Caesar the War Dog

by Stephen Dando-Collins

‘I don’t get it,’ said a young Australian soldier sitting next to Ben. The soldier had never been to Afghanistan prior to arriving in the country a month before. ‘Why doesn’t the Taliban blow up the mobile phone towers? They blow up just about everything else.’

  ‘Because the Taliban use mobile phones too,’ responded Ben, who had done several tours of Afghanistan and knew it as well as any foreign soldier could.

  ‘To detonate remote bombs?’ said the soldier.

  Ben nodded solemnly. ‘That, and to talk to their friends and agents.’

  At a crossroads, near a fort on a barren hill, they passed an empty Australian Bushmaster being towed back to Tarin Kowt for repairs. One of the Bushmaster’s front wheels had been blown off by a hidden IED, but the vehicle’s V-shaped armoured hull had ensured that none of the soldiers inside had been badly injured by the blast. It was IEDs like that one that Ben and Caesar were here in Afghanistan to find – before those bombs took lives.

  Australian Army engineers were already at work in one village the convoy passed through. They seemed to be dismantling what was left of a burnt-out building. As the convoy drove past, the engineers and their infantry escort gave their fellow Australians of the convoy a wave.

  ‘What’s going on there?’ Ben asked the cavalry regiment driver of their Bushmaster.

  ‘Last week, that burnt-out building was a new school,’ the driver began in reply. ‘Australian Army engineers built it for the village. It was the first proper school that village ever had. Four days ago, our blokes finished work on it. The very next night, as soon as we’d left the place, the Taliban turned up and burnt it to the ground. Before it even had a chance to open its doors!’

  ‘That’s just dumb!’ declared the young soldier next to Ben. ‘Why would the Taliban wreck a school? Schools don’t hurt anyone. A new school would help Afghan kids, for God’s sake!’

  ‘It’s because we built it,’ the driver came back with a sigh. ‘We’re foreigners and we’re not Muslims like the people here. Seems like the Taliban would rather Afghan kids didn’t go to school than be grateful to us. A charity even provided books for the school. The books were all piled up, ready for the village kids to use. So what did the Taliban do? They used the books to start the fire.’

  The soldier shook his head. ‘I can’t believe people could be so primitive in their thinking – could deprive their own kids like that.’

  The driver shrugged. ‘That’s what we’re up against in this country, mate. Primitive thinking. Self-destructive thinking. We build a school, the Taliban burn it down. We build the Afghan people a hospital, the Taliban will try to blow it up. We build them a road or a dam, they’ll plant a bomb in it. We’ll rebuild that school, and –’

  ‘They’ll try to burn it down again,’ said Ben.

  ‘Exactly,’ the driver agreed. ‘And we can’t guard every building in Uruzgan. The local police are supposed to do that. But some police are in cahoots with the Taliban.’

  ‘That’s so frustrating,’ said the soldier next to Ben.

  The occupants of the Bushmaster all lapsed back into their thoughts. There were plenty of lulls between action for Australian soldiers to puzzle about the actions of their opponents. A lot of the time they simply couldn’t work those opponents out at all – theirs was a totally different way of thinking to the Aussies.

  After a long, careful journey, the convoy reached its destination. Once they’d passed through a village beside a stream, the vehicles spread out and came to a halt. As the rear doors of the Bushmasters opened, the heat of the day quickly replaced the air-conditioned cool of the vehicles. Wearing sunglasses to counter the glare of the bright sun, the troops piled out. Most quickly took up defensive positions with rifles and machineguns ready, watching the hillsides for signs of Taliban fighters.

  Keeping a tight leash on Caesar, Ben dropped to one knee as he surveyed the situation. A hundred metres in front of them lay the bridge, made of stone. The old Russian truck that had gone over the side was still there, hanging at a crazy angle. Its nose sat in a rocky stream while one rear wheel remained on the bridge. In going over the side, the truck had broken through the bridge’s parapet. Looking back the way they had come, Ben saw that the village they had just passed through was just as uninteresting and colourless as any they had seen that morning, with occasional patches of green grass and only a few trees.

