Strategy of Confrontation

Mayor ACTION

Place an available Tactics Card from the Tactics deck in the Current Tactics space on the board (it is now active). You may choose any of the available Tactics Cards (you do not need to draw randomly).

NOTE: Return any previously activated card to the Tactics deck - Only one Tactics Card can be active at any time.

The Strategy of Confrontation (via Connecting the Windy City) - read the full report here.

September 7, 1968 – Mayor Richard J. Daley releases “The Strategy of Confrontation,” a 77-page report that chronicles the disturbances that took place in the city during the Democratic convention two weeks earlier.  The report claims “to point out the nature and strategy of confrontation as it was employed in Chicago,” [Chicago Tribune, September 8, 1968] It pinpoints the origin of the disturbances as November 16, 1967 when Jerry Rubin, the leader of the Youth International Party, issues a call to demonstrators to come to Chicago and “Bring pot, fake delegates’ cards, smoke bombs, costumes, blood to throw and all kinds of interesting props.  Also football helmets.”  Others blamed for the violence were Rennie Davis, Chicago coordinator for the National Mobilization Committee to end the War in Vietnam; David Dellinger, national chairman for that committee; Tom Hayden, one of the founders of the Students for a Democratic Society; and Abbie Hoffman, an associate of Rubin’s.  The report also indicts the news media for aiming “malice to the authorities while presuming good will and sincerity on the part of the protestors,” leading to “ugly and distasteful scenes … reported all over the nation and the world without sufficient explanation to allow the reports to be placed in perspective.”  The city’s Corporation Counsel, Raymond F. Simon, with the help of the police, the United States attorney’s office, and the city law department, is responsible for the report that concludes that the ultimate goal of the protestors “was to topple what they consider to be the corrupt institutions of our society, education, governmental, etc., by impeding and if possible halting their normal functions while exposing the authorities to ridicule and embarrassment."