we are in washington, d.c., crystal city hilton. it's november 12th, 2005, about 1:15 p.m., and we are here commemorating the reup, the 40th anniversary reunion of the battles in the idrang valley, x rarks alb ray,albany, and falcon. columbus. tell me about those days in novemb november. before you all get in, tell me about tony nadal and the guys around you, your buddies, before you all arrive on sunday. >> all right. well, we all trained at fort bening, georgia. advanced infantry division is what i was doing down there. we went overseas. we were best buddies back in the states. we were close knit in on-kay. we were in country about two months before the ballot of the idrang valley. so we worked together, we played together, we shared things together. we were close. and we were good friends. our sergeants were good friends, good buddies. our officers we respected. our lieutenants, our captains, right up to colonel moore himself. we all knew each other. so we were pretty much a close-knit family. >> was that unusual, do you think, f

d.c. crystal city hilton, november 12, 2005. about 1:15 p.m. and we are here commemorating the reunion, 40th anniversary reunion of the battle of the ia drang valley. tell me about those days in november before you all get in, tell me about this. the guys around you that -- you are buddies, before you all arrived. >> all right. well, we -- we all trained at ft. benning, georgia. advanced infantry division is what i was doing down there. we went overseas. we were -- best buddies back in the states. we were close knit. we were in the country about two months before the battle of la drang valley. we were close. and we were good friends. our sergeants were good friends, good buddies, our officers, we respected. lieutenants and captains. we all knew each other. so we were pretty much a close-knit family. >> was that unusual, do you think, for a battalion to be that close? >> i-didn't know at the time but in hindsight when you look back on things, i think we were a lot closer than other veterans i talked to. >> tell me about tony. >> my company comma

and we are in crystal city, hilton, washington, d.c. at the 40th anniversary reunion of the la drang valley falcon, x ray and albany and others. colonel forest, tell us a little bit of your recollection of arriving at x-ray on the 17th, 16th and on that tuesday. what did x-ray look for like to you? >> probably a sight like we had never seen. my unit unlike the other units, we walked in to x-ray. >> right. >> we had spent the night, the previous night at elsie clum yus and then the next morning went over land in to xray so on the way in we could see some of the casualties, at least to the north vietnamese casualties as we got into the landing zone. but we saw -- yeah. we saw guys who were absolutely physically exhausted. i think jack smith characteristiced it once as they said they had that blind combat stare. >> did you know what happened there? >> we did not. because communications was poor. we were not on the frequency until we got -- actually got in to xray. >> okay. do you remember the then lieutenant colonel -- >> absolutely. >> sa