War Dogs

by Rebecca Frankel

I do not know where this book would be without the creative and wonderful team at Palgrave Macmillan, though I do know how lucky I am to have had the erudite and discerning Elisabeth Dyssegaard as my editor. She appreciated what I appreciated about these dogs and their handlers, and with kindness and knowing saw how to best bring their stories full circle. Special thanks to Donna Cherry for organizing the many facets of this book’s production, and to Bill Warhop, who copyedited the manuscript and whose line-by-line comments gave me much-needed encouragement in the last and most grueling phase of editing this book. I also wish to thank Lauren Dwyer-Janiec and Christine Catarino for their amazing work getting War Dogs out into the world.

  Whatever challenges this book brought with it, I never took them on alone, for I had the counsel of Esmond Harmsworth, my brilliant and uncompromisingly lovely agent. I will always be thankful—and better off—for the guidance and support he offered.

  Thanks to Ali Rhodes, Jared Mondshein, and Rick Carp, who all contributed their time and talent—fact-checking, transcribing, hunting down the most reluctant of contacts and most obscure details of military history—helping to guard against error, ultimately ensuring this book was better and smarter.

  I am—and will always be—eternally grateful for the friendship of

  David Rothkopf. He was always there to remind me that the sky was not falling after all. I don’t know where I would be without his humor and unflagging support. The crew at Foreign Policy magazine, a brilliant and wickedly funny band of creatives who are still relentlessly encouraging of my war dog endeavors, will always have my admiration and adoration—chief among them my friend Ben Pauker and my colleague Ty McCormick.

  Thanks must be paid to Karin Tanabe, Jeremy Berlin, and Jennie Rothenberg-Gritz, who are not only among my dearest friends but are exceptional writers. Each of them provided insight, reassurance, and edits when I truly needed them most.

  Book writing was, at least as I experienced it, a sometimes terribly solitary exercise. But because of these friends, I was never lonely: Rachel Wozniak, Chris Wozniak, Michal Mizrahi, Jessica Pavone, Claire Bohnengel, Brandon Van Grack, Sarah Longwell, Erica Sandler, Molly Smith, Kyle Kempf, Nick Vilelle, Mitchel Levitas, James Fallows, Deborah Fallows, and, of course, Mike Fallows, and most especially my Great Uncle Benny, who was the very best kind of friend.

  Notes

  introduction: dogs in the time of war

  1.“Dogs of War in Conflict,” New York Times, February 21, 1915.

  chapter 1: when dogs become soldiers

  1.Jeffrey Gettleman, “Enraged Mob in Falluja Kills 4 American Contractors,” New York Times, March 31, 2004, http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/31/international

  /worldspecial/31CND-IRAQ.html?pagewanted=all.

  2.Marine Sergeant Clinton Firstbrook, “Newfound Respect: A Combat Correspondent’s Tale of the Battle for Fallujah,” Marines Magazine, July 2004, http://web.archive

  .org/web/20060301190608/http://www.usmc.mil/magazine/304/Feature1stPer

  son.pdf; Robert D. Kaplan, “Five Days in Fallujah,” The Atlantic, July 1, 2004, http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2004/07/five-days-in-fallujah/303450/.

  3.President Bush Addresses the Nation, White House Press Release, March 19, 2003, http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2003/03/20030319-17

  .html.

  4.“Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs)—Iraq,” GlobalSecurity.org, http://www

  .globalsecurity.org/military/intro/ied-iraq.htm.

  5.From interviews with Colonel Mike Hanson (retired) on January 24, 2013, and Major Jim Griffin (also retired) on January 30, 2013, who were given orders to look into this. Their Marine battalion was part of the first invasion into Iraq in 2003.

  6.When Lulofs and Aaslan left Iraq, the bounty on their heads had been upped twofold to $20,000.

  7.Tony Perry, “Snipers Stalk Marine Supply Route,” Los Angeles Times, December 28, 2006.

  8.Though a final tally of how many dogs actually served in Vietnam isn’t known—

  official records of their enlistment weren’t kept until 1968—it’s estimated that somewhere between 4,000 and 4,900 dogs were used; the confirmed number based on official records is 3,747. This number is taken from the United States War Dogs Association website, which credits Dr. Howard Hayes, veterinarian (retired) of the National Institutes of Health, who, as of March 1994, reviewed these records and counted the dogs by brand number, the tattoo the dogs get in the inside of their right ear. “U.S. War Dog History,” The United States War Dog Association, http://www.uswardogs.org/id10.html.

  chapter 2: the house of misfit dogs

  1.E. H. Richardson, British War Dogs: Their Training and Psychology (London: Skeffington & Son, LTD, 1920), 55.