  An Australian infantry officer, a lieutenant, came up to Ben and Caesar. ‘We’ve been watching the pictures from a drone all the way out here, Corporal,’ he said. Somewhere, thousands of feet above them, an Australian Army drone aircraft was silently circling the area, transmitting pictures of the landscape around the bridge to the troops on the ground. ‘Everything looks okay,’ the lieutenant went on. ‘There’s no sign of Taliban activity. But we can’t be too careful. Send your dog to the bridge to check it out for IEDs. This truck accident might have been set up as an ambush.’

  ‘Right on it, sir,’ Ben replied, pleased that he and Caesar were at last able to do the job they’d been sent to Afghanistan to do.

  The pair began to walk toward the bridge. Forty metres from it, Ben instructed Caesar to sit, then dropped to one knee and unhooked his leash. Caesar’s front legs were quivering with anticipation. He knew that he was about to go to work and couldn’t wait. Then, Caesar heard the words from Ben that he’d been waiting for. ‘Caesar, seek on!’

  Caesar eagerly sprang forward and went trotting toward the bridge with his nose low to the ground. Behind him, Ben waited on bended knee, ready to use his rifle to protect his four-legged partner if need be. Caesar did as he’d been trained, moving quickly up the right side of the road. At a whistle from Ben, he turned and crossed to the other side. Checking the bridge, and then the crashed truck, Caesar then made his way back to sit at Ben’s side.

  Ben rewarded him with a hefty pat. ‘Good boy, Caesar!’ he said. ‘Well done, mate!’ The pair had just successfully completed their first explosives check in Afghanistan. Turning to the waiting lieutenant, Ben gave a hand signal and called, ‘All clear!’

  The lieutenant then sent forward two engineers with metal detectors to trace the same path as Caesar, and they also gave the all clear, as Ben knew they would. The engineers checked the bridge for damage. They reported that it was still sound and could support heavy loads. One of the armoured vehicles then moved forward, slowly crossing the bridge and edging past the crashed truck. The crew established a checkpoint beyond the bridge, with their turret pointing down the road to cover approaching vehicles. Ben and Caesar soon followed and joined the soldiers at the checkpoint. At the same time, a Bushmaster came up to attach a towrope to the Russian truck.

  While the truck was being dragged back onto the road, it was the job of the troops at the checkpoint to stop and check all vehicles arriving on the scene. Several donkey-drawn carts came up, and Ben and Caesar checked out the carts and their drivers, who were made to wait. Then a battered old Toyota sedan drove up, and the driver and his passengers – a woman and three children – were told to get out.

  ‘Caesar, seek on!’ Ben instructed.

  Ben quickly led Caesar around the family to see if he could pick up the scent of explosives on them. One Taliban tactic was to use suicide bombers with explosives strapped to their bodies beneath their clothes. These suicide bombers would set off the explosives when they were near troops or police, or in a crowd, blowing themselves up as well as everyone around them. A young man from Pakistan had done this in a Tarin Kowt market only a few weeks back, killing and injuring scores of innocent civilians.

  Ben was pretty certain none of these family members from the car would have a bomb on them because suicide bombers almost always operated alone. Caesar, who hadn’t indicated that he’d picked up the scent of anything suspicious on the family, seemed to back him up. Ben then let Caesar off the leash and pointed to their Toyota sedan. ‘Check the car, Caesar. Check the car, there’s a good boy. Seek on!’

  Trotting with his nose dow
n, Caesar did a quick circuit of the car without giving any sign of detecting explosives in the vehicle. Ben opened the driver’s door. Without hesitation, Caesar put his front paws up on the driver’s seat. He sniffed the air inside the car, this way then that, then hopped back down. Satisfied that the car was clean of explosives, Ben reattached Caesar’s leash, planning to lead him back to their Bushmaster and let him rest in the shade of the vehicle.

  ‘Are the car and occupants clean?’ asked the sergeant in charge of the armoured vehicle. If he received the all clear from the EDD team, the sergeant would tell the Afghan family they could get back in their car.

  Ben was about to reply when he felt Caesar pulling on the leash. Something was troubling him – something back in the direction of the Afghan family. Ben noticed that a breeze had just sprung up, blowing from the direction of the family to Caesar and himself. It was possible that Caesar had picked up a new scent on that breeze. Squatting beside his dog, Ben unclipped the leash again. ‘Seek on, boy,’ he said. ‘Show me what’s bothering you. Seek on!’

