Amazing labrador

A breed apart: Our four-legged friends are now getting their own Army battalion - but dogs have been doing duty on the battlefield for centuries | Mail Online

A BREED APART
Our four-legged friends are now getting their own Army battalion - but dogs have been doing duty on the battlefield for centuries

High above the snowy peaks of a Norwegian mountain range, a paratrooper leaps out of a plane at 10,000 feet. Strapped to his waist is a large Belgian shepherd dog, jaw muzzled, ears flapping in the icy wind.

You might be forgiven for thinking this a scene from some far-fetched Hollywood war film. But it’s very real. For this dog is one of hundreds of four-legged recruits to the special forces on military duty – and his training saves hundreds of lives.

This astonishing episode took place on one of Europe’s biggest training exercises last month, where dogs appeared alongside British special forces assault teams. Far from panicking at the experience, this pooch takes the jump in his stride.
Very real: A paratrooper leaps out of a plane at 10,000 feet with a large Belgian shepherd on one of Europe's biggest Army training exercises

Very real: A paratrooper leaps out of a plane at 10,000 feet with a large Belgian shepherd on one of Europe's biggest Army training exercises

‘It’s something he does a lot and he’s very comfortable with. He has a much cooler
head than most recruits,’ says one soldier.

‘Dogs aren’t as aware of heights as humans, so altitude doesn’t faze them. They’re more likely to be bothered by the roar of the engines, but once out of the plane, that
doesn’t matter – they just enjoy the view.’

Dogs of war are usually just figures of speech. It’s centuries since real dogs of war
were bred to fight – like the 800 mastiffs Queen Elizabeth I sent to quell a rebellion in
Ireland in the 1580s.

But the complexity of modern warfare means that trained military dogs have never been more needed.

Indeed, such has been the demand for MWDs (military working dogs) that the Army has announced the formation of a new Military Working Dog Regiment, based in the UK and Germany.

The regiment will comprise 284 soldiers and officers and around 200 dogs, mainly Alsatians and Labradors, with duties ranging from guarding key installations to bomb-detection.

‘Dogs can search an area much more quickly than any human being,’ explains a spokesman.
Hero: Handler Sergeant Dave Heyhoe calls military working dog Treo 'a four-legged metal-detector'

Hero: Handler Sergeant Dave Heyhoe calls military working dog Treo 'a four-legged metal-detector'

‘Which means that one dog can do the job of four or more soldiers.’

Until his retirement last August, Treo, a nine-year-old Labrador, was one such dog – a prized member of the UK armed forces, acting as what his handler, Sgt Dave Heyhoe,
calls ‘a four-legged metal-detector’ in Afghanistan.

Treo’s mission was simple: to sniff out the IEDs (improvised explosive devices) that the Taliban have been using to inflict such heavy losses on British troops.

And he was one of the best. ‘Working in inhospitable terrain, and in 50°C heat, Treo still gave 100 per cent and never let me or any of the other men down,’ says Sgt Heyhoe, who worked with his four-legged friend for five years.

‘In August 2008, we were on patrol in Sangin, Helmand province, by a river next to a British Army compound. He suddenly started sticking his nose in the air, then putting it back down to the ground and sucking like a hoover.

‘As a handler you learn to interpret even the tiniest change in behaviour in your dog, and I knew he was on to something – I also quickly realised this would be a perfect place for a terrorist to plant an explosive device.

As Sadie went towards the compound you could tell she had picked up a scent. She sat down and stared directly into the wall, which meant there was something right on the other side

'Slowly, Treo led me to a chain of IEDs that would have blown up the whole compound and killed more than 40 servicemen and women.

‘This kind of device hadn’t been used since the Seventies, but after that Treo had alerted all the other IED officers in the army to this new development, potentially saving hundreds more lives.’

In February, to honour his bravery, Treo, who had also sniffed for explosives in Northern Ireland and acted as part of Tony Blair’s search team at Labour Party conferences, was awarded the Dickin Medal, the animal equivalent of the Victoria Cross.

Named after Maria Dickin, founder of the People’s Dispensary for Sick Animals, it was instituted in 1943 and its inscription reads ‘For gallantry. We also serve’.

Treo’s medal comes three years after another army sniffer dog won the Dickin medal. Sadie the Labrador, who had served in Bosnia and Iraq, was called into action as rescuers tried to help survivors amid the carnage of a suicide blast in Afghanistan.

The nine-year-old picked up the scent of a second bomb – designed to kill and maim
rescuer workers – through a thick concrete wall. Her strong sense of smell outside the
UN headquarters in Kabul gave bomb disposal experts time to defuse the device.
World War II hero: Khan saved his master, Muldoon, from drowning

World War II hero: Khan saved his master, Muldoon, from drowning

‘As Sadie went towards the compound’s wall onto the street you could tell she had picked up a scent,’ says her handler, Lance Corporal Karen Yardley, from Irvine, Scotland, who was also put up for a bravery award for her part in the drama in November 2005.

