He cited the growing coalition was a prime example of its not what you know, its who you know. These people, though a small group, were able to reach out to their networks and their extensive contacts to recruit the type of expertise and support required for such a mammoth initiative. No government funds would be necessary. All of us together, in and out of government, must bear the burden.12. 1. Memory Foundations (planned design for former site of World Trade Center in lower Manhattan, New York). American Artist discusses science fiction in the context of contemporary art and the concept of Colored Time.. 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. On November 8, 1979, VVMF held a press conference in which Mathias, Warner, and several others announced the introduction of legislation to grant two acres of land near the Lincoln Memorial for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. 3. Ike may not have seen the message, but at any rate he was focused on establishing NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) as a wall against additional communist advances in Europe and was intent on securing Frances participation in NATO. We do not seek to make any statement about the correctness of the war, Scruggs said. Over 1 million wounded, 50,000 plus civilian Buddhists, who comprised South Vietnams majority, claimed Diem, a Catholic, favored citizens of his religion in distributing aid. 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. When the time came, however, Diem resisted the elections; the more populous north would certainly win. As conservatives sought to consolidate their gains following Reagans election, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial controversy presented an opportunity for conservatives to harness both the affective power of the veterans fury and the resulting public outcry on their behalf. Scruggs would never forget the awful scene. Early in his efforts Scruggs had called on Emogene Cupp, then the national president of the American Gold Star Mothers. The memorial consists of three parts: the Three Servicemen Statue, the Vietnam Women's Memorial, and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall. 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. Congress swiftly passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution that removed most restrictions from the president in regards to Vietnam. One example, cited in Grab Their Belts to Fight Them: The Viet Congs Big-Unit War Against the U.S., 19651966, by Warren Wilkins, is a description of the first major battle between the VC and American ForcesU.S. The memorial was built to honor that spirit and the sacrifice of so many who gave everything they had to give. The Memorials walls point to the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial, thus bringing the Memorial into the historical context of our country. Within months after he recovered from his wounds and returned to his unit, the American public was learning the details of the events at My Lai. 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. Guerrilla warfare (asymmetrical warfare) does not permit such clear-cut data. But the fact that the language deployed to critique Arads and Walkers design so closely echoed the criticism launched against Lin in the early 1980s signifies that the debates of that era remain unresolved. Why was the Vietnam women's memorial so significant? 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. The first phase encompassed the detail planning and preparations for holding the competition, said Spreiregen. 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. 170,000220,000 military The Vietnam War is the commonly used name for the Second Indochina War, 19541975. An article by Hugh Sidey in the February 22, 1982, issue ofTIMEmagazine described the session: A few days ago, 40 supporters and critics of the memorial gathered to try to break the impasse that threatened the memorial because of such features as the black color of the stone and its position below ground level. Could a memorial accomplish such an enormous and daunting task? South Korea: 50,000 Oooo, not any more, not any more. He organized the advisors and volunteers into task groups: public relations, financial management, fund raising, legislation, site selection, and design/construction. 4 (Summer 1996): 685. We do not memorialize bus accidents, which by nature are contextless, meaningless. PDF Vietnam War Answer Key Pdf Full PDF - web1.willowwoodco.com 4) It defied spatial perception. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. For weeks, heated discussions took place around the topic of who should be part of the design jury. PDF A New World - US History Options Security was improving even as American forces were in the process of withdrawing. But instead of enthusiasm, he received skepticism. That same month, Kennedy himself was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. Vietnam Veterans Memorial - National Park Service The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) advised that was not the caseAmerica had a strong military presence in the Pacific that would serve as a deterrent. I am always incredibly moved and heartened, especially when a veteran tells me that The Wall has helped them in some wayit could not mean more to me. 