  2.Ibid., 65.

  3.Ibid., 66.

  4.Almost all domestic adult dogs have 42 teeth: 4 canine, 10 molars, 12 incisors, and 16 premolars.

  5.“Bite Force,” Season 1, Episode 2, Dangerous Encounters, National Geographic Channel, May 27, 2005, http://events.nationalgeographic.com/events/speakers-bureau

  /speaker/brady-barr/.

  6.Ibid.

  7.Dr. Stanley Coren, “Dog Bite Force: Myths, Misinterpretations and Realities,” online article from his blog “Canine Corner,” Psychology Today, May 17, 2010, http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/canine-corner/201005/dog-bite-force-myths

  -misinterpretations-and-realities.

  chapter 3: the trouble with loving a war dog

  1.Alexandra Horowitz, Inside of a Dog (New York: Scribner, 2009), 57.

  2.Ibid., 58.

  3.Ibid., 57.

  4.Marc Bekoff, The Emotional Lives of Animals (Novato, CA: New World Library, 2007), 125.

  5.Ibid., xviii.

  6.Phone interview with Marc Bekoff, September 10, 2012.

  7.John Black, “Darwin in the World of Emotions,” Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine 95, no. 6 (June 2002), http://jrsm.rsmjournals.com/content/95/6/311.long.

  8.John P. Wiley Jr., “Expressions: The Visible Link,” Smithsonian, June 1998, http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/expressions-the-visible-link-1538449

  51/?no-ist.

  9.Charles Darwin, The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals (London: John Murray, 1872), 57, 60.

  10.The bulk of this information was relayed to me via email by Dr. Jaak Panksepp, the Baily Endowed Chair of Animal Well-Being Science and Professor, Veterinary and Comparative Anatomy, Pharmacy, Physiology (VCAPP), at Washington State University, on September 22, 2012.

  11.J. Brauer, J. Kaminski, J. Riedel, J. Call, M. Tomasello, “Making Inferences about the Location of Hidden Food: Social Dog, Causal Ape,” Journal of Comparative Psychology 120 (2006): 38–47; Monique A. R. Udell and C. D. L. Wynne, “A Review of Domestic Dogs’ (Canis Familiaris) Human-Like Behaviors: Or Why Behavior Analysts Should Stop Worrying and Love Their Dogs,” Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior 89, no. 2 (March 2008): 247–261, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih

  .gov/pmc/articles/PMC2251326/?report=classic.

  12.“Dogs Decoded,” Nova, PBS documentary, original airdate November 9, 2010, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/nature/dogs-decoded.html.

  13.Anaïs Racca, Kun Guo, Kerstin Meints, and Daniel S. Mills, “Reading Faces: Differential Lateral Gaze Bias in Processing Canine and Human Facial Expressions in Dogs and 4-Year-Old Children,” PLoS ONE, April 27, 2012, http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0

  036076.

  14.J. K. Vormbrock and J. M. Grossberg, “Cardiovascular Effects of Human-Pet Dog Interactions,” Journal of Behavioral Medicine 5 (October 11, 1988): 509–17, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3236382.

  15.Ashley Balcerzak, “How Your Dog Helps Your Health,” Men’s Health, November 7, 2013, http://www.menshealth
.com/health/how-dogs-make-you-healthy.

  16.“Oxytocin is a nine-amino-acid peptide synthesized in hypothalamic cells, which project either to the neurohypophysis or to sites within the central nervous system.” Thomas R. Insel, “Oxytocin—A Neuropeptide for Affiliation: Evidence from Behavioral, Receptor Autoradiographic, and Comparative Studies,” Psychoneuroendocrinology 17, no. 1 (March 1992): 3–35, http://www.sciencedirect.com/science

  /article/pii/030645309290073G.

  17.Dr. Z, “How Owning a Dog Extends Your Life,” Stresshacker.com, November 17, 2010, http://www.stresshacker.com/2010/11/how-owning-a-dog-extends-your

  -life/; “People & Animals—For Life,”12th International IAHAIO Conference, July 1–4, 2010, Stockholm, Sweden, http://www.iahaio.org/files/conference2010stock

  holm.pdf.

  18.Phone interview with Marc Bekoff, September 10, 2012.

  19.E. H. Richardson, British War Dogs: Their Training and Psychology (London: Skeffington & Son, LTD., 1920), 151.

