Thousands of protesters march against war in D.C.

Tens of thousands rallied in the capital Saturday in an emphatic dissent against preparations for war in Iraq, voicing a cry -- "No blood for oil" -- heard in demonstrations around the world.

A rally in the shadows of Washington's political and military institutions anchored dozens of smaller protests throughout Asia, Europe, the Middle East and the United States.

In Washington, police said 30,000 marched through the streets, part of a much larger crowd that packed the west end of the National Mall and spilled onto the Capitol grounds.

"We stand here today, a new generation of anti-war activists," Peta Lindsay from International Answer, the main organizers, exhorted the spirited masses in a biting cold. "This is just beginning. We will stop this war."

Bush, at the presidential retreat about 60 miles from the White House, welcomes the fact that the United States is a democracy and that people here, unlike those in Iraq, are free to protest and make their case known, spokeswoman Jeanie Mamo said.

Police reported no arrests in the rally, which preceded the march past Marine barracks to the Washington Navy Yard. The throng slowed near the barracks as some protesters engaged a small group of counter-demonstrators in a shouting match.

Among the demonstrators were 16 Southeast Missourians who caught a bus in St. Louis that drove them through the night to Washington. Joy Bell, the counselor at the Safe House for Women in Cape Girardeau, said her reasons to be at the rally were moral and patriotic. "I am a patriot and I love my country. When I see it getting off course from what the Constitution says and what our forefathers intended, it is necessary not to be silent," she said by phone from the rally.

Bell called her protest against going to war with Iraq parallel to her work counseling abused women and children. "Violence is violence," she said.

At the rally and in the march that followed, the group held aloft a banner that read "Southeast Missouri Coalition for Peace and Justice." A flag was on one end of the banner, a dove on the other.

"I am very proud to be a Southeast Missourian who is here," the 49-year-old Bell said.

Southeast Missouri State University senior Carla Terry, who is from Bloomfield, Mo., was marching past the White House as she talked about the looming war she thinks President Bush has failed to justify. "I don't want to see a lot of innocent people die -- in my generation and in Iraq," she said.

It was important to be in Washington to oppose war on the weekend that celebrates the birth of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the 23-year-old said.

"I'm really proud to be here. Dr. King always supported civil rights and the peace movement. It feels great to be an American right now."

Twenty-six-year-old Tara Miller of Cape Girardeau could see the Capitol Dome on her left as she marched and talked. "When we walked by the statue of Justice, it fit the mood here," she said.

Miller, who is unemployed, said she was at the rally because of her sister in the U.S. Navy. Her sister has mixed feelings about her involvement in the anti-war protest, Miller said.

"My dad is a Vietnam War vet. My grandfather was in World War II on the USS Iowa. They strongly support my sister and myself."

One of the chants heard at the rally was "This is what democracy looks like," she said.

"If I could say anything to people at home I would like them to know they can speak their voice."

Robert Polack, a Southeast sociology professor who has helped organize a series of anti-war vigils in Cape Girardeau, said taking the 20-plus-hour bus ride and standing in the cold at Saturday's rally testified to the dedication of the protesters.

"I'm feeling like we're connected with a huge number of people who have similar feelings about this war," he said.

A group of 25 more protesters gathered at Capaha Park's Freedom Corner in below freezing temperatures Saturday afternoon to show solidarity with those who went to Washington. Among those holding up placards was Janet Smith, who at Northern Illinois University in the 1960s was the campus organizer for Cesar Chavez's boycott on behalf of the United Farm Workers of America. She also protested the Vietnam War.

Smith, who is employed at Southeast on a grant project, had many questions then and has them now. "I don't think he has made a case that we should go to war," she said of Bush. "War should be a last resort." A peaceful solution, she said, "hasn't been given a chance."

As with any big Washington rally, the main cause made room for other causes.

"Free Palestine" was one of them. Racism and genocide were others.

"The underlying motives for this government's actions have always been greed and racism," said Moonanum James of United American Indians of New England.

"In the spirit of Dr. King, in the spirit of Crazy Horse," he said, "no blood for oil."

Protesters denounced Bush's Iraqi policy in San Francisco, Indianapolis and in other cities and countries.

Staff writer Sam Blackwell contributed to this report.