...tml#post124266

I really feel the Manila Police botched the whole situation by waiting so long to take action against Mendoza. Was it because he was one of their own? Or were they tying to protect the hostages?

I really don't think that there is any conspiracy involved. The Filipino police force is just in very bad shape due to governmental corruption and are inexperienced to deal with hostage situations. Just look at their break in equipments (friggin hammers for God's sake)! Couldn't they just have ferried in the Chinese special forces or something? A Chinese female cop handled a hostage situation much better (like shooting the hostage taker DEAD) in a recent incident in Guangdong.

RIP to our Hongkong brothers who died as a result of their incompetence.

Originally Posted by siegecrossbow

I really don't think that there is any conspiracy involved. The Filipino police force is just in very bad shape due to governmental corruption and are inexperienced to deal with hostage situations. Just look at their break in equipments (friggin hammers for God's sake)! Couldn't they just have ferried in the Chinese special forces or something? A Chinese female cop handled a hostage situation much better (like shooting the hostage taker DEAD) in a recent incident in Guangdong.

RIP to our Hongkong brothers who died as a result of their incompetence.

It was a shocking screw up. There were numerous times when the gunman could and should have been taken out by snipers. They even had negotiators literally within arms length of the guy at one point. They could have disarmed him quite comfortably.

They could have even just agreed to his demands, got the hostages out and then arrested him. He was no terrorist, and his demands were not all that hard to meet and then reverse, so 'giving in' to his demands would not have damaged anyone.

The final attempt to storm the bus was just pathetic. It was a wonder anyone made it out of there alive at all considering how completely and comprehensively botched up that was.

A high level Philippines delegation is set to go to Hong Kong and try and make up for this debacle, and one of the things Hong Kong may demand to lift its travel warning against the Philippines could be that Hong Kong or Chinese police SWAT or special forces be brought in to deal with similar situations in the future.

If I was in the HK leader's shoes, that would certainly be something I would push hard for. It would also be good to help the Philippines tourism industry recover from this, as no-one is going to trust their police for a very long time after this.

The only problem would be the massive face loss from the Philippines government, and the possibility that other major tourist countries might demand similar rights if they made this concession to China.

Maybe as a compromise, Interpol might be persuaded to set up a special hostage rescue department and establish a special task force for such cases in the future.

Originally Posted by plawolf

It was a shocking screw up. There were numerous times when the gunman could and should have been taken out by snipers. They even had negotiators literally within arms length of the guy at one point. They could have disarmed him quite comfortably.

They could have even just agreed to his demands, got the hostages out and then arrested him. He was no terrorist, and his demands were not all that hard to meet and then reverse, so 'giving in' to his demands would not have damaged anyone.

The final attempt to storm the bus was just pathetic. It was a wonder anyone made it out of there alive at all considering how completely and comprehensively botched up that was.

A high level Philippines delegation is set to go to Hong Kong and try and make up for this debacle, and one of the things Hong Kong may demand to lift its travel warning against the Philippines could be that Hong Kong or Chinese police SWAT or special forces be brought in to deal with similar situations in the future.

If I was in the HK leader's shoes, that would certainly be something I would push hard for. It would also be good to help the Philippines tourism industry recover from this, as no-one is going to trust their police for a very long time after this.

The only problem would be the massive face loss from the Philippines government, and the possibility that other major tourist countries might demand similar rights if they made this concession to China.

Maybe as a compromise, Interpol might be persuaded to set up a special hostage rescue department and establish a special task force for such cases in the future.

plawolf, I don't think the Phillipines would accept this, nor would China or HK push for this, the reasons being:

China has always upholded an non-interventionist policy when it comes to dealing with other countries. This event, although tragic, was a domestic affair of the Philipines. Bringing in foreign troops to deal with such things is essentially taking jabs at the country's sovereignty. Remember the eight-nations alliance and extraterritoriality? This sounds just like a small version of that: if you can't put down the threats to our nationals in your country, then we will.

Originally Posted by Obcession

plawolf, I don't think the Phillipines would accept this, nor would China or HK push for this, the reasons being:

China has always upholded an non-interventionist policy when it comes to dealing with other countries. This event, although tragic, was a domestic affair of the Philipines. Bringing in foreign troops to deal with such things is essentially taking jabs at the country's sovereignty. Remember the eight-nations alliance and extraterritoriality? This sounds just like a small version of that: if you can't put down the threats to our nationals in your country, then we will.

Hong Kong's leaders have to play to the back row, such is the joy of Democracy. Beijing might not want to press it, but if the idea got traction in the HK press, the politicians may have little choice but to raise it.

