As museum visitors emerge from the trench-like entrance of the Nation Overseas Gallery, cast figures, lighting effects, imagery, and sounds of distant battle recreate a setting based on a famous photograph of the Meuse-Argonne Offensive.

Military Museums

Military Museums

The Dachau Memorial

By Mark D. Van Ells

The Nazi regime in Germany has become synonymous with inhuman cruelty. Hitler incarcerated millions in his concentration camps and inflicted on his victims the harshest forms of torture and deprivation imaginable. Read more

Military Museums

Oahu’s Museums and Memorials

By Flint Whitlock

There are few places on earth that have as many World War II museums, memorials, and monuments located in such a small area as the island of Oahu. Read more

Military Museums

The D-Day Invasion Museum

By Flint Whitlock

There is such a treasure trove of fine military museums in Normandy—perhaps more than anywhere else in the world—that we could devote an entire issue to nothing but them. Read more

Military Museums

Bovington Tank Museum

By Ray Stevenson

If armored vehicles are your interest, the Tank Museum at Bovington Camp, Dorset, is your holy grail. This cavernous museum, measuring 50,000 square feet, holds the world’s finest and most comprehensive collection of over 250 armored vehicles from 26 countries. Read more

Military Museums

Japanese American National Museum

By Mason B. Webb

Shortly after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, many Japanese Americans, especially those living on the West Coast, were suspected of being possible spies, saboteurs, and disloyal Americans. Read more

Military Museums

National Museum of the Pacific War

By Mason B. Webb

The small (population 12,000), central-Texas town of Fredericksburg, about an hour’s drive west of Austin and a little more than that northwest of San Antonio, may seem an odd location for the National Museum of the Pacific War until one realizes that Fredericksburg is the hometown of Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz––the Eisenhower of the Pacific Theater. Read more

Military Museums

The National Infantry Museum and Soldier Center

By Borden Black

The American Infantry’s illustrious history, which is older than that of the country, comes alive in an impressive, $100,000,000, 190,000-square-foot museum located just outside Fort Benning, Georgia. Read more

Wary Marines in a jeep watch the air war erupt above them in another diorama in the World War II Gallery.

Military Museums

The National Museum of the Marine Corps

By Al Hemingway

Twenty miles outside Washington, D.C., at Quantico, Virginia, motorists traveling on Interstate 95 will come upon an unusual building that is clearly visible, day or night. Read more

Military Museums

The National World War II Museum

By Peter Suciu

Opened on June 6, 2000, on the 56th anniversary of the D-Day landings, the National D-Day Museum, as it was then known, initially focused on the amphibious invasion of Normandy. Read more

Military Museums

The Canadian Military Heritage Museum

By Jerome Baldwin

The Canadian Military Heritage Museum in Brantford, Ontario, has a four-part mission: to collect, preserve, and display artifacts pertaining to the military history of Canada; to maintain and manage a museum for the purpose of education; to display the artifacts at community events; and to honor the fallen and all veterans who have served and are still serving in the Canadian military. Read more

A unique chronicle of Greece’s long and proud military history from the classical age to modern times.

Military Museums

The Athens War Museum

By Peter Suciu

While not a major military power today, from the  time of the classical age through the Middle Ages, Greece was the center of several major military dynasties. Read more

Military Museums

The 45th Infantry Division Museum in Oklahoma City

By Christopher Miskimon

The 45th Infantry Division of the United States Army earned an impressive record during World War II. Originally formed from an Oklahoma National Guard unit, the division was rounded out by National Guard formations from Colorado, Arizona, and New Mexico. Read more

Designed by architect Theophil Hansen, Vienna’s imposing Heeresgeschichtliches is one of the oldest and largest purpose-built military museums in the world.

Military Museums

The Heeresgeschichtliches

By Peter Suciu

While Austria’s Hapsburg Dynasty fell at the end of World War I, its legacy can still be seen throughout Vienna in its numerous palaces and museums. Read more

Liberty Memorial, which opened in 1926, languished from neglect for many decades until a grass-roots effort resulted in a major restoration.

Military Museums

The National World War I Museum

By Peter Suciu

While no one American city played a greater role in World War I than others, after a campaign by local residents, Kansas City, Missouri, was chosen as home to build the nation’s memorial for those who gave their lives in what was hoped to be the war to end all wars. Read more

The exterior of Istanbul’s military museum, the Askeri Müze.

Military Museums

Istanbul Naval Museum and Istanbul Military Museum

By Peter Suciu

Modern-day Turkey is truly a land of east meets west, and within the cosmopolitan city are two of the country’s finest military museums, the Istanbul Naval Museum (Istanbul Deniz Müzesi), which was established in 1897 and includes notable artifacts pertaining to the Ottoman Navy, and the Istanbul Military Museum (Askerî Müze), which is dedicated to more than a thousand years of Turkish military history. Read more

The nonclassical building that houses the Athens War Museum stands out in the traditionally classical Greek capital.

Military Museums

The Athens War Museum

By Peter Suciu

While not a major military power today, from the time of the classical age through the Middle Ages, Greece was the center of several major military dynasties. Read more