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Military Museums

Jake Cosmos Aller
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Military Museums

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I  recently had the opportunity to tour the new United States Army Museum, which opened last year at Fort Belvoir in Alexandria, VA. It’s open daily from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and accessible by metro bus from the Springfield Metro station on the Blue Line. Admission is free.

The museum moved me deeply. My spouse served 22 years in the U.S. Army before retiring as a major. She lived some of the very history captured on those walls. A trailblazer in her own right, she was the first Korean-born female U.S. Army officer to serve in Korea. That legacy echoes through the museum’s corridors.

Spanning 250 years of Army history, the collection walks you through America’s military evolution — from ragtag militias to global force. As a Civil War buff who’s visited most of the DC-area battlefields, I found myself drawn to the Revolutionary and Civil War halls, which capture the grit and chaos of a country torn and reborn. We didn’t have time to try the VR exhibit, which simulates a battlefield experience in startling clarity — “intense,” they say. Next time, for sure.

US Army Museum

🪖 National Museum of the United States Army – Fort Belvoir, VA

This is the official museum of the U.S. Army, opened on Veterans Day, November 11, 2020, and located just outside Washington, D.C. It’s the first museum to comprehensively tell the story of the Army’s entire history — from 1775 to today.

🧭 Highlights

📍 Visitor Info

⚓ National Museum of the United States Navy – Washington, D.C.

on my bucket list for my next trip to DC

Located at the Washington Navy Yard, this is the flagship museum of the U.S. Navy, chronicling naval history from the American Revolution to modern operations.

🧭 Highlights

📍 Visitor Info

✈️ National Museum of the United States Air Force – Dayton, Ohio

This is the world’s largest military aviation museum, located at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. It spans over 19 acres of indoor exhibits and features more than 350 aerospace vehicles and missiles.

🧭 Highlights

📍 Visitor Info

🪖 Military Museums Worth Traveling For

This visit sparked a deeper dive into other museums that carry the weight of war, memory, and identity — some stateside, some abroad, each revealing a different face of conflict.

🧬 National Museum of Health and Medicine – Silver Spring, MD

Military medicine through the ages, from battlefield surgeries to forensic identification.
🔗 medicalmuseum.health.mil | ☎️ (301) 319-3300

🛩️ Travis Air Force Base Aviation Museum – Fairfield, CA

Travis Air Force Aviation Museum

Another impressive museum. I had a private tour of the museum conducted by an air force retiree. The museum has a full scale mock Fat Boy Hiroshima bomb.

Airpower on display — C-5 Galaxy, B-52 Stratofortress, and stories from the Berlin Airlift to modern deployments.
🔗 travisheritagecenter.org | ☎️ (707) 424-5605

Located about 50 miles north of SF. One has to arrange access to the base in advance but the museum is worth a trip.

⚔️ Sites of Blood and Resolve: Battlefields of the Revolution and Civil War

Here are some places that blur the line between history and haunting.

🕊️ Along the Edge: Touring the Korean DMZ & Aegibong Peak

Korean War Museum

🧭 War Memorial of Korea – Seoul

🇰🇷 Korean DMZ Tour

I have toured the DMZ a number of times over the years.  I also taught classes on the DMZ for four months in 1982.

Visit infiltration tunnels, overlook North Korea from observatories, and stand at Dorasan Station awaiting reunification.
🔗 dmztours.com | Klook DMZ Tours

🏞️ Aegibong Peace Ecological Park – Gimpo, South Korea

This is the closet spot one can get to overlooking North Korea. Once a bloody battleground, now a tranquil ridge watching over the North. The observatory and memorial hall make this a place of reflection.
🔗 aegibong.or.kr | ☎️ +82-31-5186-4030

🇰🇷 2nd Infantry Division Museum – Camp Humphreys

Second ID Museum Camp Humphreys, Korea

I had the pleasure of getting a tour with the Director of the Museum, who retired from the Army Office of the Historian before taking charge of this impressive museum.

Patch by patch, battle by battle — this museum tracks the 2ID’s legacy in Korea and beyond.
🔗 2ID Museum Overview | ☎️ +82-50-3357-4011

🧭 UN Memorial Cemetery – Busan

🧭 Incheon Landing Operation Memorial Hall

🧭 Imjingak Park & Freedom Bridge – Paju

🧭 Cheorwon DMZ & Second Tunnel

🇻🇳 Vietnam War Battlefields Open to the Public

🌍 War Remnants Museum – Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Vietnam War Museum

Vietnam Poems

A sobering look at the Vietnam War through Vietnamese eyes: Agent Orange, prison recreations, and chilling artifacts.
🔗 baotangchungtichchientranh.vn | ☎️ +84-28-3930-6664

🔫 Cu Chi Tunnels – Ho Chi Minh City

Comment: Very impressive and somber place. The Vietnamese defeated the US and the South Vietnamese Army largely through these network of tunnels that allowed them to send troops and supplies deep behind enemy lines. The US was never able to shut them down entirely, the tunnels were also too small for the average American GI to crawl through. End Comment

Guerrilla warfare beneath your feet — crawl through the tunnels, examine traps, and hear the stories of underground survival.
🔗 Cu Chi Tours by Les Rives | ☎️ +84-28-3794-8830

🧭 [Khe Sanh Combat Base – Quang Tri Province]

🧭 [Vinh Moc Tunnels – Quang Tri Province]

🧭 Hue Citadel & Imperial City

🧭 [Hamburger Hill – A Shau Valley]

🧭 [Ia Drang Valley – Central Highlands]

🧭 [Hoa Lo Prison Museum – Hanoi]

US Civil War Battlefields bolded I have toured

🗽 Revolutionary War Battlefields

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