A REMINDER OF THE STAKES:

Sept. 3 (Bloomberg) — Russian troops stormed a school in the country’s south, after hostages started fleeing the building where armed terrorists had been holding as many as 1,500 people captive for two days in Beslan, North Ossetia.

More than 200 wounded were taken to hospitals, Interfax said, citing Lev Dzugayev, spokesman for North Ossetia’s government. Russian broadcasters NTV and Rossiya showed children escaping and gunfire and explosions could be heard during the broadcasts.

That could be happening here, and sooner or later it will if we don’t win this war first.

UPDATE: Well, this isn’t especially good news, though I suppose it could have been much worse:

Commandos free children

September 03, 2004
AT LEAST five people are dead and more than 300 people, including children have been injured after commandos stormed a school in southern Russia where up to a thousand hostages were being held, news agencies have reported.

The 10 victims, children and adults, have been taken out dead on stretchers, an AFP correspondent reported.

At least six children, all very badly wounded and some with their limbs ripped off and their backs torn open, were also evacuated by civilians and members of the Russian emergency ministry.

Troops were pursuing the hostage-takers, and gunfire continued to ring out in Beslan, Russian news agencies said.

Five militants were killed but 13 others escaped, the ITAR-Tass news agency said, and were holed up in a local residence surrounded by troops, the Interfax news agency said.

The Russians do not take a “zero defects” approach to these things.