NATIONAL GUARD BUREAU

Historical Services Branch

Interview NGB-01

INTERVIEW OF

LTC FRANK CANDIANO

Commander

1st Battalion, 258th Field Artillery

CONDUCTED BY

MAJ LES’ MELNYK

National Guard Bureau

Tuesday, September 18, 2001

TAPE TRANSCRIPTION

Note: LTC Candiano reviewed this transcript and 

submitted corrections/revisions in August 2002

Comments and corrections are indicated in the text by 

the use of [brackets and italic print]
2

1 P R O C E E D I N G S

2 MAJ MELNYK: This is MAJ Les’ Melnyk, Army 

3 National Guard Historian at the National Guard Bureau.

4 I am interviewing LTC Frank Candiano. That's 

5 C-a-n-d-i-a-n-o. LTC Candiano is the commander of the 

6 1st Battalion, 258 Field Artillery, New York Army 

7 National Guard. 

8 This interview is taking place at Battery 

9 Park, New York City, on the 18th of September 2001.

10 LTC Candiano, if we could start, briefly, by 

11 you telling us -- well, first off, the formality. You 

12 have signed the oral history access agreement and agree 

13 that nothing that you are going to speak needs to be 

14 withheld for any reason; is that correct? 

15 LTC CANDIANO: Correct 

16 MAJ MELNYK: Could you start sir, by telling 

17 us a little bit about your background, your unit, how 

18 long you've been in command. 

19 LTC CANDIANO: I have been in command 

20 approximately two years of the 1st of the 258. I've 

21 also served previous assignments in the same battalion 
3

1 as an AGR [Active Guard/Reserve] officer, as an S-1, S2 2, Assistant S-3 - plans and Ops officer, left the 

3 battalion to take a tour as a recruiting officer, and 

4 then an XO of an organic battalion consisting of - a 

5 TDA battalion, consisting of MPs, and signal, and 

6 prepared the 105th MP Company from Buffalo, New York, 

7 to get them to ramp up and train for a tour in Bosnia.

8 Upon completion of my assignment there, I was 

9 assigned to take command of the 258.

10 As far as branches go, I'm branch qualified in 

11 signal, mech infantry, artillery, and MI. 

12 MAJ MELNYK: If you could take us to the 

13 morning of September 11. Where were you when you 

14 learned of the attack? What were your first emotions 

15 and what were your first actions?

16 LTC CANDIANO: On the morning of - Tuesday 

17 morning a.m., I had gotten into work and --

18 MAJ MELNYK: Where is your armory located?

19 LTC CANDIANO: Jamaica Armory is on 168th 

20 Street, in Jamaica.

21 MAJ MELNYK: Jamaica, Queens.
4

1 LTC CANDIANO: Correct. 

2 LTC CANDIANO: And we were discussing the 

3 plans for an upcoming training event for one of my 

4 batteries that's preparing to do an NTC rotation, and

5 we were discussing some live fire missions that were 

6 going to take place.

7 And I went up to discuss some of the training 

8 issues with my S-3, when everybody went into his office 

9 and the television was turned on to, I believe, Channel 

10 4, NBC News, and they had just said that there was an 

11 explosion at the World Trade Center. That's all that 

12 was said at the time.

13 Several minutes later, it seemed like, there 

14 was a second explosion, and at that point in time, the 

15 news had said we believe that a plane may have hit the 

16 World Trade Center. [My Command Sergeant major and I 

17 went to the roof of the Jamaica armory and saw the 

18 smoke billowing out of the WTC tower]

19 At the time of that incident, it just seemed 

20 like maybe something really got screwed up and a plane 

21 hit, you know, maybe there's some problem with controls 
5

1 or whatever.

2 But as soon as the second plane hit the World 

3 Trade Center, we kind of figured that it was too 

4 perfect, there had to be more to it than meets the eye, 

5 and the odds of that happening are slim to none.

6 So at that point in time, the first thing I 

7 did was contact my higher headquarters to see if 

8 there's anything going on, and I believe we notified my 

9 brigade and they were not aware of the incident.

10 MAJ MELNYK: This is 3rd Brigade, 42nd 

11 Infantry Division.

LTC CANDIANO: 3rd Brigade and 42nd 12 ID, right, 

13 in Buffalo, New York.

14 MAJ MELNYK: And who did you speak to, sir?

15

16 LTC CANDIANO: I believe I spoke to a MAJ 

17 Kevin Adler, and advised him that there's something 

18 going on and I don't know what it is.

19 At that point in time, I knew that somewhere, 

20 somehow, soon, this was going to be an all out call out 

21 for the National Guard for the State of New York. I 
6

1 didn't know it was going to be a limited response at 

2 first, based on what was going on. I just figured as 

3 soon as the Governor caught wind of this thing, we're 

4 all going somewhere to do something.

5 So I immediately grabbed my full-timers and I 

6 said “As far as I'm concerned, this is a terrorist 

7 activity, a terrorist threat, you know.” I don't know 

8 what the outcome of this is going to be, but gather all 

9 the vehicles lined up on the drill floor, I broke 

10 everybody down into two crews.

11 I immediately tightened the security on the 

12 armory through our DESOPS. We have an SOP that we need 

13 to follow. Lock the building down, nobody in, nobody 

14 out, until we've kind of sorted through everything.

15 And at that point in time, had our vehicles 

16 lined up on the drill floor, had them all topped off. 

17 While that was going on, most of my -- I had the luxury 

18 of most of my full-time guys are first sergeants - so 

19 they immediately, after talking with them, went through 

20 the alert roster and started to notify everybody.

21 I called my battery commanders and said 
7

1 basically this is it, be prepared to come in, and --

2 MAJ MELNYK: You didn't order them in at that 

3 time. You told them to be prepared.

4 LTC CANDIANO: Be prepared to come in, because 

5 we didn't know what the story was at that point in 

6 time.

7 Ironically enough, a lot of my enlisted 

8 soldiers, with no questions asked, once they heard it 

9 on the news and they found out that it was, in fact, a 

10 plane and then a second plane going into the towers, I 

11 had soldiers showing up at my gates, doors locked, with 

12 duffel bags, waiting to come in, no questions asked. 

13 At the same time, I had the 105th Infantry, 

14 who happens to be in the building. 

15 MAJ MELNYK: What element of it, sir?

16 LTC CANDIANO: They're Charlie Company of the 

17 105th Infantry. They are housed in my armory, as well. 

18 We went under the concept of a Y2K configuration, and 

19 a Y2K configuration for state active duty, 53rd Troop 

20 Command, located in Valhalla, New York, was our MACOM 

21 and we report and we go through everything for, you 
8

1 know, whatever disasters might have taken place as a 

2 result of Y2K. We are OPCON'd to them.

3 I'm the task force commander for all of 

4 Queens, New York under the configuration. So after I 

5 reported in to Troop Command and I also reported in to 

6 my higher at the brigade, you know, I was in contact 

7 with the 105th commander to discuss that he may want to 

8 check with his higher, which is the 27th Brigade, to 

9 find out what their requirements are going to be and 

10 see if he is going to be required to come in.

11 MAJ MELNYK: When you contacted the 27th Troop 

12 Command, what was their state of --

13 LTC CANDIANO: 53rd Troop Command.

14 MAJ MELNYK: I'm sorry. 53rd Troop Command, 

15 what was their state of preparation, what instructions 

16 did they give you? Did they assume command at that 

17 time?

18 LTC CANDIANO: The 53rd Troop Command was 

19 waiting for a response from the State of New York and 

20 they said right now there is going to be some sort of a 

21 call out, get your alert lists ready and implement on 
9

1 order, and pretty much so.

2 And good, bad or indifferent, I understood 

3 what they were saying, but something like that is kind 

4 of critical and you need reaction time, because in many 

5 cases, soldiers in my neck of the woods have to take 

6 mass transportation and sometimes several trains to get 

7 in.

8 So I told them “Get the soldiers in.”

9 MAJ MELNYK: You told --

10 LTC CANDIANO: I told my soldiers, at that 

11 point in time, let's start calling the troops in. I 

12 don't know what the outcome is going to be. I have a 

13 drill weekend coming up in September. In the worst 

14 scenario, my soldiers will SUTA and I'll take the hit 

15 on that. [Clarification: LTC Candiano wanted his 

16 soldiers to report in immediately; if it subsequently 

17 turned out that NY State did not require them, LTC 

18 Candiano would then have compensated his soldiers for 

19 their time by granting them a SUTA – Substitute Unit 

20 Training Assembly – for that month, thus crediting his 

21 soldiers with having attended drill] 
10

1 MAJ MELNYK: But that was your own initiative.

2 LTC CANDIANO: That was my own initiative, 

3 because I thought better safe than sorry, and I think 

4 by 3:00 o'clock in the afternoon, I had 339 troops on 

5 the drill floor ready to go.

6 MAJ MELNYK: Is your entire battalion located 

7 in that one armory?

8 LTC CANDIANO: No. I have troops located in 

9 Bedford Avenue in Brooklyn and Kings Bridge Armory in 

10 the Bronx. 

11 MAJ MELNYK: So it's three batteries in 

12 Jamaica.

13 LTC CANDIANO: I have three batteries in 

14 Jamaica, my Headquarters battery, my Alpha battery, and 

15 my Service battery.

16 MAJ MELNYK: Did the troops on the drill floor 

17 also include elements from Charlie 105th?

18 LTC CANDIANO: Not at that point in time. 

[Note: With the Y2K plan in effect as per 53rd 19 Troop 

Command, C/105 Infantry was OPCON to the 258th 20 Field 

21 Artillery] Charlie 105th was falling out on their own. 
11

1 But at the time of mobilization, what I did was -- or 

2 the preparation for mobilization, I contacted New York 

3 City buses just to find out what was going on, because 

4 I didn't have enough -- you know, with an artillery 

5 battalion we Tracks. We don't have a lot of Humvees, we 

6 don't have a lot of five tons, whatever the case might 

7 be.

8 So what I did was I put a call into New York 

9 City and I kind of coordinated through our headquarters 

10 for me to say, "Listen, you know, we may be required. 

11 What is the feasibility of providing New York City 

12 buses to get my troops into New York City if I'm called 

13 upon to get in there."

14 No ifs, ands or buts, they said "If that 

15 happens, just call us. Give us a point of contact to 

16 talk to and we'll get you the buses." [Note: NYC 

17 provided 6 buses to transport individuals from the 

Jamaica armory, to include those members of C/105th 18 , who 

19 did not use organic transport assets]

20 And again, while all this was taking place, I 

21 had some supply NCOs checking rations. I had water 
12

1 buffaloes topped off and tested to make sure that they 

2 met the drinking standards.

3 We had a lot of people coming in from other 

4 armories because the radio was putting out calls that 

5 all National Guardsmen should report at that point in 

6 time to their nearest Army National Guard armory.

7 So what I had them do was come into the 

8 building, contact their units to say that they're 

9 accounted for at this facility, and I put them to work 

10 starting to utilize alert rosters, so my guys could get 

11 down on the drill floor and start working equipment.

12 That worked out to my benefit, my advantage.

13 Unfortunately, the lag in this thing was 

14 waiting to get the green light from Troop Command, 

15 because I think a lot of valuable time was wasted, and 

16 I think they should have some sort of -- if a battalion 

17 commander is making serious life and death situations 

18 in a combat zone anyway, he should be able to have that 

19 latitude to make a decision to say, okay, let's go, 

20 because I would have liked to have been on site before 

21 dark. [Lag time from Troop Command was a result of 
13

1 problems with telephone lines, not response issues. In 

2 retrospect, I wish I had a backup communications plan 

3 working]

4 MAJ MELNYK: What time did you feel you were 

5 ready to go and what time did you get the order to go?

6 LTC CANDIANO: I believe that we were combat 

7 loaded and ready to go probably by about 1600, 1630. 

8 And there were a lot of events still unfolding that we 

9 were watching on television, and it was really kind of 

10 hitting us rather hard from the standpoint that you 

11 could not believe that this happened again, although 

12 lessons learned, because we saw it before.

13 But we anticipated more at that point in time. 

14 MAJ MELNYK: You anticipated more attacks?

15 LTC CANDIANO: Attacks. Because I kind of 

16 felt that if they were so bold to go that far. You 

17 know, there had been scattered reports from time to 

18 time that bombs in vehicles were on bridges, bombs in 

19 vehicles in tunnels.

20 And we think of scenarios from the standpoint 

21 of in the event that we can't take a major route, how 
14

1 will we get into New York City if there were a problem? 

2 Would we try to get to Staten Island and utilize 

3 ferries? Because that was an option, but then, again, 

4 with the bridge being out, we couldn't go that way.

5 You know, you've got the Third Avenue Bridge, 

6 59th Street Bridge, that kind of stuff, which you're 

7 familiar with.

8 MAJ MELNYK: Yes.

9 LTC CANDIANO: That you can get in, because 

10 that's not a primary bridge. I don't think they would 

11 waste their time and efforts on a secondary bridge.

12 So based on that, we got everybody ready and 

13 full combat gear, minus the weapons, because I didn't 

14 have a green light as far as the weapons situation.

15 When I talked to Troop Command and I asked 

16 them specifically am I allowed to take sidearms, am I 

17 allowed to take weapons, they told me absolutely not.

