Thousands mark 25th anniversary of Vietnam Veterans Memorial [View All]

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Thousands mark 25th anniversary of Vietnam Veterans Memorial
By Patrick Thornton, Stars and Stripes
Stars and Stripes online edition, Monday, November 12, 2007


America’s most controversial war gave way to its most memorable war memorial.

The polished black granite of the Vietnam War Memorial is engraved with 58,256 names of fallen soldiers, but its impact has gone far beyond those who died in Vietnam, their family members and Vietnam veterans. Veterans from ongoing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have come to the wall to help heal their wounds, and many Americans with no connections to recent wars visit the memorial.

On Veteran’s Day, 25 years after the Vietnam War Memorial was completed, thousands of veterans, their family members and others came to pay tribute to a memorial that has transcended generations and American culture. Vietnam veteran and retired Army Gen. Colin Powell gave the keynote address at the 25th anniversary ceremonies, which was led by Jan Scruggs, founder and President of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund.

Few, if any, ever imagined that two 75-foot pieces of rock that carve into the Earth could have ever meant this much to a nation or have been so cathartic to a generation of soldiers who fought in a tense, bloody and unpopular war.

“How could this gravestone to those who died in one of America’s most controversial, and perhaps most unpopular war, come to occupy such a wonderful, remarkable place in America’s collective heart,” Powell wondered before describing the power of the Wall. “The Wall came at a time when we desperately needed something to help heal a nation that had been deeply wounded by Vietnam and by other traumatic events in the 1960s and 1970s,”

Edie Meeks, board member of the Vietnam Women’s Memorial Foundation and nurse during the War, remembers being told by fellow nurses, “be sure to take your uniform off as soon as you get stateside. Things aren’t pretty for anyone in uniform.”


Rest of article at: http://stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=50224