Do we have any “Go us!” monuments like that for wars we lost?
It’s not too early to wonder what would be an appropriate memorial for the Gulf Wars and Afghanistan dead. I have no idea.
You got it; this is exactly right.
Huh, when I think of “war monument”, my first thought is this one. Which is too big and in too prominent a place to completely ignore, though to be honest I’m not sure if I’ve ever actually visited it.
All over the South, there are heroic “Yay us!” monuments for the Confederate dead.
We’ve already got one for GW #1. Apparently veterans want a giant snail shell for the proper memorial.
This was the first memorial to a war that the US lost. The Korean War Veterans Memorial(to a war that ended in a stalemate instead of an outright victory) wasn’t completed until 1995. It’s very different from the Vietnam Memorial but is rather bleak with no sense of triumph.
Huh. I just tried to find a War of 1812 memorial and there apparently isn’t one.
The Civil War memorial in Washington DC (technically the U.S. Grant Memorial) is properly triumphant.
That’s because they won.
That’s why I was looking for that one. 
There are monuments to specific battles, such as theBattle of Lake Erie. The USS Constitution is a monument of sorts in itself.