A Risk Worth Taking

Hearing about what was going on at Pine Ridge, AIM was more than willing to step in to help. Members of AIM as well as the tribal leaders and a few members of the Oglala Lakota from Pine Ridge met at the Calico Hall Community Center, just five miles west of the reservation. [1] The chiefs of the Oglala, most specifically Fools Crow, explained what had been happening on the reservation. They explained that they had attempted to solve the problems with every legal option; with failures in every attempt, they were ready to take illegal action. With desperation, they asked AIM for help, even though they knew there with risks by asking. "Where AIM goes, chaos often follows. . . as they go down the road, they don't know exactly what is going to happen." [2] Following that reputation, AIM made a plan to help the Oglala nation; they were going to occupy Wounded Knee, a city on the Pine Ridge reservation. This occupation was to force Dick Wilson out of office by drawing the attention of the rest of the nation. 

Fools Crow, Oglala Chief [3]

The Oglalas were hesitant to agree but finally the women lost patience and took over the discussion. Ellen Moves Camp, one of the founders of OSCRO (Oglala Sioux Civil Rights Organization), said many things that inspired a lot of the Oglala Lakota to abandon their fears and take action. [4] "Dicky Wilson has forbidden any meetings, speech making, or traditional dancing on the reservation. But this is our land, Lakota land. It belongs to us, not him and his goons. . .  [5] I don't see why they can't take him  and throw him out or throw him in jail or something the way he's been terrorizing people here on the reservation. . . I'm not scared of them anymore." [6] Inspired by Ellen Moves Camp, Fools Crow made a decision for the entire tribe. "Then we'll go to Wounded Knee," he said, "The AIM warriors will lead us." [7]

[1] Dennis Banks and Richard Erdoes, Ojibwa Warrior: Dennis Banks and the Rise of the American Indian Movement (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2004), 160.
[2] John Kusiak, We Shall Remain: Wounded Knee, DVD, Stanley Nelson (2009: PBS), web.
[3] Otto Bettman, photographer, Frank Fools Crow at Wounded Knee Occupation, photograph, South Dakota: Corbis, March 6 1973, CORBIS Images: Bettman Collection, Web, http://www.corbisimages.com/stock-photo/rights-managed/BE054415/frank-fools-crow-at-wounded-knee-occupation (accessed March 26, 2012). 
[4] Reinhardt, Akim D. Ruling Pine Ridge: Oglala Lakota Politics from the IRA to Wounded Knee. Lubbock, Texas: Texas Tech University Press, 2007.

[5] Banks and Erdoes, 160.
[6] Kusiak, We Shall.
[7] Banks and Erdoes, 161.

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