The U.S. military has faced a particularly hard slog in Afghanistan's Korengal Valley, where NBC's Richard Engel recently visited the soldiers of Viper Company.

Engel's series of reports gives viewers an intimate look at life on Firebase Restrepo, a remote outpost in some of Afghanistan's more unforgiving terrain.

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Conditions at Restrepo, Engel notes, have gotten better over the past several months. The firefights are less frequent, and soldiers have seen a few improvements to their outpost: Security cameras, a new guard tower, better food. They even have a microwave and a morale phone. Still, the work is dangerous, and the casualties are high: Of the original 20 soldiers Engel met from one platoon when he last visited, only about half were still on Restrepo. The others had been killed, injured, or evacuated because of illness.

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