18 That I think was wrong, because we didn't know 

19 what we were facing. And I certainly could have taken 

20 them, seeing how I was staging at an armory at 26th and 

21 Lex, I certainly could have taken the weapons out of my 
15

1 armory and brought them there and had them secured, 

2 even if it were with a guard on the drill shed floor. 

3 [LTC Candiano later commented: ”I understand the 

4 concern that we don’t want National Guardsmen running 

5 through the streets of NY Shooting up the town. It was 

6 just simply put: I was taking my battalion into a city 

7 that was for all intents and purposes under attack. I 

8 didn’t know if buildings, the bridges and tunnels we 

9 went through would be blown at the first sign of a 

10 military presence. I would have been more at ease to 

11 have weapons. However, as it was, there were no 

12 provisions made for ammunition. Our mission at the 

13 time was still not defined as to the type of assistance 

14 and support we would render]

15 MAJ MELNYK: How is it you knew 26th and Lex, 

16 the 69th Regiment Armory, was your stating area?

17 LTC CANDIANO: Because I guess with me making 

18 a pain in the ass out of myself with the Troop Command 

19 TOC, they said that basically that's the closest armory 

20 to where ground zero is located, and at that point in 

21 time, muster there and await further instruction. [LTC 
16

1 Candiano later commented: I had dispatched from Bn HQs 

2 some retired NYPD and NYFD personnel to try and get 

3 some actual data from the area and speak with personnel 

4 they had worked with. My thought at the time was to 

5 find out what type of support they would need, what 

6 type of equipment they required (if we had it) and how 

7 best to assist based on known intel. The information 

8 we got back, along with our consolidated briefings at 

the 69th 9 Infantry armory clearly helped to define the 

10 mission I would take on that night with my battalion]

11 MAJ MELNYK: When did they give you that 

12 order?

13 LTC CANDIANO: I'd say that was somewhere in 

14 the neighborhood, and if my time line is off, I'd say 

15 it was somewhere around 6:00 o'clock or so, because we 

16 were pushing whatever buttons.

17 So once that came into play, we already 

18 committed our GSA buses and we also contacted the City 

19 of New York and they provided me four commercial buses 

20 for Jamaica, Queens, which also included taking the 

21 infantry on board, taking them, because there's no 
17

1 sense waiting to commit additional troops and wait for 

2 somebody to tell them they had to go.

3 I had the resources and the assets to move 

4 them. They were there, they were ready. The commander 

5 gave me the green light and we threw them on the bus.

6 MAJ MELNYK: At that time, you had no OPCON 

7 over them; no operational control. 

8 They were just --

9 LTC CANDIANO: No. Just working under the 

10 premise that it was the Y2K plan for emergencies and 

11 disasters, and that's what I implemented.

12 So I contacted my two batteries in Brooklyn 

13 and the Bronx, got them the transportation they needed, 

14 and I had everybody, with all tactical vehicles and 

15 support vehicles, to meet us at 26th and Lex.

16 Upon arrival at 26th and Lex, the 69th had 

17 already gone through their briefing with their 

18 commanders and staff, and I sat down and I interfaced 

19 my staff and my commanders with their staff and their 

20 commanders.

21 And LTC Slack and I basically did an over-
18

1 brief, one-over-the-world to both battalions.

2 MAJ MELNYK: And all the soldiers?

3 LTC CANDIANO: Just the commanders.

4 MAJ MELNYK: Just commanders.

5 LTC CANDIANO: I briefed my soldiers prior to 

6 coming out here real quick, but they got a briefing, 

7 because LTC Slack had checked out the area and 

8 basically told me what he saw, what he expected to see, 

9 and that was during the daylight.

10 Going into a nighttime operation of that 

11 magnitude, not knowing what's up, what's down, what's 

12 working and what's not working, and who to report to 

13 and where are the -- the first thing I wanted to know 

14 was where are the command centers established, who's 

15 got charge of police, fire, and emergency services, and 

16 am I going to be required to establish a liaison or is 

17 there a National Guard liaison on site already, and, if 

18 so, who is he and what are the rules of engagement for 

19 me to go out and secure the area.

20 At that point in time, while LTC Slack and I 

21 were meeting, I have a couple of NCOs that are -- well, 
19

1 I put feelers out for NCOs to tell me who are the best 

2 guys that I can send out in a scout capacity to see 

3 what routes are open for me to move through the streets 

4 and what looks like it's closed.

5 Concurrently, what I had done is contacted 

6 emergency services, which were pretty busy, and I just 

7 said to them “I’m colonel so-and-so of the New York 

8 Army National Guard, I'm the battalion commander of the 

9 artillery battalion, I have 339 troops at my disposal, 

10 and I'm here to provide the assistance, we're on of the 

11 first elements, where do you want my troops?”

12 And at that point in time, they said “get them 

13 somewhere here and we'll establish what you need to 

14 establish once you're on site.”

15 And while that was going on, I had my scouts 

16 out really or COLT teams, if you will, as far as 

17 artillery goes.

18 And those are the guys that go out and poop 

19 and snoop and they came back to me and said this route 

20 is open, this is available. You know, there are a lot 

21 of police routes that were made available to us to 
20

1 transport the troops, buses, commercial buses, GSA 

2 buses and organic vehicles.

3 We all took off. But before that, I had MAJ 

4 Slack's three -- brief my commanders, myself and my 

5 three, with the one-over-the-world scenario as to what 

6 was going on.

7 We didn't know what to expect. I didn't know 

8 what to see. And, again, something like this you say 

9 you can plan for, you can prep for, but, Jesus, when it 

10 happens in your backyard, it's something different, and 

11 that's all I could say.

12 It was horrific. As we were coming into the 

13 city skyline, you could see the billowing smoke. You 

14 could smell the smoke. You could smell the death. You 

15 can see, as you got closer to the site itself, the 

16 flames, because there was a lot of stuff still burning.

17 Buildings across the street from ground zero, 

18 the impact area, were burning. 

19 But let me back up a little bit by saying that 

20 after --

21 MAJ MELNYK: How did you get downtown 
21

1 actually? What route did you end up taking?

2 LTC CANDIANO: I think the way we worked it 

3 out is we got to the FDR Drive. I came down the FDR 

4 Drive to Battery Park and the police were at every 

5 intersection and entrance there to guide us all the way 

6 down.

7 Once we finished the briefings, I had a moment 

8 with my commanders, because to me this was going to 

9 battle. We were going to war with someone. I don't 

10 know who the enemy was. I don't know where the enemy 

11 was. All I know is that it was a terrorist activity 

12 and we were going to into a combat zone, because they 

13 could be anywhere around us. 

14 Once we made liaison with the police in the 

15 police CP, which was located at -- I think we checked 

16 into -- I think it was South and Pike or South and 

17 Pine.

18 MAJ MELNYK: South and Pike is what --

19 LTC CANDIANO: South and Pike, it just seems 

20 like a big blur. South and Pike is where the CP was 

21 established for NYPD.
22

1 The Army National Guard, what we had done, at 

2 that point in time, basically, again, three battalion 

3 commanders working together, we established our CP 

4 right next to theirs.

5 MAJ MELNYK: Your communication with the 101, 

6 what was that like? Had you spoken at all with them?

7 LTC CANDIANO: Yes. With the 101 CAV, they 

8 weren't on site yet and they were coming in later on. 

9 They were still mobilizing at the battalion. LTC Slack 

10 and I both spoke with LTC Costagliola on the phone and 

11 basically we established the rules of engagement, that 

12 I had decent numbers on the ground to start to go in, 

13 I'll establish liaison, get a perimeter set up, and 

14 hold the perimeter and secure it ‘til first light, and 

15 while that was being done, LTC Slack was making contact 

16 and communications with some of the city agencies and 

17 established liaison with me and, at the same token, we 

18 had a liaison officer from -- I think assigned to us 

19 from the 107th group, did some coordination.

20 And I know that MAJ Henry Gim and CPT Lynch 

21 became available to us somewhere down the road.
23

1 MAJ MELNYK: MAJ Gim?

2 LTC CANDIANO: Henry Gim. 

3 MAJ MELNYK: How do you spell that, sir?

4 LTC CANDIANO: G-i-m. And he came over, I 

5 think, a couple of days into the exercise, but in the 

6 beginning, it was a little sketchy as far as the battle 

7 handoff as to who was doing what.

8 But essentially and initially, it was three 

9 battalions from the 3rd Brigade, kind of, for lack of a 

10 better word, immediately took charge of whatever the 

11 situation was downtown.

12 MAJ MELNYK: I know it's sketchy, but about 

13 what time Tuesday evening did you have this 

14 conversation with your fellow battalion commanders and 

15 decide that it was going to be the 258 that would go 

16 down first?

17 LTC CANDIANO: I would like to say that it was 

18 somewhere between eight and ten. 

19 So at that point in time, we contacted Troop 

20 Command, who was initially the MACOM in charge, and we 

21 got the green light to prep to go in and they 
24

1 established who we need to talk to and who we link up 

2 with on liaison.

3 MAJ MELNYK: And who was that, sir?

4 LTC CANDIANO: It might have been LTC Joe 

5 Likar from the 53rd Troop Command. He was the acting 

6 G-3.

7 So what I had done at that time is, again, 

8 talked to the battalion commander of the 69th face to 

9 face and TELECON with 101 CAV commander on the box, and 

10 we basically said that, you know, seeing how I have the 

11 strength posture on the ground, my troops are here 

12 ready to go, I'd be first guy into the box, because 

13 they were still in the process of gathering equipment 

14 out of supply rooms and whatever and getting set up to 

15 move.

16 [LTC Candiano later commented: Once we arrived on 

sight, I had no further communications with 107th 17 CSG or 

18 higher HQs until the following day. The night of the 

11th, my battalion, along with the assets of the 105th 19

20 OPCON’d to me is what I had to work with]

21 So the closer we got in towards the city, the 
25

1 more eerie it got, and it looked almost as if, as we 

2 were coming into portions of the city, almost like an 

3 eerie fog. That's the only way I can describe it.

4 MAJ MELNYK: So this is coming down the FDR 

5 Drive.

6 LTC CANDIANO: Coming down the FDR Drive, 

7 coming towards Battery Park. We got off at -- I forgot 

8 the name of the street that we got off at prior to 

9 getting to Pike, and the battalion was behind us, 

10 because I got down to do liaison first as the commander 

11 of the troops, with the police liaison.

12 I got our rules of engagement from the chief, 

13 what kind of assistance he was looking for, what does 

14 he need from me. I gave him my strength posture, told 

15 him what I had on the ground to work with.

16 I asked him if there was any critical areas 

17 that he was concerned with, is there anything that he 

18 needs us to do, is there anything as far as an Intell 

19 brief for me, real quick, down and dirty, were there 

20 any concerns in the geographic area that I was going 

21 into.
26

1 At that point in time, he told me that he 

2 needed our assistance in a lot of the areas that were 

3 basically blacked out, a lot of the areas that still 

4 had a lot of falling debris, because there were a lot 

5 of aftershocks, there were a lot of things still 

6 dropping.

7 Plate glass to me that seemed like it was 

8 three and four inches thick dropping 50-60 floors makes 

9 a hell of a weapon.

10 And just to keep those areas clear and 

11 establish a perimeter defense around the areas that the 

12 police felt that they need support with.

13 MAJ MELNYK: Do you recall the name of the 

14 chief who gave you these directions?

15 LTC CANDIANO: Chief Hoel [unsure of spelling]

16 MAJ MELNYK: He was the man in charge down 

17 there.

18 LTC CANDIANO: He was in charge at Pike and 

19 South in the command post. And, again, everything was 

20 happening so fast, so fluid, that that was the best we 

21 could do under the circumstances.
27

1 MAJ MELNYK: And you talked about ROE, rules 

2 of engagement.

3 LTC CANDIANO: Check. Correct. 

4 MAJ MELNYK: He gave you guidance on that in 

5 terms of how to deal with other people? 

6 LTC CANDIANO: Yes. And, again, because this 

7 was a unique situation that I don't think anyone 

8 prepares for and I didn't know what to expect. 

9 I mean, maybe there was a THREATCON that he 

10 was more up to date on. Seeing how my headquarters was 

11 so far out of the box, I didn't want to take a chance, 

12 and I also knew that I had to protect the safety of my 

13 troops at the same time, because we did not have 

14 weapons. That was not the mission and the intent. And 

15 I got a VOCO not to bring weapons, period, which I felt 

16 was a mistake, because had something developed which 

17 was more of a serious attack of some sort, by virtue of 

18 the fact that we had weapons on site, even though we 

19 don't have ammo, the PD would more or less provide 

20 ammo, because they've got AR-15s. So I don't think 

21 that that might have been too much of an issue. [LTC 
28

1 Candiano later commented: This reflects my personal 

2 feelings at the time, and is not meant to question the 

3 judgment of higher HQs. In retrospect, I understand 

4 the rationale and intent behind this order]

5 I would have preferred, you know, in a 

6 situation like that, to bring my equipment downtown and 

7 to store it in that armory at 26th and Lex, based on 

8 the outcome, because it's a lot easier to have 

9 preparation and a plan there to implement with weapons 

10 systems as opposed to driving through a tunnel or a 

11 bridge which may not be there in another hour or two.

12 So to me, that was a force multiplier to have 

13 that equipment there, but I was basically told “no 

14 weapons.”

