COLORADO SPRINGS — With a squadron of vintage World War II planes thundering overheard and thousands of soldiers and airmen on the march, the Red White and Brave Welcome Home Parade drew an estimated 45,000 people downtown.
The parade began at 10 a.m. Saturday with floats, marching bands and thousands of troops heading down North Tejon Street from East St. Vrain Street to East Vermijo Avenue.
Parking downtown became nearly impossible as people packed 12-deep along the route. Fort Carson soldiers, many of whom have served in Iraq three times, drew the biggest cheers.
The last parade of this magnitude to welcome home troops fighting in Iraq in 2004 drew a crowd estimated at more than 50,000.
With the Iraq war still going after six years and the 8-year-old Afghanistan war heating up again, organizers wanted to give the community a chance to thank local troops for their sacrifices, spawning the parade idea earlier this year.
For troops and their families, the parade worked as planned.
Along with the military supporters, the route was dotted with a handful of protesters packing signs that said “War No More.”
Coloradans For Peace issued a news release saying the event is inappropriate because it glorifies war.
The military boosters, who vastly outnumbered parade opponents, didn’t seem to mind the protest.
“It’s America, they have the right,” said retired Army Sgt. 1st Class Kent Crow, a Vietnam veteran who came to cheer the troops.
“It’s so minor here, it doesn’t make an impact.”
Fort Carson’s 4th Brigade Combat Team is deployed in Afghanistan.
Some of the soldiers marching in Saturday’s parade said they were with the 1st Brigade Combat Team and returned from Iraq in March.
Both brigades are part of the 4th Infantry Division.
“This is wonderful,” Nancy Murray of Colorado Springs said from her sidewalk vantage point. “It’s great to see the community support the troops. We need to see more of this.”
Ray Sanderfer, a Navy veteran living in Colorado Springs, walked briskly through the servicemen and servicewomen as they waited for the parade to start, shaking one hand after another and saying, “Thank you. Thank you.”
“The sacrifices these guys make is far beyond anything we do in everyday life,” Sanderfer said.
Fort Carson has paid a heavy price since the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan began, having lost at least 264 soldiers in the two conflicts, including 10 killed since June in a rash of Afghan attacks.
On Friday, the military announced that Pfc. Matthew E. Wildes of Fort Carson’s 4th Brigade Combat Team had been killed in Afghanistan. The 18-year-old from Hammond, La., was killed when an improvised bomb hit his convoy.
His body arrived at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware on Saturday. As of Friday, 730 members of the military have died in Afghanistan.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
