I was kind of underwhelmed by the Army museum at Belvoir, albeit I went right after it opened and maybe it's been filled out a bit since. In contrast to the Marine museum, particularly the "immersive" Korea and Vietnam sections (which are really very well done), the Army museum seemed more just "look at stuff in glass cases."
Ouch! I helped design many of those exhibits. Indeed, the entire “Global War” gallery was my work. There is a little known secret about the design at NMUSA - each gallery is sized according to the population’s participation in each war. This is why WWII is the largest and Global War is the smallest. We decided to go with more personal touch screens rather than immersive like the Marines. If you are doing NMUSA “the right way” it would take you a full day to get the whole story. Really, it is intended that visitors will come back.
I also have a lot of me in some of those exhibits. If you go the the largest gallery called “Army & Society” (the one with the Wright Flyer and the early helicopter) and head over to the right hand wall you’ll find a NPS Park Ranger hat - that used to be mine! In the Civil War gallery you’ll find a camelback telegraph key that came from my “military crap” collection. In the Global War gallery there is a Bradley FV. I went down to Red River Army depot to find it in a lot of hundreds and yes, it is really the first one into Baghdad. In the back of that gallery is a reddish, checkered pattern saddle that I used in Afghanistan (but not with the famous “horse soldiers,” months later). Along the left wall is an Iraqi Border Guards flag that I brought home - traded the commander a bunch of MREs for that one!
It takes a lot of work to find the items, make a comprehensive story, and piece it together that makes sense. The teams that do this do it like a jigsaw puzzle. It took about 15 contractors and sub-contractors to get just the exhibits done. Amazingly, most of the “good stuff” is in private hands but once found most people are willing to donate it.