April 19, 1993, 30 years ago, the FBI and the ATF executed 76 civilians — 28 of whom were children — with the express consent of Attorney General Janet Reno and President Bill Clinton.

The slaughtered had never been convicted in a criminal court or given their due process by a judge and jury of their peers. That day when the masterminds behind project "Showtime" launched a teargas attack on the Mount Carmel Center was more than a month after the expiration date of the search warrant obtained by the ATF and FBI.

Make no mistake, however heinous you consider the Branch Davidian cult members and their leader David Koresh, there is no doubt that they were indeed victims of the Clinton-era militarized police state that set the stage for the later evisceration of civil liberties during the so-called "War on Terror."

None of this is a defense of Koresh, the person, or the Branch Davidians as a moral institution. Koresh was a mentally ill idolater who almost surely raped and abused not just the women but also the children in the compound. And especially Christians should take offense, not just at the cult's perversion of Scripture, but also that it took advantage of society's most vulnerable.

But the FBI was not investigating Koresh on charges that he was sexually abusing minors or women in the compound. If the FBI had actually cared about sexual abuse — an unlikely thing, as evidenced by the fact that it knew about Larry Nassar's abuse of young gymnasts and did nothing — it could have accosted Koresh when he regularly went on runs around the compound.

While most sources note that Koresh was by himself during these runs, some say he would bring some cult members with him. Still, an entire militarized police force would have an easier time taking down a handful of joggers, and surely with less tragic results.

The feds took a different approach, choosing to bring trumped-up firearms charges against the Branch Davidians. They based their search and arrest warrants on the notion that the cult had stockpiled illegal weapons, specifically theorizing that they were making illegal weapons by modifying legal firearms. (Note that sawed-off shotguns would technically fit the bill.)

In order to enlist 76 agents and officers, multiple military helicopters, a tank-like vehicle with a battering ram, M16 rifles, and hand grenades to execute the search and arrest warrant, the ATF lied in court that the compound hosted a meth lab. While the DOJ would later maintain that the Branch Davidians shot at the ATF first, multiple witnesses and survivors allege that the ATF, under the guise of shooting at the cult's dogs, shot first.

Why were the Branch Davidians so ready to fire back?

First, a reporter ready to break the story inadvertently tipped off the cult through a local postman, who was related to Koresh. Second and more importantly, the ATF did not do its homework. The Branch Davidians sincerely believed that Koresh was the second coming of Christ and that they would have to fight Satanic forces in order for a select 144,000 people on the planet to ascend to heaven.

Sounds crazy, yes? But when the ATF showed up in force as a black-clad paramilitary, it was exactly as Koresh had described the impending agents of Babylon.

The FBI took over the siege from the ATF, which became a standoff for the next 51 days. During negotiations with Koresh, the FBI failed to understand the religious convictions of the Branch Davidians, who were ready to die for their faith under the assumption that the militarized police force was that which was prophesied in the Book of Revelation. Despite external religious scholars warning that the actions of the FBI and ATF were only confirming the cult's convictions that law enforcement was bringing about the end times, the FBI internally mocked Koresh's "Bible babble," inadvertently heightening the cult's resolve rather than weakening it.

The FBI's final assault on the compound came on April 19, when the Clinton Justice Department signed off on plans to pump tear gas directly into the compound. The use of tear gas against civilians was technically a violation of the Chemical Weapons Convention of 1993, but it achieved the FBI's intended goal nonetheless. Six hours after the tear gas was deployed, the building broke out into flames.

Despite the pyrotechnic capabilities of tear gas, the FBI had no fire trucks on site. It took more than a half hour from the time the FBI called for fire trucks for them to actually arrive directly at the compound. By then, 76 Branch Davidians were dead. Only nine escaped that day.

Although the Justice Department has always maintained that the fires were started by the Branch Davidians, survivors from the fire alleged that it was the flammable tear gas canisters that ignited the blaze. Because they had camped out in the basement of the building to avoid the tear gas, escaping the building was more difficult.

Prosecutors succeeded in obtaining select firearms convictions after the compound had burned down, but no one ever did bring up charges related to allegations of pedophilia, the ostensible reason for the tear gas assault in the first place.

As a nation founded by brewers and enshrined with the Constitutional right to bear arms, the ATF should have never even existed in the first place. The Waco massacre only proved that point. But what about the FBI, an organization that ostensibly exists as our domestic apparatus for national security concerns? After all, pursuing national security is a good thing, right?

The same FBI that executed the Waco disaster is the FBI that shredded the Constitution to racially profile and wiretap United States citizens without a warrant after 9/11. It is the same FBI that fabricated the Trump-Russia collusion hoax to help Hillary Clinton beat Donald Trump during his first presidential election, and then pressed Twitter to censor the Hunter Biden laptop story and help Joe Biden beat Trump during his second election.

The FBI now investigates parents advocating for their children as if they were domestic terrorists.

Of course, that FBI knew about the Boston bombers, Larry Nasser, and the Parkland shooter before they destroyed the lives of hundreds and thousands. That FBI is the same FBI that massacred 27 children in the pursuit of justice. The best time to abolish the FBI and start from scratch was 30 years ago — the second best time is today.