McCormick Place, site of the upcoming NATO summit in Chicago, Illinois. Operation Red Zone, a security perimeter around the site, will be patrolled by federal law enforcement carrying "non-lethal" guns. (Photo: Chicago Man) If there is going to be a dress rehearsal for the coming NATO summit in Chicago, May Day is it. The first major mobilization of the 99 percent the month of the summit will take place on Tuesday, May 1. It will also, coincidentally or not, be the first day that police in "battle" dress hit the streets to prepare for the summit.
Operation Red Zone, a security perimeter around McCormick Place where the summits will be held and a "vast" area in downtown Chicago where federal and local government offices are located, according to the Sun-Times, will be patrolled by federal law enforcement carrying "non-lethal" guns beginning Tuesday.
The placement of the "red zone" may overlap with the planned route of the May Day march, which will go from Union Park, on Chicago's near southwest side, to Federal Plaza downtown.
The police force will be "highly visible," according to Cleophas Bradley, deputy regional director with the Federal Protective Service, "but we will not be preventing anyone from entering the red zone."
"This is the city showing us their cards," said Crystal Vance-Guerra, an organizer with Occupy el Barrio, which operates in Chicago's immigrant neighborhood of Pilsen. "This is how they are going to play it."