15 So anyway, we got down, got the directions. I 

16 got on the radio. I told my S-3, my exec, and all my 

17 commanders listening in that, yes, there was a definite 

18 bombing, yes, for all intents and purposes, you're in a 

19 state of war until somebody says otherwise, and the 

20 threat is very real, so be prepared to expect anything 

21 and make sure that you protect your troops as best you 
29

1 can.

2 Prior to that, I met with -- obviously, you 

3 can't meet with all the soldiers, because it's total 

4 chaos on the drill floor when you have another 

5 battalion prepping up, ramping up, and you're there 

6 with your troops, and my vehicles were lined up outside 

7 the building.

8 We just basically took all of Lexington 

9 Avenue, a good chunk of Lexington Avenue with my 

10 vehicles lined up, and both commercial and GSA buses.

11 So I took all the leadership at the one room 

12 and I just said, you know, "Guys, you know, this is it. 

13 You know, we're under attack. This is in our turf. 

14 Now this is going to be by our rules and this is the 

15 way we're going to do business."

16 The bottom line is that somebody punched us in 

17 the face and they made us bleed. For all you know 

18 right now, you might have a sister, you might have a 

19 brother, you might have somebody there, we don't know, 

20 we don't know what the status is.

21 But after the buildings came down, that 
30

1 finally was the icing on the cake. And I said the 

2 gloves are now off.

3 People were asking me about weapons and I 

4 basically said we cannot use weapons. That's not the 

5 mission we're under right now. We're there to assist 

6 and help in the confusion going on. 

7 (Tape change.)

8 MAJ MELNYK: This is a continuation of the 

9 interview with LTC Candiano. 

10 Sir, you were about to head downtown.

11 LTC CANDIANO: Yeah. As we got the briefing 

12 from the chief, a lot of police, a lot of fire showing 

13 up, and, obviously, there were no planes in the sky 

14 outside of military air flying around, just checking 

15 out, making sure everything was still good to go.

16 And I seem to remember that vividly, that as 

17 the World Trade Center was burning, I saw the aircraft 

18 in the sky and I knew that they weren't there just on a 

19 training mission.

20 They were there to shoot something down, and 

21 it was just -- it was just -- you know, it was just too 
31

1 much to think about.

2 You know, and at the same token, you think 

3 about what's going on, you think about your family, but 

4 that was secondary. You know, I hope my family is 

5 okay, and I know that was in the minds of the firemen 

6 and that was in the minds of the policemen; you know, 

7 yeah, I've got family, but I'm here to help somebody 

8 else.

9 And that was premise. We just took off and 

10 did what we had to do.

11 But when we were getting downtown, the closer 

12 we got to ground zero, the impact area, the darker it 

13 was. I mean, there were a lot of emergency lights on 

14 right at the impact center. Things were on fire, 

15 buildings were on fire, glass was coming down, debris, 

16 and we looked at the map that the PD showed us. We 

17 transposed all the information to our maps to say these 

18 are the critical areas and based on the strength --

19 MAJ MELNYK: What maps did you have, sir?

20 LTC CANDIANO: We had, believe it or not, I 

21 had a good old Hagstrom map of New York City in our S-3 
32

1 shop and we got to the page of lower Manhattan, xeroxed 

2 about 50 or 75 copies or a 100 copies, and basically 

3 looked at what routes we could possibly get into the 

4 city, and enlarged those maps.

5 And everybody had those and that's what we 

6 used and we just married those maps up to what the PD 

7 had, and that's what I had to work with, because we had 

8 to improvise. There's no way you're going to get a map 

9 of New York City right there under those circumstances.

10 So luckily we had it and that's what we did. 

11 So once we got the zones and everything that the police 

12 were concerned with, we started to establish the 

13 perimeter and set up a route in which we were going to 

14 get into the area.

15 And once I got the rules of engagement, what 

16 they were concerned with, what to look for, looting, at 

17 that point in time, believe it or not, was not an 

18 issue.

19 And I was amazed that it wasn't an issue, 

20 because you know when there's a blackout, the riots in 

21 New York City during the great blackout that we had 
33

1 years and years ago, it was murder and mayhem.

2 But this was a different type of situation and 

3 it seemed like people were more concerned with trying 

4 to help as opposed to trying to destroy, and to me that 

5 was the great thing about New Yorkers.

6 People that might not get along with each 

7 other during the course of a day, but they all got 

8 together for this and they were behind each other.

9 So once we knew where we were going and what 

10 we had to do, I broke down the batteries by sectors. I 

11 broke down the sectors by battery and basically said 

12 you guys are going to Zone 1, Zone 2, Zone 3, Zone 4, 

13 and it was that large perimeter, I don't know if you've 

14 got it on your map here, that we worked off of.

15 MAJ MELNYK: So you were working off of the 

16 police zones that you had gotten from the police 

17 headquarters at the base of Brooklyn Bridge.

18 LTC CANDIANO: Correct. Correct. And from 

19 this map here, which married up to pretty much the map 

20 that we had, we followed the route to establish an 

21 outside quarter and a perimeter. Then we started to 
34

1 work in.

2 We stayed away from the hot zone, which was 

3 Zone 1, because that's where all the debris, the fire, 

4 police, emergency services were all headed to Zone 1.

5 We just made sure that there were main routes 

6 of entry to assist the PD and to assist fire and 

7 emergency services to get into those routes to keep the 

8 intersections clear.

9 MAJ MELNYK: So the battalion initially 

10 followed a route down the FDR Drive, got back on the 

11 FDR Drive.

12 LTC CANDIANO: Yeah.

13 MAJ MELNYK: And then up to Battery Park.

14 LTC CANDIANO: Right.

15 MAJ MELNYK: And then --

16 LTC CANDIANO: And then from Battery Park 

17 north.

18 MAJ MELNYK: And the battalion split up at 

19 that point?

20 LTC CANDIANO: Right. We split up at that 

21 point and once we went into zones and sectors, we 
35

1 dismounted. Okay.

2 MAJ MELNYK: So the dismount point was?

3 LTC CANDIANO: Again, in looking at the map 

4 here, without having my glasses on with this thing --

5 let me get the other map.

6 MAJ MELNYK: All right, sir.

7 LTC CANDIANO: This is where age kicks in. 

8 Part of our concern was the financial center. So some 

9 of us broke off and headed towards Wall Street, Rector 

10 Street, and we went up West Street, past the World 

11 Trade Center, which was pretty much the streets were 

12 blocked off with PD anyway.

13 But what we found en route looked like Mount 

14 St. Helen's had been through.

15 MAJ MELNYK: So you actually drove up West 

16 Street right past the World Trade Center. That was not 

17 closed off at that time.

18 LTC CANDIANO: West Street was partially 

19 closed off. It had to be opened enough to let 

20 emergency vehicles in and out.

21 And emergency vehicles were coming all the way 
36

1 across, but West Street was primarily fire trucks, 

2 police, emergency services, and we got by.

3 MAJ MELNYK: Could you describe what you saw 

4 as you first laid eyes on the site?

5 LTC CANDIANO: Well, we didn't directly look 

6 at what was going on inside the site. We kind of 

7 focused on the southern area at first, to make sure 

8 that this was secured, and as we headed up, especially 

9 around Cedar and Liberty, right up around this area 

10 here, that's when it kind of hit home as to what was 

11 going on with the smell, the gray snow, the debris.

12 And we were, with boots on, over the top of 

13 the boot in just gray dust and powder.

14 MAJ MELNYK: And was there any kind of -- you 

15 didn't have any kind of masks or other protection?

16 LTC CANDIANO: No. We didn't have anything at 

17 all at the time. We didn't have our chemical masks 

18 with us, because as I seem to recall, they were still 

19 in the supply truck and they were following us up.

20 But we never got to use them, because we were 

21 told at that point in time, when we were set up to go 
37

1 in, that it's not a situation where it's going to be a 

2 chemical hazard, it's not going to be a biological 

3 hazard, to the best that they knew.

4 And, again, it was to help them do a search 

5 and rescue at that point in time, and that's what it 

6 seemed like. Whatever the city agencies needed us to 

7 do when we started to get established, that's what we 

8 had to do.

9 But in establishing the perimeter, all 

10 agencies were involved heading toward the World Trade 

11 Center, you know, and it seemed like the cops couldn't 

12 take care of security, take care of roads, when they 

13 all wanted to be at the center of the blast.

14 So we assumed responsibility and control of 

15 the zone of operation. And basically what I did at 

16 that point in time was we dismounted troops, had troops 

17 park around Battery Park, because around Battery Park 

18 was the best place to park deuce and a halfs. 

19 We dismounted and started to walk up. This 

20 whole zone here in Zone 3.

21 MAJ MELNYK: Which is Battery Park City.
38

1 LTC CANDIANO: Right. Was black, was out, was 

2 dark.

3 MAJ MELNYK: No power.

4 LTC CANDIANO: No power. And what we did was 

5 we started to walk up West Street in formation and 

6 start to break off in teams to see what we needed to do 

7 to support.

8 By the same token, my headquarters battery 

9 traveled the north route, along with my B battery, and 

10 my Charlie battery and my service battery came in from 

11 the east side and started to work their way across.

12 So we all tried to get so far in to a certain 

13 point here to see if any assistance was needed.

14 Everything was secure around the lower part of 

15 the city at this time, either by roving patrol or by 

16 foot, and we stayed in communication.

17 We augmented the police as best we could and 

18 at that concern -- at that point in time, my concern 

19 was “is there anybody alive in the outskirts or what's 

20 going on, because everything was focused here in the 

21 World Trade Center area, but there was not too much 
39

1 going on out here at first, because everybody was 

2 working in.”

3 So - go ahead.

4 MAJ MELNYK: Your men then were looking for 

5 injured people, were looking for stragglers? What were 

6 their instructions to deal with civilian personnel on 

7 the streets?

8 LTC CANDIANO: To me, it was a situation, you 

9 know, keep your radios on, if you find somebody that 

10 dazed that needs aid - I asked the chief “where are 

11 your areas established that you have triage set up?, 

12 where are your major medical areas that might have?” 

13 Pace University was one of them. 

14 My medics, I brought my ambulance along with 

15 me, so I could take care of whatever needed to be taken 

16 care of as far as the troops go. And I thought about 

17 troops at first, because, again, I was thinking about a 

18 hostile environment.

19 But then the troops, which many of them were 

20 emergency service workers, were well prepared for what 

21 they saw. 
40

1 In addition to that, in the battalion, I had 

2 20 combat lifesavers that were trained in the various 

3 batteries to support emergencies.

4 So I felt comfortable that the kit bags were 

5 full and they could provide support.

6 So as we found somebody that was dazed or 

7 injured, the medics tried to take care of whatever had 

8 to be taken care of, and we transported to either the 

9 hospital that was set up, the triage center, or turned 

10 them over to the PD or the fire department ambulances 

11 that were in the area.

12 All along these routes, ambulances were lined 

13 up. All along West, the major thoroughfares, there 

14 were medical support all along the area.

15 What kind of got gruesome for us, because a 

16 lot of the areas were not lit up, we started to into 

17 areas to try to secure it and make sure that no looting 

18 was going, because the PD did not know that at the 

19 time. The PD did not know what the extent was out 

20 here, because everybody was focusing toward center.

21 So when the 258 arrived on site, we broke 
41

1 everybody down by battery going into areas, and then 

2 the battery commanders took charge as far as securing 

3 perimeters by zone and sector, and then walking the 

4 roadways to see what was going on.

5 MAJ MELNYK: Was there any effort to secure 

6 the lower end of Manhattan from curiosity seekers from 

7 the north? Had you been given that mission?

8 LTC CANDIANO: Yes.

9 MAJ MELNYK: Where was that cordon set up?

10 LTC CANDIANO: That mission to prevent people 

11 coming in was, I believe, originally around City Hall, 

12 this area. It was a little further. Here is City Hall 

13 here. It was back along -- Canal Street originally was 

14 the road. Here's Canal Street.

15 Originally, it was up to Canal Street.

16 MAJ MELNYK: And you had soldiers as far north 

17 as Canal Street.

18 LTC CANDIANO: Yes, we did. And then the 

19 boundaries were moved and I think at that point in 

20 time, we operated around -- NYPD solely took control of 

21 City Hall, en masse.
42

1 MAJ MELNYK: City hall is down here.

2 LTC CANDIANO: City hall is -- yeah. City 

3 hall is down here. And they took total control of City 

4 Hall.

5 So we basically worked all areas around City 

6 Hall going south and all areas above going north to the 

7 original Canal Street route. 

8 MAJ MELNYK: Tuesday night, you had soldiers 

9 all the way up to Canal Street.

10 LTC CANDIANO: We had soldiers all the way up 

11 to the perimeter on Canal and because it was such a 

12 large area, we did a couple of patrols around with 

13 Humvees and then we dismounted, because we didn't want 

14 to add to additional traffic on the road while 

15 emergency vehicles were coming in.

16 MAJ MELNYK: Were you able, given that large 

17 area, to cover every intersection?

18 LTC CANDIANO: We broke everybody down into 

19 twos and in many intersections, there were police out 

20 there, and in many intersections, there were police 

21 cadets from the academy.
43

1 But I didn't really think at the time that the 

2 amount of troops that we had would be enough, but by 

3 breaking them down in twos, it seemed to be okay.

