Vietnam Veterans Memorial

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May 25

Vietnam War

Communist launch new offensive, 1968

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Dedicated in 1982, this memorial, commonly called “The Wall,” honors the members of the U.S. armed forces who served in the Vietnam War (1954-75). The memorial, designed by Maya Lin, consists of a black granite V-shaped wall inscribed with the names of the more than 58,000 Americans who were killed or missing in the war. Lin, who was a student at Yale University when she won a national competition to design the memorial, has said she wanted to create an elegantly simple tribute that steered clear of the controversies surrounding the war and allowed “everyone to respond and remember.”

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