why was the vietnam war memorial so controversial? why was the vietnam war memorial so controversial?

It was the reminder that the men who died in Vietnam all had faces and names, as well as friends and families who loved them dearly. Marinesnear Van Truong, from the VC point of view. In the end, the quarry in India was selected. Unlike previous wars, where only still images or short movie newsreels were available for conveying images, this was Americas first television war. History is who we are and why we are the way we are.. Peter Walker and Michael Arad. Im the News & Social Editor at HistoryNet and a World War II researcher with an unparalleled affinity for Sir Winston Churchill, Spitfires, and Michigan football. Holding a competition is like launching a rocket. Crowd at the dedication of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, 1982. General Westmoreland had been promoted to Army Chief of Staff and replaced in Vietnam by Gen. Creighton Abrams. In 1973 a "third" Vietnam war begana continuation, actuallybetween North and South Vietnam but without significant U.S. involvement. The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is a tribute to the dead of the United States ' longest, most unpopular, and least successful war. The women soldiers the nurses suffered too. Throughout the judging process, one of the judges, Grady Clay, had taken meticulous notes of the jurys discussions. Also known as "America's Longest War," U.S. involvement in Vietnam War did not end until 1973. Reagans 1981 inaugural speech exemplified the political rhetoric used by his administration to promote his vision to the American public. The task groups proved effective, as described by John Woods, who jointed as a key advisor. 4. Over several tense weeks, more debate followed, until the Commission of Fine Arts (CFA) and the National Capital Planning Commission (NCPC) gave their approval for a statue and flag in concept, pending suitable placement of those elements. Many people will not comprehend this design until they experience it. Why the Battle for Hamburger Hill Was So Controversial. Warner, at the time married to Elizabeth Taylor, had strong connections to both Hollywood and the corporate world. I had my ear to the ground, Mathias recalled. If all of the names could be in one place, these names would have great powera power to heal. Scruggs took two weeks off from his job at the Department of Labor to develop the idea further. In the nine months since hed been in-country, Scruggs had already seen a lot of action and had been wounded in a battle near Xuan Loc. The choice of the lettering style Optima, designed by Hermann Zapf was a font Lin selected after considering a multitude of options.The font Optima seemed to fit that desire to match an almost printed quality with a hand-cut feel. My background was relatively modest, he said. But, say those opposed, the men represent the women, the men represent all soldiers . Charles Mac Mathias, a Navy veteran of World War II, had been opposed to the war in Vietnam, but he had always respected those who served in it. The whole week was extremely emotional, Becky Scruggs remembered. Ultimately, one of the greatest challenges was how to get that many names on the wall panels in such a short period of time. Because Warner was from Virginia and Mathias from Maryland, the two had worked together on many regional issues. 6. zThe Vietnam Wall Controversy, Round 3, October 1981January 1982, History on Trial, Lehigh University Digital Library, accessed April 21, 2011, https://digital.lib.lehigh.edu/trial/vietnam/r3/october/. William Jayne, who had been wounded in Vietnam, volunteered to head up public relations activities. For years, American society as a whole, regardless of political affiliation, had studiously ignored Vietnam veterans, their presence a painful reminder of the wars moral ambiguity. Perhaps thats an appropriate design for those who would spit on us still. Similarly, casualty totals among the VC and NVA and the number of dead and wounded civilians in North Vietnam cannot be determined exactly. Traumatic memoriessuch as those of police officers brutally beating anti-war protesters at the 1968 Democratic convention in Chicago and members of the National Guard opening fire on students protesting the war at Kent State University in Ohiowere removed, like a tumor, from the body of the nation and assigned to another geographical location: Vietnam. Another article in the same issue of the Post echoed Wolfes definition of the terms of the debate, commenting that: There is a discordance between the sophisticated wall and the unsophisticated statue. Instead, Lin found John Benson, a master stonecutter, to hand cut the text at the apex the years of the earliest and latest casualties from the Department of Defense list and the brief prologue and epilogue adjacent to the dates. Vietnam Veterans Memorial, Washington D.C. Like many veterans, Carhart read Lins design through the lens of his own experience: encountering an America that was at best indifferent and at worst outright hostile towards soldiers returning from Vietnam. We do not seek to make any statement about the correctness of the war, Scruggs said. The military dog tags, flowers, war medals, photographs, and even favorite toys left behind aid the healing process. Popular dark tourism attractions include Auschwitz, Chernobyl and Ground Zero. By early 1980, contributions started to arrive. Its detractors perceived it as a monument to defeat, one that spoke more directly to a nations guilt than to the honor of the war dead and the veterans, describing it as the black gash of shame, the degrading ditch, and a wailing wall for draft dodgers and New Lefters of the future.4 Responding to its lack of narrative content, Senator James Webb called it nihilistic. Interestingly (given their opposing political positions), both the National Review and the New Republic equated the list of names with a police report on a traffic accident. 