4 We also had enough manpower whereas once we 

5 started to dismount and secure the areas that we 

6 thought we needed to, we were given the zone that was 

7 totally blacked out and the guidance there was “give us 

8 assistance to see if there's anybody hurt or injured” 

9 and in some cases, and I don't know where it was, but 

10 we found the nose wheel to one of the aircraft, one of 

11 the jetliners. [The nose wheel had already been taped 

12 of as evidence – we personally did not discover it]

13 We found a lot of people that just plain 

14 didn't make it. We found our fair share that I don't 

15 think anybody was prepared for. 

16 MAJ MELNYK: What did you do in those 

17 instances? Were guardsmen handling the body parts? 

18 Were they marking them? Were they bypassing?

19 LTC CANDIANO: What we did was we basically --

20 in some cases, in the dark zones, you couldn't see 

21 bodies, because they were buried in debris and the 
44

1 dust, and the clay and the cement. [Some soldiers 

2 assisted in moving body bags to a holding area. This 

3 was left mostly to medical personnel, to include the 

4 medical support platoon from the 1/101 Cavalry, which 

5 had arrived earlier in the day]

6 I had another colonel walking with me [LTC 

7 Carlos Rivera, a NY Army National Guard Selective 

8 Service officer, who stayed with me from early on Sept. 

9 11 until the battalion stood down] to look at an area 

10 that I wanted to secure, that it was dark, with troops 

11 to maintain a position, and I believe we walked over 

12 two or three bodies just in one spot.

13 And we didn't know that there were bodies 

14 there until first light. The city, under these 

15 circumstances, again, when it's dark and with that 

16 smell and with the debris still falling and glass 

17 falling and explosions still going off, and fire in the 

18 buildings, it was just total chaos.

19 But the soldiers maintained control. If they 

20 found a body part, some cases, it might have been a 

21 finger. Over in -- and I forgot which area it was, 
45

1 again, going up towards the promenade up here in 

2 Battery Park City, we found the antenna of the World 

3 Trade Center, or part of it. That's how far debris 

4 flew.

5 When we walked around the Trinity Church area, 

6 we found some bodies and, you know, just to see a leg 

7 sticking out of a window of a store, but just a leg. 

8 [This story was related to me by a soldier – I did not

9 personally witness it]

10 What was really weird, and I don't know if any 

11 of the other commanders talked about it and I don't 

12 know if they saw it, but there were shoes in the 

13 street, boots. People just ran out of their shoes. It 

14 was just unbelievable to see just shoes in the streets 

15 with no people. 

16 It was just -- you know, we found one shoe 

17 that had part of a foot in it. We found a woman [in 

18 shock] that was laying up against a fence, one eye 

19 open, one eye closed, just laying there covered in gray 

20 debris. [She was later assisted by EMTs]

21 We saw a child. [correction: we saw a small 
46

1 child’s carriage that was knocked over and crushed 

2 almost flat. Hopefully the child was okay] We saw some 

3 dead animals along the side of the road, one of which 

4 was missing part of an ear. We saw death. And it's 

5 not something that you soon forget and, you know, it's 

6 a different perspective when you see it on television 

7 or in the movies and you see it for real.

8 But people in fixed positions that, you know, 

9 they looked like mannequins and the only thing you 

10 could do is tell a cop where they're located or you 

11 don't want to touch them because -- I made that quite 

12 clear to my soldiers that this was a crime scene and 

13 it's a federal -- it's a crime scene, but moreover, 

14 it's federal, and anybody touching anything is 

15 tampering with evidence, because I thought that this 

16 whole area, to me, was evidence, because there had to 

17 be something there which might help the authorities 

18 find who was responsible to do whatever, and that was 

19 the premise and that was part of my rules of engagement 

20 to my soldiers.

21 See something, try to tag it, identify it any 
47

1 which way, but don't move it, don't maim it, and don't 

2 take it from its position.

3 And that's basically the way we worked it.

4 MAJ MELNYK: Looking at your soldiers, what 

5 did you see on their faces? What kind of reactions did 

6 they give you as you walked the line with them?

7 LTC CANDIANO: I saw some fear in the 

8 soldiers. I saw confusion with the soldiers. A lot of 

9 the soldiers asked why, when we weren't really out at 

10 the time, we weren't at war with anybody at the time, 

11 why would they want to do that to us.

12 But I saw, at the same token, I saw a resolve 

13 with the soldiers. I saw professionalism. I saw E-4s 

14 making decisions that officers and commanders would 

15 make on the situation. I was very proud of my men. 

16 You train for certain things, but you train for 

17 war, you train to go after a soldier. You don't train 

18 enough, or any way, you don't train in any shape or 

19 form to do and deal with what we dealt with.

20 And, again, the only thing I can tell you is 

21 that it was one of the longest nights that I've ever 
48

1 had, but at the same token, it went real fast. And I 

2 don't expect you to understand that, outside the fact 

3 that firemen, policemen were dazed and amazed that we 

4 saw things. 

5 There was just one cause and that was to try 

6 to do whatever could be done, because we found out the 

7 carnage, not only the carnage, but the personal losses 

8 of most of the firemen, many of which we still don't 

9 know what the story is, because I have a lot of 

10 soldiers that have relatives and friends that are 

11 firemen that we don't know anything about.

12 But we saw the face of death. We smelled 

13 death. We still smell death today. And you find things 

14 and you think about things that no one could 

15 appreciate. I mean, to see body parts in abundance is 

16 amazing, that, you know, how you have a leg go through 

17 a window six or seven blocks later, just think of the 

18 impact. [Again, I did not personally witness this]

19 Was it from the plane? Was it from the 

20 building exploding? I don't know. But it's -- and 

21 especially when it's three floors, four floors up. 
49

1 It's kind of tough. 

2 There were a lot of rats. There were a lot of 

3 rats running around because with windows broken and 

4 vendor stands abandoned, food was in abundance, it 

5 really was. 

6 We saw one rat basically gnawing on a bone 

7 [this was related to me by a soldier – the bone may 

8 well have been food from one of the many abandoned 

9 concession stands] and, unfortunately, it seemed like 

10 half the time something was going on, I was in the mix, 

11 because I had -- I walked the perimeter once or twice -

12 -

13 MAJ MELNYK: Every night.

14 LTC CANDIANO: -- every night with my troops, 

15 because I want to see where they are and what they're 

16 doing. The first night was confusion and we held it, 

17 but I guess the relief effort really started and came 

18 into play at first light, there were a lot of things 

19 that were being uncovered and efforts started to focus 

20 with more of the area at ground zero.

21 But our mission at nighttime was to hold the 
50

1 line that was established and it was a handoff between 

2 the 69th and the 101, but at nighttime, it just was --

3 it was just different. It was eerie. We still had to 

4 go into areas where no one wanted to go.

5 And in some cases, you'd have the request for 

6 assistance to move bodies. Use your vehicles, can you 

7 move soldiers, can you move firemen, can you move 

8 policemen, and then you had the mission that, you know, 

9 official, unofficial, “can you help us out, our truck 

10 isn't here, we need to move these bodies from point A 

11 to point B.” 

12 And in some cases, one of my guys found a 

13 spine. It was just a spine. And he is -- he works in 

14 a medical capacity. So it bothered him, but it didn't 

15 bother him that much. But for the average guy, it's a 

16 lot to swallow. [LTC Candiano afterwards could not 

17 track down the individual who claimed to have seen a 

18 spine – it may have been a medic from the 101 Cavalry, 

since they arrived earlier on the 11th 19 .]

20 A fellow officer who was in the area not as a 

21 Guardsmen, but worked in the area and got out of there 
51

1 to put the suit on, had found a face, a skull, a face 

2 without a skull. It just looked like a Halloween mask 

3 on the ground.

4 That's the type of horror that was out there. 

5 And the soldiers reacted professionally. I can't say 

6 -- you know, the National Guard gets a bad rap 

7 sometimes about things, but the National Guard also 

8 shows that they are very professional and it's been a 

9 turnaround with how the National Guard is treated as 

10 part of this overall operation.

11 And I have to tell you that soldiers got 

12 together, they're New Yorkers, and they all got 

13 together for one common cause, and that was to help 

14 whoever needed the help. 

15 It didn't matter what the mission was. It 

16 didn't matter if it was moving bodies. It didn't 

17 matter. We were looking for things to do.

18 My soldiers were so infuriated with what was 

19 going on, that when they got off of their shift 

20 working, and we were on 24 hour OPS, but we were 

21 mandatorily bedded down for 12 hours, they wanted to 
52

1 spend their hours at the dig site. And we had to do 

2 whatever we had to do to get them crew rest so they 

3 could go back and do the job that they were required to 

4 do at night.

5 It was somewhat horrific. It was somewhat --

6 it's something I'll never forget for the rest of my 

7 life. But all I know is for us doing what we did, I 

8 was glad that a National Guard battalion or a National 

9 Guard unit was on site to do whatever we had to do, and 

10 for the history books, to say that an artillery 

11 battalion, my battalion, that I'm honored to command, 

12 was the first battalion in there to do something, to 

13 say what can I do for you, what do you need from me. 

14 And I can't say enough about that. I want to 

15 tell you a story about the pigeon, because I thought 

16 that that was -- there was totally utter chaos going 

17 on. There were fire trucks.

18 One of the roads that we were walking down to 

19 secure had a lot of falling glass, and I can't even 

20 remember what building it was, but instead of having 

21 troops on both sides of the road go down this road, I 
53

1 went down this road with another colonel, who was 

2 working with us from Selective Service. He reported in 

3 to my unit. So he became more or less like my liaison, 

4 and his name was LTC Carlos Rivera.

5 And once we came on site down this road, I 

6 just looked over, and I think it was pretty close to 

7 Trinity Church, I'm not quite sure, because it was kind 

8 of sketchy, but you could hear the sirens, you could 

9 hear the screams from people [emergency workers calling 

10 out for assistance], you can smell the diesel from the 

11 emergency vehicles that were trying to work 

12 construction, and people just running all over the 

13 place, while it was snowing this stuff.

14 And I say that everything was gray powder and 

15 snow, and it was horrible. I mean, to breath it was 

16 horrible. And we were told that the chemical masks 

17 wouldn't do anything, because the vision -- you needed 

18 more vision than what you had to work with, because we 

19 had the -17 series [masks].

20 Out of the clear blue, for some reason, I 

21 turned around and I looked off to the side, and the way 
54

1 the firemen work, they have these large six or eight 

2 inch hoses all over the place.

3 And that's the other thing that you saw. You 

4 saw fire hoses all over the place. Down any street, 

5 any street that had a fire hydrant had a hose.

6 And what they did to protect the hoses from a 

7 lot of the big trucks and equipment coming in is they 

8 had four by fours along the street on each side of the 

9 hose to protect it from being smashed.

10 On one side of the four by four, on the hose 

11 itself, was a pigeon, and that pigeon had to be shell 

12 shocked, dazed, I don't know. You know, hit a window. 

13 But the pigeon was standing there on this hose and 

14 nobody -- all those trucks running over this hose, 

15 never hit the pigeon.

16 And for one brief moment, everything just 

17 stopped and I don't know if that was my release point, 

18 but everything just stopped and that pigeon allowed me 

19 to pick it up and I put it off to the side of the road, 

20 because that was another life that I couldn't afford to 

21 see lost in that city.
55

1 It wasn't much and it might not be much and it 

2 might be that is kind of Mickey Mouse, but to me, that 

3 was something that at least, not a human --

4 (Change tape.)

5 MAJ MELNYK: This is MAJ Les Melnyk, 

6 continuing the interview with LTC Candiano, Commander 

7 of the 1st of the 258 Field Artillery.

8 Sir, you were talking the --

9 LTC CANDIANO: The illustrious pigeon. 

10 MAJ MELNYK: The illustrious pigeon, the one 

11 life that you could actually influence at this time of 

12 death.

13 LTC CANDIANO: Yes. Like I was saying, to me, 

14 it was just a release point, because it was something 

15 that I needed, you know, to say that I was able to help 

16 something. 

17 And I was bitter about what was going on and 

18 it was an unknown entity out there that we were dealing 

19 with, but in the midst of all this confusion and what 

20 was going on, with all the trucks running around, this 

21 one pigeon just sat on the hose, off to the side, and 
56

1 miraculously, it was not run over by anything, and I 

2 couldn't understand it.

3 To me, it meant that there was a reason why 

4 this thing needed to be alive, you know, and it was 

5 like it's life in the city, it goes on, and you 

6 survive, and you adapt.

7 And we are going to adapt. How we adapt, I 

8 don't know, because this is going to be new to us, but 

9 I think there is a resolve and there is something that 

10 we're going to do and we'll be better for doing it.

11 But this pigeon just -- I could not see a 

12 vehicle hitting this pigeon, and it was just there, 

13 with vehicles running over this thing, dead in the 

14 road, dead center in the road, not touched. And to me, 

15 that meant something.

16 So when the opportunity came up, I went over 

17 and I grabbed this pigeon because to me, it was a life, 

18 and that's all it was. It was a life. It was a life 

19 that we had control over.

20 And we're not a bad government, we're not bad 

21 guys. You know, we take human life seriously. We take 
57

1 life seriously.

