To achieve this effect she chose polished black granite for the walls. and was so hurt by the controversy . The controversy surrounding the memorial instantly vanished from the pages of the press, replaced by celebrations of its interactivity, tranquility, and emotive power. Letters came from moms, dads, grandparents, sons and daughters with heartfelt notes accompanied by checks and dollar bills. To make his dream a reality, he planned to get support from people as diverse as former anti-war presidential candidate George McGovern and Gen. William Westmoreland, who commanded U.S. forces in Vietnam. Civilian deaths during that time period were estimated at 2 million, but the U.S. estimate of civilians killed in the north at 30,000. This began a series of destabilizing changes in government leadership. The original design proposal called for all of the names to be individually hand-chiseled in the stone, but it was soon realized the time and money it would take to do that were impractical. 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. Mai also remembers being annoyed when her playtime was interrupted by the air-raid sirens. Why was the memorial so controversial? I have a Master's degree in military history from King's College, London and my cornucopia of interests include: World War II, World War II, and World War II. Similar, even larger, atrocities were conducted by VC and NVA unitssuch as an NVA attack on a Buddhist orphanage at An Hoa in September 1970 or the execution of 5,000 people at Hue during the Tet Offensivebut the concept of American soldiers killing civilians in cold blood was more than many Americans could bear. On June 11, 1963, an elderly Buddhist monk named Thich Quang Duc sat down in the street in front of a pagoda in Saigon to protest Diems policies. 4 Facts About Vietnam Veterans Memorial Controversial History The Vietnam Wall Controversy, Round 4, 1982, History on Trial, Lehigh University Digital Library, accessed April 21, 2011, https://digital.lib.lehigh.edu/trial/vietnam/r4/1982/. Wheeler had the idea to bypass the traditional site selection route and have Congress pass legislation to award a specific area for a memorial site. Scruggs and Doubek began having regular meetings with John P. Wheeler, a graduate of West Point and Harvard Business School. He closed by saying: To say that we are closer to victory today is to believe, in the face of the evidence, the optimists who have been wrong in the past. They set their sights in support of the clear, simple vision Scruggs outlined:to honor the warrior and not the war. American helicopters rescued members of its embassy and flew some South Vietnamese to safety, but most were left behind. This message of personal responsibility, in contrast to governance by an elite group on behalf of individuals, became a hallmark of the Reagan administration. Maya Lins original competition submission for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. The National Review commented, The mode of listing the names makes them individual deaths, not deaths in a cause; they might as well have been traffic accidents. Similarly, the New Republic opined: It is an unfortunate choice of memorial. However, that posed a problem of how tolocate an individual name. It was World War II and her family lived in Nam Dinh, an industrial city and military target on the north coast of Vietnam. They were the only father-son pair to die in Vietnam.) As Scruggs had always envisioned, the Memorial would feature all of the names of those who had died. Descriptions of the desired qualities for the memorial design included harmonious, contemplative and reflective, and again, conciliatory.2 The booklet concluded with the following passage: Finally, we wish to repeat that the memorial is not to be a political statement, and that its purpose is to honor the service and memory of the wars dead, its missing, and its veteransnot the war itself. United States: 540,000 "The veterans were asking me, 'What do you think people are going to do when they first come here?'" Lin recalls. The bronze sculpture, depicting three women caring for an injured soldier, recognized the work of the more than 10,000 women who served in Vietnam. 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. Johnson wanted to focus on instituting Great Society programs at home, but Vietnam was a snake he did not dare let go of. By the end of 1967, there were 540,000 American troops in Vietnam, and the military draft was set to call up 302,000 young men in the coming year, an increase of 72,000 over 1967. The chief design criteria were that the memorial be 1) reflective and contemplative in character; 2) be harmonious with its site and environment, 3) make no political statement about the war itself, and 4) contain the names of all who died or remained missing. The love and acceptance that the American people gave to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial have continued unabated for over 25 years. The Vietnam War is the commonly used name for the Second Indochina War, 1954-1975. No government funds would be necessary. With the seed money from several defense industry donors, especially Grumman Aerospace, VVMF launched its first large-scale direct mail campaign to reach out to the public. Prior war memorials had depicted brave soldiers riding horses, shooting guns, or at some other moment of triumphfor example, the massive Marine Corps War Memorial with its enormous bronze figures raising the American flag over Iwo Jima. Everyone wanted to join the effort. The Vietnam Wall Controversy - About - Overview - Lehigh University This lends a sense of personal intimacy in a public space which helps create a sense of connection to the memorial. Like all stereotypes, this one was unfair. Carhart equated artists and their defenders with individuals who engaged in acts of aggression against returned soldiers, and who were thus correlated with the entirety of the anti-war movement. Then, in October 1980, veteran and lawyer Tom Carhart, also a former supporter, testified before the Commission of Fine Arts (CFA) against the design, saying that One needs no artistic education to see this design for what it is, a black trench that scars the Mall. In this sense, it was a complex ideological battle. And Congress had declared a Vietnam Veterans Week for that April to honor those who had returned home. Dark tourism, also known as black tourism, thanatourism or grief tourism, is tourism that is associated with death or tragedy. Rather, by honoring those who sacrificed, we hope to provide a symbol of national unity and reconciliation.1. 