Washington: Thousands of protesters marched through the nation's capital on Sunday to urge immediate withdrawal of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan.
Many of the protesters directed their anger squarely at President Barack Obama.
At least eight people, including activist Cindy Sheehan, were arrested by US Park Police at the end of the march, after laying coffins at a fence outside the White House.
Saturday marked the seventh anniversary of the US-led invasion of Iraq.
"Arrest that war criminal!" Sheehan shouted outside the White House before her arrest, referring to Obama.
At a rally before the march, Sheehan asked whether "the honeymoon was over with that war criminal in the White House", an apparent reference to Obama.
The protesters defied orders to clear the sidewalk on Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House and park police say they face charges of failure to obey a lawful order.
Activist Ralph Nader told thousands who gathered in Lafayette Park across from the White House that Obama has essentially continued the policies of the Bush administration.
"He's kept Guantanamo open, he's continued to use indefinite detention," Nader said. The only real difference, he said is that "Obama's speeches are better."
Others were more conciliatory toward Obama. Shirley Allan carried a sign that read, "President Obama We love you but we need to tell you! Your hands are getting bloody!! Stop it now."
Allan thought it was going too far to call Obama a war criminal but said she is deeply disappointed that the conflicts are continuing.
"He has to know it's unacceptable," Allan said. "I am absolutely disappointed."
The protest organised by Act Now to Stop War and Racism (Answer) drew a smaller crowd than the tens of thousands who marched in 2006 and 2007.
Protests in cities around the country also had far fewer participants than in the past.
San Francisco's rally brought out Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the top-secret Pentagon Papers study of the Vietnam War and is the subject of the recent documentary film, The Most Dangerous Man in America.
He likened the protest and others like it around the country to a day of demonstrations organised against the conflict in Vietnam in 1969.
"They thought it had no effect," he told the crowd in San Francisco, referring to the 1969 protesters. "They were wrong."
EProtesters in Washington stopped at the offices of military contractor Halliburton, where they tore apart an effigy of former Vice President and Halliburton Chief Executive Dick Cheney.
Anna Berlinrut was one of a number of protesters who have children who have served in Iraq, and said her son supports her protests.
"If there were a draft, we'd have a million people out here," Berlinrut said when asked about the turnout.
The exact number of protesters was unclear, as D.C. authorities do not give out crowd estimates. Organisers estimated the march, which stretched for several blocks, at 10,000.
In New York City, a few dozen enthusiastic protesters gathered near a military recruiting station in Times Square, though they were far outnumbered by disinterested tourists.
In Los Angeles, hundreds chanted anti-war slogans and carried mock tombstones, and several hundred gathered in San Francisco.
The Los Angeles march, which was under a mile, was to culminate with a rally in front of the famed Grauman's Chinese Theater.
"We want to see the troops out of Afghanistan and Iraq," said Corazon Esguerra with Answer. "We want all the troops wherever they are to come back."