2 And, again, you know, most of the soldiers 

3 that are M day soldiers have a lifetime and they know, 

4 they know what their life is outside and they know what 

5 they need to do, and they're citizen soldiers and they 

6 do their thing.

7 And they're not out there to take anybody's 

8 life. They're not out there to cause harm to anybody. 

9 But the resolve is there that if you harm us, we'll go 

10 after you. 

11 But this pigeon, the pigeon was there and it 

12 was as if to say I'm a life, you know, I'm worth 

13 saving, and it allowed me to pick it up, dazed and all, 

14 and it felt -- it was quiet. Everything outside got 

15 quiet. There was no noise. I didn't hear a fire hose. 

16 For a few seconds, maybe that was my release point for 

17 me, because I couldn't believe the devastation and the 

18 death all around, and the body parts, if found, may or 

19 may not be there for a while, in my mind, but the 

20 pigeon allowed me to just pick it up and take it off to 

21 the side of the road, and that was just a life that I 
58

1 had an influence on and I was able to just save.

2 And, again, it wasn't a human life, but it was 

3 a life just the same, you know, and it made me feel 

4 good, because it just gave me some closure with what 

5 the hell was going on.

6 MAJ MELNYK: It creates a vivid picture, in my 

7 mind. That was a long night and your troops had a lot 

8 to cope with.

9 What happened when the morning came?

10 LTC CANDIANO: The way we planned it out with 

11 the battalion commanders is that we figured out, and, 

12 again, planning this in advance, based on our strength 

13 posture, what we could cover in zones, and it was 

14 established between the two battalion commanders of the 

15 101 and the 69th that they could cover so much 

16 territory and so much zone.

17 And what we all agreed to is 0800, because 

18 that would give the troops enough time to muster and 

19 get into position, and 2000 hours as a handoff.

20 And the way we set it up is I am going to stay 

21 in place and provide security for my sector or my zone 
59

1 until relieved in place from your battalion, your 

2 company.

3 And that's the way we did it. We did it on a 

4 handoff squad by squad. 

5 We had rally points assembled that we put 

6 together to have transportation meet us, you know, when 

7 we regressed out of the area, and we established 

8 checkpoints to make sure that all our people were 

9 accounted for.

10 And that's the way we did a battle handoff, if 

11 you will, during the day and the evening hours by 

12 setting up the same zones and the same sectors and we 

13 established a relationship with soldiers during the day 

14 versus soldiers during the night.

15 And ironically enough, those soldiers that 

16 were working those shifts got to talk to each other to 

17 find out what they experienced in the area without the 

18 officers telling them to do that. That was very 

19 professional that they had enough wisdom and enough 

20 positive training for them to say, okay, give me a 

21 little assessment, what went on, what did you see, did 
60

1 you -- and in some cases, yeah, they bullshitted -- did 

2 you find anything? did you see anything? That's the 

3 common stuff that they talked about.

4 But they all knew, in a battle handoff, what 

5 happened in their area. I mean, there were things that 

6 my guys were involved with up to yesterday and is still 

7 ongoing.

8 Yesterday, as I set up my CP, we had a bomb 

9 scare in the building next to us. So a skyscraper had 

10 to be emptied yesterday because of bombs.

11 MAJ MELNYK: Where did you set up your CP and 

12 did it move during the operation?

13 LTC CANDIANO: Yeah. My CP was moved twice. 

14 My CP originally, like I said, I established my CP, 

15 because we didn't know what to expect and what was 

16 going on, we established a CP right at Pike and South, 

17 with the --

18 MAJ MELNYK: With the PD.

19 LTC CANDIANO: Co-located. This way, you 

20 know, if a hot spot came up, once the TOC was 

21 established, the CP was established, all the PD had to 
61

1 do is tell us where the problem was and where you 

2 wanted me to commit troops, whether it be to secure an 

3 area for a blast, or secure an area for crowd control, 

4 or to secure an area to give relief, and that's what we 

5 did. 

6 So I kept -- in the process of this mission 

7 with the security and sector, I kept so many troops in 

8 reserve for a hot spot if it came out or developed. 

9 And pretty much that's the way the other 

10 commanders ran their operation as well. So we were all 

11 in synch as far as how we wanted to do it.

12 But that night, like you said, was an 

13 extremely long night. It was short from the standpoint 

14 that you think about it and where did it go, but the 

15 night initially, no one had any concept of time. 

16 Nobody had any concept except listening to the radio to 

17 see is everybody accounted for and secure the areas.

18 And again, those areas that the PD asked us to 

19 go in and look for things, you know, looters, whatever 

20 the case might be, we found no looting, which was 

21 amazing in itself, it really was. No looting. No 
62

1 looting was taking place. 

2 And it could be because everybody thought that 

3 the police presence was so great, they didn't need to 

4 do that, but I'd like to think that it had to do with 

5 the fact that people needed to be doing other things. 

6 There were so many volunteers out there, thousands and 

7 thousands of volunteers to help the PD and fire try to 

8 get into ground zero and try to see whatever they could 

9 do to move debris, lift debris.

10 Some of the fire department guys asked us to 

11 use our Humvees to pull beams away from buildings. At 

12 the same token, some of the roads we walked, I found --

13 I came across -- I mean, I may not have been the first 

14 one, maybe it was there, but some of my guys walking 

15 down a roadway, and I did, because I think we were the 

16 first ones in this particular roadway, down this road, 

17 found a car up on the sidewalk with a steel beam from 

18 the World Trade Center on top of it, and it was a good 

19 six or seven blocks from the World Trade Center.

20 And inside was a body, crushed from the beam. 

21 [LTC Candiano later commented: Evidently, he was found 
63

1 prior to our arrival but nothing could be done for him. 

2 The rescue efforts were focused on trying to find 

3 people in that area either dazed or buried alive. I 

4 was told he was extricated from the vehicle just as we 

5 were leaving the area. The only thing I do recall is 

6 seeing something inside the vehicle.. The top was 

7 crushed so badly that I couldn’t tell if someone was in 

8 fact inside the vehicle] You know, and the only thing 

9 you could do is -- we weren't -- we were hoping to have 

10 something in case we identified a body, we can -- and I 

11 think for future events, for what it's worth, something 

12 like this, you know. If we're going to go out and 

13 secure an area or a sector, it's a lot easier to take a 

14 flag of some sort, an orange flag, something that's got 

15 a stake on it, stick it in the ground to secure it, and 

16 I think that was one of the recommendations that I had 

17 made, that if we do that, you need something where you 

18 need support in a search and rescue, we'll do that.

19 We had missions, unofficial. A lot of what 

20 was done was unofficial, because it was ad hoc, on the 

21 spot. You can't wait to get a control number to get 
64

1 this thing accomplished. You need something done now.

2 MAJ MELNYK: Can you explain that, you need a 

3 control number?

4 LTC CANDIANO: Okay. A lot of the missions, I 

5 guess, to justify the existence of what's being done 

6 with the military, city agencies or state agencies, in 

7 times of crisis or emergency, would say, okay, 

8 emergency operations center at the state headquarters 

9 level, we need so many soldiers to transport firemen, 

10 we need so many soldiers to transport food, we need 

11 generator support, we need whatever support, and the 

12 state gives it a control number or a mission number.

13 Then they send it down to the MACOM or the 

14 unit that's overseeing it and they give it a number, 

15 get it approved, then it goes out to the unit to 

16 execute the mission.

17 This particular situation, you didn't have 

18 time to do that. If you have the luxury to make up the 

19 number yourself to do something, but who the hell had 

20 time to do that, you know.

21 MAJ MELNYK: Communications?
65

1 LTC CANDIANO: Yeah. And we had no 

2 communications. Radios, you can't get in touch with 

3 anybody, and that's why I was saying I was so proud of 

4 my men because I had E-4s making decisions to react to 

5 a problem. 

6 We used our Humvees to pull beams from 

7 roadways, to clear paths for emergency vehicles. We 

8 used our Humvees and deuce and a halfs to transport 

9 firemen that were exhausted from being there all day, 

10 taking them to an area where they can rest.

11 We used our deuce and a halfs, while this was 

12 all going on with security missions, it was dismounted, 

13 we're on spot, our vehicles were available. I made my 

14 GSA buses available to transport firemen, to transport 

15 policemen. Whoever needed it, tell me what you need, 

16 this is where I am, have somebody come get me.

17 It was good that we had a liaison working over 

18 there with the police department CP, because if there 

19 was something hot, he'd get to the phone, the radio, to 

20 tell me what was going on.

21 And a lot was my personal cell phone that was 
66

1 used because we couldn't use radio communications. 

2 The radios that we had, the VRC-46s, 12 series 

3 radios, did not work too well in the city because of 

4 all the metal and all the steel and everything like 

5 that.

6 Something like this, I don't know what they 

7 have to do to get a radio system in place, because, 

8 obviously, signal towers were damaged, because, in many 

9 cases, cell phones in certain areas were dead zones. 

10 You couldn't use them at all.

11 So I know there's got to be something that's 

12 got to be out there that should be -- and I'm saying, 

13 as an after action type of thing, looking at this 

14 thing, we were prepared, but we weren't prepared.

15 We were prepared to be there to do something, 

16 but we weren't prepared for the destruction of such 

17 magnitude. And the little things that frustrated us 

18 that we needed to do things to make it better, to make 

19 us better at what we did was not there, and it pissed 

20 me off that I know somewhere there has got to be a 

21 platform to say “drop it in place here, this is 
67

1 equipment that's readily available to you to help out 

2 in an emergency,” and we didn't have it, you know.

3 I'm sure there's -- and I've seen them, 

4 because they had them at Police Plaza and they gave 

5 them to the National Guard Liaison we had there, 

6 they've got satellite radios, satellite telephones.

7 Give that stuff to the guys that need it to do 

8 our job, because we need to talk to somebody. In many 

9 cases, when we had to do something, we had to walk 

10 three or four blocks in order to get a signal to say “I 

11 need an emergency vehicle here, there's a body, or I 

12 need something.” And to me, that kind of time is too 

13 long, it's too late. But, again, you get the cops say 

14 to you, “listen, I have a mission to look for body 

15 parts.” You throw that on a Guardsman and see how you 

16 handle it.

17 You need to go into the building, you know, 

18 some of our POs found parts, we need to go through the 

19 building and find out if there's any other parts.

20 You go into buildings and you find animals. 

21 Animals alive, animals dead, animals dazed, animals 
68

1 hungry.

2 A lot of the emergency areas -- and I have to 

3 say I have never seen such support, that so much food 

4 was put out, so many things were put out to support all 

5 the --

6 MAJ MELNYK: This is Tuesday night or is this 

7 now...? 

8 LTC CANDIANO: Going into Wednesday. Support 

9 services started to come into play, on corners where 

10 bottles of water, things to eat, things to drink, dog 

11 food. I remember, for some reason, dog food, bags and 

12 bags of dog food and some cat food in the event that 

13 somebody found an animal that was alive and wandering, 

14 and here's food to give the animals.

15 Those are the New Yorkers. And believe it or 

16 not, some of my Guardsmen threw that kind of stuff in 

17 the back of their Humvees and they periodically took a 

18 bag of dog food where they thought they saw an animal 

19 or something, broke it open and left it there for them 

20 so they'd have something to eat.

21 That's a human touch. That's a quality that 
69

1 you're not going to get rid of. And, again, they did 

2 that in conjunction with doing their missions.

3 But there were a lot of things that were 

4 really horrific as far as the body parts, and that's 

5 just it. You know, you walk over bodies, you walk over 

6 parts, and thank God, a lot of the soldiers that were 

7 covering the outside sector and perimeter didn't get to 

8 see that. Only a selected few went in there and 

9 actually saw what was going on, to a certain extent.

10 But as the day progressed and as the days 

11 progressed, the nighttime took on a different 

12 environment. It was very eerie, and it was scary from 

13 the standpoint that we saw police boats out there doing 

14 their thing, saw a lot of people doing their thing.

15 You saw a lot of guys that were -- you know, 

16 they had weapons going off to do things, police 

17 department had guys with weapons, snipers doing their 

18 things, because they didn't know if it was over.

19 But all these city agencies really focused --

20 it was like it should be almost as if it was SOP with 

21 us. That “You guys provide perimeter security or 
70

1 defense, we need to go in there and fix,” because that 

2 was that type of emergency. 

3 Something else, if it was a hurricane or a 

4 fire, we know how to react to that. But this, again, 

5 was all together different. And, again, some of us saw 

6 more than you could imagine and I can't get into some 

7 of that stuff, because when I do, it kind of makes me 

8 sick to my stomach and I can't sleep. 

9 But the only thing I can tell you is that I 

10 don't think I slept for three days. I think it was on 

11 my third day that I finally got to get a couple hours 

12 of sleep, and I was pretty much pushed down by my

13 soldiers to say “get the rest,” - some of my officers.

14 And the only thing you do is you wait to go 

15 out, you wait to get what's going on and what's a hot 

16 area and what's not hot, and you go there and react.

17 I think, looking at it, you know, three days 

18 later, you're finding bodies or parts of bodies and, 

19 again, we found the nose wheel of the aircraft.

20 We started to find people and curiosity 

21 seekers coming in. [Tape breaks as helicopter passes 
71

1 overhead]

2 MAJ MELNYK: Curiosity seekers. You left off 

3 there. 

