<Tr> <Th> Budget </Th> <Td> $75 million </Td> </Tr> <Tr> <Th> Box office </Th> <Td> $115 million </Td> </Tr> <P> We Were Soldiers is a 2002 American war film that dramatizes the Battle of Ia Drang on November 14, 1965 . The film was directed by Randall Wallace and stars Mel Gibson . It is based on the book We Were Soldiers Once...And Young (1992) by Lieutenant General (Ret .) Hal Moore and reporter Joseph L. Galloway, both of whom were at the battle . </P> <P> A French unit on patrol in Vietnam in 1954, during the final year of the First Indochina War, is ambushed by Viet Minh forces, probably the Battle of Mang Yang Pass . Viet Minh commander Nguyen Huu An orders his soldiers to "kill all they send, and they will stop coming". </P>

Who was the movie we were soldiers about