15. The names are inscribed in the chronological order of their dates of casualty, showing the war as a series of individual human sacrifices and giving each name a special place in history. Movies were dealing more realistically with their issues. Corrections? The VC was effectively finished; it would not field more than 25,00040,000 troops at any time for the remainder of the war. At the time of the memorials design, many veterans who had been exposed to Agent Orange, a chemical weapon used by the U.S. military as an herbicide and defoliant, still suffered ongoing health problems. With the jury selected, the next task was to announce and promote the competition. The controversy overshadowed the mission and what we were doing, until the Salute brought it all together. Today, The Wall continues to be the most-visited memorial on the National Mall, attracting more than five million people each year. Usually it refers to the period when the United States and other members of the SEATO (Southeast Asia Treaty Organization) joined the forces with the Republic of South Vietnam to contest communist forces, comprised of South Vietnamese guerrillas and regular-force units, generally known as Viet Cong (VC), and . Mathias and Warner continually stressed that their objective was to provide the country with a symbol for reconciliation. On the other side, the same thing was occurring, with even more inflated numbersvastly more. The first cut was further reduced to 90 by midday Wednesday. The Three Soldiers, 198284. On August 2, two North Vietnamese torpedo boats in broad daylight engaged USS Maddox, which was gathering communications intelligence in the Gulf of Tonkin. Military personnel, including nurses, were warned not to wear their uniforms in the States. 1. South Korea: 50,000 The VC were often supplemented by units of the Peoples Army of Vietnam (PAVN), more often called simply the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) by those fighting against it. To make matters worse, Diem responded by sending troops to raid pagodas. Instead they found bitterness and discontent and they were often disliked by the public. Mai also remembers being annoyed when her playtime was interrupted by the air-raid sirens. Just as the American people could be a part of building the Memorial through their contributions and support, they could also have an opportunity to participate in its design. Healing meant many things to many people. Some observers attributed this factor to Maya Lins presence on the jurying panel, which also included victims families, political appointees, curators, and other artists.17 It was even announced at one point that Walkers and Arads design resembled a sketch that Lin had made for the sort of memorial that might be placed at the site.18 Like Lins design for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, Reflecting Absence was criticized for failing to incorporate any representations of human figures, its minimal design interpreted as a rejection of codes of heroism.19 In a practical reenactment of the negotiation of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, the addition of a representational statue of three firefighters hoisting a flag at Ground Zero was proposed. With such an overwhelming response to the competition, logistics became an issue. Despite the stated wishes of the VVMF, Lins design proved instantaneously divisive. Every 15 minutes, there was a pause for prayer. The U.S., which had been gradually exerting influence after the departure of the French government, backed Diem in order to limit the area under communist control. Cambodia I remember The Washington Post had pages and pages of stories in the A section. Vietnam veterans were, at long last, receiving the recognition they deserved. I heard there was a group of serious veterans, not just people getting together to have a beer in the evening, but a group that was serious about getting together to address the problems of the veterans.. North Vietnam Medals, toys, flowers, photographsanything and everything is left at The Wall as family and friends seek to remember their loved ones who made the ultimate sacrifice in Vietnam. Spreiregen, a graduate of the MIT School of Architecture and Planning, was a Fulbright Scholar who had served as the director of urban design programs at the American Institute of Architects (AIA) from 1962-66 and as the first director of architecture programs at the National Endowment for the Arts from 1966-70. They responded quickly, recapturing lost ground and decimating an enemy who had finally come out to fight in the open. Communist losses were extremely heavy. The hope is that the creation of the Memorial will begin a healing process, Doubek wrote. The timing and scale of the offensive caught ARVN, the U.S. and other SEATO troops by surprise, however. That would have made any negotiation with Ho politically ticklish. Their initial timeline was aggressive, with an ultimate goal of dedicating the Memorial on Veterans Day 1982just a little more than 36 months away. The senior staffers were against it. First Inaugural Address (January 20, 1981), Ronald Wilson Reagan, Miller Center For Public Affairs, University of Virginia, accessed April 21, 2011, https://millercenter.org/scripps/archive/speeches/detail/3407. At 21 and still an undergraduate, Linconceived her design as creating a park within a park a quiet protected place unto itself, yet harmonious with the overall plan of Constitution Gardens. Because he possessed great knowledge of history, he understood the extensive healing process required after war. Waiting meant they would never reach their dedication deadline of November 11, 1982. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. The In Memory plaque, dedicated in 2004, is near The Three Servicemen and honors the men and women who died as a result of their service in Vietnam. I just kept thinking to myself how quiet it was, and yet there was an immense feeling of community. The war became the central rallying point of a burgeoning youth counterculture, and the coming years would see many such demonstrations, dividing generations and families.. On Christmas Eve, in Saigon, a VC set off an explosive at the American officers billet in the old Brink Hotel, killing two Americans and 51 South Vietnamese. Or, people would tell me, Well why did you let him go? Of course, what choice do you have?. Buddhists, who comprised South Vietnams majority, claimed Diem, a Catholic, favored citizens of his religion in distributing aid. In late spring 1969, American and South . The communist takeover of China and subsequent war in Korea (1950-53) against North Korean and Chinese troops had focused a great deal of attention on Southeast Asia as a place to take a strong stand against the spread of communism. It set the tone for the ensuing cultural debates pitting the people against the elites, as found in Tom Wolfes criticism of Lins memorial design. Ultimately, the Commission of Fine Arts, which had the final say in the matter, overruled Lins objections. Lin knew it was critical to maintain the simplicity of the design throughout the design development and construction process.