4 LTC CANDIANO: I really -- I lost my cool at 

5 one point in time. Around Zone 3, around the Battery 

6 Park -- not the Battery Park, but the --

7 MAJ MELNYK: Battery Park City?

8 LTC CANDIANO: Battery Park City area, there's 

9 an area where I guess, under normal conditions, you 

10 have tables out there and you can look at the harbor 

11 and there's a couple of bistros over there.

12 We came across three people on bicycles. How 

13 they got in there, we don't know. But I remember one 

14 of them had -- two of them had these saddle bags on the 

15 bicycles and each one had chunks of metal and pieces of 

16 debris from the blast. 

17 And I said, "What are you doing with that and 

18 what are you doing here?" and my guys held them and 

19 they challenged them, and that's -- we were not 

20 supposed to detain anybody, but when reports of looting 

21 started and things started to get a little stupid, 
72

1 after a couple of days, again, the first day it was 

2 kind of calm because everybody was focused on that.

3 When there were some instances of looting, the 

4 mission changed a little for us, from security and 

5 support to make sure that nothing was being done as far 

6 as the looting goes. And, again, take in mind that no 

7 weapons were authorized to do the mission nor were any 

8 night sticks authorized or anything like that. It's 

9 just that if you see someone doing something, contact a 

10 police officer. And I think by the second night, they 

11 basically started to set up police officers at some of 

12 the streets as a show of force to support what we were 

13 doing.

14 And, again, what we were doing to support 

15 them. And if an incident came up, then we are to 

16 notify the police department and work with them, get 

17 the details and turn them over to the police.

18 MAJ MELNYK: You weren't supposed to even lay 

19 hands on?

20 LTC CANDIANO: Correct. 

21 MAJ MELNYK: I know you couldn't actually 
73

1 arrest.

2 LTC CANDIANO: You can't detain. We can hold, 

3 and you can put your hands on them, but you can't 

4 forcibly step on them, hold them to the ground, do 

5 whatever. I mean, they didn't want that, you know, 

6 unless it was --

7 MAJ MELNYK: Who laid down those rules?

8 LTC CANDIANO: I think that pretty much came 

9 out of Troop Command, the 53rd Troop Command. The 

10 police were kind of surprised that some units had flak 

11 vests, some units didn't have flak vests. 

12 [At this point, a helicopter hovers overhead. It 

13 is dark out]

14 They might be here for us.

15 MAJ MELNYK: Serious? What is it, thermal 

16 imagery?

17 LTC CANDIANO: If that's the case, then you'll 

18 see some fire or police boats coming up.

19 MAJ MELNYK: Right. 

20 LTC CANDIANO: So anyway, the people on the 

21 bicycle, I noticed that they had stuff coming out of 
74

1 their -- equipment coming out of their -- or things 

2 coming out of their bags. 

3 It turned out they had debris from the World 

4 Trade Center. And I said, "What are you doing with 

5 this and who are you, give me some ID."

6 Two of three had ID, one didn't. So right 

7 there, that was a flag for us. But the girl on the 

8 bicycle, they must have been -- and they weren't kids. 

9 They were in their 20s, early 20s. 

10 So they weren't new to this thing. The girl 

11 made a comment, turned around and she says, "Well, it's 

12 just that, you know, this is a piece of history and I 

13 thought I might be able to sell it on e-Bay." 

14 So that just infuriated me, because I said 

15 "There are people dead here. Life, massive loss of 

16 life here, and you're looking to make a goddamn buck 

17 out of this thing." 

18 You know, and she started to get on the bike, 

19 after she gave me a gesture, and at that point in time, 

20 I just lost it, because I was tired of what was going 

21 on, and I grabbed hold of the handlebar of her bicycle 
75

1 and she slipped of her seat. I took what was there on 

2 the bicycle and one of my guys, while this was going 

3 on, called the police department over and the POs came 

4 and they took the three people away with what I call 

5 evidence, because it was from a crime scene, and they 

6 took off with those three people. Don't know what 

7 happened to them.

8 A lot of incidents we got involved with. We 

9 had another incident around the same park area, that 

10 there was a broken window and basically what had 

11 happened is somebody had gone in there to loot and the 

12 guy was in there ransacking shelves.

13 It was a delicatessen. They were ransacking 

14 all kinds of stuff, looking for things. One guy. My 

15 soldiers, a lot of these guys have their own little 

16 Motorola walkie-talkies that have a two-mile range, 

17 because that seemed to be working better than anything 

18 else.

19 So they called me over and said, "Hey, sir, 

20 you know, there's a guy in the store down the block." 

21 Two soldiers went to go get a police officer. Three 
76

1 soldiers picked up this four by eight piece of plywood 

2 that was on the street from where they were doing some 

3 repair work and they took the plywood and just slapped 

4 it up against the hole in the window to keep the guy in 

5 the store. 

6 So they're saying "We got him, we got him, we 

7 got him," and they're holding him, and they were so 

8 proud as hell that they caught a looter in the store.

9 Well, this guy had to be hopped up on 

10 something, because the window next to it, you know, you 

11 get that crackle effect from a blast on a window, this 

12 guy came flying through that window and took off and 

13 ran into the drink out here, the water in the park.

14 So at that point in time, police got on site 

15 and they called the police helicopters and were looking 

16 for him in the river, and I think they finally got him 

17 with one of the police boats.

18 [LTC Candiano later commented: After the fact, I 

19 couldn’t corroborate the theft in the store. Later, I 

20 was also told that the individual in the store was the 

21 owner and was trying to secure his valuables and cash 
77

1 from the register. I don’t know what actually took 

2 place with the police]

3 The night after that, we're out here, and 

4 then, you know, the curiosity seekers -- and let me 

5 just say this: I wanted all my guys to see that mess. 

6 I wanted them to see it first and foremost at the 

7 earliest possible convenience for them to see it.

8 The reason why I did that is: “Get it into 

9 your head this is what they did to you, this is what

10 those bastards are going to pay for.”

11 “Forget the curiosity anymore, it's in there, 

12 now go out and do the job, because of what they did, 

13 and keep that in the back of your mind when you go out 

14 there that somebody did that and they raped you,” and 

15 that's the way I looked at it.

16 I wanted it up front so they could go out and 

17 function. 

18 So one night we had -- and I can't recall 

19 which night, because the nights just seem like they 

20 were all together, I had a guy come in on a kayak, a 

21 blue kayak with black stripes, coming into the same 
78

1 area, in area three, with a night vision device on.

2 I don't know if he was a onlooker, I don't 

3 know what was going on with that, but he came in. We 

4 found out where he was and then I went to make a radio 

5 call on it and my soldiers told me that the police 

6 boat's got him, they put him into the police boat.

7 [LTC Candiano later commented: I personally didn’t see 

8 the individual on the kayak; I just got the message via 

9 cell phone. I did see the helicopters circling the 

10 area and was told later that a man was picked up in a 

11 dingy]

12 At that point in time, I believe the police 

13 department shut off its big light with its imagery that 

14 lit up the whole thing, and I just saw flashlights 

15 moving up and down.

16 I don't know what that means. You take it 

17 (inaudible) you know.

18 MAJ MELNYK: Could be.

19 LTC CANDIANO: I don't know. But I'm sure the 

20 police took appropriate action to subdue that 

21 individual and his kayak. I don't know what happened 
79

1 with that.

2 There were -- some of my guys made some sharp, 

3 sharp, sharp captures. I don't know if LTC Slack told 

4 you about the man. Two of my soldiers spotted a van 

5 that looked kind of suspicious and it was right -- I 

6 think it was right before his watch.

7 MAJ MELNYK: So early morning.

8 LTC CANDIANO: It was around four -- yeah. It 

9 was, well, maybe 4:00, 4:30, 5:00 o'clock. The van was 

10 riding around and a couple of my guys said to their 

11 commander in the area that this van has been driving 

12 back and forth.

13 With that, they got the police involved, got 

14 the van stopped. There were four people in the van, 

15 two jumped out, two remained in the van. They couldn't 

16 get out in time.

17 But in the van, they found an undisclosed 

18 amount of money, I think about $7,500 dollars, and a 

19 couple plane tickets out of the country.

20 So they carted those guys off, plus the 

21 soldier that found or spotted it. The FBI came and 
80

1 took that soldier away.

2 Another incident that I was personally 

3 involved with two days ago was once our mission 

4 changed, that we were out of the security mission, 

5 things quieted down. We started to be given different 

6 assignments.

7 We had street corner security, from street 

8 corner security, we had to do massive sweeps by zone.

9 I was responsible, at that point in time, once 

10 reinforcements came in to support us here, I was 

11 responsible for all of Wall Street, that whole area, 

12 and it was important that we had that whole place 

13 secured so that Wall Street can open.

14 So what we --

15 MAJ MELNYK: If we could pause here for a 

16 second. 

17 (Change tape.)

18 MAJ MELNYK: This is MAJ Melnyk, continuing 

19 the interview.

20 Sir, you were talking about sweeping Wall 

21 Street.
81

1 LTC CANDIANO: Right. We got the mission as 

2 part of Zone 5 to secure, provide security around the 

3 Wall Street area, and the idea and the concept was that 

4 the police department, along with the Mayor's office, 

5 wanted to show that it was safe to come back to work 

6 and they felt having a military presence there in the 

7 Wall Street area was important.

8 MAJ MELNYK: So this would have been when?

9 LTC CANDIANO: Sunday morning, coming into 

10 Monday. I don't know the date. 

11 MAJ MELNYK: So Sunday night and that's the 

12 first night that you had assistance on the night shift 

13 from --

14 LTC CANDIANO: The 204th Engineers. 

15 MAJ MELNYK: 204th Engineer Battalion. How 

16 did you end up splitting up the perimeter?

17 LTC CANDIANO: By that time, there was a 

18 handoff between the 107th Corps Support Group and the 

19 42nd Aviation Brigade, which was established by the 

20 division to come down and take over operational control 

21 of divisional assets on the ground, and then totally 
82

1 take charge of the whole area here in the handoff.

2 The S-3 of the Aviation Brigade, established 

3 sectors and zones, which was great for me, because it 

4 meant that I could consolidate my troops to a smaller 

5 area and provide crew rest, if you will, to give them 

6 some downtime.

7 And basically from Tuesday to that Saturday or 

8 Sunday, we had no real downtime outside of guys falling 

9 to sleep wherever they were, that type of thing.

10 And, again, going back, to see the faces on 

11 firemen, to see the faces of death and fatigue on 

12 police officers is something that we won't forget 

13 either, because it was just a deer in the headlights 

14 look as far as watching those guys go by.

15 There was one fire truck that was found, and I 

16 wanted to tell you about this, going back toward the 

17 Battery Park City area, that evidently belonged to a 

18 ladder company that the guys that were off shift worked 

19 with and for a moment, also, they all got off the truck 

20 and they held hands around that fire truck and the next 

21 thing you know, you just saw some police officers 
83

1 consoling the firemen, and it really was touching to 

2 see that, that they were all their and they all had the 

3 same pain.

4 We all had the same pain, but it was really 

5 touching. That's something I won't forget either.

6 But going back to this thing with Wall Street.

7 Go ahead.

8 MAJ MELNYK: I was going to say, your soldiers 

9 rotated out in the morning. Where did your battalion 

10 go? They were, it seems, on a more regular schedule 

11 than some of the firefighters.

12 LTC CANDIANO: We got bounced around because 

13 it was too far for us to go back to the Bronx and 

14 Jamaica and Brooklyn. They decided to house us in the 

15 armory at 26th and Lex and work out of there.

16 But the Governor decided that they needed to 

17 have an armory set up where they could have 

18 notification of kin and set up as a place for -- you 

19 know, I guess --

20 MAJ MELNYK: Bereavement.

21 LTC CANDIANO: Bereavement, and set up the 
84

1 armory to handle that as a center, and also to do 

2 community -- like a town hall type meeting for the 

3 citizens of New York.

4 So, unfortunately, at that point in time, my 

5 battalion was then put on buses and we had to find 

6 another armory and the Troop Command moved us up to the 

armory at Harlem, the 369th 7 [Transportation Battalion].

8 MAJ MELNYK: Right.

9 LTC CANDIANO: Which kind of ticked me off, 

10 because now I was a 120 blocks away from where I needed 

11 to be at any given time.

12 MAJ MELNYK: Was there any given reason why 

13 you weren't put at the Park Avenue Armory of the 107th 

Support Group [located at 67th 14 St.]?

15 LTC CANDIANO: Yeah, because the Park Avenue 

16 Armory, number one, started to receive a lot of 

17 supplies and donations to support the effort.

18 You had the headquarters working out of there, 

19 the 107th Group that was operational to this thing, and 

20 you had a lot of support troops working out of that 

21 armory on standby in case they were needed to go in to 
85

1 certain areas.

2 My recommendation was Governor's Island, and I 

3 think somebody told me Governor's Island, but after 

4 thinking about it, I supported the move to Governor's 

5 Island. 

6 Also, Fort Totten, Fort Hamilton, or Fort 

7 Wadsworth at Staten Island, right over the bridge.

8 MAJ MELNYK: So the first night, when you came 

9 out Wednesday morning, where did you go?

10 LTC CANDIANO: The first night, when we came 

11 out Wednesday morning, we went right to 26th and Lex to 

12 bed down.

