The shutdown of Boston was an incredible event without precedent. It is absolutely correct for people to discuss whether the right choices were made, and it is a little bit frightening to have people declaring such a conversation "offensive".
In the end it was pretty clear that these two perpetrators were not the brightest of terrorists. They operated in plain sight, during a massively photographed event, and then went about their life as if nothing had changed. Their bombs, while sadly effective to a degree, were much less devastating than they could have been (and that they were throwing pressure cookers at police borders on...the word comedic doesn't quite fit given the carnage they have wrought, but it certainly is ridiculous).
Did the lockdown help catch them? We'll never actually know, as the suspect could have been caught using traditional means in a fully operating city. On the flip side, if the suspect wasn't seriously injured, as they purportedly were, they could have been murdering people in house after house during the lockdown.
In the end it was pretty clear that these two perpetrators were not the brightest of terrorists. They operated in plain sight, during a massively photographed event, and then went about their life as if nothing had changed. Their bombs, while sadly effective to a degree, were much less devastating than they could have been (and that they were throwing pressure cookers at police borders on...the word comedic doesn't quite fit given the carnage they have wrought, but it certainly is ridiculous).
Did the lockdown help catch them? We'll never actually know, as the suspect could have been caught using traditional means in a fully operating city. On the flip side, if the suspect wasn't seriously injured, as they purportedly were, they could have been murdering people in house after house during the lockdown.