‘She sat down and stared directly into the wall, which meant there was something right on the other side. I immediately shouted for everyone to get out of the area.’

Leaving a second bomb is a classic terrorist tactic to maximise casualties. Hundreds of people, including British, U.S. and German soldiers and medics were tending the wounded within range of the device when Sadie and Lance Cpl Yardley were called to check the area.

A spokesman for the MoD said, 'Hundreds of our boys owe their lives to Sadie’s keen nose and we’re very proud of her. Sadie definitely deserves an honour.’

Recipients of the Dickin medal include 27 dogs, three horses, 32 World War II messenger pigeons and even a cat called Simon, who killed an impressive number of rats on HMS Amethyst, despite being wounded when the warship found itself caught in the middle of a battle between Mao’s Communists and Chiang Kai-Shek’s nationalists during the Chinese Civil War in 1949.

Dogs have proved not just useful, but indispensable, particularly at clearing bombs.

‘A dog’s nose is 10,000 times more powerful than ours,’ explains Sgt Heyhoe. Each sniffer dog begins training when it is about a year old and lasts for three months.

A tennis ball is impregnated with the scents required and hidden in increasingly hard-to-find places. The dog is also taught to ignore smells such as bread, coffee and
pepper, which are used to disguise the scent of drugs or explosives.

When they’ve found something they are taught to sit and stare at it, and will stay put until they’re called off.

One dog went round on the luggage carousel at Gatwick airport until its handler caught up with it – and retrieved several kilos of cocaine.
Saving lives: A U.S. parachute dog. When MWDs have found something, they are taught to sit and stare at it, and will stay put until they¿re called off

Saving lives: A U.S. parachute dog. When MWDs have found something, they are taught to sit and stare at it, and will stay put until they¿re called off

Sadly, there are casualties. Sniffer dog Sasha and her handler, Lance Corporal Ken Rowe, were killed by the Taliban in 2008 when they came under heavy fire as they passed through a series of mud-brick compounds in a village near Sangin. Six paratroopers were also injured.

But, just like their human colleagues, dogs are never put into situations that could prove unnecessarily risky.

Dogs have been used as military auxiliaries for almost as long as men have been going to battle. One early canine war hero was Bobs, a mastiff who served alongside his handler in the Boer War.

When water was scarce, Bobs would run off to find it, with water bottles strapped to
his side, often dashing through a hail of bullets.

Then, when he found a pool or stream, he would jiggle about in the water until the bottles were full, then return to the battlefield, to quench the thirst of wounded soldiers.

Dogs also featured in World War II with a special ‘war dog school’ established at Shoeburyness in Essex. There, special handlers trained lurchers, collies and terriers
to act as messengers, or to help guide medical teams to wounded soldiers.

After a desperate search for his master, Khan found Muldoon on the brink of drowning. With the collar of his tunic between his teeth he towed him to safety

One of the school’s star pupils was Khan, an Alsatian assigned to 6th Battalion, the Cameronians. In November 1944, he and his handler, Corporal Jimmy Muldoon, were on an assault craft taking part in an attack on the Dutch island of Walcheren, a vital obstacle in the Allied advance on Germany.

The boat came under heavy fire and capsized, pitching its occupants – including Muldoon, who couldn’t swim – into the icy water. After a desperate search for his master, Khan found Muldoon on the brink of drowning, grabbed the collar of his tunic between his teeth and towed him to safety.

Then there was Chips, an Alsatian cross, who leapt into a gun emplacement in Sicily in 1943, forcing the enemy to surrender.

On another celebrated occasion, he dragged a phone cable across a battlefield, under heavy fire, so that his platoon could call for back-up.

Finally, in 2004, a monument to the animals who gave their lives for their country was
unveiled in London’s Park Lane. It bears the simple inscription: ‘They had no choice’.

Today, animals who have served in the military earn a comfortable retirement – and Treo is no exception. He retired last August and his handler, Sgt Heyhoe, followed in March.

‘We now live together in my house in the Lincolnshire countryside,’ says Sgt Heyhoe.

‘We spend hours every day walking through the fields, searching for goodness knows what.’

But Treo is a trained working dog, so he will never be a ‘pet’. ‘That’s sad on one level, but I couldn’t have a better companion to retire with,’ explains Heyhoe.

‘I always have to have spare tennis balls to hand wherever I am, as he’s only ever happy with a ball in his mouth – it’s what all AES (armed and explosives search) dogs associate with rewards in months of training, as we place them on top of boxes of explosives. But I guess old habits die hard.’