Im probably stepping right into it again, but here goes. No less an authority on Wounded Knee than General Nelson A. Miles described the incident as a Massacre in a letter to the Indian commissioner. Why? Simply because it was a massacre. General Miles should know better than most. He was the commanding General charged with solving the Indian problem at that time. You cannot call it war when approximately 150 men, women and children, with inferior weapons are slaughtered in the name of Manifest Destiny, by more than 500 U.S. Soldiers with superior arms, including four Hotchkiss guns, even if for arguments sake, they fired the fist shot.. What were they to do? All Native American tribes had been lied to by every administration up to that time, they had been moved to reservations, hunted down, their women raped or worse. This is documented, historical fact.

We can rationalize and justify anything and everything. We can rewrite history in order to sooth our conscious, but the truth is, this was a bad time in our nations history. We would be a better nation if we could just admit our own errors. It was a massacre, and truth and history has documented it as such.

Today is December 29. On this date in history in 1890, we witness the Battle of Wounded Knee in South Dakota.

This is the last battle of the Indian Wars, and so much lying and distortion surrounds the tale, that it is now the "Massacre of Wounded Knee."

The truth is that a band of Indians were under arms in violation of the agreements. Many were wearing the Ghost Shirts of the "kill the whites" Ghost Dance Religion that promised invulnerablity. The band in question was finally brought to bay at Wounded Knee and ordered to lay down their arms. They refused.

The soldiers were then ordered to disarm them and that is when the fight broke out. Thirty soldiers were killed and about 150 Indians. The soldiers had Hotchiss guns and were much better armed.

American Horse had tried to stop the Indians from attacking the soldiers but was almost killed for his troubles by his fellow Indians.

The Indians were not un-armed as the modern urban legend goes. The soldiers were part of the Seventh Cavalry, part of Custer's command, and there was no love lost for the Indians they were trying to disarm.

It is completely untrue that unarmed Indians were deliberatly shot down. It is true many died in the cross-fire but c'est la guerre!

We still have such collateral damage. Look at the bombings in WWII for instance. 6000 civilian Frenchmen lost their lives in the Normandy Invasion of D-Day and its aftermath.