  20.Known as the father of ethology, the study of animal behavior, especially in nature, Lorenz’s most notable contribution is thought to be his work identifying the pattern of imprinting in the Greylag goose. Born and raised in Austria, much of his work came during Hitler’s rise to power. That he was a willing and ardent member of the Nazi Party and contributed to the science of eugenics, however, is, in the discussion on dogs, perhaps best overlooked but not forgotten. He would later recant this affiliation and expressed regret, as he wrote, for having “couched my writing in the worst of Nazi-terminology.” “Konrad Lorenz—Biographical,” Nobelprize.org, http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1973/lorenz-bio.html. The source cited on the page is from Les Prix Nobel en 1973, Editor Wilhelm Odelberg, Nobel Foundation, Stockholm, 1974.

  21.Konrad Lorenz, Man Meets Dog (London: Methuen & Co. LTD., 1954), 139.

  chapter 4: beware the loving (war) dog

  1.This stirring quote is taken from an impassioned speech made in a court of law and known as “Eulogy of the Dog,” by Mr. George C. Vest. Vest would serve in the United States Senate from 1879 to 1903, but in the fall of 1870 he was a trial lawyer and he made this speech while defending his client, whose dog, “Old Drum” had been shot and killed by a neighbor (or someone who worked for him). With this closing argument Vest is said to have brought the jury to tears. His client was awarded damages. Even after all his years in the Senate, this speech is his legacy. 101 Cong. Rec., S4,823–24 (daily ed., September 23, 1870), http://www.senate.gov/art

  andhistory/history/common/generic/Speeches_Vest_Dog.htm, speech text: http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/resources/pdf/VestDog.pdf.

  2.Maria Cristina Valsecchi, “Pompeiians Flash-Heated to Death—‘No Time to Suffocate,’” National Geographic News, November 2, 2010, http://news.national

  geographic.com/news/2010/11/101102/pompeii-mount-vesuvius-science-died-inst

  antly-heat-bodies/.

  3.“Pliny Letter 6.20,” online translation provided by University of Texas at Austin Classics Department, https://www.utexas.edu/courses/classicalarch/readings/Pliny

  6-20.html.

  4.Albert Payson Terhune, A Book of Famous Dogs (New York: Triangle Books, 1941), 6. Terhune writes that the Museum of Pompeii keeps “two distorted figures, side by side, amid the horde of other gruesome casts”—a child and a dog. Found on the inside of the dog’s collar is the following Latin inscription: “Thrice has this dog saved his little master from death: once from fire, once from flood, once from thieves.” How they gathered this information, or if Terhune traveled to the museum to read the dog’s collar for himself, is a mystery I was not able to solve.

  5.Mark Derr, How the Dog Became the Dog (New York: Overlook Press, 2011), 33.

  6.Ibid., 40–41.

  7.Sam Anderson, “Entering Darkness,” The New York Times Magazine, June 10, 2011, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/12/magazine/entering-darkness.html?pa

  gewanted=all; Michael Balter, “Chauvet Cave Does Not Stand Alone,” Origins of History blog, Science, February 19, 2009, http://blogs.sciencemag.org/origins/2009/02

  /chauvet-cave-does-not-stand-al.html.

  8.Derr, How the Dog Became the Dog, 25–28.

  9.Jan Bondeson, Amazing Dogs (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2011), 11.

  10.Ibid., 11; Agnes Strickland and Bernard Barton, “True Stories And Historical Anecdotes of Dogs,” Fisher’s Juvenile Scrap Book (London, Paris & New York: Fisher, Son, & Co., 1839), 60, http://books.google.com/books?id=UG4EAAAAQAAJ&

  printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q=sabinus

  %20&f=false.

  11.Terhune, A Book of Famous Dogs, 84.

  12.Mari Yamaguchi, Associated Press, “Mystery Solved in Death of Legendary Japanese Dog,” Washington Post, March 2, 2011, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn

  /content/article/2011/03/02/AR2011030201491.html.

  13.Terhune, A Book of Famous Dogs, 78–100.

  14.“After Brazil Flooding, Loyalty to the Dead,” CNN.com, January 17, 2011, http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2011/01/17/in-brazil-flooding-loyalty-to-the-dea/.

  15.“Chinese Dog Refuses to Leave Dead Owner’s Graveside,” BBC.com, November 21, 2011, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-15825892.

  16.Rebecca Frankel, “Rebecca’s War Dog of the Week: Time to Lift the ‘Don’t Pet, Don’t Feed’ Ban,” foreignpolicy.com, October 15, 2010, http://ricks.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/10/15/rebeccas_war_dog_of_the_week_time_to_lift_the_don_t_pet_dont_feed_ban; “Rufus, Target and Sasha Save U.S. Soldiers,” Oprah.com, October 4, 2010, http://www.oprah.com/oprahshow/Rufus-and-Target-Save-US-Soldiers.