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. By 1979, the country was beginning to have more positive feelings toward Vietnam veterans. His political party, the Democrats, had been blamed for China falling to communism; withdrawing from Vietnam could hurt them in the 1964 elections. Ibid. One needs no artistic education to see this design for what it is, a black trench that scars the Mall. For example, veteran Tom Carhart famously commented: I dont care about artistic perceptions, I dont care about the rationalizations that abound. Thirty years later, it is difficult to think of her memorial as a controversial work of art. Adding to Americans disillusionment was the race issue. Which Secretary of the Interior James Watt then threatens to scuttle! . 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. He was in Vietnam, serving in the 199th Light Infantry Brigade. Color meant nothing on the battlefields of Korea and Vietnam. 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. 2. Unlike previous wars, where only still images or short movie newsreels were available for conveying images, this was Americas first television war. Some felt that the money to build a memorial could be better spent delivering the many services veterans needed. 13. In the nine months since he'd been in-country, Scruggs had already seen a lot of action and had been wounded in a battle near Xuan Loc. Jan came to our headquarters to see if we had any room to help them get started, Cupp remembered. I had my ear to the ground, Mathias recalled. This presented the new MACV commander (Military Assistance Command, Vietnam), General William C. Westmoreland with a thorny challenge: how to show the American people progress was being made. 12 (2006): 95. Additionally, the emergence of Park51the proposed Muslim community and cultural center to be located a few blocks from the former World Trade Center siteas a major point of public interest and debate, which peaked during the 2010 congressional elections, confirms the continued political potency and cultural power of memorials as embodiments of representational practice. As the commentaries of Wolfe, the New Republic, and the National Review demonstrate, the media was happy to add fuel to the fire of the veterans indignation through editorial contributions and obsessive coverage of the debate. 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. 1. Scruggs was raised in a rural Maryland town between Baltimore and Washington, D.C. His mother was a waitress; his father a milkman. It was also a hard-earned victory, leaving more than 300 U.S. However, the years that saw the memorials proposal, design, and construction1980 to 1982coincided with a momentous shift in the topography of American political culture: the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980 and the ensuing negotiation of a new federal agenda. This grew into the operation known as Rolling Thunder that began on March 2, 1965, and continued to November 2, 1968. Others: 80,000 plus, 200,000400,000 civilians 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 (195575). Ho attempted to contact Eisenhower to discuss Vietnam but received no answer. Maya Lin worked closely with Cooper-Lecky on all aesthetic aspects of the design. The Vietnam War Starts In 1954, following the defeat of the French colonialists at the hands of the Viet Minh at Dien Bien Phu, the last battle of the First Indochina War, the country of. 4. For the millions of people who visit each year, Maya Lin's Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall sends a chilling message about war, heroism, and sacrifice. Why Were Vietnam War Vets Treated Poorly When They . Just before Christmas 1979, Warner hosted a fundraising breakfast in his Georgetown home. They came from veterans and from the neighbors, teachers, coaches and friends of veterans. 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. As Scruggs had always envisioned, the Memorial would feature all of the names of those who had died. However, the media was not the only entity invested in the veterans compelling predicament. As a senior at Yale University, Lin entered a nationwide competition sponsored by the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, and her design was selected from the more than 1,400 submissions that were received. In response to the designs submitted to these various competitions (generated by famed architects, artists, and members of the general public alike), conflicting interpretations once again revolved around notions of elitism versus populismharkening back to the language of the controversy over Lins memorial.14 In a 2002 debate with architect Daniel Libeskind on the matter, New Republic literary editor Leon Wieseltier commented, There is something a little grotesque in the interpretation of Ground Zero as a lucky break for art. The greatest challenge VVMF faced, said Doubek, was to put together a functioning organization with people who didnt know one another, people who were very young and didnt have a lot of experience. It