  Ben watched as Caesar trotted back to the family. Around and around he went, circling the family, whose members watched him with anxious and uncertain looks on their faces. Caesar kept changing the direction of his circles, going one way and then the other.

  ‘Is your dog onto something?’ the sergeant called down from his turret.

  ‘Something is bothering Caesar, that’s for sure,’ Ben replied. He then noticed that Caesar was stopping and turning in front of the man who had been driving the car, and Ben’s memory went back to the day of the training exercise when Caesar had done the same thing in front of a red-headed corporal who had handled explosives. Based on that prior experience, Ben announced, ‘The driver has been carrying explosives in the past twenty-four hours.’

  ‘You’re sure?’ the sergeant asked.

  ‘That’s what Caesar is telling me,’ Ben replied, nodding.

  The Afghan police with the convoy were immediately called to the scene to question the driver of the car in his own language. It turned out that the driver was an off-duty policeman. But it was also revealed that he had been unloading ammunition at his police station the previous night, wearing the same civilian clothes that he was wearing today, which meant that those clothes still contained traces of explosives chemicals. Even though the car’s driver turned out to be one of the good guys, Caesar had been right to be troubled by him, and Ben had been on the ball to spot Caesar’s unease.

  The lieutenant and the other Australian soldiers were impressed by the performance of the new EDD team. ‘We reckon that dog of yours is a super-sniffer,’ said one engineer to Ben. ‘You two can work with us any time you like.’

  For the remainder of the day, Ben and Caesar continued on duty at the checkpoint as the Russian truck was pulled back up onto the road and the engineers built a temporary barrier along the broken side of the bridge. Late in the afternoon, the troops climbed back into their vehicles, and the convoy rolled back into the Tarin Kowt base at twilight.

  That night, after a shower, Ben used a computer in the recreation hall to talk to Josh, Maddie and Nan back at their home in Australia via Skype. He was able to do this once a week and it was a treat for him to see the faces of his children and his mother as he talked to them.

  ‘How’s the soccer going, Josh?’ Ben asked, after he and Maddie had been talking for a while about Maddie’s dance classes.

  ‘Real good, Dad,’ Josh replied. ‘I scored a goal last Saturday and nearly got two more.’

  ‘Well done, champ!’ Ben responded with a grin. ‘I reckon you’ll be representing Australia at the World Cup one day.’

  ‘I don’t know about that,’ Josh replied, ‘but our coach says our team’s on track to make the finals.’

  ‘That’s great, son.’

  Josh smiled and leaned closer to the screen. ‘Dad, if we make the grand final, will you come and watch me play?’

  ‘The grand final? When’s that?’

  Josh dropped his eyes. ‘September.’

  Ben sighed. Moments such as these were one of the hardest parts about being away from home for such a long time. ‘In September I’ll still be over here in Afghanistan, Josh. You know that.’

  ‘But if I make the finals, wouldn’t the generals let you come home to watch me?’ said Josh. ‘It’s really important.’

  ‘Mate, they won’t let me come home until my tour is over.’ Ben felt terrible. He would love to see Josh play in his soccer final, but the army had other plans for him. ‘Sorry, mate. I’m here to do a job for seven months. Don’t worry, the months will fly by and I’ll soon be home again.’

  ‘But you’ll miss my final,’ said Josh, hanging his head.

  ‘Look at me, son. I’ll be home for Christmas. Okay?’

  Josh wouldn’t look at the screen. ‘Christmas is forever,’ he sighed. ‘I’ll be ten by then. You’re even going to miss my birthday.’

  ‘Sorry, mate,’ Ben responded, feeling more and more guilty.

  ‘You were here for Maddie’s birthday,’ said Josh, sounding increasingly peeved.

  ‘Don’t worry, Ben,’ Nan Fulton piped up, putting her arm around Josh’s shoulders. ‘Josh will be fine. I’ll go to his soccer final and I’ll tell you all about how his team wins. Right, Josh?’

  ‘I suppose so,’ Josh agreed, glumly.

  ‘Talking about winners,’ Nan went on, ‘look what I won at golf last week, Ben.’ She held up a shiny new golf trophy. ‘You’re looking at the new Holsworthy Lakes Senior Ladies’ Champion.’

  Ben smiled. ‘What a family of champions we are! Well done, Mum.’

