Inside The Taj Hotel: Indian Commando Tells What it Was Like During the Three-Day Siege
Guards outside of the Taj Hotel
The commando emerged from The Taj Hotel tired, sweaty and unshaven. A white surgical mask hung below his chin. He seemed completely drained. The three-day standoff had just ended, but night had fallen before the commandos began to leave the compound.
He explained that there were still 150 bodies inside The Taj Hotel on Saturday night — most shots were by AK-47 rounds. He told us, “They were all over the hotel — on the floors, in the kitchen, in the bedrooms, just scattered throughout.”
I asked him: “What was the most difficult moment during the standoff?”
He paused for a moment and said, “The fact that they didn’t even spare the women or children.”
The commando walked us through the final hours. “It was 4 a.m. Saturday morning and suddenly we heard two massive explosions,” he said. “Then loud gunfire. Then another explosion. All of them coming from inside the Taj.” The leader of the Indian commando unit had announced several hours before that the operation was nearing its final hours. “The lights went off in the hotel,” he told us. “Then some lights started blinking. It appeared as though someone was sending a message. But no one knows for sure.”
The commando told us that in the last few hours there were two militants left. Grenades were thrown to try to knock the terrorists off balance. Then shots were fired. The attackers were ultimately killed on the first floor of the hotel.
When I asked why authorities were unable to end the siege earlier, he said: “It was hard to tell how many there were. The terrorists would keep firing and move around. They had so much ammunition and they really knew their way around the hotels well.”
He said the terror group used “incendiary bombs” — meaning they’d throw grenades at gas canisters. This also means they had access to the hotels early on. Both hotels — the Taj and the Oberoi — have denied their employees were involved in the attacks.
The commando still looked slightly overwhelmed as he described the attackers’ having a surprising level of sophistication. “They had satellite phones,” he told us. “You wouldn’t believe the amount of ammunition that was used inside. I didn’t realize how advanced terrorists are today.”
Here are some EXCLUSIVE photos from India:
Reena Ninan is a correspondent for FNC, spending the majority of her
time in the Middle East. She provided on-site updates of Iraq's first
parliamentary elections and coverage of Saddam Hussein's trial from
Baghdad. 
You could see this attack coming six months ago. Considering the location, the situation, the abundance of smaller incidents all over India, a larger more deadly attack was about to occur at any moment. Sadly, it did, and from the terrorists point of view it was hugely successful. Again, a small number of dedicated, more than happy to die for their cause, terrorists took down a large number of innocents and basically shut down an entire city. Soft targets, the kind of targets these mindless, less than human, animals love and dream about as they prepare to meet Allah. Here in America we are still in a continuing state of denial regarding the possibility of future attacks on our own soil. With citizens distracted by economic problems and changes in the political winds, the terrorists within await the moment they can best strike. It could come any day, any month or even in a year or two… but it will come. And, it will make 9/11 look like a Sunday picnic. Detailed planning is ongoing even as I write this note. That you can be sure of. Federal, state and local agencies are basically “asleep at the wheel” regarding the coming strike. Complacent, not prepared, and poorly trained in many instances. It is indeed a time for serious preparations on our part, or we will see catastrophy beyond belief.
What can we do to wake up our leaders, our citizens? I have just read part of the report on biological and nuclear terrorism that came out yesterday and shared it with college students. THEY got the message. How do we get our leaders back on track??
You took the words right out of my mouth. I just pray our newly elected president-to-be heeds every warning our intelligence shows him and takes them more seriously than his Democratic predecessor, Clinton. It really amazes me how quickly Americans forget.
When will we stop shying away from stating publicly “what” this really is? The News Media is so carefull to point out that all the facts are not yet in! They care not when they are reporting about a conservitive or a cause they have little interest in. This is “WAR”. This is “Murder”! This is a world wide attack, without mercy on innocents! When will the term “tragity” be eliminated in favor of a true descriptive term; Murder by Belief, by Religon, by Ignorance, without a Soul, without remourse?? Murder to enhance a belief!! Sounds like pre WWII Germany, does it not??