seemed unconscionable that heor anyone elseshould be allowed to forget. You may have been tear-choked as you touched or watched others touch "the Wall" at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, the most visited war memorial in our nation's capital. The administration was caught by surprise, however, when Diem was murdered during the coup, which was led by General Duong Van Minh. They came from all parts of the country and represented every state. Ironically, the leadership of North Vietnam came to a similar conclusion: they had to inflict enough casualties on Americans to end support for the war on the U.S. homefront and force a withdrawal before the U.S. could build up sufficient numbers of men and material to defeat them. 3) It provoked antiwar sentiment. In the early 20th century, Vietnamese nationalism began to rise, clashing with the French colonial rulers. Why reinforce the bourgeoisies pathetic illusions? . Jack was the visionary, the creative, big-picture guy. General Westmoreland had been promoted to Army Chief of Staff and replaced in Vietnam by Gen. Creighton Abrams. The Vietnam War is the commonly used name for the Second Indochina War, 1954-1975. To make matters worse, Diem responded by sending troops to raid pagodas. Joe Biden's slogan that it was time "to end the forever war" in Afghanistan was called imbecilic by former Prime Minister Tony Blair. Republican Richard Nixon won the presidency in the fall elections. Scruggs added: Make this place look like an airstrike was called in, he instructed. The Three Soldiers - Wikipedia He, in turn, called the Buddhists VC sympathizers. Subscribe to receive our weekly newsletter with top stories from master historians. Mathias had grown increasingly concerned about how veterans had been treated on their return. By Thursday morning, it was down to 39. 400,000 1 million military As soon as the design was chosen,the next step was to consider the all-important details of getting it built. Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. Paul Haagas spouse, Heather Sturt Haaga, soon came forward to lend her experience in fund raising. By years end, 23,000 American military personnel would be in South Vietnam. 7. By the time he returned home, three months after the explosion, the country was even further divided. Associated Press correspondent Malcolm Mal Browne photographed him sitting quietly in the lotus position as the flames consumed him. On the other hand, Congress had never declared war and so the president was limited in what he could do in Southeast Asia. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. End-to-end, the total number of submissions would have stretched one and one third linear miles. On that January day, There was a big explosion, Scruggs recalled. Intellectually and emotionally, America could embrace the idea. Reflecting Absence (planned design for memorial to victims of attacks on the World Trade Center, September 11, 2001). Because Warner was from Virginia and Mathias from Maryland, the two had worked together on many regional issues. I just kept thinking to myself how quiet it was, and yet there was an immense feeling of community. The jurors began by touring the site and then returned to Hangar #3 at Andrews to view each of the 1,421 designs individually. Although differences in the two bills required a Conference Committee to meet, on July 1, at a White House Rose Garden ceremony, President Jimmy Carter signed legislation providing two acres for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial on the National Mall. But how and where could all of the submissions be displayed? The effects of U.S. involvement, the impact of an individual's participation, political decisions and the politics of decision-making are still felt. 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. We had been friends for a long time, Mathias said. Her only son Robert, an Army draftee, was killed by a land mine on his 21st birthday, June 6, 1968. But it is increasingly clear to this reporter that the only rational way out then will be to negotiate, not as victors, but as an honorable people who lived up to their pledge to defend democracy, and did the best they could. Frances military involvement in Vietnam began when it sent warships in 1847, ostensibly to protect Christians from the ruling emperor Gia Long. . William Jayne, who had been wounded in Vietnam, volunteered to head up public relations activities. In accordance with the strict competition guidelines, anonymity of all designs was carefully observed. We are all equal in combat. 