13 MAJ MELNYK: So it was like a hot bed rotation 

14 with the soldiers of the 69th.

15 LTC CANDIANO: Right. But we had, at that 

16 point in time, no cots for anyone and everyone slept on 

17 the floor with their ruck sacks and their sleeping 

18 bags. And you pretty much stayed in the armory, took a 

19 hot shower, and got ready to go back upon -- just prior 

20 to the relief time and the handoff, and that was 

21 basically the way we did business for a couple of days.
86

1 But the thing -- because our guys, in many 

2 cases, came straight from work, in many cases, they 

3 came not knowing what to expect, there were no changes 

4 of uniform. There were no packages from Momma at home 

5 to show up with.

6 They just came with what they had on their 

7 back. In many cases, up ‘til today, soldiers are still 

8 working with the same uniform they had on from a week 

9 ago, and we were waiting for downtime, and that was a 

10 problem that we had, trying to get downtime 

11 established.

12 MAJ MELNYK: And plus they bounced you around. 

13 You ended up going to the 369th armory.

14 LTC CANDIANO: Yeah, and I was ticked about 

15 that. I went from the armory at 26th and Lex to the 

16 armory at Harlem, the 369th. They had no hot water in 

17 the armory at all, because it was under repair. They 

18 had ample enough space, but, again, you're sleeping on 

19 the floor.

20 So I requested cots. I requested cots for 400 

21 soldiers, because I figured I had 339 on the ground, 
87

1 but at the same token, in case I was plussed up with 

2 other soldiers that showed up or other soldiers that 

3 might be OPCON'd to me, at least I had a place to bed 

4 them down. It took another three days before I got 

5 cots. 

6 Filters, I was really pissed off about the masks, 

7 because there were a couple of disconnects, because we 

8 went up to one truck that was passing out masks to 

9 police and fire and they would only give us a few, and 

10 not a lot, because it was meant for police and fire. 

11 Now we're doing security for everybody and it 

12 was a non-agency on the outside that was there giving 

13 this stuff out, but they felt that we didn't need it, 

14 not realizing that we were that deep in it.

15 In some cases, within our own state command, 

16 they felt that we didn't need that type of mask, that 

17 quality mask, whatever the case might be.

18 I was so infuriated that I went to the 107th 

19 group commander, COL Sieter, and I took a mask from a 

20 police officer from the decon site and I said “What is 

21 the best mask for my soldiers? Because obviously the 
88

1 NBC mask is not too good to use here. It's not meeting 

2 the criteria to do the mission and it's too hot, the 

3 hood especially.”

4 I asked the officer, police officer for a 

5 sample, and he gave me a sample, after he 

6 decontaminated my boots, because my boots were a mess.

7 My clothes were a mess. And I gave that model 

8 number to the 107th group commander to say this is what 

9 we need, you know, for us to function in the field.

10 We never got them. Never got the masks. And, 

11 again, because my battalion was on nights, we were the 

12 bastard children out there that, for the most part, 

13 when supplies came in during the day, they were pretty 

14 much depleted by the evening.

15 So my guys normally went out there without the 

16 proper gear, the proper equipment, and nobody could 

17 guarantee me when I was going to get it.

18 Up until today, we still don't have the right 

19 masks. Only a few do.

20 MAJ MELNYK: Only a few do.

21 LTC CANDIANO: Only a few do. That was one 
89

1 thing that kind of ticked me off, is the fact that we 

2 couldn't get the proper masks. Another thing was cots, 

3 that we didn't get proper cots, because we're not 

4 authorized cots, based on the MTOE [Modified Table of 

5 Organization and Allowances]. We don't have a need for 

6 that. But we finally got them and got our folks bedded 

7 down in the armory in Harlem, only to find out that 

8 after everything else, there was no hot water. And 

9 again, 110 blocks may not seem like a lot, but in New 

10 York City in a time of crisis, it can take an eternity.

11 MAJ MELNYK: So the Governor's Island idea was 

12 not approved.

13 LTC CANDIANO: It was not approved by the guy 

14 in charge of Governor's Island. I guess he didn't feel 

15 it was warranted for him to turn on the electricity. 

16 It wasn't warranted for him to pull the switch to say, 

17 okay, here you go, guys.

18 But just think, the time and effort that would 

19 have been saved if we were right here in the harbor and 

20 could take a ferry right across to Battery Park, to be 

21 right at ground zero real quick, as opposed to spending 
90

1 an hour to an hour and a half coming down from another 

2 armory out of the way.

3 And it's big enough where you can house a 

4 thousand soldiers on that place. Just think of your 

5 support that you could have had there, had they opened 

6 it. But, you know, I guess it's important, but it 

7 wasn't that important. I really think that a federal 

8 agency should have opened its doors, whether or not 

9 that place was shut down or not. 

10 So I don't know if anybody pursued the Fort 

11 Wadsworth or Naval stations that night. I don't know 

12 if anybody pursued Fort Totten. That's one for the 

13 books that somebody will have to verify, because I 

14 don't know what happened to that. 

15 MAJ MELNYK: You were talking about the Wall 

16 Street mission and we got sidetracked.

17 LTC CANDIANO: Going back to that. Going into 

18 Monday morning, I did a sweep and I did a sector walk 

19 to see where my troops were, where were they going to 

20 be, because the police chief, the chief of the area, I 

21 believe it was Chief Ward, wanted us to make sure that 
91

1 we had traffic lanes established for the buses, that 

2 the PD would direct the traffic flow, and all we had to 

3 do was provide traffic control, and then establish a 

4 corridor, two main corridors for people that travel up 

5 to the main district, the Wall Street district.

6 And I was pushing all along that MPs were held 

7 in reserve. I couldn't understand that. Here we are 

8 doing the street mission, that really it would have 

9 been ideal to have MPs that handle traffic and crowd 

10 control out there doing it, three MP companies that 

11 were sitting in an armory. [LTC Candiano later 

12 commented: I found out after the fact that MPs were out 

13 doing search-and-rescue and traffic control. The MPs 

14 that I spoke with at the 107h CSG were assigned there 

15 as a reserve and were not committed to the streets. 

16 Many MPs were in fact out there doing the important 

17 jobs that they do, maintaining law and order]

18 [Tape break as another helicopter passes overhead]

19 MAJ MELNYK: Sir, I would like for you to 

20 address some of the key individuals in your battalion.

21 LTC CANDIANO: Do you want to finish the Wall 
92

1 Street thing?

2 MAJ MELNYK: Yes, sir.

3 LTC CANDIANO: Before we lose it with another 

4 helicopter. Anyway, what had happened was that one of 

5 my soldiers spotted a mail truck that had gotten into 

6 the area, a step van mail truck, and it was parked near 

7 Wall Street about a block away on a side street, and 

8 the police were called over to take a look at it after 

9 he spotted it, and it turned out that the truck was 

10 hot-wired and somebody from -- whoever drove that truck 

11 was now inside the area.

12 Whether they found the individual or not, they 

13 don't know, but I believe Alcohol, Tobacco and 

14 Firearms, in conjunction with the FBI, took the truck 

15 out of there and it was impounded after the bomb squad 

16 looked at it.

17 He's coming again. [Refers to helicopter 

18 overhead] 

19 Where my CP was set up -- you're going to lose 

20 it.

21 MAJ MELNYK: For future listeners of this 
93

1 tape, we keep getting buzzed by a Huey. That's why we 

2 have the constant breaks.

3 Sir, your CP?

4 LTC CANDIANO: Where my CP was set up on South 

5 and Wall Street, I established it close to our police 

6 liaison, their CP. This way, as missions came in, we 

7 were right next to the police department with constant 

8 communication.

9 We had a bomb scare in the building and it was 

10 kind of an eerie feeling because right away you were 

11 established and now you're assisting getting people out 

12 of a building to get them to safety.

13 And that's the way things went there. We had 

14 an incident with a Con Edison worker close to ground 

15 zero that was taking pictures. 

16 It turned out that the individual was not a 

17 worker for Con Ed, that he had some sort of ID that the 

18 police took care of and he was seen by a soldier 

19 earlier in a different uniform in that area, and they 

20 felt that he was doing battle assessment, battle damage 

21 assessment, was carted off by the police.
94

1 MAJ MELNYK: Sir, if we could turn to key 

2 leaders, both in your command and who influenced your 

3 command during the incident.

4 LTC CANDIANO: Well, the initial liaison, MAJ 

5 Magnanini, was kind of critical to what was going on, 

6 because he was a direct liaison between the city 

7 agencies and the military agencies to give us missions 

8 and assistance any which way we could.

9 MAJ MELNYK: When did he first come into that 

10 role?

11 LTC CANDIANO: I seem to recall him on the 

12 ground from day one or soon thereafter.

13 MAJ MELNYK: Was he there Tuesday night when 

14 you hooked up at South and Pike Streets with the 

15 police?

16 LTC CANDIANO: I don't believe so, but he 

17 could have. I don't remember. I don't remember, 

18 because it seemed like it was, you know, like a -- kind 

19 of hazy at that point in time.

20 MAJ MELNYK: Who was key in mobilizing your 

21 battalion?
95

1 LTC CANDIANO: SGM Rivera, my battalion 

2 sergeant major, or we're still waiting to make him a 

3 sergeant major. 

4 1SG Peck, Herbert Peck, from B Battery. They 

5 had the largest strength posture and the most -- the 

6 strongest morale and cohesiveness in my battalion, and 

7 they responded en masse. 

8 MAJ John Kool, my full-time battalion S-3 was 

9 critical in a lot of the planning stages that we had to 

10 put this thing together.

11 MAJ MELNYK: By that, you mean the discussions 

12 prior to leaving your armory?

13 LTC CANDIANO: Like whether we should be 

14 taking combat gear or not taking combat gear, that type 

15 of thing. 

16 I think SFC Coba, my battalion supply NCO was 

17 kind of critical.

18 MAJ MELNYK: How do you spell that?

19 LTC CANDIANO: C-o-b-a. Because as soon as 

20 this whole thing came to play, to fruition, he started 

21 to figure out we need meals planned and ordered for 
96

1 certain things, we're going to need support for 

2 logistical supplies.

3 And the other thing I did in planning was 

4 basically said “how many cases of MREs do we have? Pack 

5 them up and take them with you, how many days supply do 

6 we have to last before we need a resupply of anything? 

7 Because I didn't know if we'd need it for us or need 

8 it for civilians.

9 But Coba was critical from the standpoint that 

10 with all the state active duty missions we've had 

11 before, he developed a rapport and a relationship with 

12 vendors in the local community to provide those 

13 resources and assets to us.

14 MAJ Kool started to plan everything as if it 

15 was a military operation, you know. He looked at what 

16 types of vehicles would be advantageous to bring with 

17 us versus -- you don't want to take everything, because 

18 a lot of times, everything is going to be in the way. 

19 Go on an assessment, see what you need, and, again, 

20 we're only a 40 minute drive, it doesn't mean you can't 

21 get something here fast enough, and there were still 
97

1 trips to the armory. So Kool was working that piece of 

2 the pie.

3 MAJ Bati, my exec, when he finally came, and 

4 that's B-a-t-i, he tried to talk to the staff and get 

5 things going.

6 And I had Seargeant Morales was my service 

7 battery readiness NCO, SFC Morales. He was critical, 

8 talking to people in the battery to make sure the cooks 

9 were prepared, the mechanics were prepared.

10 My full-time OMS shop had a MSG Joe Grato, who 

11 is not part of my battalion, but made every effort to 

12 make sure that all my vehicles were up. After they 

13 were lined up, personally put his technicians out there 

14 to check all the equipment to make sure that I could 

15 get out the door safely. He was great -- big help.

16 And my A Battery guys, my A Battery commander, 

17 CPT Moshoyannis, was a school teacher or is a school 

18 teacher, and his name is spelled M-o-s-h-o-y-a-n-n-i-s.

19 As soon as the incident happened, he's calling 

20 me, and he's out on eastern Long Island, saying, "Hey, 

21 sir, I'm ready if you need me. I'm ready to come in. 
98

1 I just need the word from you, because I'll get out of 

2 class and come in." And he's a teacher. 

3 CPT Cliff Cotton is my Charlie Battery 

4 commander. Again, he reacted quickly as far as his 

5 troops go. 

6 But again, all my commanders did.

7 MAJ MELNYK: Were there any -- I don't know if 

8 the right word is heros, but soldiers whose -- what 

9 their actions were once they got on site really stuck 

10 in your mind? The initiative they took, anything that 

11 you wanted to bring forward.

12 LTC CANDIANO: You know, Wednesday morning, 

13 about 4:00 o'clock, 4:30, I don't know who it was, but 

14 one of my soldiers, and, you see, it's hard, because it 

15 was so much a blur, but just one of my soldiers was 

16 holding the hand of somebody, of a woman that just 

17 looked like -- she wasn't part of the blast. She was 

18 part of a support, bringing in -- starting to bring in 

19 clothes, because a lot of the firefighters and the 

20 police officers were going through tee shirts, pants 

21 and things like that.
99

1 And there were a lot of volunteer groups that 

2 were bringing in things and she said "God bless you 

3 guys, we feel safe that you're here." And she gave him 

4 a hug, but it seemed like it was just more of a hug, it 

5 was secure for her, and she didn't want to let go of 

6 that.

