Monday, November 9, 2009

Darker Days for Amercan Veterans - Bonus March on Washington, DC: 1932




American veterans recently received from Congress and the President the ability to get more educational benefits if they attend a university than previously has been awarded to those who served. They can also now transfer unused education benefits to their spouse and children for the first
time.


But back in the long, hot Summer of 1932 in Washington, as the nation slipped deeper into the grip of the Great Depression, veterans of the First World War got an entirely less hospitable response from President Hoover, the Senate and the military under General Douglas Mac Arthur.

14 comments:

  1. I was all set to remind everyone that it was MacArthur who was charged with the task of putting down the Bonus Marchers, and did so enthusiastically.

    Proof that orders are orders, and no matter the morality of the thing, when the chips are down, the People in Charge will preserve the order of things.....

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  2. This clip certainly puts the sentimentality around 'veterans' into perspective Doug. How many of the attacking troops in 1932 were themselves 'veterans' in 1945 I wonder?

    So long as the power elite can beguile, threaten or bribe young people to do their nefarious business for them this sort of betrayal will continue. We will see it again with the current 'heroes' when their 'use by date' comes around if they are fortunate enough to survive Afghanistan, mutiny and civil disobedience is the only moral position to take when the ones who give the orders are monsters I think.

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  3. Mac Arthur was the worst General because he thought he was even bigger than the President. When Hoover even went to visit Mac Arthur within the war zone - Mac Arthur had Hoover wait and would never even shake his hand. During WW1 - this was a time that there truly was internal separation and division. The Marchers certainly did petition at large as if they had not there would have been nothing for them when they arrived home.

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  4. This was certainly what went down here, Astra. Other newsreels of the time show MacArthur strutting around like some potentate. It's also likely he went beyond Hoover' orders, and did so enthusiastically.

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  5. One of the reasons we don't have a draft in the USA, AA, I submit is because of the legacy of Vietnam and the number of mutinies and near-mutinies that came stateside at the end of the Vietnam War.
    The power elite were lucky FDR came along in '33 and took the edge off what was a radicalized situation, heading south toward a Weimar-style American Crisis. Fascism of the Huey Long variety or, more likely, martial law and civil unrest a la "Dugout" Doug MacArthur variety might have been the result.

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  6. I didn't know that, Jack , but it doesn't surprise me. MacArthur had a toxic disdain for civilian authority--he proved that the way he treated Harry Truman when they met during the Korean War.

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  7. Just getting in here Doug yeah there was a many things between Mac Arthur and Hoover at the time. But that is the government and I read earlier this post and it's a part of the history. But within all that we regard and remember are what the troops did within these times - I enjoyed this post very much.

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  8. This is true. Like the speaker said in the newsreel, once you've served your country, it was a whole new fight when you come back from overseas and the economy tanks. The Bonus Marchers did succeed in improving benefits for the soldiers who fought the next war. But its always a struggle, isn't it?

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  9. Yes (as I think that while multiply is slow) there will always be so it seems. As history has a way of repeating itself.

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  10. We've seen that in the way soldiers and Marines suffering post-traumatic stress disorder have been released from the military because they were determined to be bad soldiers AFTER they served in Iraq and Afghanistan. I would hope that has ended with the new Administration.

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  11. Sorry Doug, this doesn't want to play for me. I'll see if someone else has recorded it at utube.

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  12. Sorry about that Cassandra. I think there are a couple You Tube videos on this subject that use similar newsreel/documentary footage. This "Bonus March" was a big wake-up call to Establishment America.

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  13. Power to the people!

    What a ruthless way to deal with those who served their country well, talk about dirty dealings!

    Strange how the call to fight and a persons allegiance to their country is waved in front of them when needed as battle fodder. Yet they are later shown they have no worth at all, especially when asking for what is due to them. I guess most counties have an issue that later makes them look back in shame.

    Maybe a lesson was learnt and people who fought for their country are now given the respect they are due. Having said that, many Vietnam veterans would disagree I'm sure...

    Teehee, the video worked this time. Thanks, Doug.

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  14. You're right about Vietnam veterans, Cassandra. Many accounts by ex-soldiers in books and other media state that were treated badly in some cases by civilian protesters in airports and bus depots. The irony was that many of those common soldiers were sick of the war and being lied to by commanders,too. Their "crime" was to serve as their fathers had in past wars.

    It was a case of blaming people who were "handy". More sense was shown by the protesters during that war who organized demonstrations at The Pentagon, or actually sat down to talk to disgruntled Vietnam vets (in groups such as "The Winter Soldier" movement of the early 1970's ) Chewing people up in time of war and then forgetting about them later is an all-too common exercise in hypocrisy and callousness.



    The Bonus Marchers was truly a shameful episode in American history, of course, but it had the effect of adding "ammunition" to the cause of granting benefits to future soldiers in World War II for housing and education. We slipped again as a society after Vietnam, and now that experience of misdirected anger and apathy has led to a turnabout I think---more people have the ability to separate the mistakes of policy-makers, commanders and politicians and still show respect to the regular soldier, sailor and Marine.

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