Unbeknownst to the Lakota, big corporations wanted the uranium from their land but they were very much aware of a lot of violence on the Pine Ridge and Rosebud reservations and many of their people were being killed. This is why the elderly Jumping Bull couple of Oglala asked for AIM protection. This is how Peltier and others came to be there. It is traditional to help the people especially the elderly. Here is an excerpt on events of that era, in fact, of the day the shootout took place. "According to the 1868 Fort Laramie Treaty between the Lakota Nation and the U.S., all land transfers or changes in the terms of a treaty must be approved by 2/3 of the adult male Lakota. On June 26, 1975, Dick Wilson, the corrupt Tribal chairperson, illegally signed away to the U.S. government complete control of 1/8 of the Pine Ridge reservation--133,000 acres of Tribal land--in clear violation of the 1868 Treaty. The Interior Department is now permitting exploration for uranium on this land." --William M. Kunstler (1919-1995); 1979. Kunstler goes on to say, "Several facts have been reports which suggest that the FBI was prepared on June 26 to provoke a violent incident which would preemt opposition to this land transfer: BIA policemen were warned that there would be 'trouble' on the 26th and to remove their families from the Oglala area; FBI agents and a SWAT team were sent to perform a routine function which ordinarily would have been handled by a BIA patrolman; and, in the week before the incident, at least 40 agents were added to the already substantial FBI force stationed near the reservation." WMK, 1979; Northern Sun News, Mordecai Specktor; in a Leonard Peltier Support Group Publication.