Waco's False Spring

FOR JUST A WHILE, THE SIGNS WERE HOPEFUL. THE parties in Waco's six-week standoff seemed to look beyond, toward the multiboard legal chess match bound to follow a peaceful resolution. The Texas Rangers, for instance, were reportedly miffed that fbi negotiators had unintentionally caused the Branch Davidians to sanitize possible court evidence -- scrubbing away blood, sweeping up spent cartridges and reducing automatic guns back to semiautomatics. The FBI denied the report. The Davidians,too, employed a kind of spin control that implied something will remain intact to spin. David Koresh's attorneys talked about contesting some government assertions -- in court -- and described in detail a surrender scheduled after the group's Passover. Koresh also deputized two New York City lawyers to handle his book, television and movie rights, hardly the act of a man contemplating martyrdom.

& Alas, matters degenerated. First, the Davidians distanced themselves from the Passover pledge. Then a cult member tried to climb out a compound window after dark, apparently breaching an agreement with the fbi. When agents upbraided Koresh over it, he cursed them. As if to symbolize the new low in communications, they hung up on him.