7 It's just a very -- it's in the memory banks 

8 as far as a picture goes, in my mind.

9 MAJ MELNYK: Burned in.

10 LTC CANDIANO: Yeah. I think it says 

11 something about the role of the Guard in this disaster, 

12 from everybody I talk to, that rather than being 

13 feared, we were a source of strength.

14 LTC CANDIANO: And security. There was 

15 security there, because we -- today, when I was doing 

16 my patrol of the wire, because we had this new mission 

17 with the wire.

18 MAJ MELNYK: Could you explain that, sir?

19 LTC CANDIANO: The mission of the wire?

20 MAJ MELNYK: Yes, sir.

21 LTC CANDIANO: The wire mission, basically, 
100

1 it's all the electrical wiring around the World Trade 

2 Center was melted and destroyed as a result of the 

3 blast and the fire, along with all the fiber optic 

4 equipment for telephones.

5 Verizon was putting in hundreds of thousands, 

6 -to me it seemed like miles - of wire. I mean, it 

7 sounds crazy, but the wire that was being put in that 

8 I'm talking about was electrical wire to support 

9 turning power back on in the buildings.

10 MAJ MELNYK: Heavy cables.

11 LTC CANDIANO: Extremely heavy cables, in the 

12 neighborhood of anywhere between 12 and 16 inches 

13 thick, each cable, and you're talking maybe 50 cables 

14 to a bundle.

15 And what was happening is this -- the wire, 

16 the cable was being laid out along certain routes, then 

17 buried in certain routes, and then boxes were built 

18 over them to protect them from pedestrians.

19 MAJ MELNYK: Where they were on top of the 

20 roads.

21 LTC CANDIANO: To walk, or on top of the road. 
101

1 And by touching this cable, even though it's 

2 protected, could do bodily harm. And our role tonight 

3 and today was to make sure that no pedestrian 

4 accidentally walked over those cables to get 

5 electrocuted and to make sure that they were not 

6 tampered with at the same time, in order to supply the 

7 power and everything needed to the center.

8 And that was the mission that we had. But 

9 going through it, I wanted to make sure, as we went 

10 along Broadway, that -- you know, I was concerned about 

11 security issues and security measures, and anytime that 

12 we get a mission, I'm the first one that walks the 

13 line.

14 If I feel it makes sense to do and it's safe 

15 to do, I walk it. And today I walked it and mostly I 

16 walk it with either my exec or my three to see what 

17 might be a problem, what works, what doesn't work.

18 And the people, they wanted to take your 

19 picture, they wanted to have your picture taken with 

20 somebody of their family. They wanted to say that I 

21 know a soldier. There was a soldier there to make me 
102

1 feel good and we had people today telling us, you know, 

2 it's because of guys like you, we're able to sleep at 

3 night. 

4 It's because of what you do, I can get back to 

5 work. And when I saw that in the newspapers, that the 

6 National Guard was there or the military was there –

7 [Horn blasts in the distance]

8 MAJ MELNYK: I think that's the ferry 

9 departing.

10 LTC CANDIANO: Okay. Three blasts of a horn in 

11 an area means a building is coming down.

12 MAJ MELNYK: Yes.

13 LTC CANDIANO: So if you don't know that, you 

14 know it now. If you hear three quick blasts of a horn, 

15 a building is dropping, and run for your life.

16 You had Air Guard there, you know. And in my 

17 sector, in my zone, it wasn't -- by Tuesday night I was 

18 reinforced in that zone. I forgot to tell you that.

19 MAJ MELNYK: Tuesday night.

20 LTC CANDIANO: Tuesday night. By Tuesday 

21 night, I picked up -- not Tuesday night. 
103

1 MAJ MELNYK: Tuesday was the night of the 

2 incident or the day of the incident.

3 LTC CANDIANO: By Wednesday or Thursday night, 

4 I picked up 642 Aviation Battalion and then by --

5 MAJ MELNYK: Which is Army Guard.

6 LTC CANDIANO: Army Guard.

7 MAJ MELNYK: Aviation.

8 LTC CANDIANO: Then by Wednesday night, I 

9 picked up a 120 guys from the Air Guard. That's 

10 important.

11 So little by little, I had all of these 

12 battalions OPCON'd to me to cover that zone, because we 

13 were tightening it up a little bit to -- once the area 

14 was secure, we were adding more support inside to help 

15 out with support efforts, to move equipment in and 

16 troops or people, for that matter.

17 So the Air Guard jumped right on board. 

18 There's been a lot of Navy folks here. All Reserve 

19 agencies, part of New York, plus agencies outside of 

20 New York, militarily, that wanted to be here and 

21 participate. 
104

1 But I just wanted to let you know about that, 

2 and it was really kind of important that it was a team 

3 effort.

4 CPT Joe Prudin (phonetic) made some --

5 assisted in some arrests and things of that nature and 

6 he was one of the guys that I was saying was sharp on 

7 this van incident. 

8 MAJ MELNYK: CPT Prudin is?

9 LTC CANDIANO: Is our headquarters battery 

10 commander and he's also a New York City fireman. So he 

11 had a personal interest in this thing, as well. 

12 While we were out there checking the status of 

13 the wire that was being secured by the construction 

14 workers, and we were going to provide security over 

15 that over the next few days, people went out of their 

16 way to come up to you and thank you for your efforts, 

17 try to take a picture with a soldier, to give you a 

18 hug, to give you a card, just something to say thank 

19 you for being there, and that emotion that was felt,

20 the last time I saw anything like that was during 

21 Desert Storm, where people went out of their way to 
105

1 cheer you on.

2 And ironically, from day one when this whole 

3 thing happened to now, when you're driving a military 

4 vehicle on a highway or as we were going to our 

5 armories to change and get additional equipment, people 

6 would go out of their way to honk their horns at you 

7 and come out of the houses and try to bring you 

8 something to drink at a traffic light or do anything 

9 they could to make you feel that you did something 

10 really great.

11 It was very emotional. It was very emotional 

12 for our soldiers and very emotional for the people, 

13 too, in the community, because we are a part of the 

14 community, and that's the important thing.

15 We belong, where we eat and where we work, 

16 we're there. 

17 And then today was very emotional for a lot of 

18 my soldiers out there because we got cards from kids.

19 (Tape Change)

20 MAJ MELNYK: This is MAJ Les’Melnyk, 

21 continuing the interview with LTC Candiano, the 
106

1 commander of the 1st of the 258 Field Artillery, on 18 

2 September, in Battery Park, New York City.

3 Sir, you were last talking about the benefits 

4 of being a Guardsman and serving your community.

5 LTC CANDIANO: Yeah. I just can't say enough 

6 about how the community responded to us being here. 

7 Normally, it's something where they say, you know, 

8 during a snow storm or natural disaster, that, “thank 

9 you, thank you, thank you,” but this was a different 

10 type of thank you, because it was a different response, 

11 and it's a response to say that, “yeah, normally, I'm 

12 here to help, but now it was I'm here to help and I'm 

13 here to serve” and it was something that people, 

14 although in the midst of not knowing what to do, to 

15 look up to the skies or look for bombs or whatever the 

16 case might be, they really felt secure.

17 They felt secure with the police presence, but 

18 for some reason, that Guard presence made a difference 

19 to people who were walking the streets. We got hugs, 

20 we got drinks, we got all kinds of stuff.

21 There were two National Guardsmen that were 
107

1 just working, and I have to find out from one of my 

2 officers how this took place, but a businessman from 

3 the Wall Street center said, "Listen, if you guys get 

4 jammed up with your mortgages, I'm willing to pay your 

5 mortgages, just because you're here." 

6 I swear to you, I could not believe that, he 

7 made that comment. But that's how secure they felt 

8 with this presence here, because we got here fast, we 

9 really did. It was something that was picked up on the 

10 news right away, that National Guard were on site that 

11 night, and that was important that we got there real 

12 quick and we showed that we were taking care of 

13 business.

14 It was impressive and I'm proud of my 

15 battalion.

16 MAJ MELNYK: Can you assess the feelings, the 

17 morale of your battalion? Clearly, there's a lot of 

18 people who will be disturbed by what they saw, but then 

19 there's the reaction of the community. Where do you 

20 feel your men are right now?

21 LTC CANDIANO: Well, I believe, as is the same 
108

1 with the other battalions, there's going to be some 

2 closure there. There has to be some closure, but there 

3 won't be closure at the same time from the standpoint 

4 that we got a job done.

5 We came here to do something and I think we 

6 all exceeded our expectations and our mission. We did 

7 more than anybody can expect a human to do, a human 

8 being to do, and, again, you've got to give credit to 

9 those fire and police guys out there, because they've 

10 got the dirty job. They really do.

11 But my expectations of my soldiers were such 

12 that they were going to go in there, provide security 

13 and do it professionally, but they took it one step 

14 further, because it was personal and professional, and 

15 it didn't matter and, you know, sometimes people talk 

16 about race relations, human relations, things of that 

17 nature. It didn't matter. There were no boundaries as 

18 far as the human soul goes. It didn't matter what the 

19 color of your skin was, what the nationality was, to 

20 include Muslim, Afghan, whatever. It didn't matter. 

21 If you were hurt or you were in trouble, somebody was 
109

1 there to help pick you up. 

2 And that's what it was. It didn't matter. It 

3 didn't matter. You're an American, you're a citizen, 

4 and we're going to pick you up. And that's the 

5 important thing. 

6 And then one day when this is all over, these 

7 guys will go back to driving garbage trucks or 

8 delivering mail or being a delivery man, it doesn't 

9 matter, or working in the delicatessen. These guys are 

10 going to go back to that job, but when that telephone 

11 rings to say come back, I think you're going to see

12 something where they're going to do it with a 

13 vengeance, because they've been smacked around, but 

14 they know that if they get here faster the next time, 

15 they'll be able to respond faster and take care of the 

16 needs of the people faster.

17 And they got here pretty quick. So they want 

18 to do this. This is important to them. Hopefully, it 

19 won't happen again, but if it does, there's been a lot 

20 of lessons learned for me that I can see and, again, 

21 I've seen leadership that you would not see down to 
110

1 that E-1, E-2, E-3, E-4 level, and that's amazing that 

2 they stepped up to the plate and they hit a home run 

3 each and every time. 

4 Never had a problem with discipline, never had 

5 a problem with morale. The only problem I have is the 

6 unknown, because you're on state active duty, why isn't 

7 it federal? For the type of disaster. Personal 

8 questions come into play for the soldier, which is 

9 hard, and we can't get the answers and, in some cases, 

10 the leadership can't give you the answers, and that is 

11 what is frustrating.

12 How does the Soldiers and Sailors Relief Act 

13 effect me? Am I going to be covered? Am I going to 

14 have a job? Can I be excused because of a unique 

15 situation? How long are we going to be out there? And 

16 the biggest thing, as a commander, that I felt I was 

17 not given to get the job done, you know, creature 

18 comforts go a long way for a soldier.

19 If you get him a good hot meal and you get him 

20 a good place to sleep and you give him a clean uniform 

21 and warm socks and comfortable boots, they'll go balls 
111

1 to the wall for you and keep going. 

2 In this case, being bounced around from unit 

3 to unit, not being able to take hot showers, not being 

4 able to have a clean change of clothes, had some 

5 impact. Whether it was a great impact, I would have to 

6 say no, because they were back out here doing the job 

7 again the following day or when their shift picked up.

8 They bit the bullet and they did what they had 

9 to do, because the simple fact was they were standing 

10 here, they were breathing, they had loved ones home, 

11 but they were doing it because there was somebody that 

12 could potentially could still be alive in that pile of 

13 rubble, and that's what they wanted to do.

14 They were bitter that they couldn't get in 

15 there to do what they wanted to do, [i.e., help dig for 

16 survivors at ground zero], but they all knew that they 

17 were there for a specific mission.

18 And, again, I'm proud of them from the 

19 standpoint that they knew that there was emergence, an 

20 emergency that took place. They reacted to that 

21 emergency and they don't want to leave until they are 
112

1 told to stand down. And that's the thing, they won't 

2 go until they're told to. 

3 And I'll tell you what, knowing the hearts and 

4 souls of some of these soldiers and what they've seen 

5 and what they've done, I wouldn't be the least bit 

6 surprised if they take off that green uniform when they 

7 say stand down and they'll put on a pair of jeans and a 

8 tee shirt and go back to get on some line and serve 

9 food to somebody else. 

10 That's what they'll do. It's not that they're 

11 trained to do that. It's just that they feel that they 

12 need to do more. 

13 And that's the thing, that I think closure is 

14 required for a lot of my guys because they'll walk out 

15 of here saying “Could I have done more?”, you know, and 

16 I ask myself, as a commander, “is there anything that I 

17 could have done to get the response time down to get 

18 here faster? or is there anything I could have done to 

19 possibly help a life?,” but at the same token, I think 

20 the biggest thing for me was walking over bodies not 

21 knowing that I was walking over bodies.
113

1 That's a tough sell, it really is, and it's an 

2 American and it's on your own turf. That's the tough 

3 sell.

4 That's basically it.

5 MAJ MELNYK: Thank you, sir, for taking the 

6 time to talk to me.

7 LTC CANDIANO: My pleasure.

8 (The interview was concluded.)

9 * * * * *