Forum Post: March to Washington: hit them where it hurts.
Posted 13 years ago on Oct. 13, 2011, 3:05 a.m. EST by shadaxgale
(230)
from Oswego, NY
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
More opinions?? I have gotten a ton of support from people on this and would love some more input. The most recent update is that the plan is now to set up collective marches from all different locations, and all meet up in washington in the spring (april/may 2012)...from the southeast, and the west coast where my best friend is already spreading the word and has about 100 people ready and willing to fly out...TONS of planning will be done for this, and it is not being taken lightly, so please keep your thoughts positive, as this is in its infancy, still. I realize how ballsy this is, and that's the point..haha. Thank you all :) Paranoia freaks and trolls need not apply. ;)
http://www.facebook.com/marchtodc
http://occupywallst.org/forum/how-many-of-you-would-be-willing-and-dedicated-eno/
It's been done before, in 1932.
The Bonus Army was the popular name of an assemblage of some 43,000 marchers—17,000 World War I veterans, their families, and affiliated groups—who gathered in Washington, D.C., in the spring and summer of 1932 to demand immediate cash-payment redemption of their service certificates
Of course, things didn't turn out quite that great
On July 28, U.S. Attorney General William D. Mitchell ordered the veterans removed from all government property. Washington police met with resistance, shots were fired and two veterans were wounded and later died. President Herbert Hoover then ordered the army to clear the veterans' campsite.
At 4:45 p.m., commanded by Gen. Douglas MacArthur, the 12th Infantry Regiment, Fort Howard, Maryland, and the 3rd Cavalry Regiment, supported by six battle tanks commanded by Maj. George S. Patton, formed in Pennsylvania Avenue while thousands of civil service employees left work to line the street and watch. The Bonus Marchers, believing the troops were marching in their honor, cheered the troops until Patton ordered the cavalry to charge them—an action which prompted the spectators to yell, "Shame! Shame!"
Shacks that members of the Bonus Army erected on the Anacostia Flats burning after the confrontation with the military. After the cavalry charged, the infantry, with fixed bayonets and adamsite gas, an arsenical vomiting agent, entered the camps, evicting veterans, families, and camp followers. The veterans fled across the Anacostia River to their largest camp and President Hoover ordered the assault stopped. However Gen. MacArthur, feeling the Bonus March was a Communist attempt to overthrow the U.S. government, ignored the President and ordered a new attack. Fifty-five veterans were injured and 135 arrested.[9] A veteran's wife miscarried. When 12-week-old Bernard Myers died in the hospital after being caught in the tear gas attack, a government investigation reported he died of enteritis, while a hospital spokesman said the tear gas "didn't do it any good."[13] During the military operation, Major Dwight D. Eisenhower, later President of the United States, served as one of MacArthur's junior aides.[14] Believing it wrong for the Army's highest-ranking officer to lead an action against fellow American war veterans, he strongly advised MacArthur against taking any public role: "I told that dumb son-of-a-bitch not to go down there," he said later. "I told him it was no place for the Chief of Staff."[15] Despite his misgivings, Eisenhower later wrote the Army's official incident report which endorsed MacArthur's conduct.[16]
Hmm. I don't suppose that they will open fire on any of us, assuming we all REMAIN peaceful...This isn't "war-time", so I would hope! Thank you for the information, none the less :)