Reaction to We Were Soldiers Once… And Young The battle for the la Drang Valley in early November 1965 is We Were Soldiers Once…And Young. In a time of the 1960’s where racism was at a peak in America, there was no such thing in Vietnam for our American soldiers as portrayed by pilot Bruce Crandall, “…this act is engraved in my mind deeper than any other experience in my two tours in Vietnam. A huge black enlisted man, clad only in shorts and boots, hands bigger than dinner plates, reached into my helicopter to pick up one of the dead white soldiers. He had tears streaming down his face, and he tenderly cradled that dead soldier to his chest as he walked slowly from the aircraft to the medical station. I never knew if the man he picked up was his buddy or not. I suspect not. His grief was for a fallen comrade and for the agony that violent death brings to those who witness it…” Soldiers in the 1st Battalion, 7th Calvary at LZ X-Ray and the men of the 1st Battalion, 5th Calvary on route LZ-Albany both fought, bleed, died, and grieved for each other as more than just fellow soldiers, but brothers. The men of Lt. Col. Hal Moore were greatly outnumbered more than 4:1. They quickly began to see their fellow comrades fall round them as the soldiers of the 7th Calvary were ambushed, but even against impossible odds, Moore’s men held on for just over two whole days and nights. Soon after, their sister battalion, the 1st Battalion of the 5th Calvary, was massacred in hand to hand combat on their march to LZ Albany. We Were Soldiers Once…And Young has so many acts of heroism and valor as the men fought for their lives and the lives of their fellow comrades. The story that is told, tells the real picture of war and how war really is. War is not Call of Duty where you get shot thirty times and still live, or