  17.“General Order 1B (Go-1B),” Memo from Central Command, March 13, 2006. http://img.slate.com/media/42/061101_Exp_GO-1B.pdf, linked in Adam Weinstein, “Iraq’s Slumdog Massacre: One Million Dogs Face Death,” Mother Jones, June

  18, 2010, http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2010/06/iraq-kbr-one-million-dogs

  -death.

  18.Doc’s owner, David Inham, brought Doc along to an Iowan Army Reunion, where the pair gave the local paper an interview, and a man by the name of Frank Stamper sold the dog’s photo on a piece of stock card for 25 cents apiece. John P. Zeller, “Iowa View: Patriotic Pooch Has Place of Honor in Civil War Lore,” DesMoinesRegister.com, May 12, 2012, http://archive.indystar.com/article/D2/2012

  0512/OPINION/120512009/Iowa-View-Patriotic-pooch-has-place-honor-Civil

  -War-lore.

  19.“Rags, Dog Veteran of War, Is Dead at 20; Terrier That Lost an Eye in Service is Honored,” New York Times, March 22, 1936, http://query.nytimes.com/mem

  /archive/pdf?res=FA0914FA345C167B93C0AB1788D85F428385F9.

  20.Mark Derr, A Dog’s History of America (New York: North Point Press, 2004), 257–58.

  21.“Dogs and Horses Often War Heroes,” New York Times, October 17, 1917, http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=F20F14FB385F1B7A93C3AB178B

  D95F438185F9.

  22.Captain William W. Putney D.V.M., USMC (RET.), Always Faithful (New York: Free Press, 2001). No page number is available; it is included in the book’s glossy insert, a scan of a clipping from the author’s “hometown paper, the Farmville Herald.” No date is given.

  23.Michael G. Lemish, War Dogs: A History of Loyalty and Heroism (Washington, DC: Brassey’s Inc., 1996), 176–78.

  24.“War Dogs Remembered,” The United States War Dog Association, http://us

  wardogsmemorial.org/id16.html.

  25.Rebecca Frankel, “Rebecca’s War Dog of the Week: Eli, Brother and Protector, Goes Home,” ForeignPolicy.com, February 4, 2011, http://ricks.foreignpolicy.com/posts

  /2011/02/04/rebeccas_war_dog_of_the_week_eli_brother_and_protector_goes

  _home.

  26.Ibid.

  27.E. H.
Richardson, British War Dogs: Their Training and Psychology (London: Skeffington & Son, Ltd.,1920), 150.

  28.Ibid., 151.

  29.This description of Bronco’s injuries comes from the vet who treated him at Bagram Airfield and operated on him twice, Captain Katie Barry, Facebook message, dated January 9, 2013.

  30.Phone interview with Kevin Behan on August 30, 2012.

  31.Ibid.

  32.Obituary, “Ernie Pyle Is Killed on Ie Island; Foe Fired When All Seemed Safe,” New York Times, April 19, 1945.

  33.Ernie Pyle, Brave Men (New York: Henry Holt, 1943), 197.

  34.Sebastian Junger, War (New York: Twelve, 2010), 239–240.

  35.Phone interview with John Mariana, January 5, 2013.

  chapter 5: a dog of many talents

  1.There are quite a few alternatives for the word nose, some more fitting in the context of dogs than others for obvious reasons. Thesaurus.com offers: “adenoids, beak, bill, horn, muzzle, nares, nostrils, olfactory nerves, proboscis, schnoz, smeller, sneezer, sniffer, snoot, snout, snuffer, whiffer . . .” http://thesaurus.com/browse/sniffer.

  2.Mark Derr, Dog’s Best Friend (New York: Henry Holt, 1997), 95.

  3.Ibid.

  4.Julio E. Correa, “The Dog’s Sense of Smell,” Alabama Cooperative Extension System, Alabama A&M University, June 2011, http://www.aces.edu/pubs/docs/U/UNP

  -0066/UNP-0066.pdf.

  5.The Parent Trap, dir. David Swift, Walt Disney Productions, 1961.

  6.Section 5-2, “Explosives Used for Training,” Army Manual, Department of the Army, September 30, 1993, http://armypubs.army.mil/epubs/pdf/p190_12.pdf.

  7.Ibid.

  8.Email exchange with Sean Lulofs, Lackland Air Force Base MWD program manager, on February 2, 2012.

  9.Bloodhounds have even more sensory receptors/olfactory cells in their nose than most breeds of dogs. “Underdogs: The Bloodhound’s Amazing Sense of Smell,” Nature, PBS series, original airdate January 29, 2006, http://www.pbs.org/wnet

  /nature/episodes/underdogs/underdogs-the-bloodhounds-amazing-sense-of-smell

  /350/.