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. The two sections were not unlike North and South in the United States prior to the Civil War; their people did not fully trust each other. Remembering Vietnam | National Archives In fact, throughout the 1970s, there was little political impetus on any front to address these shortcomings. All of us together, in and out of government, must bear the burden.12. Adding to Americans disillusionment was the race issue. Over 500,000 wounded, Explore articles from the HistoryNet archives about Vietnam War. Guerrilla warfare (asymmetrical warfare) does not permit such clear-cut data. This grew into the operation known as Rolling Thunder that began on March 2, 1965, and continued to November 2, 1968. Financial costs had risen to $30 billion a year. At the time, well-managed open design competitions were common in Europe, but not in the United States. Many who visit leave behind items in memoriam to those that have served. Could it heal the chasm within society, promote closure, show gratitude to those who served, comfort those in grief, and remind future generations of the toll wrought by war? Both Scruggss and the VVMFs statements clearly conveyed that the memorial the veterans sought was to be an apolitical tabula rasa that would neither contribute to nor comment upon the unresolved controversies surrounding the war. 6 Things You May Not Know About the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Congress swiftly passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution that removed most restrictions from the president in regards to Vietnam. By 1979, the country was beginning to have more positive feelings toward Vietnam veterans. Mathias and Warner continued to rally support and ferry the legislation. Laos, South Vietnam: 850,000 The South Vietnamese Army was showing improvement, winning 37 of their last 45 major engagements. The following week, Kurt Anderson recapped the festivities for TIME magazine: Saturdays three-hour parade down Constitution Avenue, led by [Gen. William] Westmoreland, was the vets own show. Ms Lin arrived at a design solution to note those that were MIA with a symbol()that could be altered if the service member was found. It would be a way to honor the veterans and to help themand the countryheal. The location secured, the seemingly uncontroversial process of articulating goals for a memorial and staging a competition draws over 1100 entries then the largest such design competition in the United States and the winner is Maya Lin's "Wall. Vietnam Veterans Memorial, also called The Wall, national monument in Washington, D.C., honouring members of the U.S. armed forces who served and died in the Vietnam War (1955-75). Such images pack tremendous emotional punch but often lack context. The first American fatality was Air Force Technical Sergeant Richard B. Fitzgibbon, Jr., killed June 8, 1956. Her only son Robert, an Army draftee, was killed by a land mine on his 21st birthday, June 6, 1968. The construction process hits a snag when relentless and powerful critics, led by Tom Carhart, find an unsavory political message in the supposedly apolitical winning design -- ultimately forcing a compromise, the addition of a flag and a statue with three soldiers to the Wall. On January 21, 1970, Jan Scruggs was having his morning cup of coffee, but he was far from his kitchen table at home. (Ten times as many Vietnamese had fled the north, where the Communist Party was killing off its rivals, seizing property, and oppressing the large Catholic population.) Vietnam veteran Jan Scruggs, the individual to first pitch the idea of a memorial, used $2,800 of his own money to begin the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund in 1979, according to History. The Gold Star Mothers is a group of mothers whose sons or daughters have died serving their country. Black walls, the universal color of shame and sorrow and degradation. Lins minimal plan was in sharp contrast to the traditional format for a memorial, which usually included figurative heroic sculpture. Civilian loss of life was also very heavy, with the lowest estimates around 415,000. The French suffered a major defeat at Dien Bien Phu in 1954, leading to negotiations that ended with the Geneva Agreements, July 21, 1954. Lin moved to Washington and immediately became part of an internal struggle for control of the design. Vietnam Veterans Memorial | Encyclopedia.com 3 (August 2004): 122. Ultimately, the VVMF Board agreed on a jury of the most experienced and prestigious artists and designers that could be found, since it took a mature eye to envision from two-dimensional renderings how a design would look when built. We expect them to do the work of history writing, to draw single comprehensible narratives out of a Gorgon's nest of individual, often contradictory, experiences. The text size is less than half an inch, which is unusual for monument design, but was selected to make the memorial read more like a book. South Vietnam ARVN divisions in the north were surrounded and routed. 10. It was a direct result of the First Indochina War (1946-1954) between France, which claimed Vietnam as a colony, and the communist forces then known as Viet Minh. The Vietnam War is the commonly used name for the Second Indochina War, 19541975. A flower is laid on the names of fallen troops on "The Wall" of the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington on Nov. 12, 2018. . The jurors began by touring the site and then returned to Hangar #3 at Andrews to view each of the 1,421 designs individually. Vietnam Veterans Memorial - National Park Service The first cut was further reduced to 90 by midday Wednesday. Some opponents simply did not like the fact that Lin was a young student, a woman, and of Asian descent; how in the world could she possibly know how to honor the service of the Vietnam veteran? The Vietnam Wall, as it's commonly known, stands as a tribute to the war's veterans, who consider it a tangible symbol that the American people recognized and honored for their service. The Selective Service System during the Vietnam war was highly controversial, especially because early in the war draftees