1. As Michael Clark points out in the essay, Remembering Vietnam, by the late 1960s, Hollywood and the mass media seized on this aspect of the veteran experience, creating variations of a fictionalized veteran who threatened at every moment to bring the war home with him in the form of flashbacks that turned firecrackers into artillery and passersby into the enemy.10 In Clarks analysis, these depictions of veterans served, for nonmilitary American citizens, as a way to launder the violence of the war by relegating it to some other place: Southeast Asia, and the [veterans] psychotic unconscious.11 Such representations enabled film viewers to reframe their experiences of the contemporaneous violence occurring at home, on American soil. In late spring 1969, American and South . By endowing memorials with the ability to accomplish these tasks, we bestow them with an extraordinary amount of power and authority. The added component of military security made the location even more attractive, since it would ensure no interference with the designs or the judging. North Vietnam spent two years rebuilding its military; South Vietnam was hamstrung in its responses by a fear the U.S. Congress would cut off all aid if it took military action against communist buildup. During the Second World War, Vichy France could do little to protect its colony from Japanese occupation. Vietnam Veterans Memorial - Washington DC Updates? They needed support, friendship and help. Every 15 minutes, there was a pause for prayer. Vietnam has a long history of being ruled by foreign powers, and this led many Vietnamese to see the United States involvement in their country as neo-colonialism. Millionaire H. Ross Perot made a sizeable donation. A few preliminary concepts were embraced. On January 27, 1973, peace accords were signed between North Vietnam and the U.S. The selected design then had to go through Federal agency approval and development into finished plans. The jury included: architects Pietro Belluschi and Harry Weese; landscape architects Hideo Sasaki and Garrett Eckbo; sculptors Costantino Nivola, Richard Hunt, and James Rosati; and Grady Clay, a journalist and editor of Landscape Architecture magazine. Eventually, a compromise was reached with the commissioning of a traditional statue depicting three servicemen with a flag to stand at the entrance to the memorial. Ultimately, one of the greatest challenges was how to get that many names on the wall panels in such a short period of time. Omissions? Although the United States won the war in a numerical sense, having far less casualties than North Vietnam, the U.S. did not accomplish what they had set out to do. The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is a tribute to the dead of the United States ' longest, most unpopular, and least successful war. Sturken, 320. My background was relatively modest, he said. When Scruggs went to see the movie in early 1979, it wasnt the graphic war scenes that haunted him. By the time of World War II, a number of groups sought Vietnamese independence but as Vo Nguyen Giapwho would build Vietnams postWWII armyexpressed it, the communists were the best organized and most action-oriented of these groups. This alliance between the veterans and their conservative defenders was a new one, forged as a direct result of the cultural battle over the memorial site. Direct mail was proving to be a highly effective fundraising tool. Having chosen Libeskinds overarching vision, titled Memory Foundations, in February 2003, the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation (tasked with coordinating the redevelopment of lower Manhattan and administering the nearly $10 billion in federal funds devoted to supporting that effort) two months later announced the memorial design competition. Furthermore, he explicitly framed his interpretation of the memorial in (perceived) opposition to an explicitly artistic perspective. Everyone wanted to join the effort. To treat the Vietnam dead like the victims of some monstrous traffic accident is more than a disservice to history; it is a disservice to the memory of the 57,000.5. It was the most thoughtful and thorough discussion of design that I have ever heard, and I have heard many, he recalled. In November, a coup deposed Diem, with the blessing of Kennedys administration, which had quietly assured South Vietnams military leaders it was not adverse to a change in leadership and military aid would continue. 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. Bronze. The priorities were to launch fund raising and achieve passage of the authorizing legislation. Vietnam Veterans Memorial - U.S. Department of Defense Perhaps Lins centralitytwenty years after the construction of the Vietnam Veterans Memorialto the debate over Arads and Walkers design was inevitable, given her presence on the design competitions selection committee as well as her legacy as the definitive memorial builder of the late twentieth century. They were unwrapped, number coded, photographed for the record, and prepared for display. News footage showed the fighting in Saigon and Hue. An air war was the most that could be done north of the 17th parallel, because the use of ground troops had been ruled out. But can America truly mean that we should feel honored by that black pit?6. If all of the names could be in one place, these names would have great powera power to heal. 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. A s memorials are objects of public commemoration, we demand a lot of them. They serve as testaments to lives lost, as repositories of grief, and to facilitate processes of mourning. The women soldiers the nurses suffered too. 