New Dunwoody veterans memorial honors American soldiers, Vietnamese who died fighting communists

DEKALB COUNTY, Ga. — Dunwoody has dedicated a Vietnam War memorial that recognizes not only the Americans killed, but the Vietnamese who also died fighting communist forces.

It’s one of the few memorials in the country to salute the South Vietnamese soldiers who fought side-by-side with American soldiers.

Two bronze statues stand guard over the memorial, one an American soldier, and one Vietnamese.

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More than 58,000 Americans and more than 300,000 South Vietnamese were killed during the war.

The monument is the vision of Tra My Nguyen, who was born in Vietnam four months after the country fell to communists.

“This dream of having a monument of both American and Vietnamese soldiers, like this statue is almost a dream of every Vietnamese American to come to this country to run away from the communists,” Nguyen said.

Throughout her childhood, she lived under communist rule.

Her father was imprisoned by the communist government.

Eventually, she fled to America and is now among the 160,000 people of Vietnamese descent living in Georgia.

Private donors raised $1 million to pay for the monument in Dunwoody’s Brook Run Park.

John Butler, with the Atlanta Vietnam Veterans Business Association, said the memorial stands as a poignant tribute to the sacrifice Vietnamese Americans made for freedom.

“They need to know, and they need to be reminding their younger generations, that this is part of who they are,” Butler said. “This is their heritage. This is what makes them a great people.”

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