  ‘Yes, we’re all champions,’ said little Maddie. ‘Aren’t we, Daddy!’

  ‘We sure are, princess,’ Ben replied. ‘And look, I’ve got something to show you all.’ Reaching over, he took hold of Caesar, who had been lying on a sofa beside him, and lifted him within view of the web camera. There was a floppy soldier’s cap on Caesar’s head, making him look almost human. From across the world, Maddie giggled with laughter.

  ‘What a comical sight you are, Caesar!’ said Nan.

  Caesar’s head cocked to one side as he looked at the computer screen. Recognising the voices of Nan and Maddie, he quickly became excited. His tail wagged so furiously that it thumped on the sofa and his hat fell off. He even barked in recognition. ‘Caesar says hello,’ said Ben.

  ‘Tell him we miss him, Daddy,’ said Maddie. ‘We miss you, too.’

  ‘Don’t worry, time will fly,’ said Ben, feeling emotional now, ‘and we’ll soon be home again – Caesar and me.’

  ‘Keep safe, the pair of you,’ said Nan.

  ‘We will,’ Ben assured her.

  Ben sadly said his last farewells to his family, ended his session, then took Caesar back to the kennels, where Zeke and Spider were already asleep.

  The next afternoon, Ben heard that an IED had that morning exploded on the same road that he and Caesar had used on the way to and from their mission at the bridge. The bomb had badly damaged an American Army vehicle and seriously wounded three American soldiers who were inside. The news sent a chill down Ben’s spine. He realised that the Taliban who had set off that IED had probably been in the hills when he and Caesar had been at the bridge; that they may have been watching them as they did their work there.

  The following day, Ben and Caesar went out on a regular patrol. Coming to a culvert as he inspected a section of road, Caesar slowly eased his rear end down to the ground and stared intensely at the culvert. ‘Explosives here!’ Ben warned the soldiers behind him. ‘Caesar’s found something.’

  Caesar had made his first find of Taliban explosives.

  For a month, Ben and Caesar went out on day-long patrols checking roads, bridges, buildings and vehicles for bombs. Almost every other day, Caesar located explosives planted by the Taliban. His discoveries saved a lot of lives, but they also told the Australian and American commanders that the Taliban were becoming more and more acti
ve, and more and more daring, in the region of Tarin Kowt. It was decided that it was time that Special Forces operations were stepped up to counter the increasing Taliban presence.

  Caesar’s growing reputation as a super-sniffer, combined with the fact that he and Ben had passed insertion training back in Australia, resulted in the pair now being assigned to their first ‘special ops’ mission. It was to be carried out by just five SAS operators plus Ben and Caesar. And the man in charge was to be Ben’s best friend, Sergeant Charlie Grover. In a meeting room inside the Special Operations Headquarters at the Tarin Kowt base, Charlie led a briefing for the men taking part in the mission.

  ‘Our codename for this job is Redback,’ Charlie began. He pointed to a map projected onto a large screen. ‘The target is this kal. We’ve received intelligence from locals that members of the Taliban under Commander Baradar are using this kal to store a large amount of weapons and ammunition. Our job is to find it. That’s where Ben and EDD Caesar come in. Right, Ben?’

  Ben nodded. ‘If there’s anything to be found there, Caesar will find it.’

  ‘At 2330 hours tonight, we’ll be landed by heelo here,’ Charlie went on, tapping a hill shown on the map. ‘We then hike to this other hill overlooking the kal, so we are in position to observe it come daylight. We watch the place all day and half the next night to see who comes and goes. At 0100 hours next morning, all being well, we enter the kal.’ Charlie tapped some keys on a computer keyboard. An aerial photograph of a farm compound now appeared on the screen. ‘One Section will go in via the western gate, here. Two Section will go through the southern gate, here. Ben, you and Caesar are with me and Bendigo Baz. We’re One Section. Two Section will be led by Lucky Mertz. While Ben and Caesar search the compound from top to bottom, the rest of us will secure it and all occupants.’

  ‘What happens if Caesar finds the Taliban weapons and ammo?’ Corporal Lucky Mertz asked.

  ‘We destroy it on-site, then pull out,’ Charlie replied, ‘taking the headman of the kal with us for questioning back here at Tarin Kowt.’