And it was out of consideration for national sovereignty that I also suggested an international organization to take this role instead of national police or special forces. Such arrangements are widely accepted, most countries co-operates with Interpol, and expending on that might not be so hard to sell.

It is also not all that unprecedented as other countries have let in foreign special forces to rescue hostages when their own forces were not adequate.

At the end of the day, I can't see anything less than such an agreement being enough to restore faith in the Philippines being a safe destination for tourism. If the Philippines want Chinese, or any other tourists, to keep going there, then they might have to make painful choices they would not ordinarily consider.

I really don't understand why they didn't just agree to his demands and have him release the hostages first. It wasn't like he was asking for a million dollars and a chopper, he was just asking for the government to reopen his investigation. The filipino police could've just agreed to his demands, wait until he released the hostages, and then arrest him in safety.

It just doesn't make sense that 8 people died for such a simple demand.

Also, the filipino police claimed that they lost their element of surprise because their actions were shown on TV, which the hostage-take had access to. WTF?? Why didn't they ban media coverage of their actions?

Originally Posted by solarz

Also, the filipino police claimed that they lost their element of surprise because their actions were shown on TV, which the hostage-take had access to. WTF?? Why didn't they ban media coverage of their actions?

Why would we want that? So they could cover up just how incompetent they were? I'm glad that the media took nice crisp footages of their buffonery - now they can't deny that it was their fault!

Originally Posted by siegecrossbow

Why would we want that? So they could cover up just how incompetent they were? I'm glad that the media took nice crisp footages of their buffonery - now they can't deny that it was their fault!

Well, at least ban LIVE coverage of it!

Actually 9 had died thus far... 1 of them died in the hospital on Tuesday night, because of grievous wound.

When I read that the police of Philippines claimed that they have lost the element of surprise due to the media reporting LIVE... but I think that might only be one reason... I mean... come on... even a blind man or one that is almost deaf would know police are trying to get into the vehicle when these idiots start smashing the windows with hammer and could climb in.

The best element of surprise is to storm the vehicle at the first possible time using frame charge, blew the door out and get in immediately, then shoot your suspect quickly. Everything should be over in minutes or seconds... but that didn't seemed to be the case with the Philippines special forces.

Another way is to line a number of snipers, each assigned to one window (it is a bus, for god sake, how many window can a bus have?). When the suspect shown himself, shoot him dead immediately - end of story... but obviously the Philippines did nothing of that.

All the things that could have gone wrong, had gone wrong in this hostage taking scenario. I think the Philippines should really sent their SWAT teams overseas to be trained by some friendly nations.

Well... as to the media... couldn't the police do something to shield transmission from the bus or at least jam the transmission to the bus, so the suspect could not monitor anyone or anything.

Originally Posted by rhino123

Actually 9 had died thus far... 1 of them died in the hospital on thursday night, because of grievous wound.

When I read that the police of Philippines claimed that they have lost the element of surprise due to the media reporting LIVE... but I think that might only be one reason... I mean... come on... even a blind man or one that is almost deaf would know police are trying to get into the vehicle when these idiots start smashing the windows with hammer and could climb in.

The best element of surprise is to storm the vehicle at the first possible time using frame charge, blew the door out and get in immediately, then shoot your suspect quickly. Everything should be over in minutes or seconds... but that didn't seemed to be the case with the Philippines special forces.

Another way is to line a number of snipers, each assigned to one window (it is a bus, for god sake, how many window can a bus have?). When the suspect shown himself, shoot him dead immediately - end of story... but obviously the Philippines did nothing of that.

All the things that could have gone wrong, had gone wrong in this hostage taking scenario. I think the Philippines should really sent their SWAT teams overseas to be trained by some friendly nations.

Well... as to the media... couldn't the police do something to shield transmission from the bus or at least jam the transmission to the bus, so the suspect could not monitor anyone or anything.

Mendoza, the hostage taker did not just see the police trying to enter the bus as well. Negotiations according to survivors were going pretty well, he did not intend to kill anybody (although he was obviously beyond the point of rationality of course) but after he saw the live news coverage of his brother, who had been brought to talk him out the situation, roughed up and arrested, he went crazy and started shooting people. Mr. Leung, one of the victims tried to disarm him but he was killed.

Originally Posted by Semi-Lobster

Mendoza, the hostage taker did not just see the police trying to enter the bus as well. Negotiations according to survivors were going pretty well, he did not intend to kill anybody (although he was obviously beyond the point of rationality of course) but after he saw the live news coverage of his brother, who had been brought to talk him out the situation, roughed up and arrested, he went crazy and started shooting people. Mr. Leung, one of the victims tried to disarm him but he was killed.

And now they are afraid of firing or punishing any of these policemen lest they go berserk and decide to hold hostages of their own.