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. They did not like the idea that it was below ground level. An electrical storm was interfering with the ships radar and may have given the impression of approaching attack boats. Although thousands of people were there, It was so very quiet, Wheeler recalled. The whole week was extremely emotional, Becky Scruggs remembered. Initially, however, homefront support for the war effort grew, but by March Americans, perceiving no change in strategy that would bring the war to a conclusion, became increasingly disillusioned. The eldest juror, Pietro Belluschi, took a full day, said Spreiregen. Not only was Harts statue included at the memorial site, but a flagpole was added as well. Each contestant sealed his or her name in an envelope and taped it to the back of the submission. Success was measured in body count. It was to be a war of attrition and statistics, a policy that suited Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, who distrusted the military and often bypassed the Joint Chiefs of Staff in issuing directives. The flag-waving crowds even cheered., Over the four days there were also workshops, parties, events, and reunions. This development was shaped by the theories of economic neoliberals on the one hand and by the values of their socially conservative allies on the other. 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. We expect them to do the work of history writing, to draw single comprehensible narratives out of a Gorgons nest of individual, often contradictory, experiences. 1. That bothered him. Although Americas war in Vietnam failed to salvage the Republic of South Vietnam, it bought time in which neighboring countries improved their economies and defensive capabilities, and it may have discouraged greater communist activism in places like the Philippines. VVMF met the prospective jurors and scrutinized their credentials. It consists of a black granite wall with the names of over 58,000 soldiers who were killed or went missing in action inscribed on it. All of them realized how critical it was that a memorial be apolitical. Or, people would tell me, Well why did you let him go? Of course, what choice do you have?. 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/. North Vietnam Sturken notes, "the memorial was seen as a monument to defeat, one that spoke more directly to a nation's guilt than to the honor of the war dead and the veterans." The disagreements over the design revealed anxiety about ownership of the war's representation. The Three Soldiers, 198284. After working alone for six months, Doubek was joined on the staff by Kathy Kielich, who served as the Office Manager throughout the project. . 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? How were Vietnam veterans treated when they returned from the war? Why was Lin's Vietnam Veterans Memorial initially controversial? 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. Their military experience meant they had contacts far and wide, at all levels of all professions, within government and the private sector. Nonsense. The Vietnam Veterans Memorial, located in Washington D.C., is a tribute to the soldiers who served in the Vietnam War. Far from being a fait accompli, amassing the public will to support this new agenda took real work. You had to live through that period to really understand it. In 1993 the Vietnam Womens Memorial was unveiled a short distance from the wall. 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. Casualties for the Republic of South Vietnam will never be adequately resolved. The wall is the centerpiece of the memorial and is made up of two black granite walls, each 246 feet in length and 10 feet in height. These meanings serve as unifying forces, reinforcing the idea of a shared national identity and healing rifts in the communal experience of nationhood. The Vietnam Veterans Memorial: from Controversy to Healing Sturken, 322. American involvement began to escalate under President John F. Kennedys administration (January 1961November 1963). They found that they were very real people who did many of the same things they did, recalled Spreiregen. Because the U.S. failed to achieve a military victory and the Republic of South Vietnam was ultimately taken over by North Vietnam, the Vietnam experience became known as the only war America ever lost. It remains a very controversial topic that continues to affect political and military decisions today. To created credibility for the fledgling effort, they formed the National Sponsoring Committee, which included then-first lady Rosalynn Carter, former President Gerald Ford, Bob Hope, future first lady Nancy Reagan, Gen. William C. Westmoreland, USA, Vietnam veteran author James Webb, and Adm. James J. Stockdale, USN. An ad hoc group of veterans had scheduled a meeting to try to use Vietnam Veterans Week to generate publicity for veterans need, and Scruggs thought that would be a good time to announce his plans. Jan C. Scruggs, a wounded Vietnam War vet, studied what is now called post-traumatic stress disorder upon his return to. For the first time, MACV worked with South Vietnams government to create annual plans. He found that returning veterans were finding it hard to trust people.