WASHINGTON — They started turning out before daybreak in the bitter cold. The antiwar demonstrators amassed on the north side of the Lincoln Memorial chanting demands for peace now. The counterprotesters, fewer in number but no less vocal, gathered on the east side of the Vietnam Wall and shouted political taunts -- many laced with obscenities.
"I got called a commie. A lot of middle fingers are going up. I try to respond with a peace sign," said Bethany Louisos, 19, who had caravaned from the University of Massachusetts with 10 friends in three cars through a snowstorm to join Saturday's march at the Pentagon.
"The last thing our troops need to see is the silliness going on here," Bob Chaney, 57, said, emotion in his voice. An ex-Marine who served in Vietnam, he had flown from Indianapolis to join the counterprotest.
On the fourth anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, as many as 20,000 people spilled into the heart of the nation's capital in a sometimes tense demonstration.
The most dramatic moment came when about 200 protesters, some calling themselves anarchists, tried to make their way up to the Pentagon, where security has been fortified since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
They pushed past the boundaries and were held back by police officers in gas masks and riot gear. Many of the protesters, most college age, seemed prepared for a confrontation. Some carried homemade plastic shields, and others wore gas masks or bandannas to protect their faces.
Cmdr. Joe Carpenter, a Pentagon spokesman, said five protesters were arrested, cited and released.
The mile-and-a-half march from the Lincoln Memorial to the Pentagon was organized by a coalition of civil rights and peace groups called ANSWER (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism). It was patterned after a demonstration 40 years ago that marked a turning point in the anti-Vietnam War movement, with hippies stuffing flowers into rifles and protesters clashing with police.
Recent polls show that about three in five Americans believe the war was a mistake and do not support President Bush's push for increasing troop levels.
Saturday's was the second protest in Washington in six weeks. It drew fewer than the 100,000 who turned out in late January and lacked that rally's celebrity speakers.
This one was notable for its angrier tone as protesters and counterprotesters faced off around noon amid an odd mix of chants for peace and shouts of profanity. One man held a sign that read: "Peace Sucks."