came disproportionately from poor, working-class, rural, and minority populations. Learn more about featured topics of the Vietnam War and Vietnam Era. Movies were dealing more realistically with their issues. The National Park Service archives most of the nonperishable items left at The Wall. Mathias set up a meeting so he could learn more. Black is not a color of shame. Spreiregen recommended having a multi-disciplinary panel: two architects, two landscape architects, two sculptors, and one generalist with extensive knowledge about art, architecture, and design. Hi, Im Claire. One film that came out early that year,The Deer Hunter,explored the effects of war on three friends, their families and a tight-knit community. Also known as "America's Longest War," U.S. involvement in Vietnam War did not end until 1973. Which Secretary of the Interior James Watt then threatens to scuttle! Instead, the memorial became a dividing line between factions both real and imagined. 14. Many had worked together, some in Washington. General Price, along with Senators Warner and Mathias and future Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, gave moving addresses before the command was given, and 150 shovels entered the ground with enthusiastic veterans enjoying the moment. Though a congressional investigative committee the previous year had warned that America could find itself slipping into in a morass that would require more and more military participation in Vietnam, Johnson began a steady escalation of the war, hoping to bring it to a quick conclusion. [3] It was the first representation of an African American on the National Mall. The Vietnam Veterans Memorial stands as a symbol of America's honor and recognition of the men and women who served and sacrificed their lives in the Vietnam War. Top Essentials to Know About the Vietnam War - ThoughtCo In the Shadow of the Washington Monument. Undoubtedly, news media played an important role in Americans saying, Enough. Indeed, Vo Nyugen Giap had always envisioned using media as one of his spear points for victory. Security was improving even as American forces were in the process of withdrawing. 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. They were unwrapped, number coded, photographed for the record, and prepared for display. They serve as testaments to lives lost, as repositories of grief, and to facilitate processes of mourning. The more people you got to co-sponsor, the more people wanted to join.. The Three Soldiers, 198284. Critics of Lins design proposed that a second work be included on the memorial site, as a solution to the problem of the original memorial design: a figurative bronze statue by Frederick Hart of three soldiers in uniform, which had placed third in the initial competition. Healing meant many things to many people. He was in Vietnam, serving in the 199th Light Infantry Brigade. As soon as ground was broken for The Wall in March 1982, planning for its dedication ceremonies began. With the jury selected, the next task was to announce and promote the competition. I was dumbfounded that we had succeeded at doing this. Just before Christmas 1979, Warner hosted a fundraising breakfast in his Georgetown home. Though its location on federally owned property and its maintenance by the National Park Service might imply otherwise, the impetus to create the Vietnam Veterans Memorial came entirely from the private sector and from one man in particular: Jan Scruggs, a Vietnam veteran who had been wounded in the line of duty. Ibid. The memorial, located near the western end of the Mall, is a black granite V-shaped wall inscribed with the names of the approximately 58,000 men and women who were killed or missing in action. American troops had won every major battle they fought, and General Nguyen Van Thieu had come to power in South Vietnam in September; he would remain in office until 1975, bringing a new measure of stability to the government, though he could not end its endemic corruption. Spreiregen wrote, I saw this as a needed opportunity to honor the service and lives of the soldiers we had lost and do so by running a model competition., Arthur Mosley headed the site selection task group and was assisted by John Woods, a structural engineer, who had been permanently disabled in a helicopter crash in Vietnam. It seemed every time they contacted someone, they were greeted with enthusiasm for the idea. Consequently, by the time of the memorials design and construction, veterans had built up a significant amount of moral outrage and found their outlet in the controversy over the memorial. Or, people would tell me, Well why did you let him go? Of course, what choice do you have?. Lin and VVMF eventually selectedthe Cooper-Lecky Partnership as the architect-of-record, with Lin as the projects design consultant. The following February a strategic hamlet program began; it forcibly relocated South Vietnamese peasants to fortified strategic hamlets. Please leave evidence I will report anything other than this 1 See answer Advertisement lheduardomarques 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. Thirty years later, it is difficult to think of her memorial as a controversial work of art. He would never forget those friends. The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall was dedicated in 1982. President Johnson, watching the broadcast, said, If weve lost Walter Cronkite, weve lost the country. In May, Johnson announced he would not run for reelection. Sturken, 322; Anne Swartz, American Art After September 11: A Consideration of the Twin Towers, Symploke 14, nos. It was surreal.. But several weeks after the announcement, a handful of people began to protest the design. On April 27, 1979, Doubek incorporated the fledgling entity, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, and Scruggs asked him to be an officer and director. 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. Never before or since have journalists been given such complete access to cover a war. Scruggs and Doubek realized that Cupp could be instrumental in helping communicate the all-important personal, emotional side of the healing story. Gulf of Tonkin Resolution - Definition, Cause & Significance - HISTORY But, say those opposed, the men represent the women, the men represent all soldiers . (An American medic treated him during World War II, probably saving his life.)